Purity of the Moon

Feiyin Tongrong
Chinese, 1593–1662
Yinyuan Longqi (Ingen Ryūki)
Chinese, 1592–1673
Purity of the Moon, 1655
Hanging scroll; ink on paper
83.41

This pair of calligraphed poems is a rare document recording the transfer of the Ōbaku school of Zen Buddhism from China to Japan. The poems were written by two Chinese monks, one living in China and the other in Japan. Both monks were spiritual descendants of Linji Yixuan (d. 866), the founder of the Linji (Rinzai) school of Chan Buddhism, whose teachings influenced Ōbaku. Feiyin Tongrong, the abbot of Wangfusi Temple on Mount Huangbo in southern China, wrote the first poem on the right:

Purity of the Moon
The unchanging, pure nature of the moon is like the Bodhisattva of Compassion;
One realizes this completely when the moon rises.
The thirty-first generation descendant of Lanji, Feiyin [Tong]rong, the old monk of Mt. Jing wrote this in the cyclical year yiwei [1655].

The poem on the left is a response by Linji’s thirty-second descendant Yinyuan Longqi, better known by his Japanese name Ingen Ryūki:

Brilliant light illuminates the three thousand realms;
Its perfect illumination stands me in good stead.
Yinyuan of Huangbo respectfully continued and wrote [this].

One year before writing these poems, in 1654, Ingen traveled to Japan and established the Ōbaku school—now one of the three main Zen schools in Japan. He founded Japan’s most important Ōbaku temple, Mampukuji, where he served as abbot until 1664, when he appointed his disciple Mokuan Shōtō as his successor.

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This painting is a spectacular tour de force of brush work. The bold characters were executed in a quick and fluid style of calligraphy developed to write complicated characters more quickly. The same style also allowed for more personal expression, and thus was considered more suitable for poetry and private correspondence than the precise, clerical script used to write documents. In order to write with such speed, the calligrapher has to have complete mastery of brush, ink, and form. The calligrapher must also be focused and resolute—paper is an unforgiving medium and a moment of hesitation will result in an unsightly blot of ink. Buddhist monks, particularly those who practiced Zen Buddhism (known as Chan Buddhism in Chinese), often employed this rapid style of painting and calligraphy because of the discipline it requires. This painting—which is actually two works joined together—consists of a pair of poems written by two Chinese monks, one living in China and the other in Japan.
The first poem (on the right) is by the monk Feiyin Tongrong, the abbot of the Wangfusi Temple on Mt. Huangbo in Fujian Province, southern China. As Feiyin says in the inscription (and in his seal in the upper right corner), he is the thirty-first spiritual descendant of Linji Yixuan (d. 866), the founder of the Linji sect of Chan Buddhism—perhaps better known by its Japanese appellation, Rinzai Zen.

Provenance research is ongoing for this and many other items in the Eskenazi Museum of Art permanent collection. For more information about the provenance of this artwork, please contact the department curator with specific questions.

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"Purity of the Moon | Collections Online." Collections Online. Sidney and Lois Eskenazi Museum of Art, Indiana University, 2025. https://artmuseum.indiana.edu/collections-online/browse/object.php?number=83.41