Kukai's pitcher
Michael Pye
Can anybody please tell me why there is always a pitcher in
representations of Kukai seated on his chair? The shoes I understand;
he took them off and left them beneath the chair. But the pitcher? Why
is it there, and what is or was in it? Did he take it there? Or does
somebody else put it there for him?
The pedigree of this representation is evidently very old. If anybody
can tell me just where and when it began, that would also be
interesting.
Greetings from the emerging spring in Kyoto.
Michael Pye
Professor of the Study of Religions
University of Marburg, Germany (retired)
Visiting Professor, Otani University, Kyoto, Japan
cjb...@u.washington.edu
have not studied them, but in terms of the artistic/representational
prototypes for representing him with the ewer, see the five portrait
paintings Kûkai brought back from China (by the Tang-dynasty painter
Li Zhen and his studio) and the two Japanese works added to the set in
821 (all owned by Kyôôkokuji/Tôji, Kyoto).
The works are illustrated in many publications but some of the best
reproductions are in
弘法大師の書 : 御筆七祖影 special exhibition /
Kobō Daishi no sho : Onhitsu 7-soei special exhibition
by Tōji Hōmotsukan.
(available for purchase in the Tôji bookshop, since you are in Kyoto).
The set of five are listed in Kûkai's Catalogue of Imported Objects
Shôraimokuroku, section (4) on Icons, KZ 1:94-95
The works represent Kongôchi (Vajrabodhi), Fukû (Amoghavajra), Zenmui
(S’ubhâkarasimha), Ichigyô (Yixing), and Keika (Huiguo)
I don't have the images in front of me but my memory is that the
portraits of Yiching and Nagabodhi do not have ewers; in the other 3
paintings they are difficult to discern due to abrasions to the
surface. The vessel is probably best referred to as a ewer or kundika.
It references initiations (abhiseka [abhis'eka] ) in the historical
transmission of Mikkyô. The Indian kundika (kun[.bel]d[.bel]ikâ ) was
originally used for the royal accession ceremony for water from the
four or five oceans poured on the head of the recipient; in Tantric
traditions five ewers are often used. (Ennin received abhisekha from
the master Yuanzheng 元政 with the Diamond World mandala then received
the initiation of the Five Pitchers).
In the badly damaged Tang portrait of Kûkai's teacher Huiguo, the
kundika placed near him may function as a double visual metaphor of
the dharma transmission initiation (where it serves as a libation
vessel) and the transmission of the Esoteric teachings—which Kûkai
said he received from Huiguo like pouring water into a vessel. (The
young assistant depicted next to Huiguo may represent the acolyte who
had achieved spiritual attainment and so was able to respond on behalf
of the master about Esotericism when question by Emperor Daizong in
770.)
For a discussion in Japanese of the Kyôôgokokuji Tang 5/+2 Japanese
paintings see:
Hamada Takashi, "Kôbô Daishi to Mikkyô bijutsu," in Kôbô daishi
kenkyû, ed. Nakano Gishô (Tokyo: Yoshikawa kôbunkan, 1978).
In English please see a chapter I recently published titled "Situating
Moving Objects: A Sino-Japanese Catalogue of Imported Items, 800 CE to
the Present," in What's the Use of Art? Asian Visual and Material
Culture in Context, ed. Morgan Pitelka and Jan Mrazek (Honolulu:
University of Hawaii Press, 2007), Chapter 6.
See also Tôji no rekishi to bijutsu, 444-446, and the bibliography for
the set found on p. 530.
You should also look at the Shingon Hasso, the eight patriarchs, a
grouping that includes Kûkai. The oldest extant representation of the
eight is inside the pagoda at Daigoji, dated 951.
(There is another set of eight that includes Kukai, Saicho, Ennin,
Enchin and others).
With some time I'd be happy to look into the portraits of Kukai —and
ought to do so in any case.
Cynthea Bogel
University of Washington
Michael Pye
Thanks very much for this splendidly valuable response. It will keep
me busy for a while.
