Toshiya Unebe
Graduate School of Letters, Nagoya University
Among the scenes of the Buddha’s biography depicted in temple uposatha halls in Thailand, the scene of the teaching of his mother in Tāvatiṃsa Heaven is often positioned centrally behind the main Buddha image. Moreover, the scene probably provides the basic concept of the mural as a whole. In the scene of the Tāvatiṃsa teaching, we usually find Sakka (Indra) at the side of the Buddha, with surrounding rows of male and female deities as the audience. Usually on the opposite side of Sakka, a saluting female figure is depicted. The present speaker has identified her as the mother of the Buddha, Mahāmāyā.
In the Theragāthā, a disciple Kāḷudāyin reports that Mahāmāyā passed away after the delivery of the Bodhisatta, Prince Siddhattha, and then she was reborn in Tusita Heaven. According to the commentary, however, she was reborn as a male. Therefore, as far as the Pali commentary is concerned, the above identification should be questionable. In Thailand, Mahāmāyā is not just regarded as the one who gave birth to the Bodhisatta, she is also the one who receives the Abhidhamma, the most profound teaching of the Buddha. In this sense, she represents women intellectuals in the realms of humans and deities.
In this presentation, I will show the scene in question as found in murals found in Thonburi, Thailand and an illustration in a folded paper manuscript. Then I examine related Pali passages. Lastly, I will show and examine the Japanese images of the Mahāparinirvāṇa, in which Mahāmāyā is always depicted as a female.
(Presented in the 2013 Chulalongkorn Asian Heritage Forum: The Emergence and Heritage of Asian Women Intellectuals, 10-11 September 2013, Imperial Queen’s Park Hotel, Bangkok, organized by Institute of Thai Studies, Institute of Asian Studies, Faculty of Arts and Indian Studies Center, Chulalongkorn University)