Assembly of the 500 rakhans (arhats, lohans). Gouache painting, 17--.

The Buddha is surrounded by scenes of groups of monks and laymen in gardens with rocks and water. The Buddha is flanked by Samantabhadra (Chinese P'u hien) on an elephant and Mañjuśrī (Chinese Wen shu) mounted on a leopard (instead of the usual lion) and holding a pine branch (instead of the usual blue lotus of the Simhanāda Mañjuśrī, the Mañjuśrī with the lion's roar). He is accompanied by Lokapālas (World protectors). The group underneath consistsof the sixteen Arhats. The other groups are presumed to be connected with stories occurring in Chinese Buddhism

The scenes relate to a set of 100 paintings, each of which shows five rakhans, and of which eight are in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts and two are in the Freer Gallery, Washington D.C. Those paintings show similar scenes to the present painting, e.g. rakhans washing clothes, rakhans feeding hungry ghosts, rakhans admiring stupas, scriptures that are not destroyed by flames etc. The series is said to be in Daitoku-ji Temple, Kyoto. The present painting may be a composite picture of the rakhans put together from some of the 100 pictures. There seem to be at least 300 rakhans in the present picture

[between 1700 and 1799?]

1 painting : gouache on paper, surrounded by brocade ; paper 177.5 x 118 cm, brocade 244 x 142.7 cm

Wellcome Collection 23726i