MAHA MAYA

also called Maya, the mother of Gautama Buddha; she was the wife of Raja Suddhodana. According to Buddhist legend, Maha Maya dreamt that a white elephant with six tusks entered her right side, which was interpreted to mean that she had conceived a child who would become either a world ruler or a buddha. After 10 lunar months, feeling that the time of birth was near, she went to the Lumbini grove outside the city of Kapilavastu. While she stood upright and held onto the branch of a sal tree (in the posture adopted by mothers of all buddhas), the child came forth from her right hip. Seven days after his birth (again, in accordance with the destiny of the mothers of all buddhas) she died and was reborn again in the Heaven of the Thirty-three Gods (Tavatimsa Heaven). The scenes of the conception and delivery of Gautama Buddha have been beautifully depicted in art.