Like thousands of others over the past few months—whether Buddhist faithfuls or not—these young bonzes are combining religious and aesthetic feelings by viewing one of the most extensive exhibitions of Buddhist bronzes ever put on public view in one place.
Titled "The Crucible of Compassion and Wisdom," this exhibition of 214 Buddhist works of art at the National Palace Museum in Taipei, spans 1,700 years and more than a third of the globe. The exhibits, which bring together statuary from Pakistan, India, Nepal, Kashmir, Tibet, Thailand, China, Korea, and Japan, are part of the Nitta Group Collection owned by Peng Kai-tung.
Peng, more commonly known by his Japanese name, Nitta, is a native of Taiwan and a pious Buddhist. He has lived in Japan for many years, amassing a considerable fortune in real estate, then devoting much of his wealth to acquiring one of the world's most impressive personal collections of Buddhist statuary art. His desire to share his treasures with his countrymen, and simultaneously honor the Buddha, led to the idea of presenting this exhibition. After three years of planning and negotiating, and another year completing arrangements, the magnificent exhibition opened at the National Palace Museum in October 1987.
Chin Hsiao-yi, Director of the Museum, says the logistics were "formidable," and the strain on the museum staff was so great that one of them ended up in the hospital for two days from sheer exhaustion. But the efforts were well worth it—the collection is awe-inspiring.
The smallest piece among the 214 works—and Chin's favorite—is a dainty 8.4 cm gilt bronze figure of a kneeling bodhisattva from the Tang Dynasty (618-907 A.D.). The largest piece in the exhibition is a 3.12 meter high Buddha sitting on a huge lotus plinth; from his exalted height, The Enlightened One gazes with dominant grace upon the worshippers below.
Because Nitta cherishes every item in his collection, the negotiations for the exhibition almost failed a number of times on account of his reluctance to let them out of his sight for more than three months. Given the work involved in staging an exhibition of this magnitude, the museum wanted them for a year. A compromise was finally reached whereby one third of the exhibition returned to Japan in March, after six months in the Museum; the rest will stay in the Palace Museum until September 1988.
Buddhist art, like Buddhism itself, originated in India and survived on the subcontinent for about 1,700 years after its founding. Indian art therefore had a profound influence on the development of Buddhist art, especially in the early centuries. In China, the Indian influence was particularly strong in the Tang Dynasty when many monks went to India to study the scriptures. Indian influence can be seen in the interest in the form of the body and the rich three-dimensionality of the robes draped around the Buddha's body. The faces, in a blend of traditions, are more Chinese and show the Tang Dynasty preference for roundness, whether male or female.
China later developed its own particular style, with less sensuous bodies, yet a continuing strong interest in the lines of the drapery. The Chinese style was eventually exported to Korea and Japan, where 7th and 8th Century bronzes clearly show its influence. But both countries developed their own unique styles: in Korea, the face of the Buddha tended more toward squareness, and in Japan the shoulders narrowed, and iconographic elements from earlier folk religions were incorporated into Buddhist iconography.
Tibet remained more strongly influenced by India, but quickly added many iconographic elements peculiar to the Tantric school of Buddhism which developed there.
In Thailand, as in Korea, Buddhist sculptures lost their original Indian form, developing their own brand of elegance. While the Buddha is usually depicted with great simplicity, in Thai sculptures he frequently wears a crown and other royal insignia to show that had he not been a great spiritual leader he would have been a great king. In contrast, throughout Asia the Bodhisattvas, or "buddhas to be," are usually richly adorned.
Buddhism, like Roman Catholicism, embraces a complex culture as well as a religion, and for centuries it has interacted with the indigenous cultures of the areas into which it has spread, influencing their development, and in turn being influenced by them.
And in each case, the indigenous art forms have been adopted and adapted to honor the Buddha, The Enlightened One, The Awakened One—all these honorifics indicating the special attainment of one who has entered Nirvana, the ultimate goal of all Buddhists, and shown the way to all other beings trapped in the world of rebirth.
Shakyamuni Buddha, Thailand (13th-14th Century A.D.), Bronze (60.5 cm)
According to Buddhist belief there have been, and will be, countless Buddhas. The personal name of the Buddha of this age, in Sanskrit, was Gautama, who was born a prince about the year 563 B.C. in the kingdom of the Shakyas, on the border of present-day Nepal and India; he therefore is also frequently referred to as Shakyamuni, or the Sage of the Shakyas. This was an age of great intellectual ferment in India, as it was in Greece and China. Buddhism arose initially as a reform philosophy—both theoretical and practical—to the Hinduism of the time, seeking a middle path to the goal of enlightenment sought by so many religious figures and believers at the time.
