The Mongolian Artist Zanabazar and the Mongol Devotion to the Future Buddha Maitreya

The statue of Maitreya is attributed to Zanabazar (1635–1723), an eminent Mongolian sculptor, architect, Buddhist teacher, and political leader. Maitreya, the buddha of the future, appears in a standing bodhisattva form as a slim and youthful figure holding a ritual ewer (kundika) in his left hand and assuming a gesture of discourse (vitarka mudra) with his right hand lifted to his chest. Maitreya’s second main attribute, a stupa, is piled high on the hair. A deer skin, another attribute of Maitreya, is seen hanging on the left shoulder.

Maitreya displays a slight movement as he stands with his right leg forward, leaning on it and subtly shifting his weight. The lower part of the body is covered by a garment (dhoti), which is made to appear transparent to reveal the shape of the youthful figure and the legs in motion. As the sculpture is cast in bronze, it required a high level of artistry to render the translucence and lightness of the garment. The sculpture is elegant in other details as well, such as the dhoti tied in a flamboyant bow at the waist, and a broad sash that stretches diagonally across the hips, enhancing the delicate liveliness of the figure. A beaded chain that represents a Brahmanic “sacred thread” stretches from the left shoulder across the body, creating a stylish loop under the sash as a skillfully made sartorial ornament. These details augment the voluminosity of the sculpture in a visually subtle, delicate way, as they make asymmetrical linear patterns on the smooth planar surfaces.1 As several scholars have shown, this sculpture follows an early, twelfth-century, Nepalese-inspired Maitreya in Nartang Monastery in Tibet, currently lost.2 Lotus thrones in the sculptures by Zanabazar are distinct, their round shapes decorated with symmetrically arranged lotus leaves and accentuated with tiny beads, whereas the Newari style is seen in a suave S shape of the posture, the details of the jewelry, and the sartorial ornamentations. Maitreya stands on two platform; the entire sculpture, including the pedestals, is worked all around, and the finely detailed craftsmanship continues on the back as well. All these details indicate the style of works known to be by Zanabazar. He sculpted several similar sculptures of Maitreya, two of which are currently in the Choijin Lama Temple Museum (fig. 2), Gandan Tegchinling Monastery (fig. 3), in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, with others located elsewhere.3

Zanabazar

Zanabazar was a descendant of Chinggis Khan (ca. 1162–1227) and was enthroned as the First Jibzundamba reincarnation of the Tibetan historian of the Jonang tradition, Taranatha (1575–1634), at the age of five. In 1639 two khans of Khalkha Mongolia, his own father, Tüshiyetü Khan Gombodorji (1594–1655), and his close ally, Setsen Khan (1577–1652), assembled with other Khalkha noblemen for this occasion, which is recorded in Zanabazar’s first biography, written by his disciple, a learned monk, Zaya Pandita Lubsangperinlei (1642–1715).4

Zanabazar was the first of altogether eight historical Jibzundamba reincarnations (Khutugtus) of Khalkha Mongolia, the first two identified among the Tüshiyetü Khan’s family and the remaining seven discovered in central Tibet.5 The discovery of Tibetan reincarnations to rule in Khalkha Mongolia came about because of a shift in Inner Asian power struggles and the rise of the Qing court in Beijing, which now intervened and approved the new Jibzundamba reincarnations. Zanabazar’s recognition of this new lineage connecting to Jonang tradition was a Mongol initiative and was later “confirmed” by the Fifth Dalai Lama of Tibet (1617–1682), who sent him a letter from the Potala Palace in 1645, and by the Fourth Panchen Lama (1570– 1662) in 1651.6 Zanabazar remained active in the social and political life of the region, personally visiting and establishing important alliances with the Tibetan and Qing hierarchs. Thus, he traveled to Tibet twice, visiting monasteries in eastern and central Tibet in 1649–51; in 1655 he made a shorter visit to Tashilhunpo, the main seat of the Fourth Panchen Lama. It was at Tashilhunpo, that Zanabazar took his monastic novice getsul vows and received important teachings and initiations from the Panchen Lama, whom he considered his main teacher.

On returning home to Khalkha, Zanabazar disseminated Buddhist teachings among the Khalkha nomads, built monasteries, and created art. He was also a political leader of the Khalkha Mongols and spent many years in Beijing after the Khalkha Mongols’ submission to the Qing in 1691 to become a vassal state. Zanabazar was a close friend of the Qing Kangxi emperor (1654–1722). He aided the emperor with healing rituals, consecrated and repaired sacred images, and provided empowerments and rituals for imperial family members.7 Zanabazar died in Beijing and was later entombed in Amurbayasgalantu, a special monastery in northern Mongolia, which was built by the Qing Yongzheng emperor (1678–1735) in memory of his father.

