古代“为虎拔刺”文本流传与图像创造——兼谈敦煌行脚僧图像表现的人物集体性

The Ancient Legend about Pulling a Thorn from a Tiger's Paw:From the Text of the Story to Images from the Hagiographies——Plus a Discussion on the Collective Nature of Wondering Monks in Dunhuang Art

从中国古代为虎拔刺的报恩故事入手,首先梳理了其发展和来源,强调了其中印度传说的影响、佛教故事的参照。从文明互鉴的角度,对比了亚欧大陆东西两端对同类故事的发展和创造。基于文本诞生的图像叙事,也与宗教传播过程中对高僧、圣徒类人物的宣扬相结合,成为一种“人间宗教”内涵中的图像模式,代表了一类人物的集体形象,如敦煌发现的伴虎行脚僧图像。宗教人物和猛兽的互动,是宗教宣扬的自然观的体现,将以猛兽为代表的动物作为人物的附属和象征。

Focusing on ancient stories about people curing ailments for animals and receiving rewards in exchange for their generosity, especially the ancient Chinese story of pulling a thorn out of a tiger's paw, this paper begins by deciphering the textual origins and development of the story, highlighting the influence of ancient Indian Buddhist legends and stories, and then compares the creation and development of similar stories in China and western Eurasia. This comparative study is interested in this story as a good example of the mutual learning that occurs between civilizations, in which a legend or a story was passed down to later generations, absorbed into religious literature, and finally became a narrative model for writing stories about the lives of Buddhist monks and saints. As a narrative device developed from these stories, images from Dunhuang of important monks represent a kind of ideal image of what it meant to be a monk: a figure of religion wandering among the people. The interaction of ancient religious figures and animals, as depicted in both texts and images, was intended to accord with the common view of nature at the time, and the animals existed more as converts, guardians, or symbols of the identity of the person who cured them than dangerous beasts.