Why has the rhinoceros come from the west? An excursus into the religious, literary, and environmental history of the Tang Dynasty.

• Author: Heller, Natasha
• Position: Report

Taking Dongshan Liangjie's reference to a "chicken-scaring rhinoceros" as a starting point, this paper explores the cultural and literary significance of the rhinoceros with special attention to Buddhism. I argue that the precise parameters of the rhinoceros' significance were never firmly established, in part because it remained an exotic animal. Further, the horn of the rhinoceros often stood for the whole, even though horn and animal have very different meanings. From a very early period the horn was closely associated with the supernatural and with curative powers, and thus is valued as a medicine. By the end of the Tang dynasty the rhinoceros as an animal was perceived as an exotic tribute, one that was out of place in the capital. Through the new yuefu of Yuan Zhen and Bai Juyi, a tribute rhinoceros came to represent the failure of Dezong's rule in the late eighth century. I show that this was likely the source for Dongshan's remark, and then explore the interpretative possibilities of this phrase. The ambiguity of his remark--in comparison with other kinds of utterances from Chan teachers--helps to clarify the range of strategies used in middle-period Chan texts and the hermeneutic challenges they present.

In the sayings attributed to the Dongshan Liangjie [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (807-896), the Chan master is asked by a student, "Why did the First Patriarch come from the west?" To this Dongshan is said to have replied, "it is much like a chicken-scaring rhinoceros" [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]. (1) While the question is a frequent one in Chan texts, Dongshan's reply is striking, for both its mention of the unusual animal and its particular description. (2) One approach to exchanges such as these has been to see them as non sequiturs intended to cut off unproductive lines of thought; this is an interpretive strategy that tends to mystify Chan. (3) Yet it is true that the Chan master in these encounters seems to be operating in a way that deliberately thwarts expectations. John McRae writes of the general patterns of such exchanges, noting that "in many cases the student's inquiries are standardized" but the master's response is intended to be "spontaneous and unique," and the exchanges without "explicit rules." (4) Understanding these exchanges, then, is a process of discovering the latent rules and patterns through consideration of their intellectual and cultural contexts. McRae, Yanagida Seizan, and others have shown that Chan encounter dialogues emerge out of Buddhist history and have antecedents in earlier Chan texts. (5). Even as they are at times resistant to analysis, Robert Sharf has demonstrated how to read these exchanges within the framework of Buddhist doctrinal debates. (6) Further, the particularities of Chan anecdotes have the potential to yield insight into the cultural imaginaire of Tang-dynasty Chan, territory that has begun to be profitably explored by Steven Heine. (7) I take this exchange as a starting point to examine representations of the rhinoceros in the Tang-dynasty and the curious intersection of the rhinoceros with Buddhism. The resistance of this exchange to resolution highlights the interpretative challenges of lesser-known Chan episodes, but it also reflects the way in which animals and events can take on different meanings over time without ever fully shedding prior associations.

To make sense of Dongshan's answer, in which Bodhidharma is likened to "a chicken-scaring rhinoceros," we might first consider an environmental perspective, and inquire as to the rhinoceros's range in the mid-ninth century. It was not very likely that Dongshan himself would have seen a rhinoceros. Even in early texts, the rhinoceros often is associated with remote regionS. Indeed, driving out rhinoceroses and other wild beasts was seen as part of the civilizing process in early China. For example, when Mencius lists the Duke of Zhou's accomplishments, he praises him for "expelling tigers, leopards, rhinoceroses, and elephants so that they were far away" [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]. (8) From both the archaeological and written record it is clear that rhinoceroses ranged across the territory controlled by the Shang and Zhou, where they were hunted for their hide, which was used for shields, and their horn, used for drinking vessels. Over the subsequent centuries, however, rhinoceroses began to disappear from central China. Both Berthold Laufer and Edward H. Schafer argue that by the Tang dynasty the rhinoceros inhabited a territory that included western and southern Hunan and adjacent areas. Mark Elvin, in his The Retreat of the Elephants, concurs, noting that by this time the rhinoceros survived only to the far south and the west. (9) Likewise, the scholars Wen Huanran [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], He Yeheng [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], and Gao Yaoting [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] indicate that during the Tang rhinoceroses could be found in Hunan, Hubei, Guizhou, and Sichuan. They persisted in Guangxi through the Song, and last disappeared from Yunnan. The primary cause of their shifting habitat seems to have been cooling temperatures, but deforestation also played a role. (10)

