Agusan image

Since its discovery, the identity of the goddess represented by the gold statuette has been the subject of debate. Proposed identities of the gold figurine range from that of a Hindu Sivaite goddess to a Buddhist Tara. Recent scholarship suggests that the image represents the offering goddess Vajralāsyā of the Tantric Buddhist tradition.

Identity

H. Otley Beyer believed that the image was that of a Hindu Shaivite goddess, but with the religiously important hand gestures improperly copied by local craftsmen. If true, this suggests Hinduism was already in the Philippines before Ferdinand Magellan arrived, with early Filipinos adopting an imperfect version of Hinduism from the Majapahit Empire. Natives would not convert into Hinduism, rather, they absorbed its traditions while retaining their own indigenous Anitist religions. This golden Agusan image seems to be modelled after — or copied — Nganjuk bronze images of early Majapahit period.

A study of this image was made by F. D. K. Bosch, of Batavia, in 1920, who came to the conclusion that it was made by local workmen in Mindanao, copying a Nganjuk image of the early Majapahit period — except that the local artist overlooked the distinguishing attributes held in the hand. It probably had some connection with the Javanese miners who are known to have been mining gold in the Agusan-Surigao area in the middle or late 14th century. The image is apparently that of a Sivaite goddess, and fits in well with the name "Butuan" (signifying "phallus").

— H. Otley Beyer, 1947

Juan R. Francisco however questioned Beyer’s identification of the golden image in that: (1) "Butuan" means "phallus" (the origin is still under discussion); (2) that the King of Butuan, not being a Muslim, should therefore be a Hindu of the Shaivite persuasion; (3) that the existence of other Shaivite images discovered among the Mandaya (south of where the Agusan image was discovered) and in Cebu should support his conclusions regarding the female Shaivite goddess identity of the golden statuette. Regarding the last assumption, Francisco pointed out that the identity of the other supposedly "Sivaite" images mentioned by Beyer (all of which were destroyed by the fire that consumed the Ateneo de Manila Museum in the early 1930s) is also questionable, since John Carroll, who examined a photograph of the Cebu image, believed that it is an "Avalokitesvara, not a Siva". Francisco, on the basis of the re-study of the gold statue, believed that it represents a Buddhist Tara.

It seems likely that the image is a goddess of the Buddhist pantheon, in the Mahayana group. Its related to the concept of a female Boddhisattva, and at the same time the counterpart of the Hindu goddess (Sakti), as a Tara (or wife of a Buddhist god), which is a peculiar development of Buddhism in Southeast Asia.

— Juan R. Francisco, "A Note on the Golden Image of Agusan" (1963)

Another proposed identity of the Agusan image is the offering goddess Vajralāsyā, one four female deities located in the inner circle of a mandala called the Diamond Realm (Vajradhātu). Mandalas like the Diamond Realm Mandala in Tantric Buddhism are elaborate diagrams that represent the cosmos in a metaphorical or symbolic manner. Mandalas can be represented as two-dimensional (either temporarily drawn on flat surfaces, painted on cloth, or etched on metal plates), as three-dimensional sculptural tableaux, and large architectural constructions likeBorobudur in Central Java. Three-dimensional mandalas are thought to have been used for sacred rituals involving the offering of water, flowers, incense, lamps, unguents, etc.

The Diamond Realm Mandala is one of the well-known and well-documented of early Buddhist mandalas. Located at the center of such mandala is the Buddha Vairocana, surrounded by an inner circle of deities. The four cosmic Buddhas occupy the four cardinal points of the inner circle, each of which is surrounded by four attendants, while the four offering goddesses sit at the inner circle's four corners. The four inner goddesses associated with offerings made to the Buddha Vairocana are Vajralāsyā ("amorous dance", at the southeast corner); Vajramālā ("garland", at the southwest); Vajragītā ("song", at the northwest); and Vajramṛtyā ("dance", at the northeast). In the outer circle are sixteen more deities, four arranged along each of the four cardinal directions, while at the interstitial corners are four more "outer" offering goddesses. The outer circle is surrounded by 1,000 more buddhas and 24 deities who guard the boundaries, while four guardian deities protect the four portals at the four cardinal directions.

The Tibetan scholar Rob Linrothe was one of the first to identify the Agusan image as Vajralāsyā, who is always shown with her hands on her hips. Florina Capistrano-Baker agrees with this conclusion, noting the similarities in style between the Agusan golden image and the other statuettes belonging to a three-dimensional Diamond Realm Mandala set such as the four bronze deities discovered in Nganjuk, Java (believed to represent the four outer offering goddesses). The shared characteristics between the Nganjuk figurines and the Agusan golden image were already suggested back then in 1920 by the Dutch scholar F. D. K. Bosch; however, it was ignored at that time because no illustrations of the bronze figurines were presented. Recent scholarship is now re-evaluating the relationship between the Agusan golden image and the Nganjuk bronze deities as these are believed to have been made around the same time (10th–11th centuries). Identification of the gold figurine with the offering goddess Vajralāsyā also implies that it is part of a larger set of offering deities associated with the Diamond Realm mandala, the whereabouts of which remains unknown and is most likely lost.

Although study of the relationship between the Agusan Vajralasya and the Nganjuk offering goddesses has been overlooked, it is clear that the Agusan image belongs to the same genre.

— Florina H. Capistrano-Baker, "Butuan in Early Southeast Asia", Philippine Ancestral Gold (2011)

One of the factors that makes the identification of the image by scholars difficult is the fact that it has no specific iconographic attributes. The goldsmiths in the Philippines knew of Hindu and Buddhist artistic conventions, but did not include motifs to identify them as specific deities. Philippine goldsmiths may have done this intentionally to maintain their ethnic identity.