Hinduism and Buddhism, Volume 2 | Page 9

do not carry emblems) set in the position known as teaching the law.[46] Other signs which distinguish his images are the blue lotus and the lion on which he sits.
An interesting fact about Ma?jusr? is his association with China,[47] not only in Chinese but in late Indian legends. The mountain Wu-t'ai-shan in the province of Shan-si is sacred to him and is covered with temples erected in his honour.[48] The name (mountain of five terraces) is rendered in Sanskrit as Pancas?rsha, or Pancasikha, and occurs both in the Svayambh? Purana and in the text appended to miniatures representing Ma?jusr?. The principal temple is said to have been erected between 471 and 500 A.D. I have not seen any statement that the locality was sacred in pre-Buddhist times, but it was probably regarded as the haunt of deities, one of whom--perhaps some spirit of divination--was identified with the wise Ma?jusr?. It is possible that during the various inroads of Gr?co-Bactrians, Y��eh-Chih, and other Central Asian tribes into India, Ma?jusr? was somehow imported into the pantheon of the Mahayana from China or Central Asia, and he has, especially in the earlier descriptions, a certain pure and abstract quality which recalls the Amesha-Spentas of Persia. But still his attributes are Indian, and there is little positive evidence of a foreign origin. I-Ching is the first to tell us that the Hindus believed he came from China.[49] Hs��an Chuang does not mention this belief, and probably did not hear of it, for it is an interesting detail which no one writing for a Chinese audience would have omitted. We may therefore suppose that the idea arose in India about 650 A.D. By that date the temples of Wu-t'ai-Shan would have had time to become celebrated, and the visits paid to India by distinguished Chinese Buddhists would be likely to create the impression that China was a centre of the faith and frequented by Bodhisattvas.[50] We hear that Vajrabodhi (about 700) and Praj?a (782) both went to China to adore Ma?jusr?. In 824 a Tibetan envoy arrived at the Chinese Court to ask for an image of Ma?jusr?, and later the Grand Lamas officially recognized that he was incarnate in the Emperor.[51] Another legend relates that Ma?jusr? came from Wu-t'ai-Shan to adore a miraculous lotus[52] that appeared on the lake which then filled Nepal. With a blow of his sword he cleft the mountain barrier and thus drained the valley and introduced civilization. There may be hidden in this some tradition of the introduction of culture into Nepal but the Nepalese legends are late and in their collected form do not go back beyond the sixteenth century.
After Avalokita and Ma?jusr? the most important Bodhisattva is Maitreya,[53] also called Ajita or unconquered, who is the only one recognized by the Pali Canon.[54] This is because he does not stand on the same footing as the others. They are superhuman in their origin as well as in their career, whereas Maitreya is simply a being who like Gotama has lived innumerable lives and ultimately made himself worthy of Buddhahood which he awaits in heaven. There is no reason to doubt that Gotama regarded himself as one in a series of Buddhas: the Pali scriptures relate that he mentioned his predecessors by name, and also spoke of unnumbered Buddhas to come.[55] Nevertheless Maitreya or Metteyya is rarely mentioned in the Pali Canon.[56]
He is, however, frequently alluded to in the exegetical Pali literature, in the Anagata-vamsa and in the earlier Sanskrit works such as the Lalita-vistara, the Divyavadana and Mahavastu. In the Lotus he plays a prominent part, but still is subordinate to Ma?jusr?. Ultimately he was eclipsed by the two great Bodhisattvas but in the early centuries of our era he received much respect. His images are frequent in all parts of the Buddhist world: he was believed to watch over the propagation of the Faith,[57] and to have made special revelations to Asanga.[58] In paintings he is usually of a golden colour: his statues, which are often gigantic, show him standing or sitting in the European fashion and not cross-legged. He appears to be represented in the earliest Gandharan sculptures and there was a famous image of him in Udyana of which Fa-Hsien (399-414 A.D.) speaks as if it were already ancient.[59] Hs��an Chuang describes it as well as a stupa erected[60] to commemorate Sakyamuni's prediction that Maitreya would be his successor. On attaining Buddhahood he will become lord of a terrestrial paradise and hold three assemblies under a dragon flower tree,[61] at which all who have been good Buddhists in previous births will become Arhats. I-Ching speaks of meditating on the advent of Maitreya in language like that which Christian piety uses of the second coming of Christ and concludes a poem which is incorporated in