James Baquet

    jamesbaquet@gmail.com

    For a small temple, Wutai Mountain’s Tayuan (Pagoda Yard) really has a lot to see.

    First, of course, is the titular pagoda itself. This milk-bottle-style structure serves as a symbol for the entire mountain, standing as it does at the base of Bodhisattva Peak. Accounts vary, but it seems to have been built in the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), and it stands about 75 meters high.

    Elsewhere on the grounds is an ornate sutra cabinet in its own hall, which with several other buildings forms the compound around the pagoda.

    A side-yard contains a couple of unusual features. One is a hall in which Mao Zedong is said to have slept when he passed this way April 9, 1948. Inside is a statue of the chairman, as well as a reconstruction of how the interior of the room may have looked at the time.

    In this same side compound stands a second pagoda, smaller than the main one, with a fascinating legend attached. An old lady once appeared at the temple with a child, a baby, and a dog. She and the child were fed, and more was given reluctantly for the baby and the dog. When she asked for still more, the monks refused her. She then manifested herself as Manjushri, the Bodhisattva of Wisdom. The child and baby were her companions, and the dog was a lion. She scolded the monks for discriminating against her, and left behind some gold strands of hair, now enshrined in the smaller pagoda.

    I wonder what the kernel of truth is that led to the creation of this story?The milk-bottle-shaped pagoda at Tayuan on Wutai Mountain.

    James Baquet