text: In Buddhism In Tibetan Buddhism, according to the Padma Thang Yig, Rudra are devas (beings who live in heaven) at Maheśvara heaven. Or formerly a human monk of noble origin named Koukuntri and then Tharpa Nakpo, who misunderstands dharma and engages in a life of vice and is condemned to Naraka. After 20.000 impure lives, he is eventually reborn as a demon in Sri Lanka by a prostitute who sleeps with three kinds of supernatural creatures, giving him three heads. His birth brings about plague and famine, so he is banished to a charnel ground, but he survives by devouring his mother's corpse and returns in order to conquer the world. Becoming the lover of the rakshasa queen Krodhishvari, he battles the gods, who are terrified of his extraordinary power and call the Buddhas and boddhisattvas for help.
  The Buddha Vajrasattva, who in a previous life was Tharpa Nakpo's master Thupka Zhonu, receives the mission to destroy Rudra, for which he is accompanied by Vajrapani, himself a reborn Pramadeva or Denphak, Nakpo's servant and fellow disciple. They both assume the wrathful forms Hayagriva and Vajravarahi, who challenge Rudra with nine dances and battle him. Hayagriva turns diminutive and enters Rudra's anus, after which he becomes gigantic and destroys his body from inside out, submitting the demon and converting him to true dharma.
  In another version, Hayagriva impersonates Rudra and impregnates Krodishvari. As a result, he is reborn as the resultant child, Vajrarakshasa. He takes over Rudra's realm and defeats him by plunging a three-pointed khaṭvāṅga into his chest. He then devours Rudra, purifies him in his stomach and excretes him as a protector of dharma, who hands over his army of demons to Vajrarakshasha as attendants. Other versions replace Hayagriva with Ucchusma, an emanation that Vajrapani draws from his own anus.
  In Sikhism
  The 10th Sikh Guru, Guru Gobind Singh, describes the incarnation of Rudra in a composition titled 'Rudra Avtar' in his book the Dasam Granth.