The eight fears are a traditional list of dangers from which Tara is said to rescue those who call on her, most often given as lions, elephants, fire, snakes, robbers, floods, imprisonment and flesh-eating demons or ghosts. In paintings, artists show them as eight small rescue scenes set around a large central Tara, which is why the subject is known as "Tara who protects from the eight fears," or in Sanskrit-derived museum titles, Ashtamahabhaya Tara.
We make Green Tara images in our studio, and this is a subject we love to find in old paintings: a snow lion, two monks beside a pond, a prisoner, and each time a small Tara arriving to help. Below we cover what the eight fears are, why the lists differ, how teachers read them as inner troubles, where the theme began in India, and how to find the eight scenes in a painting.
What are the eight great fears in Buddhism?
The eight fears (sometimes called the eight dangers or eight great perils) are a set of threats to life and property that Buddhist literature names as a group. Jeff Watt of Himalayan Art Resources (HAR), introducing the HAR set of Tara paintings on this theme, lists them as "(1) water, (2) lions, (3) fire, (4) snakes, (5) elephants, (6) thieves, (7) false imprisonment and (8) ghosts." The Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive glossary gives the same eight in slightly different words, including "wild elephants," "floods" and "cannibals."
Most of these needed little explanation for a traveller in early medieval India. Wild animals, fire, floods, bandits on the road, being thrown into a cell on someone's word: the Metropolitan Museum of Art's label for a wooden shrine relief (1994.488) notes that merchants and mariners "regularly confronted such dangers."
Why do the lists of the eight fears differ?
Compare sources and the core is steady but the edges move, which matters when you are identifying scenes in a painting.
A key scripture on the subject is a short work preserved in the Tibetan canon, translated by 84000 as Tārā Who Protects from the Eight Dangers (Toh 731). Its English translators note that "there is to our knowledge no extant Sanskrit version of this sūtra." In its praise section, the eight are "lions, elephants, fire, snakes, robbers, waters, infectious diseases, and demons." So in this text, disease takes the place that imprisonment holds in the more familiar list.
Other sources shift differently. HAR's description of a nineteenth-century Green Tara in the Rubin Museum (HAR 832) names the fears as elephants, lions, snakes, ghosts, fire, drowning, bandits and tyrants. HAR describes the prison scene in another Rubin painting (HAR 237) as "false imprisonment by unjust rulers," so the tyrants probably stand for the same peril. The Met's label for that same relief, from Himachal Pradesh, dated to the 10th to 11th century, lists "lions, snakes, thieves, enslavement, yakshas, shipwreck, fire, and rampaging elephants." Yakshas are a class of spirit, and shipwreck is the sea-going version of the flood.
The early Indian cave reliefs vary even more. In a 1950s study published in the Bulletin of the Prince of Wales Museum of Western India, R. Sengupta records that at Kanheri the dangers shown include fire, shipwreck and imprisonment, along with disease, a sword, an enemy and Garuda. Lists of eight, in other words, were not always strictly eight.
What does each fear mean on the inner level?
The tradition reads the eight fears on more than one level. Jeff Watt writes that they "are meant literally, but also have a deeper significance," and in the main HAR set he names three levels: outer, inner and secret. The outer level is the actual danger. The inner level treats each danger as a mental affliction that harms us the way the animal or the flood would.
One widely read explanation of the pairing comes from a Tibetan hymn. Thubten Chodron, abbess of Sravasti Abbey, explains it in a Lion's Roar article, drawing on "A Crown Ornament for the Wise," a hymn to Tara by Gyalwa Gendun Drubpa, the First Dalai Lama. She writes that Tara "liberates us from the eight dangers, each of which has an outer and inner aspect," and works through them one by one:
- Lion: arrogance
- Elephant: ignorance
- Fire: anger
- Snake: jealousy
- Thieves: wrong views
- Chains: miserliness
- Flood: attachment
- Carnivorous demon: doubt
Of the flood she writes: "Like a flood, attachment sweeps over us, propelling us helplessly into the stormy ocean of cyclic existence."
