Interesting Phurba

[David]

Originally Posted by Jim McDougall

Nice work Tim!!!!
It looks like Andy's example has the vajra and phur pa incorporated into one, as these are apparantly used in tandem in ritual. I think I will join with Vandoo and Battara in noting that this one has quality that may well be commensurate with one for actual ritual use rather than the commercial stuff out there.

Hey Jim, i think that Barry and José were referring to the one if the museum, not Andy's. I'm pretty sure that Andy's is only a commercial repro. There are so many variations on commercially produced phurbas, but the vast majority of what is available out there has had absolutely no ritual use by Buddhist monks. Many of the repros are beautifully crafted, some with valuable metals and gems like the museum example, quality is not necessarily a guide to authenticity. Keep in mind that these items would be passed down and kept within the practice. They are considered VERY powerful ritual tools. So the availability of real authentic phurpas that have seen real ritual use is next to nil.
Phurpas have traditionally been made out of wood as well as metal. When metal the blades are generally iron or in special cases, meterorite, which it was felt was necessary to employ against certain demons that were immune to earthly materials.
Here are some images of some "real" and some possibly "real" phurpas. The one with the hammer is supposedly 17th century.