Karuṇā

Karuṇā is compassion, the wish that others be free from suffering. In early Buddhism it is one of the four “immeasurables” (brahmavihāras), with loving-kindness, sympathetic joy and equanimity, which the practitioner extends without limit to all beings.

In the Mahāyāna, compassion becomes the motive of the whole path. Great compassion (mahākaruṇā) is what moves a bodhisattva to seek awakening at all, and it is joined with wisdom: the bodhisattva sees that beings are empty and still works tirelessly for them. Śāntideva argues that since suffering belongs to no one, there is no reason to remove one’s own and not another’s.

Compassion is embodied in devotion by the bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara, known in East Asia as Guanyin or Kannon, and in Tibet as Chenrezig, of whom the Dalai Lamas are regarded as emanations.