On a five-colored cloud: the Songs of Mount Wutai.

• Author: Cartelli, Mary Anne

THEMES OF THE MOUNT WUTAI POEMS

The Mount Wutai poems (1) take as their theme the Buddhist concept of nirmanakaya, or bianxian [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]: the idea that buddhas and bodhisattvas can transform themselves and vary their manifestations at will according to the needs of individual beings. These transformations and manifestations take place on Chinese soil, and even, more importantly, in the Chinese imagination. However, in the Mount Wutai poems, a unique Buddhist imagination also emerges: a cloud no longer appears as the floating cloud so familiar in the Chinese literary tradition but as a five-colored cloud or nimbus surrounding the bodhisattva Manjusri and his various forms. The five-colored cloud is one of many numinous traces (lingji [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]), or holy traces (shengji [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]), of Manjusri and other extraordinary beings which appear repeatedly in the Mount Wutai poems. Buddhas, bodhisattvas, arhats, and other divine beings change into forms both understandable and suitable to the person experiencing the manifestation. Although the goal of these transformations and manifestations is to save the recipient, they are colorful, magical, entertaining, and far more comprehensible than abstract or esoteric Buddhist doctrines.

The universe of the poetry of Mount Wutai reflects the magic and mystery of medieval Chinese Buddhism, with auspicious birds and roaring lions, holy lamps that fly through the air and divine bells that sound without being struck. Mysterious old men and young children engage the pilgrim in elevated conversations, and buddhas and bodhisattvas suddenly appear to preach the Dharma and just as soon vanish. Mount Wutai is also a realm of great natural beauty, both serene and terrifying. It holds fragrant delicate plants, jeweled cliffs, colored mists, storms of rain, hail, ice and snow, and gloomy dragon caves. This is poetry of devotion and faith: a heartfelt devotion to the pursuit of complete enlightenment, and an utter faith not only in Manjusri's ability to rescue all sentient beings, but in his eternal residence on Mount Wutai.

The theory of the three periods of the Buddha's teachings, particularly the belief that the period of the Final Dharma had begun, lent an urgency to the medieval Chinese pilgrims' wish to experience the transformation and manifestation of the bodhisattva Manjusri on Mount Wutai. Even if Buddhist teachings could not be easily obtained or understood, the pilgrim could still be rescued from the cycle of birth and death by a visit to the bodhisattva's gold-colored world, or pure land.

Therefore it is not surprising that the Buddhist concept of the pure lands or buddha lands also occurs as a theme in the Mount Wutai poems. These pure lands, which manifest themselves for the benefit of sentient beings, contain each other, as they are essentially empty and exist outside the conventional boundaries of time and space. Although Mount Wutai was considered the pure land of Manjusri and the center of the Avatamsaka school, it also attracted the monks and pilgrims of Amitabha's Pure Land sect, along with those of the Tiantai, Chan and Tantric schools. In their blending of the ideas and motifs of these various schools, the Mount Wutai poems reflect the syncretic nature of Tang Buddhism.

The poetry of Mount Wutai is more closely associated with pilgrimage and sutra literature than with secular literature. The poems are anonymous and generally lack a strong personal voice or a focused individual vision. Notwithstanding their magical qualities, ultimately they are not intended to entertain. They relentlessly urge meditation and enlightenment. Their stage is the Buddhist practice hall. Nonetheless, they share some basic themes of Chinese poetry through the ages. Despite their Buddhist motifs, there are familiar elements in the Mount Wutai poems. One reason is obvious: the authors of these poems were Chinese. Another reason is that the writers also aimed to make the Buddhist doctrine attractive to the ordinary person in familiar terms.

