Carrying Out Acts of Service in the Buddhist Community

In 1469 master artisans of the Kathmandu Valley put pigment to cloth to commemorate the life and passing of the Indian Buddhist monk, scholar (pandita), and teacher Vanaratna (1384–1468). The cloth painting (paubha), a masterful early example of Newar painting in the medieval Malla period (ca. 1385–1769), was likely commissioned by the community of Gopichandra Monastery, Vanaratna’s seat in the city of Patan, shortly after his passing. The paubha bears a Newari inscription describing two large-scale alms distributions Vanaratna performed at Gopichandra, and provides us with the date and year of his passing. The main image presents a vibrant and detailed scene of one of these alms distributions, but instead of depicting Vanaratna, it features a large female figure flanked by two smaller women handing out alms to a diverse crowd of alms seekers. The inscription does not provide the names of the artists, but it bears clear stylistic similarities with another masterwork of fifteenth-century Newar artistry, a portrait of Gaganasim Bharo of Dolakha and his wives Ashayani Lakshmi and Jivatana.1 These similarities strongly suggest that the paubha commemorating Vanaratna’s passing was made by Adyayaraja Puna and Udrayarama Puna of Kathmandu, or in the atelier in which they worked.2 The two artists made a number of important innovations in Newar art and specifically portraiture, some of which—including the depiction of the female form and the prominence given to human figures in relation to the divine—are evident in the unattributed paubha commissioned by the Gopichandra community.3

The Pandita Vanaratna

The painting is of great significance both as a work of high Newar art and for the historical data it offers us on its subject, the Buddhist master Vanaratna (fig. 2). Born in 1384 in the town of Sadnagara near what is now the border of Bangladesh and Myanmar (Burma), Vanaratna received his early training at the local Mahachaitya monastery. After completing his studies and taking full ordination, he traveled to Sri Lanka, where he spent six years studying at the island’s leading Buddhist institutions. He then returned to India, first studying in the Krishna River valley before proceeding to the ancient heartland of the Buddhist world, Bodhgaya. Vanaratna remained there for six years, but the attenuation of the Buddhist community and the derelict condition of its once-great monuments left him dissatisfied, compelling him to leave India for the Himalayan kingdoms of Nepal and Tibet and their thriving Buddhist communities. He arrived in the Kathmandu Valley in 1423, and spent the remainder of his life traveling between Nepal and Tibet, becoming a teacher celebrated by the leading Newar and Tibetan Buddhist figures of the day and patronized by royal courts on both sides of the Himalayas. In roughly 1438, Vanaratna was given Gopichandra Monastery in Patan, known in Newari as Pintu Bahi (fig. 3), which became his home and spiritual seat. He died in his private chambers at Gopichandra in 1468.4

The Inscription and Image

In the upper-left corner of the painting, a Newari inscription records three important events in Vanaratna’s later years at Gopichandra: his large alms distribution in 1455, a similar rite in 1467, and the date and year of his death. The food distributions are described in detail, including the diverse assembly of supplicants and the varieties of offerings made. These details are corroborated with remarkable consistency in the biography of Vanaratna composed by his Tibetan disciple and colleague Sonam Gyatso (1424–1482), who also confirms the date of Vanaratna’s passing recorded in the inscription: midnight on Monday, the seventh day of the dark fortnight in the month of Margashirsha (November–December) in Nepala Samvat 589 (1468).

The image depicts an alms distribution at Gopichandra, though the inscription does not clarify if it is related to one of the events recorded there or a later distribution led by the Gopichandra community. The left half of the image is arrayed with a diverse group of supplicants approaching three women dispensing alms. The inscription, the details of the painting, and textual sources all concur that the crowd included Buddhist monastics, non-Buddhist mendicants, and lay people, among whom were musicians and beggars. The right half of the image is taken up by a large portrait of a woman distributing alms with her right hand and holding a lotus elegantly in her left. She is flanked by two women who, like the central figure, are dressed in fine garments. Four seated figures adorn the upper-right corner of the image, and though they are not identified by name, their position suggests them to be the patrons of the image or prominent members of the Gopichandra community. Interspersed between the figures are various flowers and ritual utensils that add to the festive imagery. The entire image is surrounded by a decorative border and sewn into a brocade frame. The painting is faded, worn, and incomplete, and its inscription is nearly illegible; however, a copy of the image commissioned by the Gopichandra community in 1862 clarifies many of the details of the original image, provides a more legible reading of the inscription, and demonstrates that the 1469 painting is likely missing an upper register that contained an image of an unidentified buddha surrounded by monastics and flanked by Buddhist adepts and other buddhas (fig. 4). That this upper register was included in the original image is suggested by traces of ornamental features still evident at the top of the original painting.

The identity of the large female figure is a matter of some debate that has been the primary focus of previous scholarship on this image. Some propose that the main figure is Vanaratna’s widow distributing alms,5 and cite Vanaratna’s biographies to argue that Vanaratna abandoned his monastic status and took a wife while living in Kathmandu, a custom common among Newar Vajracharyas in more recent times.6 This reading of Vanaratna’s biography is inaccurate and incomplete, however, as it ignores substantial evidence that Vanaratna placed great importance on his monastic ordination, even if he did rely on a consort in specific esoteric ritual contexts.

A more plausible, but ultimately unsatisfying argument is made by Dina Bangdel, who asserts that the main female figure is the white form of the female deity Tara.7 Her argument is based on the figure’s iconography and prominence, other minor details from the image, and proposed connections between Vanaratna and Tibetan lineages of White Tara practice. The textual and lineage connections Bangdel proposes are tenuous, however, as the sources she cites date four centuries after Vanaratna’s passing and cannot be directly linked with Vanaratna’s biography or extant writings. There is also little evidence to suggest White Tara was of specific relevance to either Vanaratna or the Gopichandra community. The key iconographic features and details that in Bangdel’s argument identify the figure as Tara—specifically the figure’s hand gestures and the ritual objects arrayed throughout the image—are in fact stylistic motifs also used in the previously mentioned secular portrait of Gaganasim Bharo and his wives, a portrait likely made by the same artists or in the same artist collective. While the prominence of the female figure in the image and the fact that she holds a lotus lends some support to Bangdel’s claim, the evidence is insufficient to identify her as Tara.8

While her scale and placement suggest she is someone of importance, it is notable that the woman is not mentioned in the inscription. It is also notable that Vanaratna himself is not pictured, despite the fact that his is the only name provided in the inscription that exclusively describes his activities at Gopichandra Monastery. If, as the 1862 copy of the image indicates, the alms distribution scene is in the lower frame of what was originally a two-frame image, then the painting discussed here would be subordinate to the missing image of a buddha above. It is therefore perhaps not intended to be the primary focal point of the painting.

If we leave the mystery of the woman’s identity unsolved, a different interpretation comes into focus: the image is not meant to depict a specific individual, but rather represents the Gopichandra community as a whole. As we know from his biography, Vanaratna used the gold he amassed throughout his career to establish a food bank at Gopichandra that continued to serve the people of the Kathmandu Valley long after he passed away. The anonymity of the main figures focuses our attention not on an individual, but on the community carrying out the acts of service instigated and inspired by their spiritual leader. Thus, as this exceptional image attests, it was a dynamic depiction of the community, rather than a formal portrait of Vanaratna, that was selected to memorialize his passing and serve as a remembrance for the vital community he left behind.