Zanabazar’s biographers describe him as an avid artist who sculpted precious Buddhist images “with his own hands.”8 Zanabazar’s images suggest a pantheon of deities, including buddhas and bodhisattvas that are seminal to Buddhist practice (fig. 4).9 He also made images for his foreign allies, teachers, and patrons. For instance, Zanabazar painted images of Tsongkhapa for Jakhyung Monastery in Amdo, and sculpted a buddha statue and “three gilded sculptures of Manjushri” for the Qing emperor around 1700. Some of these sculptures are still in Beijing.10

In his dharma seat Ribogejai-Gandan-Shaddubling in northern Mongolia, Zanabazar led a considerable sculpting workshop, creating locally an entire iconographic program with monumental buddhas, mahabodhisattvas, and over three thousand clay buddha sculptures.11 Moreover, Zanabazar designed a new assembly hall for his monasteries based on a tent design (fig. 5). The development of his yurt (ger) into a mobile monastery in Yekhe Khüriye also began with Zanabazar.

Zanabazar’s Engagement with Maitreya

Zanabazar had a special interest in Maitreya, as evidenced in his several sculptures of Maitreya and the rituals of Maitreya he conducted in Mongolia. Bodhisattva Maitreya sculptures were used in the annual ritual Maitreya Procession, held in Geluk monasteries in Mongolia and Tibet (fig. 6). During the Maitreya Procession, the image of Maitreya and Maitreya’s texts are carried by the monks in a cart and followed by the lay public, a ritual particularly favored in the Geluk tradition. In Mongolia, several characteristic details in performing this ritual emerge. Unlike Tibetan monasteries, which perform the ritual during the Great Prayer Festival in the early days of the Lunar New Year, the Maitreya Procession in Mongolia is carried out in late spring or early summer. Placing the Maitreya sculpture in a green wooden horse chariot decorated with the colors of the Five Buddhas is also unique to Mongolia. Attendant monks and lay devotees accompany the cart carrying the Maitreya statue, circumambulating the monastery (fig. 7). Another Mongolian hallmark, mentioned in textual records, suggests that the Jibzundamba Khutugtus’ Maitreya Procession was carried out in conjunction with the long-life ritual known as tenzhuk. The Maitreya Procession at Erdeni Juu began in 1657, when Zanabazar’s twenty-third birthday was celebrated. In 1681 it was carried out again in Erdeni Juu for Zanabazar’s forty-seventh birthday.12

One clear source of Zanabazar’s interest in Maitreya was in Tashilhunpo Monastery’s Maitreya Lhakhang, where the First Dalai Lama, Gendun Drub (1391–1474), built a monumental seated Maitreya statue in 1461, and where Zanabazar’s teacher, the Panchen Lama, had his artists create three monumental statues of Maitreya, inscribed in lanydza (Nepali: Ranjana) and Mongolian scripts, thereby suggesting that the patrons of the statues included Mongol noblemen.13 Zanabazar’s Maitreya statues were copied in the eighteenth century until this standing form of Maitreya Bodhisattva lost its popularity in Mongolia and was replaced by a seated form of Buddha Maitreya (fig. 8), which was also produced in monumental dimensions akin to monumental sculptures of Maitreya in Geluk monasteries across Inner Asia.14 The Fifth Jibzundamba (1815–1841) initiated and supported several projects focused on Maitreya in Yekhe Khüriye. In 1833 Yekhe Khüriye’s abbot Agwang Khayidub (1779–1838) built a new colossal Maitreya statue measuring about 54 feet (16.5 meters) high, which he placed in the Maitreya Temple designated specifically to house that statue and built in 1820–1822 in a Tibeto-Mongolian architectural style.15 Agwang Khayidub wrote numerous texts about Maitreya, whereas his patron, the Fifth Jibzundamba, built a new Gandan (Maitreya’s Heaven) Monastery in Yekhe Khüriye in 1838. The Mongolian interest in Maitreya continues to this day, as Zanabazar’s Maitreya sculpture is now developed into a new monumental statue for a state-of-the-art satellite town on the outskirts of Ulaanbaatar (fig. 9).16 When completed, the new colossal Maitreya will measure 177 feet (54 meters) in height.