Panjeon Hall Guardian Deities Painting of Bongeunsa Temple

Currently enshrined on the left wall (facing the altar) of Panjeon Hall, this is a sinjungdo — a painting depicting Buddhist guardian deities (sinjung) — created in 1857 as the jungdan, or middle-rank, altar painting for Panjeon Hall. The Seon master Uisun, known as Choui, took part as jeungmyeong (witness and verifier); Donseok, Beobyu, Hyeo, □gyu, □il and Seongnul drew the outline (chulcho); and the master painter-monks (geumeo) Seonyul, Yujin, Beobin and Jinho carried out the work. Although the beginning of the votive inscription (hwagi) is now missing, so the exact date of production cannot be confirmed with certainty, the donor Park Yong-seok is also listed in the "List of Donors for the Regilding of Buddhist Paintings at Bongeunsa Temple" (1857), and the "Record of the Purchase of Rice Paddies for Buddhist Offerings" records that in 1857, the eighth year of King Cheoljong, Great Master Yeonggi and others solicited donations to produce a guardian-deities painting for Panjeon Hall. This suggests that Panjeon Hall was built in 1856 and the painting made the following year, 1857. On a nearly square canvas measuring 237 cm in height and 224.4 cm in width, the guardian deities are arranged neatly in four rows. The first and second rows contain twenty guardian deities centred on Daejajaecheon (Mahesvara), who rides a white ox; the third and fourth rows contain eighteen heavenly beings arranged to either side of Jipgeumgangsin, the vajra-bearing guardian deity. In total thirty-nine figures are depicted, following the format of the "Painting of the Thirty-nine Guardian Deities," which illustrates the thirty-nine guardian deities of the Avatamsaka Sutra. Daejajaecheon, at the centre of the first row, is one of the thirty-nine guardian deities who, according to the first chapter of the Avatamsaka Sutra, the "Chapter on the Wondrous Adornments of the World Rulers," gathered together with Samantabhadra Bodhisattva and countless other bodhisattvas to protect the Buddha while he preached at the bodhimanda in the Magadha forest. Also called Mahesvara, he is shown with three eyes and eight arms, riding a white ox, either with his hands joined in prayer or holding attributes such as the sun and moon, a spear, and a vajra bell. Usually, as seen in the Guardian Deities Paintings of Jikjisa Temple (1789) and Cheoneunsa Temple (1833), only his upper body is shown at the top of the composition together with Brahma and Indra; in the Bongeunsa painting, however, he is depicted at the very bottom centre of the composition, riding the white ox. This iconography was subsequently followed, twenty-four years after this work, in the guardian-deities painting of Yongmunsa Temple.

AI Translation

Where it is

Region

Gangnam-gu, Seoul

Designation

Provincial Tangible Heritage · 시도유형문화유산