1/25/2005

Menpeki Kunen <> Wall Gazing

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Wall-gazing Daruma <> Menpeki Kunen
.. .. .. .. .. .. 面壁九年の修行
mempeki kunen
私、ガビはPCの画面ペキ10年のかも。。。
I am sitting in front of my GAMEN ... the computer screen
for more than 10 years ...

Bodhidharma's years of meditation are represented with images of a seated monk facing a cave-wall called "Wall gazing" (Menpeki Daruma 面壁達磨). Related are depictions of the disciple Hui-ke presenting his cut-off arm (*Eka Dampi 慧可断臂) as a sign of his serious desire to study meditation with the Indian master.
http://www.aisf.or.jp/~jaanus/deta/d/daruma.htm


http://www1.pref.shimane.lg.jp/contents/sam/ja/colle/colle_01_08.html

Painting at the Shimane Art Museum

下村観山 Shimomura Kanzan
http://www2.pref.shimane.jp/sam/ja/colle/colle_01_08.html


Zenbunka Small Painting
http://www.komazawa-u.ac.jp/~zenbunka/images/daien.jpg
http://www.komazawa-u.ac.jp/~zenbunka/daruma.htm

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quote
John Stevens about Zen Art


On occasion, Zen artists combine Daruma and enso into one image as we see in this piece (Figure 7) by Seiin Onjiku (1767 -1830). Normally with such an inscription: "Who said, 'My heart is like the autumn moon?"' The enso would be placed at the top of the paper; here, however, Seiin has set the moon-mind at the bottom to represent Daruma "wall-gazing" (mempeki), illumined by the moonbeams of enlightenment.

Further, the inscription reminds us that, despite vast differences in time and place, the minds of the Patriarch, the Chinese poet Han-shan (to whom the verse refers), the Japanese monk who created the painting, and that of the modern viewer are essentially the same. Totally unaffected, Seiin's brushwork is soft and warm and the bokki radiates gentle light.

http://www.zenpaintings.com/images/stevens7-small.jpg

Read all about Zen Painting by John Stevens here
http://www.zenpaintings.com/stevens.htm

Safekeep copy
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DarumaArchives-002/message/44

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CLICK for more photos .

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Daruma jako mistr bojových umění, 1800–1838
Takeda Mocugai

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A Doll from Hakata showing Daruma wallgazing


http://www.hakata-doll.co.jp/sampl/d_disp_warabe.cgi?rec=421


By this way, here are many more Hakata Dolls with Daruma and a few other famous figures. Do not miss a quick look here. Even Charlie Chaplin is here in the last row.
http://www.hakata-doll.co.jp/Gazou/sonota.htm

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Bodhidharma was born in Kanchi in the Southern Indian kingdom of Pallava between 440 and 470. His spiritual instructor was the monk Prajnatara. He told him to travel to China and he came there by ship somewhere between 475 to 520. Legend has it that he spent nine years in meditation, where he used to sit facing the rock wall of a cave that's about a mile from the Shaolin Temple. Thus he won the title "the wall-gazing brahmin".

"The buddha in the mind is like a fragrance in a tree. The buddha comes from a mind free of suffering, just as a fragrance comes from a tree free of decay. There's no fragrance without a tree and no buddha without the mind. If there's a fragrance without a tree it's a different fragrance. If there's a buddha without your mind, it's a different buddha."
http://www.santosha.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=766


Just another Daruma


Photo : http://www.santosha.com/



Exhibition of Daruma Scrolls at the Japanese Temple
Choo-on-ji 潮音寺

インドで生まれて中国に渡り崇山少林寺で9年間座禅を組んで悟りに達したといいます(面壁九年)。あまり長い間座禅をしていたために足が腐ってしまったという俗説があのユーモラスなダルマ人形を生んだともいいます。
http://www8.plala.or.jp/rikan/jihouten/daruma/daruma-ten.htm

Click on the .jpg here to see the pictures.
http://www8.plala.or.jp/rikan/jihouten/daruma/

The Temple Choo-on-ji
http://www8.plala.or.jp/rikan/

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The place in China where Daruma practiced austerities.
巨大な達磨大師の像。この下が達磨洞。
達磨大師が修行したときは、当然何もなかった。



.. .. .. Look at more pictures here:
http://www1.odn.ne.jp/~shaolin/album/daruma_dou.htm

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.. .. .. .. Some Paintings

See my Photo Album, Pictures Nr. 41 to 52, start here.
..... ALBUM PAGES


Wall-Gazing Daruma
by Mamiya Eiju (1871-1945)
http://www.shambhala.com/zenart/images/scrolls/detail/roll9_f2.gif
http://www.shambhala.com/zenart/html/gallery/detail/d8.cfm

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Wall-Gazing Daruma
by Kozan Saisho (d.1901)


Enlightenment is the singular taste (of Zen).
Clouds may cover the moon (of illumination),
But soon spring returns in full force,
And nature flourishes like the evergreen pine.
Reside in high mountains and beside flowing streams,
traverse deep valleys and all will be well.


(signed) Kozan Saisho

...zenart.shambhala.com/


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The Practice of "Silent Illumination" (mo-chao)
by Master Sheng Yen

Quote from the middle, read it all here:
http://www.chan1.org/ddp/chanmag/spr1999.html

Bodhidharma himself is said to have taught, "If you wish to cast aside the false and return to true, concentrate and settle your mind in wall-gazing.
Self and other, the unenlightened and the saintly are all as one. Abide securely in this and do not stray."

The Hsin hsin ming (Inscription on Having Faith in the Mind) attributed to the third patriarch, Seng-ts'an (d. 606), states: "The two come when there is [a notion of] one[ness], so oneness also must not be adhered to. When a single thought does not arise, the myriad things are without defect." And again, "All wise ones throughout the ten directions penetrate this essential truth; this essential [moment of] truth is neither pressingly short nor lengthy. An instant of thought is ten thousand years."

Safekeep copy is here
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DarumaArchives-002/message/45

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Jiun Onko 1718-1808
Wall Gazing Daruma

Take a good look and discover
That one's true nature
Is an inexhaustible treasure
Transmitted from generation
To generation

http://www.skillfulmeditation.org/

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Just for the record,
there is even a Sake ricewine called “menpeki kunen” .

I tried it of course and can highly recommend it after nine years of looking at the "gamen" of my computer.


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. Kobayashi Issa 小林一茶 in Edo .

.面壁の三介どのや五月雨
mempeki no sansuke dono ya satsuki ame

a servant in Zen meditation
faces a wall...
Fifth Month rain


In Issa's time sansuke was a manservant or an attendant in a bathhouse.
If he is a bathhouse servant, his "sitting Zen meditation facing a wall" (mempeki) might indicate a lack of customers; the Fifth Month rains have kept people away. "Fifth Month rain" (samidare) pertains to the old lunar calendar; it would be June rain in the present calendar.

David Lanoue


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Read about Daruma and the courtesans sitting for ten years

nine years or ten <>
not even waiting for
things to come

http://darumasan.blogspot.com/2005/01/daruma-and-courtesans.html
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/happyhaiku/message/1113

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Hakata Dolls / 博多人形 more Hakata Clay Dolls

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