उत्तरांचल

 

Bodhidharma (Sanskrit: बोधिधमृ; Chinese 菩提達摩, pinyin Pútídámó or simply Dámó; Wade-Giles Tamo; Japanese ダルマ, Daruma), also known as the Tripitaka Dharma Master, was a semi-legendary Buddhist monk. Bodhidharma is traditionally held to be the founder of the Chan school of Buddhism (known in Japan and the West as Zen), and the Shaolin school of Chinese martial arts.

Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Biographical details from the Anthology of the Patriarchal Hall (952) 2 Spiritual approach 3 Portrayals of Bodhidharma 4 Legends 4.1 Emperor Wu 4.2 Nine years of gazing at a wall 4.3 Bringing tea to China 4.4 Daruma dolls 4.5 Bodhidharma and Huike 5 The lineage of Bodhidharma and his disciples

 

Biography

The major sources about Bodhidharma's life conflict with regard to his origins, the chronology of his journey to China, his death, and other details. One proposed set of birth and death dates is c. 440–528 CE; another is c. 470–543 CE.

Biographical details from the Record of the Buddhist Monasteries of Luoyang (547) by Yang Xuanzhi

The earliest historical record of Bodhidharma was compiled in 547 by Yang Xuanzhi, the Record of the Buddhist Monasteries of Luoyang, in which Yang identifies Bodhidharma as a Persian Central Asian (Wade-Giles: po-szu kuo hu-jen) (Broughton, 1999, p. 54, p.138).

At that time there was a monk of the Western Region named Bodhidharma, a Persian Central Asian. He traveled from the wild borderlands to China. Seeing the golden disks [on the pole on top of Yung-ning's stupa] reflecting in the sun, the rays of light illuminating the surface of the clouds, the jewel-bells on the stupa blowing in the wind, the echoes reverberating beyond the heavens, Bodhidharma sang its praises. He exclaimed: "Truly this is the work of spirits." He said: "I am 150 years old, and I have passed through numerous countries. There is virtually no country I have not visited. But even in India there is nothing comparable to the pure beauty of this monastery. Even the distant Buddha realms lack this." He chanted homage and placed his palms together in salutation for days on end.

Yongning was built in 516 and destroyed in 526, dating Bodhidharma's exultation to these years.

Biographical details from the Biography of Bodhidharma by Tanlin

Bodhidharma's disciple Tanlin identifies his master as South Indian (Broughton, 1999, p. 8).

The Dharma Master was a South Indian of the Western Region. He was the third son of a great Indian King....His ambition lay in the Mahayana path, and so he put aside his white layman's robe for the black robe of a monk....Lamenting the decline of the true teaching in the outlands, he subsequently crossed distant mountains and seas, traveling about propagating the teaching in Han and Wei.

The Biography is part of the Long Scroll of the Treatise on the Two Entrances and Four Practices, which Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki found in 1935 by going through the Dunhuang collection of the Chinese National Library.

Biographical details from the Continued Biographies of Eminent Monks (645) by Daoxuan

The entry for Bodhidharma is almost entirely drawn from the first two sections of the Long Scroll (Tanlin's Biography and the Two Entrances, traditionally attributed to Bodhidharma himself), to which Daoxuan added the following:

Caste background 

Daoxuan writes that Bodhidharma's father is Brahmin. However, as a king, he is more likely to have been from the Kshatriya caste.

Age 

Daoxuan takes his figure for Bodhidharma's age from the Record of the Buddhist Monasteries of Luoyang.

The duration of Daoyu and Huike's service to Bodhidharma 

Tanlin's original says "several" years. Daoxuan gives a figure of "four or five".

The route of Bodhidharma's journey 

Tanlin's original says only that Bodhidharma "crossed distant mountains and seas" on the way to his ultimate destination, the northern Chinese kingdom of Wei. In Daoxuan's account, Bodhidharma travels to by sea to southern China and then makes his way north, eventually crossing the Yangtze River, according to legend, on a reed.

The date of Bodhidharma's journey 

Daoxuan says that Bodhidharma makes landfall in the southern Chinese kingdom of Song, making his arrival in China no later than that kingdom's fall to Qi in 479.

Bodhidharma's death 

Bodhidharma dies at Luo River Beach. His interment by Huike on a bank of the river, possibly in a cave, is unusual because masters of Bodhidharma's reputation typically receive elaborate funerals. According to Daoxuan's chronology, Bodhidharma must have died before 534, when the Northern Wei falls, because Huike leaves Luoyang for Ye at that point. The use of the Luo River Beach as an execution grounds suggests that Bodhidharma may have died in the mass executions at Heyin in 528. A report in Taishou shinshuu daizoukyou states that a Buddhist monk was among the victims.