Monju- Japanese GodDeity"Bodhisattva of Wisdom"

The Silence of Vimalakīrti

In the Vimalakīrti Nirdeśa Sūtra, the layman Vimalakīrti falls ill, and the Buddha sends his disciples to inquire after him. One by one, the great bodhisattvas refuse. Each recalls a past encounter in which Vimalakīrti reduced them to silence with a question they could not answer. Only Monju agrees to go.

The two meet in Vimalakīrti's small room, which somehow holds thousands of bodhisattvas, and they debate the nature of nonduality. Monju speaks brilliantly. Then he turns the question back to his host: what is the entrance to nonduality? Vimalakīrti says nothing. He simply sits. His silence is the answer, and Monju recognizes it as such.

The Sword on the Lion

Japanese sculptors carved Monju as a youth. Where other bodhisattvas are serene, Monju is alert, poised on his lion mount as though about to speak. In his right hand he holds the riken, a sword wreathed in flame. In his left, a scroll of scripture rests on a lotus stem.

The lion beneath him roars. In Buddhist teaching this is the shishi-ku, the proclamation of dharma that no opposition can withstand. At Abe Monju-in in Nara Prefecture, a Kamakura-period sculpture by Kaikei shows Monju riding at the head of a procession, his lion stepping forward, four attendants walking beside him. The group crosses the sea: a depiction of Monju's legendary journey to Mount Wutai in China, where he was believed to reside.

Three Heads

Sannin yoreba Monju no chie (三人寄れば文殊の知恵): when three people put their heads together, they match the wisdom of Monju. The proverb survives in daily Japanese speech, a bodhisattva's name turned into a common measure of cleverness.

Monju's Kitchen and Monju's Poor

In Tendai monasteries, Monju presides over the kitchen and dining hall. His image watches over the preparation and eating of food. Chopping vegetables is practice. Eating in silence is practice. Monju oversees it all.

Outside the monastery, his patronage took a different form. In the thirteenth century, the Shingon Ritsu monk Eison and his disciple Ninshō organized charitable works under Monju's name: feeding the destitute, treating lepers, building roads and bridges. Ninshō alone is said to have treated over 57,000 sick and built 189 bridges.

Each spring, students still crowd Monju's shrines before examination season. At Abe Monju-in and at Chion-ji on the coast at Amanohashidate, they buy wooden prayer tablets and write their hopes for the year's tests. The keeper of the flaming sword now also hears the prayers of teenagers hoping to pass their university entrance exams.