Bodhisattva
Quote from CohentheWriter on 6. May 2022, 2:47Museum Link: https://app.museumofcryptoart.com/collection/permanent-collection?collection=0xb932a70a57673d89f4acffbe830e8ed7f75fb9e0&token=11545&page=2
Source Link: https://superrare.com/artwork-v2/bodhisattva--11545
Date Minted: July 1, 2020
Artist Description: A bodhisattva is literally a living being (sattva) who aspires to enlightenment (bodhi) and carries out altruistic practices. The bodhisattva ideal is central to the Mahayana Buddhist tradition as the individual who seeks enlightenment both for him- or herself and for others. Compassion, an empathetic sharing of the sufferings of others, is the bodhisattva’s greatest characteristic. It is shown in the following incident from the Vimalakirti Sutra which concerns a prominent lay follower of the Buddha who had fallen ill. When questioned about his illness, Vimalakirti replied, “Because the beings are ill, the bodhisattva is ill. The sickness of the bodhisattva arises from his great compassion.” It is held that the bodhisattva makes four vows expressing a determination to work for the happiness of others: “However innumerable sentient beings are, I vow to save them; however inexhaustible the passions are, I vow to master them; however limitless the teachings are, I vow to study them; however infinite the Buddha-truth is, I vow to attain it.” The life-condition of bodhisattva is inherent in the lives of ordinary men and women. The vows, each of which commits the bodhisattva to the open-ended pursuit of a continually receding goal, may seem daunting. Buddhism asserts, however, that the path of the bodhisattva is not an otherworldly undertaking for people with unique gifts of compassion or wisdom. Rather, the life-condition of bodhisattva is inherent in the lives of ordinary men and women, and the purpose of Buddhist practice is to strengthen that state until compassion becomes the basis of all our actions. In addition to compassion, the vows reflect the bodhisattva’s commitment to self-mastery, to study and learning, to the attainment of wisdom. None of these, however, is pursued in a vacuum, merely to improve or adorn the self; at the base of all these efforts is always the determination to remove the sufferings of others, and to replace them with joy.
CohentheWriter’s Commentary:
“A bodhisattva is literally a living being (sattva) who aspires to enlightenment (bodhi) and carries out altruistic practices. The bodhisattva ideal is central to the Mahayana Buddhist tradition as the individual who seeks enlightenment both for him- or herself and for others. Compassion, an empathetic sharing of the sufferings of others, is the bodhisattva’s greatest characteristic. It is shown in the following incident from the Vimalakirti Sutra which concerns a prominent lay follower of the Buddha who had fallen ill. When questioned about his illness, Vimalakirti replied, “Because the beings are ill, the bodhisattva is ill. The sickness of the bodhisattva arises from his great compassion.” It is held that the bodhisattva makes four vows expressing a determination to work for the happiness of others: “However innumerable sentient beings are, I vow to save them; however inexhaustible the passions are, I vow to master them; however limitless the teachings are, I vow to study them; however infinite the Buddha-truth is, I vow to attain it.” The life-condition of bodhisattva is inherent in the lives of ordinary men and women. The vows, each of which commits the bodhisattva to the open-ended pursuit of a continually receding goal, may seem daunting. Buddhism asserts, however, that the path of the bodhisattva is not an otherworldly undertaking for people with unique gifts of compassion or wisdom. Rather, the life-condition of bodhisattva is inherent in the lives of ordinary men and women, and the purpose of Buddhist practice is to strengthen that state until compassion becomes the basis of all our actions. In addition to compassion, the vows reflect the bodhisattva’s commitment to self-mastery, to study and learning, to the attainment of wisdom. None of these, however, is pursued in a vacuum, merely to improve or adorn the self; at the base of all these efforts is always the determination to remove the sufferings of others, and to replace them with joy.”
I fear that seeing Bodhisattva, the artwork by Yuramiron, so small and on a screen does an injustice to its obviously quite high-minded ideals. Nevertheless, this is the Bodhisattva we have, and the first to my knowledge to be created in a digital setting. But renderings of a Bodhisattva are not new, they span epochs and nationalities, being a quite common subject for Eastern Art ranging from the Japanese Edo era and on back to BCE Indian art; most Asian nation-states in the post-Gautama era had some section of their artistic canon devoted to this most generous of icons. The Bodhisattva as an image has a special esteem in Buddhist culture, the being who has achieved enlightenment but remains behind, i.e. has not passed through to nirvana, so as to help the rest of humanity achieve the same goal.
