Vairochana, the name means the Illuminator or the one who is like the sun, is the central buddha of the scheme of the Five Tathagatas, occupying the middle place around which the buddhas of the four directions are arranged, and in the esoteric Buddhism of East Asia he is elevated further still, to the status of the cosmic buddha of whom all other buddhas are expressions. He is usually white in colour and makes the dharmachakra mudra, the gesture of turning the wheel of the teaching, with both hands at the heart. In the symbolic system of the five, he transforms the poison of ignorance or delusion, the most fundamental of them, into the wisdom of the absolute reality-realm (dharmadhatu), the all-pervading awareness that is the ground of the others.
Vairochana's clearest monument is the Great Buddha of Todai-ji in Nara, Japan, a colossal bronze image completed in 749 CE and consecrated in a lavish eye-opening ceremony in 752 attended by the retired emperor, the reigning empress, and envoys from across East and South Asia, with an Indian monk, Bodhisena, performing the rite of painting in the statue's pupils; the choice of Vairochana for this state-sponsored monument reflects the Kegon (Huayan) Buddhist vision, current at the Nara court, of a single cosmic Buddha whose body is the entire universe and every other Buddha merely one of its manifestations.