敦煌莫高窟第159窟文殊、普贤赴会图——莫高窟第159窟初探之一

On the Pictures of Congregating Manjusri and Samantabhadra in Cave 159 of the Mogao Grottoes——A Preliminary Study on Contents of the Murals in Cave 159(partⅠ)

莫高窟第159窟,是吐蕃统治敦煌时期(敦煌艺术中分期为中唐)的代表窟。根据文殊菩萨赴会图下屏风画内所绘五台山图,可知此窟修建于唐长庆四年(公元824年)以后不久。此时正是吐蕃在政治、经济上相对稳定阶段,也是吐蕃时期敦煌艺术的成熟期。

Cave 159 of the Mogao Grattoes,which was built nat long after 824A. D. is a typical Tibetan cave. The pictures of Congregating Manjusri and Samantabhadra depicted by the use of frech, light elegant colours, add up to an artistic style already removed from the colorful grandeur of prosperous Tang period. The facial features of the figures are quite elegant and lean already departing from full and round. The artist concentrated his efforts on depicting the figure's inner heart and mind.The pictures of Congregating Manjusri and Samantabhadra were originally denominated in the past'stories of Manjusri and Samantabhadra', but we have not found the independent text illustrating the contents of them. So the denomination of them was only done as one identified. The author now denominates them the picture of Congregating Manjusri and picture of Congreating Samantabhadra in accordance with their positions in the cave and dynamic stateThere is a green-faced and long-toothed yaksa with a baby in his hand standing behind eight classes of brave divine beings in the picture of Congregating Manjusri. The author thinks that he shauld be called 'Hariti'. There is an account of this figure in sutras 'Ken Pen shuo i chieh yu pu pi nai yeh tsa shih'in 31 roll and 'Kuei tzu mu ching' 'Hariti' is a Sanskrit word which means 'blue'. It had been a yaksa who had been fond of eating children before and then if became a god of protecting children. Taking all this into consideration,the author thinks that the yaksa in the picture should be tentativellg denominated Hariti