subdued god trampled by Buddhist deities like Aparajita, Parnasabari and Vignataka. The Tibetan Ganesha appears, besides bronzes, in the resplendent Thangka paintings alongside the Buddha. In "Ganesh, studies of an Asian God," edited by Robert L. BROWN, State University of New York Press, 1992, page 241–242, he wrote that in the Tibetan Ka'gyur tradition, it is said that the Buddha had taught the "Ganapati Hridaya Mantra" (or "Aryaganapatimantra") to disciple Ananda. Japanese Buddhism Vinayaka, the Buddhist equivalent to Ganesha, is known in Japanese as Shōten (聖天, lit. "sacred deva" or "noble deva"; alternatively Shōden) or Kangiten (歓喜天, "deva of bliss") and is worshiped mainly in the Shingon and Tendai schools. Vinayaka's inclusion in the two primary mandalas of East Asian esoteric Buddhism (Tangmi) - brought to Japan from Tang China by Kūkai (774–835), the founder of Shingon Buddhism - facilitated his introduction to Japan, where he (like most other Hindu deities assimilated into Buddhism) was first considered a minor deity. By the Heian period (794–1185), an individualized cult centered around Vinayaka (as Shōten / Kangiten) emerged. He was then increasingly identified and conflated with a number of Buddhist and native Japanese deities, eventually being regarded in some texts in a henotheistic way as a kind of transcendent god who is the source of all the other gods. Although this development shares a number of parallels with the Hindu tradition of Ganapatya, it does not seem that Shōten benefited from a group whose members defined themselves exclusively as his worshipers as Ganesha did. Although some traits are common to both Vinayaka (Shōten) and Ganesha, there are also some notable differences between the two. For instance, the Buddhist Vinayaka was originally negatively portrayed as the creator of obstacles and the leader of a horde (gaṇa) of obstructive demons called vinayakas; indeed, some legends portray him as originally being a malevolent demon king who was subjugated by the bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara (Kannon in Japanese), who took the form of a vinayaka demoness to tame and reform him. As Shōten grew in stature, however, he was increasingly disassociated from his vinayaka underlings, ultimately becoming regarded as a manifestation of the cosmic buddha Vairocana. Also, unlike his Hindu counterpart, whose image is prominently displayed and venerated in temples and homes, Shōten is regarded as a 'hidden' god too sacred to be seen: images of the deity in temples are permanently kept hidden from public view, rituals