“The one who can become enlightened in the body of a clam . . . suddenly emerges from the clam.”

 

Hakuin was fond of painting the Bodhisattva Kannon in many different settings, no doubt because he identified with Kannon’s mission to save all sentient beings. This whimsical rendering of Kannon emerging from a partially open clamshell represents one of the thirty-three manifestations of Kannon as described in the Lotus Sutra. The subject also evokes a famous anecdote in which China’s Emperor Wenzong (808–840) attempts to eat a clam but the shell refuses to open; upon lighting incense, however, the shell pops open and gives rise to Kannon.

The Bodhisattva Kannon is an important and ubiquitous figure in Hakuin’s paintings and takes many guises. In this example, Kannon appears to emerge from a clamshell, a subject painted multiple times by the monk.¹ Although this scene may appear comical at first glance, it is truly a clever illustration of one of the most complicated and confounding aspects of Zen Buddhist Dharma: the notion that everything contains the Buddha nature, a topic debated in many Zen dialogues and texts. With this painting, however, Hakuin illustrates this idea more literally, using the well-known and revered figure of Kannon. Beyond simple parody, Hakuin’s painting suggests to viewers and students that even a humble clam, through repeated cycles of suffering and reincarnation, could one day reveal itself to contain the same Buddha nature as embodied by Kannon—and indeed, by extension, all things. This humorous treatment of Kannon is therefore subtly profound, suggesting the interconnectedness and commonalities shared by all of humanity.

 

The idea of Kannon emerging from a clamshell can be traced back to the fourth chapter of the Chinese Song Dynasty text The Records of the Lamp (in Chinese, Ching-te Ch’uan teng lu; in Japanese, Keitoku Dentō-roku), which was first published around the beginning of the eleventh century. The story, in which Kannon manifests in myriad forms in response to the needs and prayers of her worshippers, was known in Japan as early as the Kamakura period (1185–1333), and the specific iconography of the clamshell Kannon was published in Japan during the late seventeenth century, though Hakuin appears to have been the first to use the story as a theme in Zen painting.²        

           

—Bradley Bailey