TheMet has a wonderful Japanese exhibition titled, The Three Perfections: Japanese Poetry, Calligraphy, and Painting from the Mary and Cheney Cowles Collection.* (The show runs through August 5, 2025) The serene Buddha in the photograph was there. As I looked further, this scroll caught my eye.
The calligrapher was Seigan Sōi (1588–1661), an abbot of the prestigious Daitokuji Temple in Kyoto. He came from a distinguished lineage of Zen monk-calligraphers, including Ikkyū Sōjun and Motsurin Jōtō—both active in the fifteenth century. Seigan was also a tea master who embraced the dictum of Sen no Rikyū (1522–1591): “the most important ‘utensil’ in the tearoom was the hanging scroll.
Seigan Sōi borrows a line, 高殿坐幽人, from Li Bai (701–762), the great Tang Dynasty poet, and turns it into an explicit reference to meditation: “In a high hall, secluded persons meditate.” (Since the Chinese language is ambiguous about plurality this could be interpreted as many people or one person.) Where artists appropriate to comment or protest, Seigan Sōi extracts a poetic line and heightens one of its possible meanings.
The poem is titled “Inscribed on Jiangxia Xiujing (Cultivate Tranquility) Temple” (題江夏修靜寺):
我家北海宅，作寺南江濱。
空庭無玉樹，高殿坐幽人。
書帶留青草，琴堂冪素塵。
平生種桃李，寂滅不成春。
My home is in Beihai. I write of a temple on the river’s south shore:
No jade trees in the empty courtyard, secluded persons sit in the high hall.
Book bindings are left as green grass, and the qin hall is covered with white dust.
I have planted peach and plum trees all my life, but they have died out, unable to become spring.
This poem takes some analysis to appreciate.
The word “sits,” zuo, 坐, also means meditation. The word for “hall,” dian, 殿, is specific to a palace or temple. The word you, 幽, means “remote; hidden away; secluded; serene; peaceful.” (The same word was above the moon gate in post 15.00.) The ideogram is an image of smoke rising like silk, 絲, from a fire, 火 , (the glyph for fire was later changed to 山) to invoke the image of remote and secluded.
“No jade trees in the empty courtyard (空庭無玉樹) consists of words that must have been carefully chosen. The first word is kong, 空, the word that is interpreted in this series as “space.” The second word is wu, 無. At first glance, it seemingly plays an ordinary role: there are no jade trees. Deeper still, though, these words take extraordinary metaphysical meanings in the classics. Kong can be rendered as emptiness and wu as nothingness. Li Bai refers to space and the nonexistence of jade trees as the setting for a secluded person in a high hall.
“Book belts are left as green grass” (書帶留青草) needs some explanation. Book belt grass is also known as step grass, honeysuckle, lingling, or ophiopogon. Its leaves are so tough and plentiful that scholars used them to tie their books. However, in this poem, the raw material for book belts, though plentiful, isn’t used: it remains green grass. This implies that the books aren’t being studied and the grass keeps growing.
The hall where the qin is played (typically a qin is a solo instrument; which contrasts with the high hall of the earlier line) is covered with white (素) dust. “Dust” is 塵, an ideogram that shows deer raising dust by trampling the earth. Again, human activity is halted but the natural world continues.
The entire poem is melancholy: no jade trees, an empty courtyard, no book belts, a music hall covered in dust, and all the trees the poet has planted have died and cannot become spring. (Peaches are symbols of longevity. Plum blossoms symbolize hope. Spring symbolizes renewal and life.) The word “become” here is 成, which also means success. 寂滅 means “die out; fade away.” (It also means nirvana.) 不成 means “unable to.” Despite all his efforts, nothing bears fruit.
Is he saying one should be a secluded person in reaction? Or is he implying that meditating in the temple is just as futile? The entire poem is tinged with irony. But that may well be the very reason to become secluded persons, a youren, 幽人: to find spring within.
_________
Amida, the Buddha of Limitless Light. Kamakura period (1185–1333). ca. 1250. Japan. Wood with lacquer, gold leaf, and color. Dimensions: H. 34 5/8 in. (87.9 cm); W. 28 3/4 in. (73 cm); D. 22 3/4 in. (57.8 cm) . Overall (with pedestal): H. 61 in. (154.9 cm); W. 39 in. (99.1 cm); D.39 in. (99.1 cm). TheMet. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/44890
Attendant Bodhisattva Seishi. Kamakura period (1185–1333). late 12th–13th century. Japan. Wood with lacquer, gold paint, gold leaf, and inlaid crystal. Figure: H. 33 in. (83.8 cm); W. 9 3/8 in. (23.8 cm); D. 103/8 in. (26.4 cm) . Pedestal: H. 9 1/4 in. (23.5 cm); W. 14 in. (35.6 cm); D. 11 in. (27.9 cm). TheMet. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/49108
Attendant Bodhisattva Kannon. Kamakura period (1185–1333). late 12th–13th century
Japan. Wood with lacquer, gold paint, gold leaf, and inlaid crystal. Figure: H. 33 in. (83.8 cm); W. 9 1/2 in. (24.1 cm); D. 13 in. (33 cm). Pedestal: H. 9 in. (22.9 cm); W. 14 3/4 in. (37.5 cm); D. 11 1/4 in. (28.6 cm). TheMet.
Line from a Poem by Li Bai. Seigan Sōi. Edo period (1615–1868), early 17th century. Hanging scroll, ink on paper. 48 11/16 × 11 1/4 in. (123.7 × 28.5 cm). TheMet.
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/902217
* https://www.metmuseum.org/exhibitions/the-three-perfections-japanese-poetry-calligraphy-and-painting-from-the-mary-and-cheney-cowles-collection
† https://zh-wikisource-org.translate.goog/wiki/%E9%A1%8C%E6%B1%9F%E5%A4%8F%E4%BF%AE%E9%9D%9C%E5%AF%BA?_x_tr_sl=zh-CN&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=sc