Now here is a really interesting and controversial garden personality. He is credited with designing some famous gardens, including Tenryuji and Saihoji. Some see him as a devout Buddhist and brilliant spiritual garden designer, others as a mere politician with refined aesthetics.

Born in 1275, he was a Zen priest and studied Buddhism devoutly from an extremely young age. He studied Tendai and Shingon Buddhism for a long time before switching to Zen. Some Western critics cite the fact that he was never able to detach completely from scripture (a requirement of Zen) as a reason to doubt his sincere adherence to Zen, along with the fact he had at one time 1,300 disciples, a ridiculous number considering the master is supposed to directly transmit enlightenment to his disciples. He was also never far from the center of power whether it was with the shoguns in Kamakura and then in Kyoto or with the emperor during a brief wresting of power from the shoguns.

I’ve been reading a new Japanese book called "Muso Soseki: Nihon teien wo kiwameta zenso" (Translation: "Muso Soseki: The Zen Priest who Mastered the Japanese Garden") by Shunmyo Masuno (NHK Books, 2005). Shunmyo Masuno is a Zen priest and garden builder of great repute. Shunmyo Masuno’s book paints a very positive picture of Muso, although that’s what one might expect from a fellow Zen priest.

Something interesting I came across recently is Princeton Professor Martin Collcutt’s paper on Muso Soseki, published in "The Origins of Japan’s Medieval World: Courtiers, Clerics, Warriors, and Peasants in the Fourteen Century" (Stanford, 1997). Professor Collcutt feels Muso has been unfairly judged by some and deserves more credit for being religiously devout. He notes, among other things, that the Japanese are famous for their eclecticism and that Muso seemed to have felt it was all right to incorporate aspects of Tendai and Shingon in his Zen. Prof. Collcutt also notes that monks of his day very frequently moved constantly from place to place, a behavior for which Muso had been criticized. Collcutt notes that although Muso was repeatedly appointed to prominent positions in key temples by the country’s most powerful, he always refused initially and only accepted the appointments after repeated requests. Etc.

Wybe Kuitert ("Themes in the History of Japanese Garden Art") and others describe Muso as more of a politician than a sincerely religious person. Another interesting twist is that Kuitert feels Muso would have been incapable of designing Tenryuji, and that it was actually designed by a Chinese priest who was there at the same time.

Professor Paul Varley of Columbia University also treats Muso with skepticism in his paper "Ashikaga Yoshimitsu and the World of Kitayama: Social Change and Shogunal Patronage in Early Muromachi Japan" found in the book "Japan in the Muromachi Age" edited by John Hall and Toyoda Takeshi (Cornell, 2001).

(BTW, in connection with recent threads: Muso talks in his writings about meditating IN GARDENS with the Ashikaga shoguns, with whom he was close.)

The questions remain --- was Muso Soseki really devout, or was he more of a politician? Did he really design Tenryuji and other gardens?

Does anyone have an opinion on this?

Lee

If Muso Soseki was indeed a poseur, then I'd like to know more about the Chinese priest responsible for those designs..

Jack

It’s an interesting idea, isn’t it? Wybe Kuitert suggests it might have been a Chinese priest named Lanqi Daolong.

In addition to what Wybe said in a lecture about Tenryuji, here are some excerpts from "Themes in the History of Japanese Garden Art" on the subject (from pp. 81-82):

"Many writers on Japanese garden art ascribe the garden [Tenryuji] to Muso Kokushi. This attribution starts with a popular eighteenth-century garden book (Kitamura 1735…) and is also found in an old tourist book on the celebrated gardens and sights of Kyoto (Akisato 1799)…….

"Theories of Song landscape painting are skillfully applied in the waterfall arrangement of rocks at the pond shore. Generally speaking this rather sudden appearance of Song-influenced rock work cannot be ascribed to an indigenous Japanese like Muso. Muso himself could not have had such detailed knowledge; and he did not paint; and he never went to China. Besides, Song landscape painting was not yet being imported on a large scale……

"The appearance of Song-painting-inspired rock work in Tenryuji, then, is too sudden to be ascribed to an indigenous Japanese……. Besides the waterfall arrangement, the concept of pond and hillock with winding pathways in between rows of rocks used as retainers is so typically Chinese in concept that one also hesitates on this point to attribute it to an early medieval Japanese. Another reason to attribute the design to a Chinese artist is the so-called carp stone halfway up the waterfall….. At the side of the upper step of the waterfall is a curved stone with a split tip, quite suggestively representing a fish jumping the rapids. It is generally accepted that this stone relates to the Chinese legend of a carp that, after successfully ascending the gorges of the Yellow River at Lung Men (Dragon Gate), will turn into a dragon…… The carp stone leads to another hypothetical attribution of the waterfall rock grouping to the Chinese Lanqi Daolong (Jpn. Rankei Doryu). This Zen priest came to Kyoto for three years to deal with questions on Zen matters at the court of ex-Emperor Go Saga, whose palace was located at the present site of the Tenryuji temple. Two other temples that Lanqi Daolong revived during short periods of residence have the same type of Dragon Gate waterfall….. Again, no documentary evidence exists that proves his engagement in constructing these Dragon Gate waterfalls……"

Lee

Yes, there would definitely seem to be grounds for suspicion - and most telling is the fact that there's no evidence of his painting, working drawings etc and no documentation of his ever being involved with any construction work... even if one could overlook the fact that he never travelled to China..

Jack

Please contact to Cady. we send you email but we din't get call from you.

Jack
Muso kokushi did not traveled to china. But he is mastermined building Tenryu ji sen/ Tenryuji ship, trading ship to china for trade. Tenryuji temple was able to complete constraction from profit of the trade by Tenryuji ship. also at the time , many Chinese monks came to Japan escape from Mongolian. ( many Buddhism monks were killed in china by Mongolians.) Between China and Japan did not have formal relationship at the time.

Most temples havelong history of its record. often those recorded history of temple and monks of the Temples are not open to public. Muso kokushi traveled often. Tenryu ji may not have recoreded countryside temples which Muso kokushi worked on thire gardens. It is highly posibility of record of Muso kokushi existing are not discovered yet.

Plese forgive misspelings and 4th grade English.
mike