JĀTAKA, ILLUSTRATIONS OF

Visual jātakas do not simply illustrate verbal jātakas (birth stories) but share equal status with them. Each is a unique narrative belonging to a genre of stories existing in a community of memory rather than in a specific verbal version. Except for the Viśvantara Jātaka, individual jātakas are rarely narrated in isolation. They usually participate in larger texts, which occasionally have counterparts in literary genres. Since these larger texts are expressions of different Buddhisms in various times and places, jĀtaka narratives should be viewed in their embedded textual and sociocultural contexts.

Despite the acknowledged antiquity of the 547 Pāli verse jātakas, the earliest datable physical jātaka narratives are the visual ones on the Bhārhut stūpa railing (ca. first century b.c.e.). With the exception of the coping reliefs, the Bhārhut jātakas belong to a larger text that includes other kinds of narratives, such as incidents from the Buddha's life, avadĀnas, and "legends" concerning historical figures. The Bhārhut coping takes the form of an s-shaped lotus vine-cum-garland, within each of whose lower curves a jātaka is narrated. Hence, the coping functions as a unified text of the JĀtakamĀlĀ (garland of jātakas) genre.

The Borobudur stūpa contains another sculpted example of a unified jātaka cycle within a larger monumental text, which is possibly an extended biography of the Buddha. Similar cycles proliferate in the murals of the pre-Tang (ca. 421–640 c.e.) Silk Road cave monasteries of Kucha and in various media in Burmese stŪpas and temples from the eleventh century onward, especially at Pagan. Burma has the longest and most prolific tradition of visual jātakas, which ceramists, painters, and woodcarvers narrate individually, in small groups, or in cycles. For example, glazed tiles line the upper circumambulatory terraces of the Ananda Tem-ple, composing a cycle of 554 jātakas, prefaced by events from the Buddha's last birth on the lower terraces. The main hall narratives of AjaṆṬa's fifth-century caves 1 and 17 compose monumental jātakāmalās, which are framed and bracketed by the cave's porch, shrine antechamber, and shrine. The latter narrate important events from the Buddha's ministry and represent cosmic landscapes and beings often shown worshiping the Buddha.

How do visual jātakas function? Buddhist texts do not narrate jātakas concerning other buddhas and all buddhas perform the same deeds in their last births. Thus, the significant presence of jātakas in a Buddhist monastery indicates that Śākyamuni Buddha and his worship are the focus of Buddhist practice and belief there. Further, visual jātakas re-create the Bodhisattva's marvelous deeds as models to be imitated and as transcendental actions to be worshiped, characterizing his nature as human and supramundane. Architecture and style express this visually, as in the jātaka cycles painted on the sloping ceilings of the Kizil caves and in the idealized naturalism of paintings at Ajaṇṭā. Finally, jātaka cycles allow Buddhist pilgrims to follow the Buddha's steps by walking through his previous lives.

See also:Buddha, Life of the, in Art; Dunhuang; Sūtra Illustrations

Bibliography

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Girard-Geslan, Maud, et al. Art of Southeast Asia, tr. J. A. Underwood. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1998.

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Leela Aditi Wood