Devaraja

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Devaraja (Sanskrit: देवराज, romanized: Devarāja) was the religious and political concept of the "god-king" or deified monarch in ancient and medieval India and Southeast Asia. The concept of the devaraja developed from both Hinduism and other, local traditions depending on the area. It held that that the king was a divine, universal ruler and a manifestation of the gods (often attributed to Shiva or Vishnu) on Earth. The concept is closely related to the Indian concept of chakravarti (universal emperor). In the political context, it was viewed as the divine justification of a king's rule. The concept was institutionalised and expanded in ancient Java, Cambodia and Thailand, where monuments such as the Prambanan, Ayutthaya and the Angkor Wat were erected to celebrate the king's divine rule on Earth. The devaraja concept of the divine status of kings was adopted by the Indianised Hindu-Buddhist kingdoms of Southeast Asia through the Indian Brahmin scholars that were deployed in the courts there. It was first adopted by Javanese kings, and thereafter by various Malay kingdoms, the Khmer Empire, and the Thai monarchies.