The flame-shaped nimbus of Fudo Myo-o

Visiting the Japanese temples, you will notice that some statues are represented with a nimbus or halo around the head or around the entire body. In the Japanese Buddhist iconography this is called zukou ("head light") - usually sculpted separately and attached at the back of the main statue.

The most impressive type of halo is the one with flames, used to represent wrathful deities, like this Fudo Myo-o from Takahata Fudo Temple (Kongo-ji), in Hino, Tokyo, one of the most beautiful statues of this kind. The flames are signifying the purification of the mind from material desires and the power to consume the evil and the defilement of the world...