Amidst all this, Gautama was born. Also called Siddhartha, or One Whose Aim Is Accomplished, he was the son of the king and queen, and many tales are told about the dreams his mother had preceding his birth, and the miraculous events which surrounded it.
From the iconographic point of view, the most important is the tradition that immediately after he was born he took seven steps, from each of which a lotus grew. He then pointed one hand to the earth, the other to heaven, and said "I am the only one in the universe." This episode from his life is a frequent theme in Buddhist art, and there are impressive examples of this in the exhibition. One, a 40.3cm gilt bronze from China, dated 477 A.D., is a complex icon. The supporting lions symbolize wisdom, and, the hand is in the mudra, or gesture of reassurance. On the back of the nimbus (not shown), bas-reliefs depict scenes from the Buddha's life, in particular his birth from his mother's side, and his first miraculous seven steps and declaration. Two seated figures depict a tradition not found in India: a previous Buddha was said to have promised to return to earth to hear another Buddha preach should there be one. The two seated figures are Sakyamuni and the earlier Buddha, who has returned to listen as promised.
A 56.8 cm Ming Dynasty piece, dated 1624, also shows the infant Gautama at the end of his seven steps, standing on a lotus and making his prophetic declaration. The large ear lobes are one of the 32 physical signs by which a Buddha can be recognized. Because of prophesies in his childhood that Gautama would leave home and become a great sage, his father attempted to keep him at home by surrounding him with every luxury, and marrying him at the age of 16 to his beautiful cousin. But it was all in vain. According to tradition, at the age of 29, he was outside the palace walls with his charioteer when he saw, for the first time, an old and bent man, a sick cripple, and a funeral. Finally, he saw a yellow-robed, shaven-headed wandering ascetic who looked calm and serene, and fully unshaken by the concerns about old age, sickness, and death now so vividly present in the young prince's mind. Gautama immediately decided to leave home and discover how one could attain such peace amid such misery.
After wandering for some years, and studying with several teachers of different persuasions, all of whom sought enlightenment, he became for a time an emaciated ascetic, eating, according to some accounts, but six grains of rice a day. This stage of his life is seldom depicted in Buddhist art, but a rare example is included in the Nitta collection. This bronze, which stands 76.4cm tall, comes from 17th-18th Century Thailand. It shows the Buddha at the height, or maybe depths, of his ascetic stage. He is sitting in the vajrasana, or full lotus position, with his feet resting on his thighs. His hands are in the dhyana mudra, the gesture of meditation, which in China and Japan is often shown with the thumbs touching and the fingers curled.
But Gautama eventually realised that asceticism was not the path to enlightenment; he took a bath, drank some milk, and determined to sit under a banyan tree until he received true awakening.
Amitabha Buddha Yuan Dynasty, Gilt bronze (27.6 cm)
The banyan tree, variously called bo tree, assatha tree, bodhi tree, and pipal tree (the Ficus religiosa), was often substituted for the Buddha in early Buddhist art, when it was felt that his image was too sacred to be portrayed. For the same reason the footprints of the Buddha, and the stupa in which he was buried, were also used to symbolize him and his attainment of Nirvana.
As Gautama sat under the bo tree, it was the last chance of Mara, the Evil One, the Tempter, the Lord of the World of Passion, to defeat the prince's attempt at enlightenment. But Gautama was supported against Mara's demonic hordes by the ten great virtues (the paramitas): charity, morality, renunciation, wisdom, effort, patience, truth, universal love, and equanimity—virtues he had already perfected through countless previous lives as a bodhisattva.
The battle with Mara is a favorite subject for murals in Buddhist monasteries, but in sculpture the Buddha himself is most commonly found seated, at the moment of victory, pointing one hand to the earth to call it to witness that he had indeed defeated evil and achieved enlightenment. A 60.5cm bronze from 13th-14th Century Thailand is a typical example representing this moment.
By the age of 35, Gautama had achieved his aim, and fulfilled the promise of his other name, Siddhartha. After his enlightenment, the Buddha spent several weeks contemplating his new knowledge, and deciding what to do. He wanted to pass on his knowledge to others, but knew that it was very subtle and difficult to understand even for the wise, let alone for men surrounded by passions and the darkness of ignorance. The Buddha likened the people of the world to lotuses in a lotus pond. Some lotuses are still under water, others just at water level, and yet others raise pure, beautiful blossoms high into the brilliant sky above the putrid, muddy water.
