. landmarks of esoteric art in japan 905
The Nara Great Buddha at Tōdaiji has been severely dam-
aged multiple times, and at present only minor fragments on the main
figure and some of the lotus petals of the dais remain from the mid-
eighth–century original (IBJ 625). However, each petal depicts a realm
with Śākyamuni as described in the Brahma’s Net Sūtra (Ishida Hisa-
toyo 1988, 26; Elisseeff 1936, 91). Because of the state of the Great
Buddha sculpture itself, it cannot be ascertained if there once was
additional imagery more relevant to the Garland Sūtra. However,
the later eighth-century Tōshōdaiji dry lacquer sculpture of Rocana
has eight hundred and sixty-four seated transformed buddha figures
depicted on its mandorla, and the petals of the lotus dais have multiple
images of buddhas depicted in ink.^2
In 743 Emperor Shōmu (701–756, r. 724–749) officially
promulgated his vow to build an image of Rocana, in the tradition
of a history of building great buddha figures on the continent.^3 The
“eye-opening dedication ceremony took place in 752 before the gild-
ing was complete, probably to commemorate the bicentennial anni-
versary of the official introduction of Buddhism to Japan in 552, and
international emissaries from India and Tang China participated in
the ceremony.^4 Following the precedents of the Sui and Tang dynasties
in China, Emperor Shōmu established a network of national temples
(^2) Likewise, among Chinese examples, the painted image of the mid-sixth–century
Vairocana from Dunhuang cave 428 has a depiction of a buddha realm on the outer
robe with flying apsaras above and the six realms of existence on the lower half of the
robe. The mid-fifth–century sculpted buddha image from Yungang cave 18 also has
multiple images in relief of seated buddhas on the robe, which, like the Tōshōdaiji
image, likely illustrate clouds of transformed buddhas emanating from the hair fol-
licles, as described in the Garland Sūtra.
(^3) The Great Buddha at Nara was in its time the culmination of a history of Great
Buddha figures built on the continent, such as the Bamiyan Great Buddhas (ca.
fourth–sixth centuries), the fifth-century Northern Wei Great Buddha at Yungang,
the Vairocana Great Buddha at Fengxian dated 765, and the Leshan Great Buddha
built from 713 to 803. 4
The first molds for the sculpture were made in 746, casting was completed in
749, and after gold was discovered in the northern Ōshū province in 749, the gilding
of the sculpture was completed in 755. However, the final gilding of the lotus petals
was not completed until 756 after Ganjin ( Jianzhen , 688–763) had arrived in
Japan from Tang China in 753. With a total height of approximately sixteen meters
and requiring two hundred and sixty-six tons of bronze (IBJ, 545), the construction of
the Nara Great Buddha was a major feat, especially in light of the failure to complete
the bronze Great Buddha of China commissioned by Empress Wu Zetian
(690–705, r. 624–705) in commemoration of Śikṣānanda’s translation of the Garland
Sūtra in 699 (Asai Kazuharu 2004, 55).