Guanyin

• 1. Introduction

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  Guanyin is the Chinese name for the Bodhisattva of compassion, and it means The One Who Perceives the Sounds of the World. The camera maker Canon Inc. took its name from her. Her statues appear in the Asian art sections of most museums in the world, and she has been called the most widely beloved Buddhist divinity. Her worshippers describe miracles that answer anyone who prays to her. This documentary follows her across languages, scriptures and borders. How did a name about listening travel from Sanskrit into so many tongues? Why do her images differ so sharply from one temple to the next? And what stories do believers tell to explain who she is?

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• 2. A Name in Translation

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  Xuanzang translated the bodhisattva's name as Guānzìzài, and for a time that choice seemed to confirm a theory of translator error. According to the theory, early translators confused two Sanskrit forms, Avalokitasvara and Avalokiteśvara, and so produced Guānyīn by mistake. Later study reversed the verdict. The original form really was Avalokitasvara, which contains the word svara, meaning sound or noise. The compound means a sound perceiver, literally one who looks down upon the cries of beings who need help. Guanyin is its exact Chinese equivalent.

  Kumārajīva and some other translators preferred the variant Guānshìyīn, which reads as one who perceives the world's lamentations. That reading worked because the Sanskrit syllable lok was understood as meaning both to look and the world. The Chinese character 世, pronounced shì, carries the second meaning.

  Sanskrit fragments from the fifth century preserve the older form Avalokitasvara. The ending -īśvara does not appear in Sanskrit before the seventh century. Only after that did Avalokiteśvara begin to supplant the earlier name.

  In Hong Kong the name is Kwun Yam, and in Macau it is Kun Iam. Hokkien speakers say Kuan Im, and Vietnamese speakers say Quan Âm. In Japan she is Kannon, in Korea Gwan-eum, and in Tibet Chenrézik. Some names stress motherhood. Khmer speakers call her Preah Mae Kun Si Im, meaning Goddess Mother. In Burmese she is Kwan Yin Medaw, or Mother Kwan Yin, and Indonesians sometimes say Mak Kwan Im. Nepali speakers know her as Seto Machindranath, and Sinhala speakers say Natha Deviyo.

  The Thai form, Phra Mae Kuan Im, copies the sound of the Teochew name Kuang Im, and Phra Mae means goddess.

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• 3. Chapter Twenty-Five

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  The twenty-fifth chapter of the Lotus Sutra is generally accepted as the earliest writing to teach the doctrines of Avalokiteśvara. It portrays a compassionate bodhisattva who hears the cries of suffering beings and works tirelessly for anyone who calls on his name. In the chapter, the Buddha answers a questioner named Akṣayamati. He promises that Avalokiteśvara will "immediately perceive their voices and free them from their suffering." The text also gives the bodhisattva grand titles, Lokeśvara and Lokanātha, meaning Lord God of all beings and Lord and Protector of all beings.

  Thirty-three manifestations are listed in this chapter, each fitted to the mind of the being who needs help. They include a Buddha, a king, an elder, a householder, a Brahmin, a wife, a young boy, a young girl, a nāga, and a human or non-human being. Seven of the thirty-three are female. This teaching was already very popular in Chinese Buddhism during the Sui and Tang dynasties. The chapter also circulates on its own as the Avalokitasvara Sūtra, which temples across East Asia commonly recite or chant.

  The scholar Tan Chung notes that the Mahāyāna sutras themselves treat gender as unimportant. Whether Guanyin is male, female or genderless does not matter, because ultimate reality lies in emptiness. Other texts agree. The Vimalakirti Sutra has a chapter on a goddess who is both female and enlightened. In the Lotus Sutra, a maiden reaches enlightenment in a very short time.

  One scripture stands apart because it is ascribed entirely to Guanyin. In the Heart Sutra, where the bodhisattva appears as Guanzizai, Lord of Contemplation, she explains the nature of reality to the arhat Sariputta. Most Mahāyāna sutras are credited to the Buddha, who then describes the vows and deeds of bodhisattvas. The saying "Form is emptiness, emptiness is form" comes from this sutra.

  In Pure Land Buddhism, Guanyin is called the Barque of Salvation. With the Buddha Amitābha and the Bodhisattva Mahasthamaprapta, she temporarily lifts beings out of the Wheel of Samsara and into the Pure Land. There they can gather the merit needed to become a Buddha in one lifetime. In art she usually sits on the left of Amitābha, with Mahasthamaprapta on his right. Some Buddhists believe that Guanyin places a dying follower in the heart of a lotus and sends them on to the western pure land of Sukhāvatī.