The beauty and purity of the Bodhisattva lifestyle is captured quite literally in Bodhisattva the work, the sparkling and glimmering and multi-manifold body of a being in perfect symmetrical harmony, reflecting the glimmer of an absentee sun. Indeed, Yuramiron’s Bodhisattva is a being that embodies many of the more sociocultural understandings of enlightenment: the third eye, representing a higher sight, and the eyes on hands, representing compassion, and the perfect lotus position, this a being that appears to float in the air, that is equally balanced on all sides, that has at the same time both superseded its originally human form and is also unquestionably connected to it.
Bodhisattva is a shimmering golden body covered in gleaming metallic texture, its edges sharp, with its arms covered in what might be feathers but which seem also like razors. Polygons cover the Bodhisattva’s surface, which may seem to on the surface be a bit crude artistically, but which I’d argue emphasize this creature’s ultimate elegant simplicity, that it is intentionally non-intricate. The being is also bedecked in fanciful and gregarious clothing: all of it appearing to us like armor; there are enormous blades extending from its thighs, whatever feather/razor garment covers its arms, a shirt or torso covering with many jutting petals, reminiscent of the lotus flower itself, and an enormous shining crown about the size of the Bodhisattva’s torso. The crown too blossoms outwards with lotus petal significance, and has a thin stalk in the middle, almost like a lightning rod (more like an enlightening rod) with a sequence of five black beads embedded into it.
It’s really quite a beautiful piece, many-faceted and serene. It’s a shame we can’t see it much larger, the largesse of its subject reflected in the viewing experience. Alas, the Bodhisattva is relegated to a small, spinnable sculpture on a flat screen, cutting it off from its many enormous physical counterparts, the renderings of Bodhisattvas past which inspire the genuflection of those in its orbit. So what is a Bodhisattva in this circumstance, small and an object not of awe but of petite interest? It’s almost a pocket Bodhisattva, no less beautiful but perhaps freed of the ingrained tendency towards worship that characterizes huge things.
“If you meet Buddha on the road, kill him,” the Buddha said. Or at least make him small, make him shiny, turn him into a bauble and fit him into the size of a digital palm, to be a reminder of an ideal perhaps, but no longer a God.
Source Link: https://superrare.com/artwork-v2/bodhisattva--11545
Date Minted: July 1, 2020
Artist Description: A bodhisattva is literally a living being (sattva) who aspires to enlightenment (bodhi) and carries out altruistic practices. The bodhisattva ideal is central to the Mahayana Buddhist tradition as the individual who seeks enlightenment both for him- or herself and for others. Compassion, an empathetic sharing of the sufferings of others, is the bodhisattva’s greatest characteristic. It is shown in the following incident from the Vimalakirti Sutra which concerns a prominent lay follower of the Buddha who had fallen ill. When questioned about his illness, Vimalakirti replied, “Because the beings are ill, the bodhisattva is ill. The sickness of the bodhisattva arises from his great compassion.” It is held that the bodhisattva makes four vows expressing a determination to work for the happiness of others: “However innumerable sentient beings are, I vow to save them; however inexhaustible the passions are, I vow to master them; however limitless the teachings are, I vow to study them; however infinite the Buddha-truth is, I vow to attain it.” The life-condition of bodhisattva is inherent in the lives of ordinary men and women. The vows, each of which commits the bodhisattva to the open-ended pursuit of a continually receding goal, may seem daunting. Buddhism asserts, however, that the path of the bodhisattva is not an otherworldly undertaking for people with unique gifts of compassion or wisdom. Rather, the life-condition of bodhisattva is inherent in the lives of ordinary men and women, and the purpose of Buddhist practice is to strengthen that state until compassion becomes the basis of all our actions. In addition to compassion, the vows reflect the bodhisattva’s commitment to self-mastery, to study and learning, to the attainment of wisdom. None of these, however, is pursued in a vacuum, merely to improve or adorn the self; at the base of all these efforts is always the determination to remove the sufferings of others, and to replace them with joy.
