Overview

Kalachakra With Consort

Two Arm Kalachakra 'Yub - Yung'. Usually when you see Kalachakra he has a great many number of arms, holding many different implements in them.

In the center of the thangka there is Kalachakra (Yub-yung), which means in union, surrounded by a halo of flames.

Kalachakra literally translates to 'wheel of time', so at the bottom of the thangka there is a depiction of a Tibetan mother giving birth to a child outside of her house with a close friend. On the other side there is a depiction of what's called a charnel ground. These are places likened to grave yards, in old Tibet it was considered a good thing to commit a body back to the earth for the animals. So in the thangka you can see what's called an sky burial. This was typically when a body was left in a high place as food for vultures and wolves.