Traditional Lotus flower tattoo meaning is life and death, rebirth and the pursuit of truth, purity and eternity, spiritual growth and development, purity and fertility, divinity and immortality, peace and tranquility, struggle and happiness.
The mandala represents the universe itself, and the word itself means “center.” The meaning of the Mandala lotus tattoo is purity and wisdom, the desire for unity with the universe
Also, the meaning of the lotus mandala tattoo is following Buddhism. Usually, the mandala lotus tattoo is made by girls, because it looks very feminine and sophisticated. For a woman, such a design will also be a sign of the feminine, tenderness, purity, and beauty.
Unalome is a Hindu symbol. Unalome tattoo means the path of the seeker, it originates in the center of the curl, and as you continue along this path, the wanderer is more aware of himself and the world around him. The top of the symbol is a straight line that represents the triumph of enlightenment. Unalome lotus tattoo is usually made by girls and in such a design combination, its meaning is not only the spiritual enlightenment, but also the innocence of the owner, and her pure thoughts.
Lotus tattoo can have different designs, it can be traditional, mandala, unalome, Japanese, Chinese, 3D picture, realistic, minimalist, vine, simple, geometric, blossom, tribal, watercolor, sacred, tiny and small or big. Such a tattoo can have a huge variety of colors, but the most common are white, black and white, dark blue, blue, red, purple, pink, orange, and green.
It can be made on different parts of the body wrist, back, thigh, shoulder, sternum, sleeve, hand, arm, neck, foot, ankle, finger, spine, chest, forearm, rib, hip, leg, side, lower back, behind ear, under the breast or cover up a big part of the body. Here you can find an image gallery of different lotus flower tattoo designs and ideas. Lotus is not just a female tattoo it suits well for girls, women, guys, and men.
Lotus flower symbol
The lotus flower tattoo has many meanings. It is a universal symbol in the East (Japan, China) as a lily or rose in the West.
The lotus flower tattoo is a symbol of perfection because its leaves, flowers, and fruits form a circle. The lotus personifies the spiritual disclosing, beginning to grow from dirt and slime and sprouting upwards through muddy waters in order to reveal on the sun and in the light of Heavens.
Its root personifies the insolubility, the stalk – an umbilical cord adhering the person to his sources, the flower has the form of solar beams, the box with seeds symbolizes the fertile force of creation.
There are solar and lunar aspects. Lotus flower also means death and life. It appears in the images of gods of the Sun in Egypt and India, and also in images of lunar deities of Semitic religions. It is represented with the Great Mother as the goddess of the Moon.
This “flower initially was a magnificent lily of Great Waters during the time when different creatures come and leave”. The lotus is the space rising from chaos, as the Sun which has ascended from a lotus at the beginning of the world. It is Light Flower, the result of the interaction of the creative forces of the Sun and the lunar forces of water.
Being a product of the interaction of fire and water, it symbolizes spirit and matter. Being “a universal basis of all real things, it blossoms in waters of boundless possibilities”.
Lotus is a solar basis, a matrix. Revealing with dawn and being closed with the sunset, it personifies its revival, so, and any other revival, creation, fruitfulness, updating, and immortality.
The lotus is a perfect beauty. The opened flower, taking the form of a socket, personifies a wheel of the solar matrix, the solar wheel of a continuous cycle of existence. Besides, it forms a bowl symbolizing the perceiving female principle.
Lotus is a “mover on waters” (the aperture in the seedbox has a smaller size than seeds in it and when the box bursts, seeds scatter to take root there where they will be carried away by water).
The lotus is also a symbol of an unusual or divine birth, coming clean from the dirt of waters. Gods shown coming out of the lotus, mark themselves the world growing from the elements of water, thus lotus symbolizes the Sun which is coming up from the initial waters of Chaos.
The lotus flower and lotus sheet can support existence at any level.
