Art historian does 'detective' work on Japanese Buddhist imagery

[rug]

Tue, 02/21/2017
Rick Hellman

LAWRENCE — More is better. That’s the core idea that gave rise to the Six Kannon cult in Japanese Buddhism. Then the Seven Kannon cult, and then the Thirty-Three Kannon cult that persists to this day.

A new book about the phenomenon, “Accounts and Images of Six Kannon in Japan” (2016, University of Hawaii Press), by Sherry Fowler, professor of Japanese art history in the History of Art Department at University of Kansas, is the culmination of many years of research – including falling off a cliff.

Kannon is a bodhisattva — an enlightened being who could achieve nirvana, i.e., total enlightenment and freedom from the cycles of rebirth — but who chooses to remain in the world in order to aid other sentient beings through those six cycles. Kannon is the Japanese name for Avalokiteshvara in Sanskrit or Guanyin in Chinese.

“Kannon’s identity may be divided into different types, each with specific interests,” Fowler said. “A Christian comparison would be saints with different tasks. If you have a group of six Kannon, you’ve got all the six paths covered. In Buddhism, more is better; more donations, more monuments, more spreading the doctrine, and for a bodhisattva more arms, more eyes, more heads means more compassion and more power.”

http://news.ku.edu/2017/02/13/art-historian-does-detective-work-japanese-buddhist-imagery