I'm wondering about the difference between a ewer and a pitcher, if
any. It's easier to say "a pitcher" than "a ewer" ("a" plus initital
"e" is rare; I suppose people may have said "an ewer" at some point).
Moreover "pitcher" is a word which has been in normal use in my
lifetime, while "ewer" sounds a bit more, well esoteric!
My interest was/is in the specific representation of Kukai by himself
with one ewer as in the materials used for/by pilgrims up to the
present day (commemorative scrolls, nokyocho etc). If it " references
initiations (abhiseka [abhis'eka] ) in the historical transmission of
Mikkyô", is it in such pictures because it shows that Kukai has
RECEIVED the initiation, or does it mean that he has it standing
nearby in case he is called upon to initiate somebody else, i.e.
symbolising his qualification to do that?
This spring I'll try and ask a few pilgrims around here if they have
any idea what it's for, I suspect not...
Best wishes,
Michael Pye
Professor of the Study of Religions
University of Marburg, Germany (retired)
Visiting Professor, Otani University, Kyoto, Japan
Zitat von cjb...@u.washington.edu:
William Wetherall
The people who represented the vessel in question in drawings of Kukai (among others) probably did not say either ewer or pitcher, since apparently they did not speak English. Nor would they have called it a keg, amphora, or bucket. Calling it a urinal would be a crock, though dubbing it a carafe or decanter would rock. A pitcher could be full of lemonade, cream, or curve balls and sliders, while a ewer, though it may sound sheepy, is truly a water vessel.
Kundika, from Sanskrit, is transliterated into Sino-Japanese as 君持 (kunji) or 軍持 (kunji, gunji) and translated into Sino-Japanese as 水瓶 (suibin). Today it might be called a water bottle (Got Evian?), or even a canteen. No self-respecting laptop lugging, iPod plugged Kwannon, monk or nun would be without one in a digital portrait.
In reference to Kukai and his contemporaries, however, perhaps kundika should be rendered in a way that lends it a bit of temporal, if not exactly esoteric, distance. If Aquarius were to be reborn as an English-speaking Buddhist, s/he might well call it ewer, if not a water jar or jug.
Michael Pye
Indeed the paintings of the patriarchs almost all show the kind of
vessel in question, as a symbol of the transmission. However, I think
Cynthea Bogel must have meant a different catalogue than the one
mentioned, in similar format, which shows all these things in
excellent detail. But anyway it was all there, so thanks again.
As William Wetherall wrote (among other entertaining things!) it's
referred to as a ??, but pronounced suibyoo, not suibin, by a monk who
explained it to me. That's also in Kojien.
I looked up "ewer" and "pitcher" in a big Kenkyusha ei-wa this morning
(not having English dictionaries to hand) and both are
explained/translated as suisashi. This isn't relevant for the Shingon
item itself, but it does just suggest to me that "ewer" and "pitcher"
are not much different from each other. Funnily enough these entries
also have a picture. The vessel is practically the same in each case,
just a big jug really, with a broad pouring mouth, as pointed out
specifically in the entry for "ewer". This latter is also shown
standing in a bowl, like a Victorian water jug for the bedroom. With
this in
mind, I tend to think I can say pitcher just as well as ewer.
It's interesting that the Shingon ones are much more elegant, usually
having a double bulge and a very fine spout for pouring the water on
the recipient's head in a thin stream, visible but not messy, I
presume. Of course, "decanter" would be elegant (= William Wetherall's
"canteen"?) but in England at least it ususally implies shifting wine,
sherry or port from a bottle to an intermediate glass vessel for
serving (shades of WW's orange juice etc..?).
I can't see much point in referring to it as a kundika or a kunji,
even though it's the Indian derivation. The normal expression in both
written and spoken Japanese is now apparently suibyo, so why not use a
straightforward English equivalent?
Once again, thanks for helping me think this out a bit more.
Asashoryu just lost today.
William Wetherall
The Wu reading of 水瓶 is indeed "suibyou" -- which makes better sense in a Buddhist context.