Other sources agree on the pairing with small differences in wording. The Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive gives "lions (pride)," "fire (anger)," "imprisonment (miserliness)" and "cannibals (doubt)." The Walters Art Museum's label for an early Tibetan Green Tara (more on that painting below) uses the same scheme with its own vocabulary, describing protection from "thieves (false views), imprisonment (greed), floods (lust), and demons (doubt)." The Penn Museum's record for a nineteenth-century Mongolian Green Tara thangka lists the inner fears simply as "attachment, false views, pride, jealousy, anger, doubt, greed, and ignorance."
Where does the theme of Tara and the eight perils come from?
In the cave temples of western India, the saviour from a set list of perils is first carved as the bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara. The link to Tara is a close one: Jeff Watt notes a Tibetan tradition, based on the Mani Kabum, in which Tara emanated as a tear from Avalokiteshvara.
Sengupta dates the "litany" panels of Avalokiteshvara (as Padmapani) at Ajanta, Aurangabad, Ellora and Kanheri to the sixth and seventh centuries. For the Ajanta panels he writes: "The eight dangers are those of the lion, elephant, fire, snake, robber, water, fetters and demon." He also notes that "at Ajanta a sculptured image of Tara as such is not to be found at all." His explanation for the subject's popularity is practical: the caves lie near old trade routes, and the perils carved are "those which merchants generally encountered on their journeys or voyages."
At Ellora the role passes to Tara. On the façade of Cave IX, Sengupta identifies the central figure as "Tara who stands in the centre holding the stem of the lotus," with fire, shipwreck, a naga (serpent), an enemy and an enraged elephant around her. He dates the panel to the mid seventh century and calls it "perhaps the earliest of its kind" in western India.
The Met's wooden relief from Himachal Pradesh shows the theme still alive in the Himalayan foothills several centuries later. Its label repeats the merchants' connection, saying they "particularly venerated this goddess."
How do Tibetan artists paint Tara of the eight fears?
Tibetan painters laid the subject out in a few recognisable ways, all of which you can see in museum collections.
One painting: Tara with eight small scenes around her
A common format puts one large Tara at the centre and fits the eight rescues into the border. The Walters Art Museum in Baltimore holds an early example, a Tibetan Green Tara dated to the 1160s–1180s (accession F.112). Its label describes Tara's eight emanations "appearing in smaller scale to the left and right of the central goddess," each offering protection from one peril. The Met shows a related painting from Reting monastery, Ashtamahabhaya Tara, Savior from the Eight Perils, where the perils "are illustrated in episodes on either side of the central figure." The Met's label adds that the Indian teacher Atisha, shown above Tara, venerated her.
Later paintings keep the idea but spread the scenes into a landscape. HAR's notes on a nineteenth-century Eastern Tibetan painting in the Rubin Museum (F1997.15.1, HAR 237) make a good tour. At upper left, "Tara is protecting from the fear of lions," and the lion is painted as a Tibetan snow lion. At middle left, two monks beside a lotus pond "receive protection from the fear of drowning." At upper right, "Tara protects from the fear of rampaging elephants," while prison, snakes and a ghost fill the lower part of the picture.
Nine paintings: one Tara per canvas
Some workshops gave each fear its own canvas. Jeff Watt's HAR page for the set documents nine: "The main, or central, composition of the nine paintings set is HAR #832," a nineteenth-century Green Tara now in the Rubin (P1999.9.6). HAR's entry for that painting notes that "the other eight Taras are arranged at the sides of the centerpiece and face inward." The set page adds that one panel has wandered: "That painting is Tara removing the fear of snakes and it resides in the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts." Odd-numbered sets like this are common, the painting's entry explains, "so that one painting is at the center."
