Some Thoughts on Buddha's Foootprints Bunpo Kojima
Some Thoughts on Buddha's Foootprints Bunpo Kojima Whenever things happen to us, we think of our fathers, we dream of our mothers and we think of our native land. We, Buddhists, think of the Buddha and dream of India at all times. Our forefathers, in contemplating the fatherly Buddha, expressed their affection toward Him with stupas, dharma cakras, bodhi trees, His footprints and others. Of course the stupa, a little hill containing Buddha's relics, symbolizes Buddhakaya or Buddha's Body; the the cakra expresses Buddha's sermons; the bodhi tree symbolizes Buddha's enlightenment; and His footprint expresses traces of His propagation. These examples, however, represent a fraction of the Buddha. As time went by it has, become more difficult to grasp the true meaning by mere representation. At the same time, influenced by Greek art, our forefathers made statues which resembled that of Greek Gods and fully satisfied their affection toward the Buddha. Since people were apt to forget the basic principle of Buddha's teaching, it was in the Pala period (10 to 11 century) that inscription of Engi (1) Ho A (Gatha of Pratiya Samutpada) began to appear on the pedestal and (1) a. In Pali : ye dharma hetuppabhava tesam heturn tathagata aha tesan ca yo nirodho evam vadi mahasamano (Vinaya-pitaka, Mahavagga 1) b. In Sanskrit: ye dharma hetu prabhava hetu tesam tathagato by advat tesam ca yo nirodho evam vadi mahacramanab (E. Senat, Mahavastu, vol. 3, p. 461, 1. 15-16) c. In Chinese: 若 法 所 因 生 如來 読 是 因 若 法 所 因滅 大 沙 門 亦 説 此 義 四 分 律 巻33 (大 正.
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