Indian Art: A History of Indian Art from the Earliest Times up to the Third Century A.D. c13.s5.16

c13.s5.16

The word Bodhisattva literally means one who is destined or worthy of attaining the *Bodhi* or enlightenment, i. e. a being on the path of *Sambodhi*. The Buddha himself was a Bodhisattva up to the age of thirty-five years, i. e. before his enlightenment at Bodhgaya. After the great enlightenment he became entitled to the epithet Buddha i. e. ‘the Enlightened One.’ The first part of his life of thirty-five years is also divided into two portions, viz. his palace life as a prince up to the age of twenty-nine when he was dressing himself in the robes and ornaments worthy of royalty, and when he became a recluse at the age of twenty-nine he gave up his costly dress and jewels and donned the *trichīvara*. The question which must have presented before the monks and the artists alike was whether the Buddha should be represented with or without royal dress. Here the evidence of the earliest sculptures is of value to us. The several early sculptures in the Mathura school throw significant light on this point. Whether they are standing images of muscular built and big size as the Sarnath Bodhisattva of the year three of Kanishka or the Maholī Bodhisattva, or slender seated type like the Katra Bodhisattva and Anyor Bodhisattva (both of which are undated but by the consensus of opinion of all scholars are among the earliest images made in Mathura school). [Figs. 146-7]. We find that it is the later phase of Gautama as Bodhisattva wearing monk's dress that was accepted for representation. It may be imagined that after sometime the urge to represent the Buddha in human form also must have become irresistible then it was found necessary to reorient the two types of images, the one without ornaments was chosen for that of the Buddha and the other with ornaments and royal dress became the type of the Bodhisattva image. When the artists were called upon to evolve a formula of the Buddha image they were not without a precedent, in the form of earlier examples of divine images.