Visualizing the Spirit Consciousness: Reinterpreting the Medicine Buddha Tableau in Mogao Cave 220 (642 CE)

Abstract

This paper considers how Buddhist art of the early Tang dynasty was shaped by concerns with states of consciousness and transmigrating spiritual entities. Focusing on the Medicine Buddha (Skt. Bhaiṣajyaguru) tableau in the main chamber of Mogao Cave 220, dated to 642 CE and among the earliest full wall transformation tableaux at Dunhuang, I propose that the tableau depicts a structured process centered around the transmigrating spiritual entity of spirit consciousness (shenshi 神識) and its transformations that were visually expressed by lighting devices. Other elements in the tableau, such as the dancers and bodhisattvas seated in the pond, are also part and parcel to this visual project of transformation, as indicated through the colors of their attire and the types of dance being performed. The spirit consciousness could be visualized through lighting devices in the Medicine Buddha tableau because of the associations of lamps with vital, spiritual parts of humans since the first century CE. More importantly, the central role of the spirit consciousness in the Medicine Buddha tableau shows that such Buddhist murals depicting rituals and performances situated among grand edifices could be visual expressions of states of spiritual entities and their transformations. Seemingly intangible spiritual entities in Buddhist art were thus inextricably intertwined with and visually expressed through physical objects and their representations. To this end, this study is a first step towards understanding the pictorial program of Mogao Cave 220 and similar cases through explorations of cognitive templates that informed the creation and production of Buddhist art, with the spirit consciousness as a case in point.