Apparently when read "suibin" -- using the Tang (Song and later) reading of 瓶 -- 水瓶 refers to a narrow-necked water vessel, possibly more like a pitcher. The Yamato reading is "mizugame" -- and appears to mean a vessel used for storing water, perhaps a larger jug or jar -- and the Aquarius constellation is called 水瓶座 or "mizugame-za".
Of course, a kundika could be called anything in English so long as readers understand what its purpose is. And if there is no need to give a language lesson, then by all means refer to the object in terms that a reader would immediately understand as a water vessel, as opposed to a water-going vessel.
Finding ewer equated with 水差し (mizusahi) in an Ei-Wa jiten may simply betray an attempt in such dictionaries to interpret a common variety of "English" ewer, such as the Victorian ewer used with a wash basin -- rather than specify the possibly broader semantic range of the word as used by art historians. Not that they should have the final say, but it might help to get an opinion on distinctions made in descriptions of classical and more recent objects that store or dispense water. The more general Japanese term for a vessel that holds water, and could be a source of water, is 水入れ (mizuire).
Canteen, at first passing, does come across as less than elegant. But who knows what a poet could do with it in a pinch. It shares the same pitfalls as pitcher, in that you can't be sure what you will get from one -- a hot dog and pitcher a beer, hold the relish and foam.
But, yes, I am personally in favor of simplicity and precision. I would certainly play ball with an editor who insisted on pitcher. At the same time I would avoid talking about a "picture of Kukai with a pitcher" -- as this might cause some readers to consult their ophthalmologist or neurologist or both, then their lawyer.
I also saw a picture of a ewer of the Victorian kind. It bore a striking resemblance to the Phoenix on the reverse of the 10,000 Yukichi Fukuzawa banknote, from a drawing in the Hall of the Phoenix at Byodoin. It's a bird, it's a ewer, it's . . . a flask, font, flagon, aspersory?
Asashoryu did lose. It's now even Steven.
Thanks, again, for keeping me honest.
Bill Wetherall
W. J. Higginson
In your most recent e-mail I've seen on this thread, you say:
I tend to think I can say pitcher just as well as ewer.
While "pitcher" encompasses "ewer", the reverse is not true at all. My wife and mother in law have many pitchers, ranging from an inch to half a foot tall. None of them is even shaped like a ewer, much less the size that I associate with the word.
The structure of a lip versus a spout is distinctive, for one thing. Pitchers come both ways; ewers seem always to have a lip.
In terms of its form, a teapot is a "pitcher". But I doubt anyone would suggest that the word pitcher could be substituted for the word teapot in a translation without doing a disservice to the reader. Similarly with gravy boat versus gravy pitcher; the former has a distinctive shape and is used almost exclusively for one purpose, the latter could be any handy pitcher used for gravy. For me, the same with ewer vs. pitcher.
On the various Kenkyusha and other ei-wa and wa-ei dictionaries, as I have noted in my work in connection with haikai seasonal topics and the like, frequently such dictionaries err on the side of either too generic a "meaning" for a more specific word, as in this instance, or on the side of a common metaphorical meaning rather than the actual. (Two cases in point: kasumi is not, technically, "haze"--it's "mist", nor is arare "hail"--it's graupel, or, often, "snow pellets".)
Best,
Bill Higginson
cjb...@u.washington.edu
> Cynthea Bogel must have meant a different catalogue than the one
> mentioned, in similar format, which shows all these things in
> excellent detail. But anyway it was all there, so thanks again."
indeed the one that I meant you to find.I said that it was difficult
to discern the ewers in the damaged paintings, not in the
illustrations. Buyer beware! Illustration does does not equal reality.
I can certainly recommend other sources off line that show the muddy
details as they are.... When you see the paintings one day you will
agree. The details were originally legible, of course, so in that
sense the Tôji book is, er, reality.
Cynthea Bogel
Michael Pye
Thanks for these careful comments. Obviously I need to reconsider my
statement "I tend to think I can say pitcher just as well as ewer." -
but perhaps not for the reasons you adduce.