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• 4. Changing Faces

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  Chinese images of the bodhisattva made before the Song dynasty, which lasted from 960 to 1279, looked masculine. The figure wore chest-revealing clothing and might even sport a light moustache. Around the 12th century, Chinese art moved toward an all-female form. The shift followed the bodhisattva's reputation as the personification of compassion, a mother goddess, and a patron of mothers and seamen. The Lotus Sutra also credits the figure with the power to grant children, so some images show Guanyin holding an infant. The modern white-robed woman derives from an earlier form called Pandaravasini.

  The standard image in China is a young woman in a flowing white robe, wearing necklaces that suggest Indian or Chinese royalty. Her crown usually shows Amitābha. In her left hand she holds a jar of pure water, a vessel counted among the Eight Symbols of Good Fortune. In her right hand is a willow branch, a plant that bends without breaking. Sometimes she stands on a lotus bloom, the common Buddhist symbol of purity, floating on the sea.

  Chinese artists often place her atop a dragon, beside a white cockatoo, and flanked by two children or two warriors. The warriors are Guan Yu, a general of the late Han dynasty who was deified as the protector Qielan, and the deva Weituo. Both guard the temple and the faith.

  In Fujian, a popular image shows her as a maiden dressed in Tang hanfu, carrying a fish basket. Late 16th-century Chinese reference works and the prints that accompany the novel Golden Lotus display this image, along with the Guanyin of the South Sea.

  Tibet took a different path. There the same bodhisattva, Chenrezig, is revered in male form. The female Guanyin resembles the Green Tara aspect of Tara, yet the two are rarely identified with each other.

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• 5. Princess Miaoshan

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  The Buddhist monk Jiang Zhiqi is usually credited with the research behind the Precious Scroll of Fragrant Mountain, a story set down in the 11th century. Jiang believed that the Guanyin people revere today was once a princess named Miaoshan, who had a religious following on Fragrant Mountain. The tale likely has roots in Taoism, and many variants exist in Chinese mythology.

  In the story, the cruel king Miaozhuang Wang wants his daughter to marry a wealthy but uncaring man. Miaoshan agrees on one condition. The marriage must ease three misfortunes: the suffering of aging, the suffering of illness, and the suffering of death. If it cannot, she would rather live a religious life forever. When her father asks who could ease all three, she answers that a doctor could. The king is furious, since he wanted a man of power and not a healer.

  He forces her into hard labour and cuts her food and drink, but she does not yield. Eventually he lets her work in a temple, and he tells the monks to give her the toughest chores. She works all day and all night while others sleep. The animals around the temple begin to help her. Her father tries to burn the temple down, and Miaoshan puts out the fire with her bare hands, unburned. In fear, the king orders her put to death.

  Versions of the execution differ. In one, the executioner's axe shatters into a thousand pieces. His sword shatters too, and his arrows veer off course. In desperation he uses his hands. Miaoshan, aware that he would suffer her father's wrath if she survived, forgives him and takes on the karmic guilt of her own killing. In another version, a supernatural tiger carries her to a hell-like realm. There she plays music, flowers bloom around her, and the guardian of that place watches her turn it into a paradise. Witnessing the suffering of its beings, she releases all the good karma she has gathered over her lifetimes and frees many souls. Yama, ruler of hell, sends her back to Earth to save his realm from destruction. A further tale says she never died and was carried by a tiger, thought to be the Deity of the Mountain, to Fragrant Mountain.

  The legend usually ends with the king ill with jaundice. A monk says the cure is a medicine made from the arm and eye of one without anger, to be found on Fragrant Mountain. Miaoshan gives up her eyes and arms willingly. The king recovers, travels to the mountain to give thanks, and begs forgiveness when he learns his daughter made the sacrifice. She is transformed into the Thousand-Armed Guanyin, and the king, queen and her two sisters build a temple for her. As she begins her journey to a pure land, she hears a cry of suffering and turns back, vowing to stay until all suffering ends.

  After returning to Earth, she is said to have spent a few years on the island of Mount Putuo, meditating and helping stranded sailors and fishermen. Because of this, she is worshipped as their patron and is said to calm the sea when boats are threatened by rocks. The titles Guanyin of the Southern Ocean and Guanyin on the Island come from this tradition.

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• 6. Legends in Her Circle

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  Shancai, a name that translates as boy skilled in wealth, is said to have been a disabled boy from India with a deep wish to study the dharma. His place in Guanyin's imagery draws on the Gaṇḍavyūha Sutra, where he seeks out 53 spiritual masters and meets Guanyin as the 28th. Hearing of a teacher on the rocky island of Putuo, he journeys there and finds her despite his disability. To test his resolve, Guanyin conjures three illusory pirates with swords and runs from them to a cliff edge. Shancai hobbles uphill to help her. She jumps, the illusions follow, and he crawls to the edge. When he falls, she stops him in midair and tells him to walk. He walks normally, and his reflection in a pool shows a handsome face.