PILGRIMAGE LITERATURE ABOUT MOUNT WUTAI

The "Songs of Mount Wutai" echo the preoccupations of the pilgrimage literature about the mountain. The oldest of these records is the Gu qingliang zhuan [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (Ancient Record of Clear and Cold), (2) by the monk Huixiang [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], who visited the mountain in 667. Yanyi [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], a monk of the Northern Song dynasty, wrote a more complete work called the Guang qingliang zhuan [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (Expanded Record of Clear and Cold), which dates to approximately 1060. (3) Yanyi's work is especially helpful, as he composed a list by terrace of the most important ancient temples, numinous traces, and medicinal plants. Another Song dynasty work was written by the lay Buddhist Zhang Shangying [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (1043-1122), the Xu qingliang zhuan [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (Further Record of Clear and Cold) around the time of his visit to Mount Wutai in 1088. (4) Yet another significant source of material about Mount Wutai is Nitto guho junrei gyoki [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (The Record of a Pilgrimage to China in Search of the Law), the diary of the Japanese monk Ennin [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (793-864), who visited during his trip to China from 838 to 847. (5) Other Tang records by Buddhist monks that mention Mount Wutai include two works by the Vinaya Master Daoxuan [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (596-667), Ji Shenzhou sanbao gantong lu [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] and Daoxuan lushi gantong lu [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], (6) the Huayan jing chuanji [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] by Fazang [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (643-712), Third Patriarch of the Huayan sect, (7) and the Dafangguang fo huayan jing shu [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], a commentary on the Avatamsaka sutra by Chengguan [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (737-838), Fourth Patriarch of the Huayan sect. (8) There is also a Ming dynasty record by Zhencheng [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (1546-1617), Qingliang shan zhi [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (Record of Clear Cold Mountain), (9) which quotes from the earlier records of Huixiang, Yanyi, Zhang Shangying, and others, but also contains some new material, along with a wealth of poems about the mountain.

SUTRA LITERATURE CONCERNED WITH MOUNT WUTAI

There are over a dozen Buddhist sutras mentioning Manjusri that were translated into Chinese in the second and third centuries A.D. Three Buddhist scriptures featuring Manjusri are believed to prophesy Manjusri's appearance on Mount Wutai: the third-century layman Nie Daozhen's [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] translation of the Wenshu shili ban niepan jing [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (10) (Manjusri-parinirvana sutra), Bodhiruci's (672-727) rendition of the Wenshu shili fabaozang tuoluoni jing [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (11) (Manjusri-dharma-ratnagarbha-dharani sutra), and Buddhabhadra's translation of the Huayan jing [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (12) (Avatamsaka sutra). These works are quoted repeatedly in the Tang pilgrimage literature of Mount Wutai.

The Manjusri-parinirvana sutra states that after the nirvana of Sakyamuni Buddha, Manjusri went to Snow Mountain to preach the Dharma. The original Indian text clearly refers to the Himalayas, but the reputation of Mount Wutai as a mountain where the snow still fell in summer must have encouraged its subsequent association with Manjusri. The sutra further states that after his parinirvana, Manjusri was brought to Fragrant Mountain (Skt. Gandhamadana), a mythical mountain of the Himalayan chain. According to other Indian texts, this mountain chain had five peaks surrounding a great lake called Anavatapta. (13) In the imagination of the Chinese Buddhists, Mount Wutai resembled the five-peaked mountain range associated with Manjusri in the Indian texts, and they saw the Chinese mountain as four flat-topped peaks, or terraces, surrounding a fifth peak, when, in actuality, the mountains roughly form the shape of an arc. Mount Wutai was assigned a lake analogous to Anavatapa, called Great Flower Pool, located in the center of the Mount Wutai range, on the Central Terrace.

The Manjusri-dharma-ratnagarbha-dharani sutra reveals that Sakyamuni Buddha declared after his death that Manjusri will go to a country named Mahacina, to a mountain called Pancasikha (Five Peaks) to preach the Buddhist doctrine. (14) Manjusri is strongly associated with the number five. He has five hundred disciples; he is also called Pancasikha for his five tufts, or topknots, of hair, tied in the manner of a youth. This provides additional justification for the association of the bodhisattva with a five-peaked mountain range in China. Yanyi, in the Guang qingliang zhuan, quotes from the Wenshu zhuan [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (Record of Manjusri) by Haidong [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]: (15) "Five Terrace is none other than the throne of the Tathagatha of the five directions. It also resembles the five topknots on the bodhisattva's head." (16)

The chapter of the Avatamsaka sutra called "The Dwelling Places of the Bodhisattvas," provided additional scriptural justification for Manjusri's appearance on Mount Wutai. The Gu qingliang zhuan quotes from the earlier Buddhabhadra translation, whereas the Guang qingliang zhuan uses the Tang dynasty translation, but the passage remains essentially the same, describing a mountain in the northeast called Clear Cold Mountain, where Manjusri lives with his assembly of ten thousand bodhisattvas. (17)

The Sanskrit version of the Manjusri-dharma-ratnagarbha-dharani sutra is no longer extant, but the Tibetan version does not mention Manjusri or Clear Cold Mountain. Etienne Lamotte has argued that the Chinese translation of the Avatamsaka sutra was "falsified" to assign...