Lotus tattoo meaning in different designs
Being solar-lunar, the lotus is also androgynous, self-sufficient, and pure in its cleanliness. The image of the flame rising from a lotus is treated as divine revelation, and the union of dualistic forces of fire and water, the Sun and the Moon, the man, and the woman.
If the lotus is represented near a bull than it has solar sense and associates with gods of the Sun. Represented with a cow, it becomes lunar and attributes of goddesses of the Moon. It often appears on the images together with a lion, ram, goose, swan, and swastika. Associated with cobra the lotus means giving life and overcoming the death force of Great Mother; the dual character of the shown world; the pressure between contrasts in the course of transformation in a final unity.
The thousand petal lotus tattoo is a symbol of the Sun, the Heavenly arch, and in relation to a human, it symbolizes the skull. The throne in the form of lotus means perfection, harmony in the Universe, the top of spiritual perfection. Two lotuses mean the Top and Bottom Waters.
Lotus is one of eight Treasures or Propitious omens. According to the tradition of Chinese Buddhism, “the Lotus Heart personifies the solar fire, and also time, invisible and all-consuming, disclosing all real, world, harmony, union. The full blossoming of lotus when it has a form of wheel personifies the Circle of Existence and is a symbol of Amitabha, Kuan-iiya and Mothers, and Buddha.
The lotus often represented all four ancient elements, symbolizing the initial condition of the Universe before the World’s creation when all these elements were a single whole in a space womb. The Earth is dirt in which the flower starts up roots, water feeds its stalk. Its flowers smell as air, giving their aroma to the wind. Sun fire gives fruitfulness gives to the lotus. The red lotus symbolizes Mother India. On many illustrations is depicted the stylized lotus in the left hand of the Persian tsar is represented; in the right hand, he holds the staff or the scepter of the man’s force symbolizing the union with the Goddess. Further governors put the same sense in the combination of scepter and orb.
Lotus flower meaning in different cultures
In Assyrian, Phoenician and Hittite cultures, the lotus has funeral sense and personifies death and revival, resurrection and the future life, the productive forces of nature.
In Buddhism the lotus means initial waters; the potential possibilities of the shown world and the person in it; the spiritual disclosing and blossoming; wisdom, nirvana. The lotus stalk is a world’s axis on which there is a throne lotus flower – the spirit top. It is devoted to Buddha who came from a lotus in the form of flame and was named “the Lotus Pearl”. Buddha is considered the heart of lotus he sits on a throne in the form of a completely revealed flower.
Bodhisattvas stood on the flowers which hadn’t blossomed yet. The attribute of White Tara, the Mother of all Buddhas, is the book of educating wisdom which lies on a lotus, which means the spiritual blossoming.
In Chinese culture, the lotus means cleanliness, perfection, spiritual grace, the world, the female genius, summer, fruitfulness. Besides, it personifies the past, the present and the future as every plant at the same time has buds, flowers, and seeds. Lotus is a symbol of a noble person, grown from dirt, but not dirty (China).
At Egyptians, the lotus means “the intelligence fire”, creation, fertility, revival, immortality, the imperial power. It is the emblem of the Top Nile where papyrus is the emblem of the Low Nile; imaged together, they represent their union, which is devoted to Gore: “He is from lotus”, “Lotus is a pure, offspring of the Sun’s field” (the Book of dead). The four sons of Gore faced to Osiris on a lotus. Being connected with the god Amon-Ra in Thebes the lotus has solar sense and when it is held by Hathor it has lunar sense. As the attribute of Isis, it personifies fertility, virginity, cleanliness, Mother-maiden.
In Hinduism the lotus is a symbol of the universe as a passive side of the shown world; the higher form or the aspect of the terrestrial; the creating force of eternal essence; the mover on the bosom of waters self-reproduced, self-born, immortal and spiritual human nature; disclosing of all abilities, the eternal life, the superhuman beginning, cleanliness, beauty, longevity, health, glory, good luck, especially for children.
Lotus flower tattoo, lotus mandala and unalome designs and ideas
