Yama the Lord of Death

Today we went to the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago. We went for the King Tut exhibit, but my favorite thing that we saw today was actually this statue of a demon with a crown of human skulls and a necklace of severed heads... oh yeah, I guess the guy also "holds a loop of rope in his left hand with which he pulls the soul from the corpse"...

Even better is his story, from Tibetan Buddhism:

"A holy man was told that if he meditated for the next 50 years, he would achieve enlightenment. The holy man meditated in a cave for 49 years, 11 months and 29 days, until he was interrupted by two thieves who broke in with a stolen bull. After beheading the bull in front of the hermit, they ignored his requests to be spared for but a few minutes, and beheaded him as well. In his near-enlightened fury, this holy man became Yama, the god of Death, took the bull's head for his own, and killed the two thieves, drinking their blood from cups made of their skulls. Still enraged, Yama decided to kill everyone in Tibet."

I mean, come on, that's just freaking awesome. Quoting another guy who walked by the display, that's "badass"... !

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