“Mr. Moon, how old are you? Thirteen? Seven?”

A monk in the Hakuin lineage, Nantenbō brought the Zen traditions of the past into the twentieth century, reviving the reforms and practices of Hakuin’s reformed Rinzai, which he believed to be a more pure form of Zen. With this ensō, Nantenbō continues Hakuin’s revolutionary practice of integrating popular culture and contemporary vernacular language into his sermons and paintings, here using a children’s song about the moon. Far from tongue-in-cheek, the juvenile lyrics are meant to suggest the brief and ephemeral nature of human life when compared to the eternally present moon, whose ancient age defies comprehension, making us seem like confused children in comparison.

 

—Bradley Bailey