Receptacle of the Sacred. Jinah Kim
eight scenes from the Buddha’s life (see fig. 2–1), whereas the accompanying text does not narrate the stories from the Buddha’s life. Even more challenging to understand is the inclusion of a number of images that are identified by captions as specific images of specific localities, as seen in the Nepalese AsP manuscript now in the Cambridge University Library (Ms B1, W-diagram 3–3), when these sites and images are not mentioned in the Prajñāpāramitā sūtra. The reason behind the choice of these specific types of images at first seems to be purely instrumental: the chosen images were perfect for accruing religious merits (puṇya), one of the most important purposes of religious donations in Mahāyāna Buddhist context. Their systematic placement in a manuscript calls for further investigation regarding the religious and art historical significance of the images in Buddhist book production. These images also provide excellent art historical evidence for studying Buddhist iconography as it was understood and realized in the eleventh century. For example, a caption accompanying the image of the Goddess Cundā on folio 188r of Ms B1 reads “lāhṭadeśevunkaranagarecundā,” or “Cundā in Buṅkaranagara in Lahṭa country,” and the panel represents a four-armed goddess seated with a bowl on her lap, holding a rosary and a manuscript (see fig. 3–5). The surrounding elements, such as four nonmonastic devotees who look like wandering ascetics, a bull, three small shrine structures, an elephant, and a monk (or Buddha), indicate the specific locality of Buṅkaranagara in Lahṭa. In fact, these manuscripts have often been used as source books for iconographic studies since Alfred Foucher’s pioneering study in 1900.1 But this art historical approach often discounts the fact that the manuscripts were made as sacred objects of worship in the context of the Buddhist book cult. When we consider these images in the context of a three-dimensional object, a book, as I propose to do in this study, we can appreciate their art historical and religious value more fully. I believe these images help us understand the process and the rationale behind the construction of Buddhist sacred objects in the medieval South Asian historical context. As we open the manuscripts and enter into their visual worlds, let us examine the roles of images in constructing a book as a cultic object par excellence of the time.
PRAJÑĀPĀRAMITĀ AND THE ENLIGHTENMENT
The text of the AsP does not tell us about the Buddha’s life stories, yet the main subject matter of the manuscript paintings is the Buddha’s life scenes, as seen in Group A manuscripts.2 When we probe the relationship between the text and the images in the AsP manuscripts, they are not as unrelated as they first appear. One of the main goals of the text is to explain the importance of the Prajñāpāramitā as the root cause of the Buddha’s enlightenment. In chapter 3 of the AsP, the Buddha equates the spot of earth on which Prajñāpāramitā is placed with the seat of enlightenment, that is, vajrāsana at Bodhgayā.
Further, where this perfection of wisdom has been written down in a book, and has been put up and worshipped, where it has been taken up, etc., there men and ghosts can do no harm, except as a punishment for past deeds. This is another advantage even here and now.
