Classification, Layout, and Iconography of Buddhist Cave Temples and Monasteries*

CLASSIFICATION, LAYOUT, AND ICONOGRAPHY OF BUDDHIST CAVE TEMPLES AND MONASTERIES* Li Yuqun Introduction The Chinese Buddhist temple was born with the arrival of Buddhism in China. In the medieval period, as Buddhist belief became an important part of the spiritual life of the people, the temple became an important location for Buddhist devotees to carry out religious activities. With the development of Buddhism, the physical space and focus of devotion continuously developed and changed. For this reason, the evolution of the layout and iconography of the Buddhist temple has received extensive scholarly attention. As is well known, the Buddhist monastic system originated in India. In ancient India, the first Buddhist monastery, originally termed a “hermitage” (vihāra), was a garden hermitage built for the Buddha by Anāthapiṇḍada and Prince Jeta. Because of differences in style and function, different names for Buddhist monasteries eventually evolved. Texts from ancient China preserve many transliterations and transla- tions from Sanskrit terms for monasteries, such as saṃ ghārāma, meaning “garden for an assembly”; caitya, originally a stupa-like structure built to house ashes, and meaning “stupa temple” or “śarīra hall”; vihāra, meaning a dwelling for cultivated adepts or, more specifically, a dwelling for monks; araṇya, meaning a “tranquil place”; cāturdiśa, meaning monastic quarters; and bodhimanda, the place where the Buddha achieved enlightenment, which by extension came to be used to designate any monastery. When Buddhism first entered China, as monks from the western regions were normally lodged in one of the offices for receiving emis- saries, such as the officesi ( 寺) for dependencies (Honglu 鴻艫) or the office of imperial sacrifices (Taichangsi太常寺 ), it became common to refer to the place where monks congregated or practiced as an “office” (si), which from that time on can be translated as “monastery.” Other * Translated by John Kieschnick. 576 li yuqun terms for monastery in Chinese include “buddha shrine” ( futuci 浮屠祠 or fotuci 佛圖祠), Caitya monastery (sicha 寺剎), or buddha hall ( fotang 佛堂). In the Sui dynasty, the eminent monk Lingyu 靈裕 in his Monastic declaration (sigao 寺誥) enumerated ten different appellations for the monastery.1 The Song-dynasty monk Zanning 贊寧, in his Brief history of the clergy of the great Song (Da Song sengshi lüe 大宋僧史略), divides monastic appellations into six types: cave, cloister, forest, temple, hermitage, and ordinary. “Cave” here refers to the cave temple as in the caves carved from the sides of mountains in the Northern Wei in order to shelter sacred images and monks.2 Other types of monasteries were constructed from the ground up, and can be referred to collec- tively simply as “monasteries.” Zanning was no doubt right to classify the cave temple as a particular class of monastery. Indeed, as early as the Northern Wei, the earliest cave in the central plain at Yungang in Datong was called the “cave temple of Mt. Wuzhou” 武周山石窟寺.3 Clearly, for the people of the Northern Wei, a Buddhist cave was equiva- lent to a Buddhist monastery. For this reason, from the perspective of architectural structure, Buddhist monasteries can be divided into the two categories of cave temple and monastery. A “cave temple” is a monastic structure carved into the side of a cliff along a river. Although in structure the cave temple differs from the surface monastery, the larger cave temples could serve the same func- tions as other types of monasteries. This is most evident in the different uses assigned cave temples of different structures. For instance, in caves centered on a pillar (stupa cave temples), a Buddhist stupa is placed at the center of the cave. As in the case of stupas in surface monasteries, Buddhist devotees circumambulate the stupa while making reverence to it. Similarly, in buddha hall caves, the images carved in the monastery are like those in a great hall of a surface monastery: devotees can enter the cave and venerate and make offerings to the icon. All of these were essential attributes of the Buddhist monastery. Some cave temples have as well monks’ quarters and meditation cells, just as a monastery would have rooms for the residence of monks and a meditation hall created for the daily needs of the saṃ gha and for meditation. The dif- 1 Da Song sengshi lüe 1, compiled by Zanning, T 2126, vol. 5, p. 237. 2 Ibid. 3 During the Northern Wei, emperors often visited the cave temples at Yungang. See for instance Weishu 6, “Xianzu ji” 顯祖紀, which states that Emperor Xianwen “visited the cave temples at Wuzhou shan” (Beijing, 1974), p. 128..

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