All of these scholars work primarily from tax and tribute records of the Tang dynasty to establish where rhinoceroses might have been found; pharmacopoeias also provide some information. In the Xin Tang shu [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], rhinoceros horn frequently appears in lists of tribute. To take one example, the record of tribute from Qianzhou [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII](in present-day Sichuan) lists rhinoceros horn (xijiao [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]), luminous cinnabar (guangming dansha [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]), and candles (la [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]) as the regional items (tugong [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]) presented to the throne. (11) In other records, items such as goldthread (huanglian [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]; Coptis chinensis), sweet-peel tangerines (gan [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]), coarse fabric mats (zhushu dian [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]), fennel (lingling xiang [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]; Lysimachia foenum graecum), fine linen (bozhu [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]), and silver are enumerated alongside rhinoceros horn. Generally speaking, tribute offerings included luxury items, local products, and medicinal plants--and rhinoceros horn fits into two, if not three, of these categories. Like goldthread and fennel, rhinoceros horn has medical applications. Rhinoceros horn hairpins (xizandao [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]) are also mentioned in description of royal attire. (12) It is worth noting that what appears as tribute at the capital is, for the most part, rhinoceros horn. Tribute offerings of the animal itself were far more rare and of a different order. Because it is the horn that appears in tribute lists, and because this could have been acquired through trade with regions farther south or west, we must be cautious about taking these lists as definitive evidence of the rhinoceros's range.

Aside from the ecology of the rhinoceros's habitat, the textual record provides a sense of the Tang cultural understanding of the animal. Reflecting the fact that it was an exotic beast, the chicken-scaring rhinoceros stands out as anomalous within Dongshan's discourse record. Take, for example, the responses in other instances in which students asked Dongshan the meaning of Bodhidharma's arrival in China. In one case Dongshan turns the question back to the disciple, asking how he would respond when he becomes a teacher. In another instance he replies that he will answer only when Dong Creek flows backwards. (13) As Dong Creek is in the vicinity of Mount Dong, both these answers refer to the immediate surroundings. When we look at the other kinds of animals to which Dongshan made reference, we find a similar pattern. There is an ox being led through rice paddies, (14) a question about a snake swallowing a frog, (15) birds fighting over a frog, (16) bird paths, (17) a white rabbit, (18) and a bull giving birth to a calf. (19) Although this last example is impossible, all the animals mentioned in dialogues are common, and were either directly observed by the monks or could have been. (20)

On the face of it, then, the rhinoceros is distinguished by the fact that it is a non-local animal. Given that Dongshan was located in the northwest part of Jiangxi [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], it is improbable that any rhinoceros inhabited the area, although not wholly outside the realm of possibility. It remains very unlikely that Dongshan is referring to a local rhinoceros in his response, not only for environmental reasons but also from the descriptions of animals in his discourse record. As I have noted, the rhinoceros stands out among the common animals mentioned in Dongshan's dialogues themselves, but more exotic animals appear in two poems at the end of the later versions of Dongshan's record. The first poem is a g[a.bar]th[a.bar] composed following a dialogue with a student, and mentions the cuckoo (zigui [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII],), a jade elephant (yuxiang [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]), the gilin 11Mitt and the francolin (or chukar, zhegu [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]). (21) A second poem, presented to Caoshan 'Mil on his departure, mentions herons (lu [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]), a colt (ju [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]), a rat (shu [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]), a tiger (hu [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]), a horse (ma [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]), a raccoon-dog (linu [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII].), and a white bull (baigu [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]). (22) While a few of these are animals that Dongshan might have encountered himself, more are wild or fanciful animals, several of which refer to legends or to other texts. (23) Given the appearance of other animals...