1368-1911

Bodhidharma

The colophon on this work talks about Wangguan, a painter who specialized in Buddhist figures, and Bodhidharma, the subject of the painting. Generally thought to have been a prince in southern India, Bodhidharma (known as Daruma in Japan) became a Buddhist monk and traveled to China in the early sixth century to help propagate Buddhism. He practiced asceticism at the Shaolin Temple in the Songshan Mountains near Luoyang and meditated facing a cave wall for nine years until he was spiritually awakened. Bodhidharma is the twenty-eighth Patriarch of Buddhism and the founder of Zen Buddhism. The priest on the left is his disciple and successor, Huike.