CAKRASAMVARA. The term Cakrasamvara, "the binding of the wheels," designates both a Buddhist scripture and also the maṇḍala that it describes, which is the abode of a host of deities centering around the divine couple Śrīheruka and Vajravārāhi. The text, the Cakrasamvara Tantra, is also known as the Śriheruka-abhidhāna (The discourse of Śrīheruka) and the Laghusamvara (Samvara light), a name it earned because it is a short text of approximately seven hundred Sanskrit stanzas. It was composed in India during the mid-to-late eighth century, and it quickly became one of the most important Indian Buddhist Tantras, as evidenced by the large number of commentaries and associated ritual literature that it inspired. Like most Tantras, it is primarily a ritual text, dedicating most of its fifty-one chapters to the description of rites such as the production of the maṇḍala and the consecration...