Amitābha (Japanese Amida or Amitāyus) is a "cosmic or celestial buddha" like Vairocana according to the apocryphal scriptures of Mahayana Buddhism.
Amitābha is the principal buddha in Pure Land Buddhism (Amidism), a faith-based type of East Asian Buddhism.
In the Himalayan Vajrayana Buddhism of Tibet, Nepal, Bhutan, and elsewhere, Amitābha is known for his longevity, magnetizing red fire element, the aggregate of discernment, pure perception, and the deep awareness of emptiness (the impersonal nature) of phenomena.
According to Mahayana scriptures not found in Theravada Buddhism, Amitābha possesses infinite merit resulting from good deeds (karma) performed over countless past lives as a bodhisattva named Dharmakāra.
Amitābha means "Infinite Light," and Amitāyus means "Infinite Life," so Amitābha is also called "The Buddha of Immeasurable Light and Life."
According to an apocryphal Mahayana text known as the "Larger Sūtra of Immeasurable Life," Amitābha was in very ancient times (and possibly in another world-system) a monk named Dharmakāra.
In some versions of the sūtra, Dharmakāra is described as a former king who, having come into contact with Buddhist teachings through the Buddha Lokeśvararāja, renounced his throne.
He then resolved to become a buddha and to create a buddhakṣetra (literally, a "buddha-field," often called a "Pureland" or a "Buddha Land" -- a realm posited to exist in the primordial universe outside of ordinary reality -- produced by a being's merit) possessed of many perfections.
These resolutions were expressed in his 48 vows, which set out the type of Pureland Dharmakāra aspired to create, the conditions under which beings might be born into that world, and what kind of beings they would be when reborn there. More
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