Buddhist-Meditation-Systematic-and-Practical

will practice very carefully. The devaputra-demon
causes pride, so one learns from him the necessity of
being humble. In the same way, Mahesvara (Siva, who
is usually an opponent of Buddhadharma) is regarded in
the Mahayana as an emanation of Guan Yin, who has
come to help (see the Lankavatara Sutra).
In the Vajrayana, there are many good methods of
dealing with demons; one could in fact call such ways
"demonic methods"—using the demon to get rid of him.
First, however, it is necessary to know the different
kinds of demons so that one may treat them suitably.
Demons in the Vajrayana sometimes appear as a
Buddha, so one must know how to distinguish them:
i. Know what kind of demon one is dealing with.
ii. If the demon occurs in the form of the yidam (and
one suspects that it is not the latter), then try altering the
size of the appearance, making it as huge as the sky, and
then contracting it to tiny proportions, etc. If that figure
can be changed in these ways, then it is a demon, for
Buddhas, bodhisattvas, and devas always appear in a
certain fixed size.
At one time, a Pure Land follower sat down every day
as the sun set, facing it and continuously intoning the
name of Amitabha. One evening, the sun disappeared
behind a mountain, at the foot of which was a very large
tree. To the great joy of that devoted man, Amitabha
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