雲谷等顔筆　玉甫紹琮賛　達磨図|Bodhidharma

Unkoku Tōgan|Gyokuho Jōsō

late 16th–early 17th century · Hanging scroll; ink on paper · Asian Art

This imagined portrait depicts Bodhidharma, the monk credited with transmitting Zen Buddhism from India to China in the sixth century. The image is inscribed with a poem in Chinese by Gyokuho Jōsō (1546–1613), the 130th abbot of Daitokuji, a major Zen monastery in Kyoto. To accommodate the figure, who faces left, the text is read from left to right; this is atypical for Japanese and Chinese writing but common in devotional paintings, where the direction of the text often responds to the orientation of the figure. The poem celebrates Bodhidharma’s early efforts to spread Zen in China: Speeding past Liang and Wei, He cut his trip short. And why did he do so? He held back, for the sake of the unenlightened. —Translated by Aaron Rio

Artist

Unkoku Tōgan|Gyokuho Jōsō

Date

late 16th–early 17th century

Medium

Hanging scroll; ink on paper

Culture

Japan

Department

Asian Art

Credit line

Mary Griggs Burke Collection, Gift of the Mary and Jackson Burke Foundation, 2015