CohentheWriter’s Commentary:
“A bodhisattva is literally a living being (sattva) who aspires to enlightenment (bodhi) and carries out altruistic practices. The bodhisattva ideal is central to the Mahayana Buddhist tradition as the individual who seeks enlightenment both for him- or herself and for others. Compassion, an empathetic sharing of the sufferings of others, is the bodhisattva’s greatest characteristic. It is shown in the following incident from the Vimalakirti Sutra which concerns a prominent lay follower of the Buddha who had fallen ill. When questioned about his illness, Vimalakirti replied, “Because the beings are ill, the bodhisattva is ill. The sickness of the bodhisattva arises from his great compassion.” It is held that the bodhisattva makes four vows expressing a determination to work for the happiness of others: “However innumerable sentient beings are, I vow to save them; however inexhaustible the passions are, I vow to master them; however limitless the teachings are, I vow to study them; however infinite the Buddha-truth is, I vow to attain it.” The life-condition of bodhisattva is inherent in the lives of ordinary men and women. The vows, each of which commits the bodhisattva to the open-ended pursuit of a continually receding goal, may seem daunting. Buddhism asserts, however, that the path of the bodhisattva is not an otherworldly undertaking for people with unique gifts of compassion or wisdom. Rather, the life-condition of bodhisattva is inherent in the lives of ordinary men and women, and the purpose of Buddhist practice is to strengthen that state until compassion becomes the basis of all our actions. In addition to compassion, the vows reflect the bodhisattva’s commitment to self-mastery, to study and learning, to the attainment of wisdom. None of these, however, is pursued in a vacuum, merely to improve or adorn the self; at the base of all these efforts is always the determination to remove the sufferings of others, and to replace them with joy.”
I fear that seeing Bodhisattva, the artwork by Yuramiron, so small and on a screen does an injustice to its obviously quite high-minded ideals. Nevertheless, this is the Bodhisattva we have, and the first to my knowledge to be created in a digital setting. But renderings of a Bodhisattva are not new, they span epochs and nationalities, being a quite common subject for Eastern Art ranging from the Japanese Edo era and on back to BCE Indian art; most Asian nation-states in the post-Gautama era had some section of their artistic canon devoted to this most generous of icons. The Bodhisattva as an image has a special esteem in Buddhist culture, the being who has achieved enlightenment but remains behind, i.e. has not passed through to nirvana, so as to help the rest of humanity achieve the same goal.
The beauty and purity of the Bodhisattva lifestyle is captured quite literally in Bodhisattva the work, the sparkling and glimmering and multi-manifold body of a being in perfect symmetrical harmony, reflecting the glimmer of an absentee sun. Indeed, Yuramiron’s Bodhisattva is a being that embodies many of the more sociocultural understandings of enlightenment: the third eye, representing a higher sight, and the eyes on hands, representing compassion, and the perfect lotus position, this a being that appears to float in the air, that is equally balanced on all sides, that has at the same time both superseded its originally human form and is also unquestionably connected to it.
Bodhisattva is a shimmering golden body covered in gleaming metallic texture, its edges sharp, with its arms covered in what might be feathers but which seem also like razors. Polygons cover the Bodhisattva’s surface, which may seem to on the surface be a bit crude artistically, but which I’d argue emphasize this creature’s ultimate elegant simplicity, that it is intentionally non-intricate. The being is also bedecked in fanciful and gregarious clothing: all of it appearing to us like armor; there are enormous blades extending from its thighs, whatever feather/razor garment covers its arms, a shirt or torso covering with many jutting petals, reminiscent of the lotus flower itself, and an enormous shining crown about the size of the Bodhisattva’s torso. The crown too blossoms outwards with lotus petal significance, and has a thin stalk in the middle, almost like a lightning rod (more like an enlightening rod) with a sequence of five black beads embedded into it.
It’s really quite a beautiful piece, many-faceted and serene. It’s a shame we can’t see it much larger, the largesse of its subject reflected in the viewing experience. Alas, the Bodhisattva is relegated to a small, spinnable sculpture on a flat screen, cutting it off from its many enormous physical counterparts, the renderings of Bodhisattvas past which inspire the genuflection of those in its orbit. So what is a Bodhisattva in this circumstance, small and an object not of awe but of petite interest? It’s almost a pocket Bodhisattva, no less beautiful but perhaps freed of the ingrained tendency towards worship that characterizes huge things.
“If you meet Buddha on the road, kill him,” the Buddha said. Or at least make him small, make him shiny, turn him into a bauble and fit him into the size of a digital palm, to be a reminder of an ideal perhaps, but no longer a God.