210 stephan peter bumbacher
thus sort of an “equivalent” of Xi Wang Mu’s sheng—, the left hand
holding the end of his gown, the right hand raised in the gesture of
the “fearlessness”, abhayamudr.
It cannot be by accident that the Buddha became associated with the
Queen Mother of the West on pictorial representations of the second
century AD. The famous Yi’nan tomb in Shandong contains a
stone column with carvings on all four sides. One side shows on top
the Queen Mother, another one has the King Father of the East at
the corresponding position. This deity was introduced during the Later
Han dynasty to let the Queen Mother t the yin-yang scheme as the yin
part, whereas the King Father came to act as the yang part.^35 On the
third side of the column we nd, in the centre, a seated gure with
u
a, holding the gown with the left hand and raising the right one
in the abhayamudr gesture—which serve to identify the gure beyond
any doubt as the Buddha. Both deities, the Queen Mother and the
Buddha, must have been regarded as akin in caring for the souls of
the departed and were thus worshipped together. Wu Hung, therefore,
could say: “The Buddha’s powers and ability to help people resemble
those of the Queen Mother. In this context, the association between
the two was strengthened by the belief in the western abode of both
and by their shared connection with immortality.”^36
It is even possible that, on Chinese soil, both divinities initially com-
peted with each other to some degree, to be seen in the fact that the
Buddha’s iconography—inherited from Central Asian (Gandhran and
Mathurn) art—irreversibly in uenced that of the Queen Mother. The
latter was formerly shown, as we have seen, in a three-quarters posi-
tion looking at visitors who came to meet her or at companions such
as the hare.^37 On the other hand, the traditional representation of the
Buddha had him presented en face in his characteristic posture: holding
his gown with his left hand and raising his right hand in the gesture of
the abhayamudr. In addition, he is symmetrically surrounded by deities,
princes, disciples, worshippers or donors (who nanced the sculpture)
looking at him. During the rst century AD, Xi Wang Mu’s position
(^35) Both the Queen Mother of the West and the King Father of the East are also
carved in a detailed way on the façade of the same tomb, see gs. 25–26 in Zeng
et al. 1956.
(^36) Wu Hung 1989, p. 135.
(^37) Examples are given in James 1995, gs. 4, 5, 8; Sfukawa, loc. cit.; Wu Hung
1989, p. 113.