I would like to say "ewer", following Cynthea Bogel's introduction of
it (after I had asked about the "pitcher") and also your guidance.
Indeed it's a very nice word and I'll probably start using it at home
now (though of course I did know it as such).
About pronunciation (c.f. William Weatherall's comments), I can also
pronounce "a ewer" with a hidden "y-" all right, so that's not an
obstacle in itself; I had just been wondering why the word wasn't in
normal use in my older family, back to my grandmothers, i.e.
throughout the whole of the twentieth century in England. That's where
I grew up and was educated. There was a lot of translation going on in
those times and not a little poetry, so plenty of reason for liking
words.
Well, in my original post I'd been asking about the function or
symbolic meaning of the vessel in the depictions of Kukai. That was
solved easily enough. Allow me to recall that my purpose is to refer
to this vessel, very briefly, in some writing on pilgrimage because
there is a standard representation of Kukai which appears in many
contexts familiar to pilgrims (and of course ordinary temple visitors
too). In other words, I will be referring to a specific, more or less
stable iconographic element.
That's where "ewer" gets difficult again, after the your new
reflections. You emphasise that a ewer has a wide mouth, or "a broad
lip". But in the pictures I'm talking about, which must be familiar to
most pmjs persons, the vessel in question doesn't have a broad lip. It
definitely has a narrow spout. Thus, looking at the object itself (and
Toji also has at least one very fine object in three dimensions), the
word "ewer" seems to commend itself less.
This brings me back to the use of the word "pitcher" in your own
family. It sounds to me as though your wife and mother-in-law possess
a large number of jugs. In my own extended family the word pitcher was
also rarely used, because none of our jugs were big enough to count as
pitchers, in our usage. Pitchers were things one might expect to see
occasionally, in a large farmhouse, an old rectory, etc.. and would be
used for holding and dispensing any liquids drunk in quantity by a
large group (who didn't live at the level of port decanters!). The
word "ewer" was never used in normal speech, being the sort of thing
which people used for water and wine in the ancient near east (i.e. in
our minds).
Against this background, I wonder if you/your family are well
established in North America, and whether there the word pitcher has
come into very wide use there for all kinds of pouring vessels. For us
these were mostly jugs, big ones, little ones, some as big as your
head (like the coconuts). You seem to regard it as a generic term
which could even include a teapot and a gravy boat! But we didn't. And
is the word pitcher also being regarded as slightly vulgar (c.f. also
the jocular comments by W.Weatherall)? Is this the effect of baseball
culture. For me, "pitcher" symbolises rugged honesty, simplicity, or
something like that.
A teapot is not a jug because it has a spout and is used for tea. Of
course you can make tea in a jug, but you wouldn't, or shouldn't use a
teapot for anything else. (Don't remind of the person who tried to put
the cat in the teapot.)
Coffee can be made in all kinds of things, but the traditional,
elegant coffee pot with a bulge at the bottom and a long spout is the
closest vessel in form to Kukai's. But evidently I can't call it
Kukai's coffee pot...(though that might have been a better name for
this thread)
Now my problem is that the writing about pilgrimage has lots of
technical terms and special words in it which will be quite enough for
the reader, the audience is intended to be academic-plus-general. I
won't really be discussing Kukai's coffee-pot as such, and certainly
not as on this thread (!) but I do just need to refer to it in the
course of two-three sentences. In this context it will be neither a
bit of archeaology nor a literary flourish. It will be a reference to
an iconographically depicted ritual object with a long history.
Ewer is a great word for poetry, so is pitcher, and so is jug. Teapots
and coffee pots, well, that's more Betjeman and the like, I think. But
the broad lip versus the spout means I can't use "ewer" for my
purpose, doesn 't it?
The matter is not central enough to use the Japanese term in my
writing (but perhaps in brackets), let alone the older Sanskrit word
or its transliterations. But now I think I can't use "pitcher",
because of course we Brits always have to think of the North American
readership...
So for suibyo, I'm now thinking of saying "water jug".
