Wu Zetian and Buddhist Art of the Tang Dynasty

Tang Studies 20-21 (2002-03) Wu Zetian and Buddhist Art of the Tang Dynasty PATRICIA E. KARETZKY BARD COLLEGE Empress Wu Zetian (^UlR r. 690-705), the only woman to hold imperial power in her own name, had a dramatic impact on Chinese society. Opinions of her accomplishments as a ruler and as a moral exemplar are contradictory. Chinese historians have portrayed her as a successful consolidator of power and as an inventive administrator who was at the same time a murderous and manipulative ruler. More recently, the bias of native historians has been questioned and attention drawn to contemporary historical records that were positive.1 Evaluations of her manifold contributions to Tang society are varied, but in one regard, opinion of Empress Wu is consistent: she is recognized as having been a generous supporter of Buddhism. Brought to court as a concubine, she entered a Buddhist nunnery with the death of the second Tang emperor, Taizong.2 After a while she re-entered the harem, in 651, and through a series of advantageous circumstances she became the favorite of Emperor Gaozong. Soon she replaced the childless Empress Wang (3LJa) in his affections and began her ascent to the throne, which was 1 There are several Western studies of Empress Wu, including C.P. Fitzgerald, Empress Wu (London: Cresset Press, 1968); R.W.L. Guisso, Wu Tse-t'ien and the Politics of Legitimation in Tang China (Bellingham: Western Washington Univ. Press, 1978); Denis Twitchett and Howard Wechsler, "Kao Tsung and the Empress Wu: The Inheritor and the Usurper/' in The Cambridge History of China, vol. 3, ed Twitchett (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1979), 280ff. See also Twitchett, The Writing of Official History under the Tang (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1992), 143ff., who points out that it was not until the ninth century that Tang historians first questioned her legitimacy. 2 Tainted by the death of Emperor Taizong, she entered the nunnery as an exconcubine in retreat from society. This was a common practice at the time. 113 Karetzky: Wu Zetian and Buddhist Art achieved in 655 when she was installed as Empress at the age of 32. Emperor Gaozong's regard for her was such that he often consulted with her, earning them the title of Twin Sages.3 When the emperor became sick in 660, suffering from a stroke that may have incapacitated him, her power steadily increased. When he died, in 683, she assumed the throne; and in 684 she changed the name of the dynasty to that of the fief with which her father had been posthumously invested, Zhou $*, and became its first ruler. BUDDHIST ACTIVITIES Diverging from the precedent established by earlier Tang emperors , in 691 Empress Wu ensconced Buddhism as the state religion , giving it prominence over Daoism and Confucianism. But even before her rise to solitary monarch, Wu demonstrated her support of Buddhism. She was a sponsor of Buddhist monks, beginning with the eminent Xuanzang ^ ^ (600-664) with whom she had a short but seemingly important association; in fact, he chose the name for her son. She maintained a close affiliation during her life with Fazang &M.4 Identifying herself with the Indian universal sovereign or Cakravartin, she, like the most famous Indian Buddhist ruler Asoka (third century B.C.), worshipped the relics, vowing to build 840,000 stupas.5 She had the Thousand Buddha Temple, Daqianfosi ^^0Nf, erected in honor of Gao3 They were called the 'Two Sages"; see Guisso, 20. Guisso maintains that Gaozong had an active role in government until 675 when, owing to his illness, he offered Empress Wu the regency. 4 Guisso, 48. 5 Ibid., 40. Actually, Asoka is said to have built 84,000 stupas. See Antonino Forte, Political Propaganda and Ideology at the End of the Seventh Century (Naples: Istituto Universitario Orientale, 1976). Wu Zetian's assumption of the role of Cakravartin is one of the main themes of this study. 114 Tang Studies 20-21 (2002-03) zong's memory6 and sponsored Buddhist activities at Famensi 8sf"JT?, the temple of the famous finger-bone relic, outside of Chang'an. In 659, she generously granted the temple gifts of cash and silk and commissioned an image...