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Secret Symbols of Dharma
lobster
Crusty Veteran
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Oops there are none 
As we know Gautama revealed all her secrets but some sects do otherwise. So naughty!
Notably Tantra, Tendai, Shingon and Zen.
Wait ... Zen? Sure, no teacher, no flower raising symbolic moment ...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flower_Sermon
I think a holy lasso would be fitting for Wonder Women ...
http://viewonbuddhism.org/tantra_symbols.html
What symbols catch your focus?
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Comments
I'm not sure that I am following, but maybe a scythe? Like Shiva the Destroyer type thing? I think destruction is deeply underrated. I think there is a lot of hacking needed to be done to get to the truth of things. And I like to hack.
I don’t usually read much into the symbolic content of imagery, unless it’s very obvious like Christian or Judaic symbols. So I suppose you could say they catch my attention.
I'm probably in the majority in saying Yin/Yang. There is so much depth in such a simple image.
Maybe you’d like to talk a little more about what you see in the Yin-Yang image? I was considering it a while ago and came to the conclusion that it is a representation of duality and absolutes, which are shown fitting together to make up the whole. I’m not sure I can get behind that message.
I was just reading up about Buddhas ringing staff. Nice timing that this thread came up right now. Different Buddhas have different sets of rings.
If I was a Buddha, I would incorporate healing drumming into the practice.
I agree. To me it reinforces the interconnectedness I feel with everything. It reminds me that opposition is convention. Yin is not the opposite of yang, it is complimentary as they are a part of the same cycle. The only opposite of yin is no-yin and just so, even yang has yin.
Maybe you're a little zennier than you thought.
I have a pendant of the Eightfold Noble Path very similar to this one.
Ok going to do a secret google search. Will report back!
I think maybe your coming at this purely from an ultimate perspective, so yeah from that sense yin/yang I think is a symbol of the conventional world.
It exists in the cosmology of Taoism that sees the Tao as something undefinable, beyond this and that and all the 10,000 things.
It shows how things in the world are interdependent, how one changes into the other as it grows and how each contains the seed of the other within them. It also expresses a cyclical view of the world rather than a linear one.
Ringing staff is new to me. In our poverty stricken Capitalist cities, this might be the ideal way to do food deliveries from food banks. Collecting food is a little passé.
Monkey drums are used in Tantric chod practice.
Welcome to NewBuddhist @Nerida, you are our latest cymbal wearer ...
I see the yin yang from the Buddhist perspective which works well for my practice and is basically the same way Taoists look at it. When Taoism and Buddhism met, Zen happened and I can see why.
Speaking of symbolism and the yin yang, I am probably too attached to my shrine but have been working on it for years. The yin yang medicine balls were the first addition so I've had them for 29 years now. You can't really see him but on the lower level, behind Buddha is a tall statuette of Lao Tzu because he likes to lead from behind, unseen.
Beautiful shrine @David
I am too ashamed to show mine.
oh go on then ...
It's just something I've loved doing for a few years, any shrine can be beautiful. It could be a leaf. I work on mine and watch it unfold like a painting I'm working on.
Thanks but I've been here for a while now
Yes sorry @Nerida I sometimes forget that we have lurkers ... an unkind term ... howdy to our exponents of 'silent exploration'
Talking of the silent clash of virtual cymbals ...
In one sense we are an expression of our being. Wearing symbols such as the wheel, footsteps of the Buddha, holy umbrellas or shells to hear the sea is a reminder that the world of Tantra is constantly revealing ...
For example: chakra or wheels, circles divided, yin yanged or brush stroked are all around us. What is a straight line but an arc on an infinite circle ...
https://www.breadloafmountainzen.org/infinite-circle/
To put it another way. Give us this day our daily dharma
I didn't think this'd be a particularly hard question to answer. I was wrong.
I have a shrine, such as it is. It's even housed in its own room. I light candles. I burn incense. I have a riser I sit on (I have a hard time getting off if the floor from a lotus position). I have a homemade set of mala beads I use at times. None of it means anything in particular to me. I meditate where I am, usually without all this stuff. Frequently without getting out of bed.
Ah ha!
... it is autumn/fall here ... countless shrines descending from bodhi trees
Actually, that's not so. Yin and Yang are far from being so, because it depends on what you consider to be Yin, and what you consider to be Yang. By comparison.
For example, Yin is inward, cool, dark, feminine, solitudinous, contracting, and Yang would seem to be the opposite of those qualities. Outward, warm, bright, masculine, gregarious, expansive....
So gymnastics would be Yang in the description of its energetic qualities.. but only if you compare it to something like, say, Ballet... But Gymnastics is Yin when compared to Cage Fighting... Nothing is ever completely, absolutely Yin, or Yang. They are moveable feasts, and certainly not dual, neither absolute. And you cannot label something as being either Yin or Yang, unless there is a converse comparison... but even then, neither is static or fixed.
Certainly @federica when you look at the deeper meaning of the concepts. But when you just look at the image of the symbol, it’s that harsh white contrasted with a dark black, sharply delineated.
@Kerome
@Federica is explaining a deeper understanding of duality as you say
... as yin yang spin, at the point of maximum yang they become yinified. Their seeds ebbing and flowing ... as in @Shoshins animated representation.
A symbol worthy of the name, contains fluidity and unfolding.
Did she? Did she tell Vacchagotta about anatta, for instance? She kept it a secret, because it would hurt Vatsagotra's feelings!
Some Not so secret signs of the Dharma:
Smile
Laugh
Extend Hand
Embrace
Accept
Encourage
Sit down
Stand up
Support
Share
Stay safe all
Peace to all
Well... offer to bump elbows at least.