White Tara versions
Green Tara is the usual central figure, but not the only one. HAR records a nineteenth-century White Tara in the Rubin (P2000.22.6) "surrounded by eight Taras and eight story vignettes," and a twentieth-century White Tara in the Erie Art Museum where "eight forms of Green Tara perform the protection from the eight fears." If you want the background on the two Taras, see our notes on Green Tara vs White Tara.
Other examples include an eighteenth-century Green Tara of the eight fears in the British Museum (HAR 35705) and the Rubin's Tara as Protectress from the Eight Fears (F1997.17.7). For more museum Taras, see Green Tara in art museums.
How can you spot the eight scenes in a painting?
Start with the size difference. The central Tara is large and calm, facing you. The rescuing Taras are much smaller, and they usually appear in the side borders or scattered through the landscape. In set paintings they turn inward toward the centre, as HAR notes for the Rubin set.
Then look for a person in trouble next to each small Tara. The danger is usually the easiest thing to read: a lion, an elephant, flames, a snake, robbers, water, a prisoner and a demon or ghost. If you find a sick person or a ruler instead of a prisoner, remember that lists vary, as the 84000 text and HAR's notes on HAR 832 show.
Finally, check the colour of the small Taras. They need not match the centre: in the Erie Art Museum's White Tara, HAR notes, the rescuers are forms of Green Tara. Count to eight, and don't worry if one scene is hard to read. If thangka painting is new to you, our introduction to what a thangka is covers the basics of composition and materials.
Does Tara protect from the eight fears?
That is what the tradition says. The praise in the 84000 sūtra includes the plea, "Protect us from these eight dangers!" and teachers in the Tibetan tradition, such as Thubten Chodron, describe Tara as liberating beings from both the outer and inner dangers. We are glad to report that faithfully. We make no promise that any image, statue, piece of jewelry or other object from us, or from anyone else, will protect you from any danger.
HAR places a secret, tantric level beside the outer and inner ones, and we don't try to explain it here. If the theme draws you toward Tara practice, a qualified teacher is the right person to ask. Our pieces on the Green Tara mantra and Green Tara meditation for beginners describe what sources say, with the same caution.
Our Green Tara thangkas
Our Green Tara thangkas show Tara alone in the centre; they do not include the eight-fears vignettes. Each is made from our own drawings kept to traditional proportions, printed on heavy card with eco-friendly inks, and finished by hand at a temple by elderly lay Buddhists who set glass crystals one by one and trace outlines in gold glitter, about two days per piece. Framed at 55 × 71 × 12 cm (image 40.2 × 56.2 cm, about 4 kg), each starts at US$570, and part of every order goes to the temple. If you would like it, an optional temple consecration is US$100, offered in full to the temple. See how to choose a Green Tara thangka if you are deciding between designs.
Tara and the eight fears: common questions
What is Ashtabhaya or Ashtamahabhaya Tara?
It is Tara in her role as rescuer from the eight fears. The Met explains that the title "refers to the eight great perils from which she offers sanctuary." HAR files these paintings under "Tara, Eight Fears."
Are the eight fears the same as the eight Taras?
They go together. Many paintings show eight smaller Taras, one for each fear, around a central Tara. The Encyclopedia of Buddhism lists eight such forms, from "Tara who protects from fear of Water" to "Tara who protects from fear of Elephants."
Is disease one of the eight fears?
In some sources, yes. The 84000 translation of the sūtra lists "infectious diseases" among the eight, where many other lists have imprisonment.
Is this the same as the 21 Taras?
No. The 21 Taras are a different set, tied to a famous praise. Our Green Tara guide introduces them briefly.
Do your thangkas show the eight fears?
No. Our designs show Tara on her own, without the eight rescue scenes.
Next time you meet an old Tara painting, look to the edges: the eight small stories are often waiting there.
All Green Tara Thangkas · Jade Green Thangka · Night Blue Thangka · Temple Consecration
More from the Journal: Green Tara · Green Tara in Art Museums · White Tara · What Is a Thangka? · Tibetan Buddhist Deities · How to Hang and Care for a Thangka