  Years later, the third son of a Dragon King was caught by a fisherman while swimming in the form of a fish. Stuck on land, he could not change back, and his powerful father could not help. Guanyin heard his cry and sent Shancai to the market with all her money. A crowd had gathered, believing that eating a fish that stayed alive for hours might grant immortality. Shancai was easily outbid. As the crowd turned angry, Guanyin projected her voice from far away: "A life should definitely belong to one who tries to save it, not one who tries to take it." The crowd dispersed, and Guanyin returned the fish to the sea. Paintings of her holding a fish basket recall this tale.

  The grateful Dragon King sent his daughter Longnü, whose name means dragon girl, to present Guanyin with the Pearl of Light, a jewel that constantly shone. Longnü asked to become a disciple. Guanyin agreed on one request: that Longnü keep the pearl. In art, Longnü holds a bowl or an ingot standing for the pearl. Shancai stands beside her with joined palms and slightly bent knees, a sign of his earlier disability.

  A story first dating to the Ming dynasty, set in the Tang dynasty, tells of a white parrot, the cleverest in a family of parrots, who recites sutras and chants the name of Amitābha. Hunters kill the father and blind the mother. The young parrot is captured while gathering cherries, sometimes said to be lychees, to feed its mother. By the time it escapes, she has died. After it mourns and gives her a funeral, the Earth God suggests it worship Guanyin. Moved by its filial piety, she lets its parents be reborn in the Pure Land. The Tale of the Filial Parrot and the later Precious Scroll of the Parrot preserve the story. The white parrot, usually shown to her right with a pearl or prayer bead in its beak, became a symbol of filial piety.

  In Quanzhou, Fujian, the people needed money to build a bridge. Guanyin turned into an attractive lady and promised to marry any man who could hit her with silver. She collected many silver ingots this way. At last, one of the Eight Immortals, Lü Dongbin, helped a merchant hit her hair with silver. The hair floated away and became a white demon snake that seduced men and killed other women. Guanyin let blood from her finger flow down the river. A woman called Ge Furen drank some of it and became pregnant with Chen Jinggu, who later killed the snake.

  A Vietnamese verse, Quan Âm Thị Kính, recounts the life of a woman falsely accused of trying to kill her husband. She disguises herself as a man to join a Buddhist temple, where she is blamed for impregnating a girl named Thị Mầu. She bears every indignity and enters nirvana as the Goddess of Mercy. P. Q. Phan based a 2014 opera on this story.

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• 7. Thousand Arms, Many Forms

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  The Tiantai patriarch Zhiyi, who lived from 538 to 597, wrote in the Mohe Zhiguan that Guanyin takes six forms, each matched to a realm of samsara. Chinese Tiantai and Tangmi traditions and Japan's Shingon and Tendai schools follow this scheme. The Thousand-Armed form corresponds to the hell realm, the Eleven-Headed form to the asura realm, Cundī to the human realm, and Hayagriva to the animal realm.

  The Complete Tale of Guanyin and the Southern Seas explains the multiple heads and arms. Guanyin almost emptied hell by reforming nearly all its inhabitants, until the Ten Kings sent her away. Still seeing many unhappy beings, she struggled to grasp their needs, and her head split into eleven pieces. Amitābha gave her eleven heads to hear their cries. Then her two arms shattered as she reached out, and he gave her a thousand arms. Many Himalayan versions give eight arms instead. In Japan, statues of this kind stand at Sanjūsangen-dō in Kyoto.

  The Karandavyuha Sutra praises this form with a famous line: "it is easier to count all the leaves of every tree of every forest and all the grains of sand in the universe than to count the blessings and power of Avalokiteshvara." Its mantra, the Nīlakaṇṭha Dhāraṇī, is one of the most popular in East Asian Buddhism. During the Song dynasty, the Tiantai monk Siming Zhili created the Dabei Chan, a repentance ceremony still performed in temples in Mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

  At the entrances and exits of some Chinese temples stands Hayagriva Guanyin, protector of travel and transportation, especially cars. In certain temples, visitors may have their license plates enshrined before his image. Taoism absorbed him as the god Mǎ Wáng, the Horse King, associated with fire and shown with six arms and a third eye.

  The Kāraṇḍavyūhasūtra is the first textual source for Cundī and dates to around the late 4th or early 5th century. The Cundī Dhāraṇī Sūtra was translated into Chinese three times, in the late 7th and early 8th centuries, by Divākara in 685, Vajrabodhi in 723, and Amoghavajra. Cundī appears with eighteen arms holding different implements and is called the Mother of the Seventy Million Buddhas. Her mantra is one of the Ten Small Mantras recited in the morning services of most Chinese temples.

  Another form begins with Ānanda, one of the Buddha's ten principal disciples, meditating in a forest at night. A ghost king, named either Burning Face or Flaming Mouth, warns him that he will soon die and be reborn among hungry ghosts. He can avoid this only by giving a measure of food and drink to each of one hundred thousand nayutas of hungry ghosts. The Buddha then reveals a ritual and a dhāraṇī he learned from Guanyin in a past life, when he was a brahmin. Chinese tradition regards the ghost king, called Mianran Dashi, as an emanation of Guanyin herself. His account is the basis for most ghost-feeding rituals in East Asian Buddhism, and his effigy is enshrined during festivals such as the Zhongyuan Festival. It also shaped the Chinese Shuilu Fahui and the Korean Suryukjae.

  China has native forms of its own. Shuiyue Guanyin sits beside a pond with the moon reflected in the water, a picture of emptiness. Songzi Guanyin, a white-robed woman with a child on her lap, is invoked for children. Yulan Guanyin carries a fish basket, and in the Ming novel Journey to the West she uses it to capture a sea demon.

  Japan added forms even in the 20th century. Bokefuji Kannon was invented by a religious goods manufacturer in response to worry about senility and dementia. Mizuko Kuyō Kannon, a woman surrounded by children, answered grief over stillbirths and aborted pregnancies. Yōkihi Kannon takes the name of Yang Guifei, a famous beauty of the Tang dynasty, yet is usually shown with a moustache, to show that enlightenment does not depend on sex.

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• 8. Worship Across Borders

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  Mount Potalaka in India is recorded as the abode of Guanyin. As belief spread, each region adopted its own Potalaka. China chose Mount Putuo, Korea chose Naksansa, and Japan chose Fudarakusan-ji. Tibet's is the Potala Palace, and Vietnam's is the Hương Temple. Putuoshan is the main pilgrimage site in China. Korea has a 33-temple pilgrimage that includes Naksansa. The oldest of Japan's pilgrimages is the Saigoku Kannon Pilgrimage, which passes through 33 temples with Guanyin shrines.

  Temples dedicated to her include Shaolin Monastery, Longxing Temple, Dule Temple, Puning Temple, Nanhai Guanyin Temple, Kwan Im Thong Hood Cho Temple, Shitennō-ji, Sensō-ji and Kiyomizu-dera. She is found in influential Theravada temples in Sri Lanka, among them Gangaramaya, Kelaniya, and Natha Devale near the Temple of the Tooth. In Thailand she appears at the Temple of the Emerald Buddha and at Wat Huay Pla Kang. Her huge statue at Wat Huay Pla Kang is often mistakenly called the Big Buddha. In Myanmar she is at the Shwedagon Pagoda, and in Patan, Nepal, at the Hiranya Varna Mahavihar.

  On the 19th day of the sixth lunar month, believers celebrate her attainment of Buddhahood. Devotional Chinese schools see her as a savior who answers every plea. Non-devotional schools revere her as the principle of compassion itself, so that a loving, merciful person is said to be Guanyin. Taoist records name her Cihang Zhenren, a woman who became an immortal in the Shang dynasty. Chinese folk belief makes her protector of women and children. A woman hoping for a child may offer a shoe to Guanyin, and after the birth the shoe is returned with a new pair as thanks. Because of a legend of the Great Flood, in which she sent down a dog with rice grains in its tail, farmers worship her too. Some traders see her as a goddess of fortune, and many people believe the sea goddess Mazu is her manifestation.

  Her compassion also links her to vegetarianism. Buddhist cuisine is often decorated with her image. A soil named after her is said to prevent nausea and diarrhea. Cooks bake the snack Chaoqi in it, using flour, eggs, sugar and salt. The soil helps preserve the dough, so it was traditionally taken on long journeys.

  New religious movements have claimed her. Taiwan's Yiguandao calls her the Ancient Buddha of the South Sea. In Zaili teaching she is the main deity. Followers of Ching Hai learn the Quan Yin Method. Shinji Shumeikai teaches that she guided its founder, and Caodaism honors her as a Buddha who teaches female disciples and saves people from fire, drowning and false imprisonment.

  European travelers during the Ming and Qing dynasties noted that the Child-giving Guanyin closely resembled the Virgin Mary with the infant Jesus. The Taiwanese Buddhist organisation Tzu Chi commissioned a portrait of Guanyin holding a baby, much like a Catholic Madonna and Child, and displays copies in its medical centres. In Edo-period Japan, when Christianity was banned on pain of death, underground Christians disguised Mary as Maria Kannon, often hiding a cross. Jibo Kannon also became especially popular among suppressed Christians, and Koyasu Kannon, who predates it by centuries, was used the same way. One theory traces the likeness to Spain's colonization of the Philippines in the 16th century, as shown by an ivory Virgin Mary carved by a Chinese carver. In Seoul, the statue of Gwanse-eum at Gilsangsa was sculpted by the Catholic sculptor Choi Jong-tae, who modeled it on the Virgin Mary in hopes of fostering religious reconciliation in Korean society.

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