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Locating Mahacina

By admin on May 10, 2014 | InSociety,Oriental/New Age

- Prof. Tan Chung

Buddhist iconographical texts often refer to Mahcna as the source of some distinct form of the

iconography of the images of divinities. For instance, in the Sdhanaml there is the description of a

form of goddess Tr, composed by Shvatavajra, which the latter refers to as the Mahcnakrama

form. Both in the text of the Sdhanaml and in the colophon; Mahcnakrama evidently implies that

the iconographic form concerned was popular in the geographical dispensation of Mahcna, and, as the

suffix krama indicates, the composer of the sdhana introduced the aforesaid popular form to the

Indo-Nepalese Buddhist pantheon.

An interesting illustrated manuscript of the Aashasrik Prajpramit, dated A.D. 1015 and now in

the collection of the Cambridge University Library, there are several illustrations of Buddhist divinities

along with inscribed labels not only disclosing the identity of the relevant images, but also associatingthem with a topographical placement. A parallel version of this manuscript, but bearing the date A.D.

1071, is there in the holding of the Asiatic Society, Calcutta. Interestingly, this manuscript contains the

illustration of a male divinity with the accompanying inscribed label reading: Mahcne Majughoa.

The inscription may have either of these two meanings. (i) Majughoa (a well-known form of the

Bodhisattva Majur) while he was at Mahcna (ii) Majughoa as he is known in Mahcna. In both

the interpretations, Mahcna evidently bears a geographical connotation, and that being the case, the

second of the above interpretations seems to be more valid because the objective of the Aashasrik

Prajpramit manuscript concerned ostensibly was to prepare a visual documentation of the

distinctive iconographical forms of divinities which had acquired celebrity at the various shrines and

centers of Buddhism.

The expression Mahcna definitely refers to a land that could be regarded as Greater China, and not

the mainland of China. Stael Holstein discovered from the lamaistic establishment, Pao-hsiang Lou

(Buaxianglou), in the city of Peiping (Beijing) in China as many as 787 Buddhist bronze images belonging

to the pantheonistic community of Chinese Buddhism. These objects of visual representation were

studied, along with a series of photographs from three manuscripts in Chinese, admirably by Walter

Eugene Clark, and he published valuable materials in two volumes under the title Two Lamaistic

Pantheons. Clark recovered the Sanskrit names from their Chinese counterparts. These materials not

only throw significant light on the interrelationship between Indian and Chinese Buddhist iconography,

but also offer information of much relevance in the history of Buddhist iconography in general. It isinteresting to note that Clarks list of images contains the names like Chna Tr and Chnakrama Tr,

and none of the images bears the epithet Mahcnakrama. It seems that the topographical epithets Cna

and Mahcna were two distinct connotations.

That cna and mahcna referred to two separate geographical concepts is known from various other

sources. Here we can refer to a glaring evidence to put the point across. In the Laghukalacakrarjatantra

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Tk there is the prescription for the composition of the canonical texts in the languages, and perhaps

also in the scripts, prevalent in the respective lands. It has the following categorical statement:

tath bhoaviaye ynatrayabhotabhay likhita, cne cnabhay, mahcne mahcnabhay |

Here three distinct geographical territories, Bhoaviaya, Cna and Mahcna are mentioned. This leaves

no doubt that Cna and Mahcna are two seperate entities in terms of geo-cultural identities. Cna is

positively the present day China, and Mahcna is the land where Chinese culture commuted

notwithstanding the orthodoxy of the geo-political boundary. In that case, what is known as Central Asia

or the Chinese Turkistan should really be that land referable by the expression Mahcna or Greater

China.

However, there is a wrongly upheld belief that Mahcna stands for Tibet. In the above mentioned

statement of the Laghukalacakrarjatantra Tk, there is the mention of a land called Bhoaviaya which

is distinct from Mahcna and Cna. The sdhana number 127 of the Sdhanaml is ascribed to the

authorship of Ngrjuna, and, as per the further information given in the colophon, the iconographical

concepts delivered in the sdhana concerned are derived from the tradition of the Bhoa country. In this

sdhana there is the description of three different presentations of the Ekaja form of the goddess

Tr. Since all these presentations are quite distinct from the form of the Mahcnakrama Tr of the

Sdhanaml, referred to earlier, it seems that Bhoa and Mahcna represent two distinct geo-cultural

entities. Bhoa is, in fact, Tibet and Bhutan forming one cultural unit. The contribution of the Tibet-

Bhutanese tradition of Bon-Po culture is of much significance in the evolution of Tantric Buddhist

iconography and rituals. In the above mentioned colophon statement of the Sdhanaml the reference

evidently is to Tibet (Bhoa), and not to Central Asia (Mahcna).

That Bhoa is Tibet, and Mahcna is Central Asia or other than Tibet, can be known from other

authorities as well. It is well-known that the Lamaistic form of Buddhism is primarily pertinent to Tibet.In a Nepalese Buddhist work entitled Tantratattvasamuccaya, there is an interesting observation which

is as follows:

nepladee skynvatatantram | bhoadee lmnkmbojatantram | cnadee cnn

ptatantram | mahcnadee vrtynmiratantram | sihaladee ngnsthaviratantram ||

Here the people of the Bhoa country is associated with the Kmboja Tantra, and they are called as the

Lamas, and they seem to be distinct from the vrtyas who are associated with Mahcna and with the

Mira Tantra. The ascription ofthe Kmboja Tantra to Bhoa or Tibet is interesting because Amtnanda,

the residency Pundit in Nepal in the nineteenth century under Brian Hodgson, associates the Lamaistic

Buddhists of Tibet with the Kmbojadea in his Dharmakoa Samgraha. In fact, cultural nomenclatures

differed not merely on the change of time, but also on the personal interpretations of the individuals

looking at a culture.

However, it is pertinent to mention that the reference to any culture does not necessarily imply its

relevance only to the political boundary of the country of its origin. It is understood that because of the

predominantly Chinese cultural traits, the presence of which is not the result of any force or motive, the

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vast land of Central Asia has been referred to by the ancients as Mahcna or Greater China, and as

Chinese Turkistan by the present day chroniclers. It is true that it is almost impossible to single out the

Chinese features from the cultural complex of Central Asia. But the fact remains that the overall Chinese

ethos there cannot escape notice. Minute and detailed analysis shows that the Indian, Persian, Turkish

and Mongol elements are also present there in various modes and manners. Central Asia seems to be

the land where various cultures seem to have stepped out of their respective playgrounds in order to

revel in a composite game of give and take.

In view of the stepping out from the boundaries of the orthodoxy, and because of the participation in

activities bereft of the consideration of who contributes what, Central Asian culture has been referred to

by the Tantrasamuccaya, mentioned above, as Miratantra, i.e., the amalgamated system, and the

people involved in it as the vrtyas or the disconnected ones. Once one steps out of the protected realm

of orthodoxy, one gets disconnected from the concerns of the mainstream culture. That is exactly what

might have happened with the mendicants, monks and itinerant travelers and merchants traversing

Central Asia through the so-called Silk Route. In their every footstep in the journey between China and

India through Khotan, and in the reverse travel, they got themselves distanced from the culture of theland of the origin, and they adapted themselves to other itinerant cultural traits that they happened to

meet en route. Being disconnected or distanced from the mainstream culture, they verily were the

vrtyas, and because of their adopting alien cultural traits during transitory meetings with fellow

itinerants, they imbibed a mixed culture which admittedly can be called Miratantra. It is in the fitness of

things that the Tantratattvasamuccaya has characterized the culture of Mahcna or Central Asia as the

Miratantra followed by the vrtyas.