The lotus has become one of the preeminent symbols of Buddhism, and is found in a huge proportion of all Buddhist art work in whatever medium. Frequently, the Buddha himself is shown seated on a lotus.
The Buddha sought to teach ordinary mortals the way to enlightenment by following moderation and the Four Noble Truths: (1) man's existence is dukkha, full of conflict, suffering, and dissatisfaction; (2) these are caused by man's tanha, thirst, or selfish desires; (3) there is nevertheless emancipation from all this, which is Nirvana; and (4) the way to this liberation is the Noble Eightfold Path of right view, right thought, right speech, right action, right mode of living, right endeavor, right mindfulness, and right concentration.
The first people to whom the Buddha gave his teaching, setting in motion the wheel of truth, were his five old companions of his ascetic period, who became his first disciples.
This wheel of Buddhist truth, or dharma, appears frequently in Buddhist art. Its simplified form is the swastika, or sun wheel, whose appearance on the body is another of the 32 distinguishing marks of a Buddha. Others are the bump on the crown of the head, the usnisa, which often looks like a top-knot, and symbolizes exceptional wisdom; and the urna, the tuft of white hairs between the eyes which twine clockwise, and shoot out rays of light when the Buddha preaches. These derive from marks which pre-Buddhist Indian mahapurusa, or great souls destined to become either universal teachers or spiritual teachers, bore upon their bodies. A 27.6 cm gilt bronze from China in the Yuan Dynasty (1279-1368 A.D.), showing Amitabha Buddha with his hands in the vitarka, or expository mudra, illustrates these special marks of the Buddha.
Raigo Painting of the Welcoming Amitabha Buddha with Attendant Bodhisattva, Korea Choson Period (16th-17th Century A.D.), (90 x 40 cm)
Time and place worked their variations upon Buddhism, but its basic principles have not changed. Buddhism split into two main branches: the Theravada, or stricter way, and the Mahayana, or greater vehicle, whose followers refer to Theravada as the "Hinayana," or lesser vehicle. Theravada Buddhism is found today mostly in Thailand, Sri Lanka, and Southeast Asia. Mahayana and its derivatives, the most famous of which is Ch'an, better known by its Japanese name, Zen, is found in China and Japan. In India, an admixture of gnosticism and magic gave rise to Tantric Buddhism, now mainly found in Tibet, where elements of the indigenous Tibetan Bon religion were also incorporated. Tantric Buddism is also known in China, as Chen-yen, and in Japan as Shingon.
Both vehicles take persons to Nirvana: the important thing is to be on the Buddhist path. A vast literature of reinterpretations and reformulations of Buddhist thought grew up around early Buddhist teachings, and are regarded by both the Mahayana and the Tantric schools as the Buddhavocana, the voice, or word, of the Buddha.
Another very important off-shoot of the Mahayana school was the Pure Land School. Pure Land became predominant in China, and spread to Korea and Japan. In this school, one of the countless buddhas of the universe, Amitahba Buddha, presides over a pure land known as the Western Paradise, into which male believers are reborn. At the point of death, Amitabha, often accompanied by two bodhisattvas, welcomes the dying man. A 33cm high gilt bronze from the Fujiwara period in Japan (898-1184 A.D.) shows Amitabha Buddha, with his hands in one of his nine welcoming mudras. Before the 7th Century A.D., Japanese Buddhist iconography was heavily influenced by Chinese styles, but later it began to develop a more individual style, of which this figure, with its narrow shoulders, and disc-like forehead bump, is typical.
Another excellent example of this welcoming theme is a 16th-17th Century painting from the Choson period (1392-1910 A.D.) in Korea showing Amitabha and his two attendants, their hands respectfully clasped in the anjali mudra, trailing auspicious clouds as they float to welcome a dying believer.
Differences in doctrine, as well as regional and temporal differences, have affected Buddhist iconography. Particularly striking are the images from Tibet, or those made in China for the Tibetan market. These images were not meant to be seen by the uninitiated, who have consistently misinterpreted them as demonic and even obscene. They are mandalas, visual summaries of profound truths designed to aid meditation.
A fine example of this style is an icon from 17th Century Tibet, which stands 64.5cm high. It represents the bodhisattva of wisdom, Manjusri, taking on the appearance of the fearsome deity Vajrabairava in order to overcome the ox-headed death god, Yama. To accomplish this, Manjusri also assumes an ox-mask, upon which his own likeness is surmounted.
