Vast Emptiness, Nothing Sacred

Nantembo Toju was one of the most important Zen monks of the Meiji and Taisho eras(1868–1926), and he is now considered the finest early 20th-century Zen painting master, whose brushwork displays the continued vitality of this painting tradition (in Japanese, Zenga) well into this century. Like many monk-painters, he did not take up painting and calligraphy in earnest until late in life—in his sixties—and this work was brushed when he was seventy-six years old. This ink painting presents a Zen icon: Daruma is a 6th-century Chinese monk and the first patriarch of the sect. The calligraphy brushed above his head is a hallowed aphorism, "vast emptiness, nothing sacred," which was Daruma's cryptic response when the Chinese emperor asked him to define the first principle of the sacred Buddhist teachings.