Japanese Buddhist Art: Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, and the Path to Enlightenment

Japanese Buddhism arrived from Korea in the 6th century CE and transformed the artistic landscape of the Japanese archipelago with a completeness and speed that has few parallels in cultural history. Within two centuries of Buddhism's introduction, Japan had produced some of the most extraordinary Buddhist sculpture in the world — the dry lacquer figures of the Nara period (710-794 CE), the bronze Great Buddha of Todai-ji, the wooden Kannon of Horyuji, the Asura of Kofukuji — works that combined Chinese Tang-dynasty technical mastery with a distinctive Japanese refinement of feeling that has characterized Japanese aesthetic production ever since. The Japanese Buddhist visual tradition is distinguished by its capacity to express the full emotional range of the Buddhist path: the serene equanimity of the meditating Buddha, the fierce urgency of the wrathful protectors, the touching compassion of the Bodhisattvas who delay their own liberation to remain with suffering beings.

Daibutsu (Great Buddha), Todai-ji, Nara (752 CE) — the largest bronze Buddha in Japan, 14.7 meters high, seated in the Vairocana mudra that expresses the cosmic Buddha's omnipresent radiance; the casting consumed most of Japan's available copper and is considered the supreme achievement of Nara-period Japanese art

Todai-ji Great Buddha Hall (Daibutsuden), Nara — the largest wooden structure in the world, even in its reduced 18th-century reconstruction (the original was destroyed twice by fire and civil war); built to house the Daibutsu, it is simultaneously a reliquary, a temple, and a cosmological statement about the scale of the Buddha's compassion

Shakyamuni Triad, Horyuji Temple (623 CE) — cast in bronze by the sculptor Tori Busshi; the central Shakyamuni flanked by bodhisattvas, the halos behind them filled with flame patterns; the archaism of the faces (influenced by the Chinese Northern Wei style) gives the figures a timeless, otherworldly quality that the more naturalistic later style deliberately sought

Asura, Kofukuji Temple, Nara (734 CE) — the six-armed, three-faced Asura (a class of fierce supernatural beings, neither fully divine nor fully demonic) rendered in dry lacquer with an expression of such concentrated sorrow that it has become one of the most beloved figures in Japanese art; the Asura strives toward enlightenment but is driven back by its own nature

Muchaku by Unkei, Kofukuji, Nara (1208 CE) — the Buddhist patriarch Asanga (Muchaku) rendered in wood with a psychological realism unprecedented in East Asian sculpture; Unkei's figures appear to breathe; the eyes of crystal set into the wood catch light and seem to follow the viewer; this is portraiture in the deepest sense, not of the face but of the soul

Great South Gate (Nandaimon), Todai-ji (1199 CE) — rebuilt in the Daibutsu-yo (Great Buddha style) imported from Song Dynasty China; the gate is guarded by two colossal Nio (guardian king) figures by Unkei and Kaikei, the greatest sculptors of the Kamakura period; the Nio's wrathful faces and muscular bodies protect the sacred interior from demonic interference

Todai-ji belfry and bell — the bell of Todai-ji (752 CE) weighs 26.3 tons and is one of the largest temple bells in Japan; each New Year's Eve it is struck 108 times to dispel the 108 earthly desires that bind beings to the cycle of suffering; the sound of the bell is itself a teaching — the vibration of the dharma entering the body through hearing