By the way, I do agree that the ei-wa and wa-ei dictionaries are only
of very limited value for those of us on the ei-side of the language
divide. Here's a new Japanese word: ei-saido. Use it to baffle your
friends.
best wishes
Michael Pye
Professor of the Study of Religions
University of Marburg, Germany (retired)
Visiting Professor, Otani University, Kyoto, Japan
Zitat von "W. J. Higginson" <word...@gmail.com>:
> Dear Michael Pye,
>
> In your most recent e-mail I've seen on this thread, you say:
>
>>
>
> As a poet and translator who has worked in archeology a bit, I would
> strongly urge in favor of "ewer". The word in my experience always
> refers to a fairly large vessel, perhaps a foot or more high, with a
> broad lip, as others have noted, indeed similar to the pitcher that
> accompanies a wash-basin (long before and including "Victorian").
>
> While "pitcher" encompasses "ewer", the reverse is not true at all.
> My wife and mother in law have many pitchers, ranging from an inch to
> half a foot tall. None of them is even shaped like a ewer, much less
> the size that I associate with the word.
>
> The structure of a lip versus a spout is distinctive, for one thing.
> Pitchers come both ways; ewers seem always to have a lip.
>
> In terms of its form, a teapot is a "pitcher". But I doubt anyone
> would suggest that the word pitcher could be substituted for the word
> teapot in a translation without doing a disservice to the reader.
> Similarly with gravy boat versus gravy pitcher; the former has a
> distinctive shape and is used almost exclusively for one purpose, the
> latter could be any handy pitcher used for gravy. For me, the same
> with ewer vs. pitcher.
>
> On the various Kenkyusha and other ei-wa and wa-ei dictionaries, as I
> have noted in my work in connection with haikai seasonal topics and
> the like, frequently such dictionaries err on the side of either too
> generic a "meaning" for a more specific word, as in this instance, or
> on the side of a common metaphorical meaning rather than the actual.
> (Two cases in point: /kasumi/ is not, technically, "haze"--it's
> "mist", nor is /arare/ "hail"--it's graupel, or, often, "snow
> pellets".)
Greve Gabi
Why not call this vessel Kendi?
That seems an accepted word nowadays online.
http://images.google.co.jp/images?um=1&hl=en&q=kendi&btnG=Search+Images
GABI
Daruma Museum Japan
http://darumasan.blogspot.com/
Noel Pinnington
As a line of Hindu esotericism seems to inform Kukai's Shingon, is it
possible that the staff and water pot derive from Indian sadhu traditions?
In Japan one frequently see things said to be Buddhist which seem more
connected with Hinduism that Buddhism. I once saw a photo of a Shingon
priest meditating with the letters: om sri ram jay ram jay jay ram, in some
form of deva nagari on a plaque above his head.
In any case, the standard gear for a wandering Indian ascetic, a sadhu, is a
staff, in trident shape if particularly connected with the deity Shiva, and
a water pot, usually metal, but based in shape on a gourd, that is with a
double bulge. These pieces are common in old depictions and statues of the
Shiva, in his role as naked ascetic. I have sometimes wondered, seeing
yamabushi and other ascetics in Japan, whether they might not be recipients
of this tradition.
In the sadhu lifestyle, the water pot fulfils a number of practical purposes
related to the normal uses of water in human life. Of course, these have
become ritualized; when collecting water from a river, sadhus generally
intone mantra to purify it. Like any piece of traditional equipment, these
water pots have also collected symbolic interpretations.
An example of sadhu gear can be seen at this site:
http://www.himalayan-mercantile.com/rituals/hmr100.html
Descriptions of sadhu possessions (and also Shivaite images) usually refer
to two or three of the following: water pots, staffs, mantra beads, begging
bowls. The striking shape of the water pot is also often mentioned.
Noel Pinnington
Michael Pye
Thank you Gabi, but I won't call it a kendi for two reasons.
Ad rem (a): kendi is not an English word.
Ad rem (b): the pictures of "kendi" shown in the link you kindly
provided are quite diverse and sometimes are glossed with various
expressions such as "teapot".
