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| Sunday, 11 January 2004 |
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Colombo hosts rare exhibit on Lotus Sutra Illustrating Buddhism's journey through the Silk Route by Jayanthi Liyanage
A rare glimpse into Mahayana Buddhism awaits the Sri Lankan Buddhists of Theravada tradition when Soka Gakkai Lanka Buddhist Association opens an exhibition of rare, ancient Buddhist manuscripts on January 17. The exhibits which will be displayed at the Public Library, Colombo 7, will give an insight into how Buddhism spread to the Far-East through the Silk Route and illustrate Lotus Sutra (Saddharma Pundarika Sutra), which is regarded as one of most important sacred scriptures of Mahayana Buddhism and describes the existence of an innate and universal truth known as Buddha nature (Bodhisatva), inherent in all life, regardless of race or gender. Facsimile reproductions of three ancient manuscripts of the Lotus Sutra, written in Sanskrit and discovered in China, Nepal and India and a copy of another found in Russia, will be important highlights of this exhibition. The originals are preserved at the National Archives of Nepal, The Institute of Oriental Studies at St. Petersburg, The Asiatic Society of India, Cambridge University Library, and Lushun Museum of China. Another will be the copy of the first printed book compilation of manuscripts of the Lotus Sutra by collating from various collections. "The versions of the Sutra found in 255 AD, 270 AD and 335 AD were lost and what remains are those found in 286 AD, 400 AD and 401 AD," explains Paul Dias, Director-General, Soka Gakkai International (SGI) Sri Lanka Branch. The manuscripts could date back to 3rd or 4th Century, says Dr. Chandrasiri Palliyaguru, Professor of Sinhala, University of Kelaniya, which possesses a copy of the Nepalese Lotus Sutra manuscript.
The compilation of the Sutra by Bunyiu Nanjio (1849-1927) and Hendrik Kern (1833-1917), was first published in the series of Bibliotheca, 10, in 1908, records SGI and their book is supposed to be the world's first-ever Buddhist work to be printed. The copy at SGI was presented to its President Daisaku Ikeda by Dr. Lokesh Chandra, Director, International Academy of Indian Culture and son of Prof. Raghuvira who had also given a copy of it to Mahatma Gandhi. The role played by the Silk Route in spreading Buddhism through traders coming from the Far East and Central Asia to India, followed an era in which dhamma had come down generations through memorisation, explains Prof. Palliyaguru. Two and a half centuries after Sakyamuni Buddha attained enlightenment, a council of Buddhist monks collected his teachings and the oral traditions of the faith into written form, called the Tripitaka.
This included a very large collection of commentaries and traditions of which many are called Sutras (discourses). "After the council, differences divided the Buddhist monks in two sects - Theravada and Mahayana. In Theravada Buddhism, the scriptures were scribed in Pali whereas in Mahayana, they were recorded in Sanskrit." The Lotus Sutra, containing 28 chapters, had been translated from Sanskrit into Chinese by a monk called Kumarajeeva. The Chinese had translated the Sutra into other languages. The Sanskrit Lotus Sutra fragments in Lushun Museum are among the oldest found anywhere in the world. Prof. Palliyaguru explains that Mahayana Buddhists had populated Tibet, Mongolia, Khotan in the Soviet Republic and Central Asia, during 9th-12th centuries, starting from the 3rd century. Buddhism which originated in India and spread during King Ashoka's reign, was taken to the rest of the world through the Silk Route by merchants. Scholarly monks from China and Japan came in search of Buddhism to India. Many of the Buddhists populating the Silk Route had been Mahayanists. One such was Hiuen Tsang who lived in the 4th century and Fa-hien who came to Ceylon in the 5th century and stayed here for 30 years. Fa-hien wrote the book "Records of Buddhist Kingdom" and Tseng wrote "Buddhist Records of the Western World" both of which have been translated into English by Beal. "Mongolian emperor Ghenghis Khan and Kubalai Khan, who was the emperor in China during the times of Marco Polo who visited Sri Lanka in 13th century, were Buddhists," remarks Prof. Palliyaguru. The Buddhist cave complex at Dunhuang, China, located on the eastern end of the Silk Trading Route, had been a thriving centre of Buddhist activity in the first millennium CE. At the exhibition on January 17, SGI will present framed and enlarged photographs of a number of scrolled illustrations of the Lotus Sutra found in the Dunhuang caves and other ancient monasteries in China and Japan. Many such monasteries had been buried under desert and Chang Shuhong, who was an artist in Paris until he saw a beautiful collection of the Chinese art of Dunhuang in Seine, is credited with sacrificing his time and resources to uncover and preserve the treasures of Dunghuang, a World Heritage site of UNESCO. When hand-written books were the main means of spreading Buddhism in the Far East Asian countries, the Lotus Sutra had been extremely popular, as seen by the Dunhuang cave depictions of the Sutra in various situations and events. "The significance of the Lotus Sutra is that it emphasizes the possibility of activating one's own enlightenment-self, termed as Buddhahood," reads information from SGI. "The Lotus Sutra reveals that this power lies dormant and can be activated by following the philosophy of Nichiren Daishonin, a 13th century Buddhist sage in Japan, who taught that the Lotus Sutra's title phrase 'Myoho Renge Kyo' encapsulates the universal truth to which Guatama Buddha was enlightened. This phrase is the translation of Saddharma Pundarika (Lotus) Sutra, done by the Buddhist scholar Kumarajeeva." Members of the SGI follow the Nichiren Buddhism. |
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