Just, Kausika, as those men and ghosts who have gone to the terrace of enlightenment, or to its neighbourhood, or its interior, or to the foot of the tree of enlightenment, cannot be hurt by men or ghosts, or be injured by them, or taken possession of, even with the help of evil animal beings, except as a punishment for former deeds. Because in it the past, future and present Tathagatas win their enlightenment, they who promote in all beings and who reveal to them fearlessness, lack of hostility, lack of fright. Just so, Kausika, the place in which one takes up, etc., this perfection of wisdom, in it cannot be hurt by men or ghosts. Because this perfection of wisdom makes the spot of earth where it is into a true shrine for beings, — worthy of being worshipped and adored—, into a shelter for beings who come to it, a refuge, a place of rest and final relief.3
What Edward Conze translates in this passage as “the terrace of enlightenment,” bodhimaṇḍa in Sanskrit, refers to the place where the Buddha attained enlightenment, that is, Bodhgayā. The spot of earth where the book of the AsP is located (sa pṛthivīpradeśa) is equated to “not just a caitya, but with the bodhimaṇḍda,” in its power, firmly established as the mahā-caitya by the eleventh century when the illustrated manuscripts were made.4 The predominance of Pāla-period life-scene steles privileging the Māravijaya (the Buddha’s enlightenment, lit. “the Buddha’s victory over Māra”) scene suggests the status of Bodhgayā as the mahā-caitya;5 so does the popularity of Bodhgayā as a pilgrimage site where numerous votive objects datable to the periods between the eighth and the twelfth centuries were found.6
The text of the AsP further explains the relationship between enlightenment and the Prajñāpāramitā. In chapter 4, the Buddha asks Indra which one he would choose, tathāgata relics or a written copy of the Prajñāpāramitā, upon which Indra answers:
Just this perfection of wisdom [Prajñāpāramitā]. Because of my esteem for the Guide of the Tathāgatas. Because in a true sense this is the body of the Tathāgatas. As the Lord has said: “The Dharma-bodies are the Buddhas, my body. Monks, you should see Me from the accomplishment of the Dharma-body.” But that Tathāgata-body should be seen as brought about by the reality-limit, i.e. by the perfection of wisdom. . . . As come forth from this perfection of wisdom are the relics of the Tathāgata worshipped, and therefore, when one worships just this perfection of wisdom, then also the worship of the relics of the Tathāgata is brought to fulfillment. For the relics of the Tathāgata have come forth from the perfection of wisdom. It is as with my own godly seat in Sudharmā, the hall of the Gods. When I am seated on it, the Gods come to wait on me. But when I am not, the Gods, out of respect for me, pay their respect to my seat, circumambulate it, and go away again. For they recall that, seated on this seat, Śakra, the Chief of Gods, demonstrates Dharma to the Gods of the Thirty-three. In the same way the perfection of wisdom is the real eminent cause and condition which feeds the all-knowledge of the Tathāgata.7
Here, it seems clear that the all-knowledge that leads tathāgatas to enlightenment originates from the Prajñāpāramitā: Prajñāpāramitā is the cause of enlightenment. The famous simile of Prajñāpāramitā as the mother of the Buddhas from chapter 12 explains this point further as the Buddha emphasizes that the Perfection of Wisdom (Prajñāpāramitā) is the root of enlightenment like a mother to her son. The iconographic program explicitly articulates this important causal relationship between Prajñāpāramitā and the Buddha’s enlightenment through a visual pairing between the Prajñāpāramitā deities and the Buddha’s life scenes.
The life scenes in illustrated manuscripts are often placed at the beginning and the end of the text on two facing folios, as seen in figure 3–1. The four scenes of the birth, the enlightenment, the first sermon, and the miracle appear on the first two folios of most Group A manuscripts, flanking central panels that often have Prajñāpāramitā deities (see fig. 2–1, web 2–1, W-diagram 3–1). The four scenes of the descent, the taming of the mad elephant, the monkey’s offering of honey, and the Parinirvāṇa are placed on the last two folios, mirroring the first four panels. The pairing of the first sermon and the miracle, and that of the descent and the taming of the mad elephant, suggest that compositional balance was one of the main principles governing their placement, sometimes superior to the chronological order of the events, as the first pair, that of the first sermon and the miracle, has the Buddha seated in a preaching gesture (see fig. 2–1, web 2–1) and the second pair, that of the descent and the taming, has the Buddha standing in action (see fig. 2–1, 3–4).
From the popularity of the life scene steles privileging the enlightenment, we may suggest that the Buddha’s life scenes collectively signify the Buddha’s enlightenment.8 That the focus of the program was to represent the Buddha’s enlightenment is also evident in our manuscripts, as the scene of the enlightenment is placed foremost in the sequence of the life scenes in Ms A1 and Ms A5 (see fig. 3–1, W-diagram 3–2). The makers of Ms A5 and Ms A6 placed the life scenes in the center of the manuscripts rather than in the outer layer (see W-diagram 3–2, fig. 3–3). As seen in figure 3–3, Ms A6 goes further with the theme of emphasizing the Buddha’s enlightenment and places the enlightenment panel in the structural center of the manuscript on folio 102r (see fig. 3–4), with two additional panels that depict two more events that happened