To celebrate the 1,250th Anniversary of Kūkai’s Birth, the special exhibition Kūkai: The Worlds of Mandalas and the Transcultural Origins of Esoteric Buddhism is opened at Nara National Museum in Japan on April 13.
Aspiring to offer a path to salvation to one and all, the great monk Kūkai (774–835), a figure of unparalleled importance in the religious world of the early Heian period (794–1185), set out to transmit to Japan the esoteric Buddhist tradition. The teachings, practices, and iconographies encompassed by esoteric Buddhism first emerged in India, where Buddhism began, and it traveled across the maritime and continental trade routes known as the Silk Road to reach China. Striving to bring the teachings of the Buddha to as many as he could reach, Kūkai traveled to Tang-dynasty China. There, after a fateful encounter with the great master of esoteric Buddhism, Huiguo (746–805), he received esoteric initiations as Huiguo’s disciple. Upon returning to Japan, to protect the country and rescue sentient beings, he fervently spread esoteric Buddhism far and wide.
The exhibition showcases the Takao Mandara for the first time since its conservation. The Takao Mandara is the earliest extant example of a paired Womb World and Diamond World mandala set and the only one that was produced with Kūkai’s direct involvement. By bringing together an overwhelming display of sacred treasures of Buddhist arts from China, Indonesia, and Japan, this exhibition enfolding completely unprecedented perspectives not only conveys the history of the transcultural transmissions of the esoteric Buddhist tradition, but also presents an experience of esoteric Buddhist cosmology as Kūkai intended to share it.
Source: Nara National Museum, Japan