The nine heads symbolize the nine divisions of the Buddhist canon, the two horns are the truth of earth and heaven, the five-lobed crown with the human skulls represents the elimination of all disturbances from the five aspects of consciousness, and the figure's nakedness symbolizes that he is unimpeded by obstacles. The 34 arms, in conjunction with the body and the mind, are among the 37 ways that lead to enlightenment.
He tramples eight animals and eight birds, meaning he has eight supernatural powers and eight special strengths. The union with his female prajna or consort in yogic embrace symbolizes the union of compassion, which is a male principle, with wisdom, which is female. In Tantric Buddhism the symbolic union of male and female deities stands for union with the divine, and for divine perfection.
Vajrabairava's heads face in all directions, and his arms spread out like the spokes of a wheel, as a visual expression of the macrocosm for which the microcosm of the mandala stands. Among the Tibetan Buddhist deities, Vajrabairava is one of the most iconographically complex, and this is a particularly good example.
The National Palace Museum exhibition drew large crowds of admirers, including many tour groups from Japan.
For the first few hundred years after Gautama's death, when the Buddha was felt to be too sacred to represent in human form, symbols such as his footprints, or the banyan tree under which he obtained enlightenment were used instead. But around the 1st Century A.D., these began to be replaced by Buddha shown in his human form. The earliest of these come from Gandhara, a region in northwest Pakistan and eastern Afghanistan, which at one time was part of Alexander the Great's Asian empire, and from Mathura, present day Uttar Pradesh in northern India.
Art historians have argued bitterly over the origins of the Buddha's image, but it is now fairly well accepted that they developed independently in the two places. The Mathura images resemble Indian yaksa, or nature deity images, and have the same feeling of inner power, with wide shoulders and feet planted firmly on the ground. The Gandhara images, on the other hand, bear a striking resemblance to Græco-Roman representations of gods, especially the sun god, Apollo. Some, such as a 16.8cm bronze dated to 2nd Century A.D. Gandhara, even have mustaches. The drapery of the robes is distinctly classical, and the nimbus closely resembles the type found in Christian iconography.
In the high flowering of Indian art in the Gupta period (4th-7th Century A.D.), the characteristics of these two schools merged into the classic Buddha image which spread throughout the Buddhist world—a benign figure sitting cross-legged on a lotus throne, a nimbus behind him, serene countenance with a delicate half-smile on its full lips, hair arranged in a neat series of knob-like curls, and a monastic robe draped over both shoulders. A 20.7cm bronze from 6th-7th Century Pakistan is typical of this pose, although classical western influence can still be seen in the toga-like drapery. The nimbus is probably a later addition.
As depictions of Sakyamuni Buddha proliferated, other Buddhas of the past began to be depicted, and in time each was associated with a specific set of characteristics. The same happened with the bodhisattvas, especially the compassionate bodhisattva Avalokitesvara, beloved by millions of Chinese as Kuan Yin, Goddess of Mercy, and Manjusri, famous for his wisdom. The latter is frequently depicted riding the lion of wisdom, a scroll in one hand to represent the sutras, and a sword in the other to signify that the teaching of the Buddha is a powerful weapon. A 40.7cm bronze from the Nambokucho Period in Japan (1333-1392 A.D.) is a classic example of Manjusri.
A 147cm gilt bronze from Ming Dynasty China (1368-1644 A.D.) depicts Avalokitesvara. The small seated figure near the top of the head, representing the buddha nature, is the primary identifying mark of this bodhisattva.
A natural step from showing the Buddhas of the past was to show the Buddha of the future who will come to earth in 56.7 million years' time. Called Maitreya, he is represented in this exhibition by one of the Ming dynasty bronzes at the entrance to the exhibition, as well as by a fat monk. The iconography in this 75.6 cm bronze from the Ming Dynasty is copied from a style popular in the Tang Dynasty almost a thousand years earlier when, as legend has it, a poem found beside a fat monk who had died read: "Maitreya is Maitreya, but nobody knows." It became widely accepted that the deceased monk had been Maitreya, unrecognized in this age, and from that date, particularly in China, he is often portrayed as the fat monk.
Through the ages, and the multitudinous heavenly and hellish worlds beyond the ken of mortals, shines the light of the Buddha's teaching. And to all worlds, times, and places, he manifests himself in the manner most comprehensible to the beings of the times. The Buddha remains the same, but people fashion his image in their own likeness, the more easily to identify with him. And on them all he bestows the compassionate smile seen so often in this exhibition, mirroring its apt title: "The Crucible of Compassion and Wisdom."