TSH: Ted's identity

Gwern Branwen · 20 Apr 2010, 16:57 · from 2010-April.txt.gz

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From: gwern0 at gmail.com (Gwern Branwen)
Date: Tue, 20 Apr 2010 12:57:17 -0400
Subject: (urth) TSH: Ted's identity
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On Tue, Apr 20, 2010 at 12:48 PM, Craig Brewer <cnbrewer at yahoo.com> wrote:

> (And only vaguely related, but is the lion-headed man that Winker takes Bax to at all related to Doris? She's Griffin, a lion's body, so that lion head would complete her? Is that just grasping at straws?)

My take is that the lion-head is another Orientalism; not precisely
accurate (no more than the Musashi depicted), but 'through a mirror
darkly'. Lions are an extremely common motif in Buddhism (the Lion's
roar drives away ignorance), and in particular, Manjushri,
Boddhisattva of wisdom (Bax goes to the lion-man for answers,
remember), is frequently paired with lions.*

* quick ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manjushri#Iconography

-- 
gwern

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