Ad hominem: "kendi" doesn't appear at all in the alphabetical index of
words in your own "Dharma Museum" (your other link). Why's that I
wonder. Perhaps because people have never heard of it and therefore
wouldn't look it up?
Thank you Noel Pinnington. The original Indian background of Shingon
is undisputed, though partly rather distant. I very much like your
expression "water pot". It's so neutral! Wonderful. But the pictures
of the sadhu paraphernia blow it away again. They are indeed pots. No
spouts.
Oh dear, if I'm not careful I'll end up with "ritual vessel", so
useful in many museum glass cases.
But no: my hierarchy currently stands at:
a) water jug (close to suibyo, but - unlike water pot - indicating the
pouring facility, for the initiation function)
b) pitcher
c) ewer
d) coffee pot
e) teapot
f) ritual vessel
I'm also thinking about "water dispenser", but people might think it
implies some kind of mechanism.
In the meantime I think I'll pop outside and take a look at the
Kamogawa waterfalls in the sunshine.
Michael Pye
Professor of the Study of Religions
University of Marburg, Germany (retired)
Visiting Professor, Otani University, Kyoto, Japan
Zitat von Greve Gabi <gokurakua...@gmail.com>:
William Wetherall
While it is extremely important to map how all contending words appear to differentiate or conflate elements like lips, spouts, mouths, necks, handles and the like -- or functions like storage, dispensing, drinking, or washing or sprinkling or dabbing for whatever purpose, including ritual -- isn't this focus on what to call the vessel drawing attention away from the real protagonist in the silent drama represented in Dr. Pye's pictures? Not the vessel we see, but what it holds? That wonderful community of molecules so essential to life that people press it into the service of purification as well as hydration, while neighbors, tribes, and nations are known to kill for it?
Presumably "water ewer" would be redundant, whereas "water pitcher" would clarify. If so, then why not dub the vessel in question a "ewer" in English, then also refer to it as a "water pitcher" or "pitcher of water"? Then save the more esoteric commentary, on what it might be called in other languages and why, for a footnote in a publication that would welcome and tolerate such detail?
Mr. Higginson's analysis, by the way, makes it possible to anthropomorphize ewers and pitchers characterologically and even behaviorally -- in terms of their thick necks, big mouths, lip service, and spouting off.
Bill Wetherall
Darumasan
Just back from a pilgrim tour to Takahashi, Yakushi-In. Apart from the
most beautiful cherry blossoms, I found a statue of a "Koyasu
Daishi" , standing with a baby on his arm. Usually when standing,
Daishi sama wears his pilgrim sandals.
But on this statue, on a relief below the figure, we can see his
priest shoes and the "ritual water vessel" in stone. So I think this
is quite an amazing statue of a barefooted Daishi.
Before I noticed the shoes on the relief, I realized the kundika
vessel, because of the discussion here in this forum. Otherwise it
might have compeltely slipped my attention!
GABI
Look at my photo of Kobo Daishi here
http://darumamuseumgallery.blogspot.com/2008/04/daishi-with-child.html
If anyone has a good cup of tea ready and about 20 minutes time for a
real Japanese hanami, start from here, maybe take the slide show!
Special Treat, best weather, all mankai in Western Japan, Takahashi
and Fukiya Bengara Mura !
http://www.flickr.com/photos/grevegabi4000/sets/72157604558224862/
.
Michael Pye
Well, thanks for this interesting version. I suppose that if the wish
is to show his usual accessories, then the shoes have to be off,
whatever else he's doing... This is where you get to the rough edges
of stylised iconography, perhaps.
By the way, I have recently noticed that the (vessel) sometimes has a
handle and sometimes doesn't. This is probably an example of a
completely accidental iconographic detail (just sloppy painting or
folksy pottery), or do I get any differing takers on that? :)=
best wishes,
Michael Pye
Professor of the Study of Religions
University of Marburg, Germany (retired)
Visiting Professor, Otani University, Kyoto, Japan
Zitat von Darumasan <gokurakua...@gmail.com>: