Page 45 - Tibetan Thangka Painting Methodsand Mat, Jackson

pa scholar criticize the composition of a recent painting
where the artist had wrongly placed the yi-dam Hevajra
above some of the gurus of the Sa-skya-pa lineage. As he
reminded us, the preeminence of the guru over the yi-
dam is an important point that one also finds in
biographical literature, for example in the life of Marpa
the Translator (1012-1099) when the great Indian siddha
Naropa projected the form of the yi-dam and asked
Marpa to whom he would bow, to the yi-dam or to the
guru himself. A similar episode also occurred in a dream
that Rje-btsun Grags-pa-rgyal-mtshan (1147-1216) had
of his father Sa-chen Kun-dga'-snying-po (1092-1158).6
It bears repeating that the principle of hierarchy
did not govern all compositions. In thangkas depicting
teachers or great yogic adepts (mahasiddhas), yi-dams
were sometimes placed above and before them in the
sky, as if appearing there in a vision. (But here the yi-
dam was usually painted on a smaller scale.) Also, for
aesthetic reasons such as balance and equal distribution
some artists placed members of different classes on the
same level of the painting (although the relative status of
the deities could still be shown by putting one deity
outside and a little below the other). Furthermore, a few
painters were ignorant of these precise hierarchical
conventions. Nevertheless most knew in general that
they should put such figures as Buddhas and teachers
above, and wrathful figures below.

Didactic Paintings Emblem of Manjusrl. drawing by Legdrup Gyatsho.

Didactic pamtmgs express through a pictorial medium
some aspects of Buddhist doctrine. In a sense even a
didactic painting was a rten, being a receptacle or
embodiment of religious truth. Typical examples include
those that illustrate the arrangement of the physical
universe as taught in the Abhidharma, the layout of the
animate universe in the form of the Wheel of Existence
(srid pa'i 'khor lo), illustrations of monastic garb,
implements and practices as taught in the Vinaya, and
illustrations of meditative postures and states. We could
even include some medical and astrological paintings
within this class of religious art because they too often
grew out of scriptures held by tradition to be the word
of the Buddha.
Another related group of paintings represented
Buddhist teachings or themes through the more indirect
means of symbols. The eight-spoked wheel of Dharma
and other such symbols were the earliest manifestations
of Buddhist art in India. When Buddhism spread to Tibet
many centuries later, such symbolical representations
were also. introduced. The depictions of certain
auspicious symbols still common in Tibetan wall paint-
ings are a continuation of this tradition.
A more complex symbolical composition is the
"Mongol Leading the Tiger" (sog po stag 'khrid) which
represented the three great Mahayana bodhisattvas
Avalokitesvara, Manjusri and VajrapaI).i in the form of
the Mongol, the tiger and the chain connecting them.
Some versions symbolize the suppression of the four 'Mongol leading the Tiger', drawing by Wangdrak.

DIDACTIC PAINTINGS 41