Seven Shaolin Temple Stories

Bodhidharma (called Da Mo in Chinese), a Persian or South
Indian Buddhist monk, came to China in the late 5th or early
6th century BCE. The Shaolin Temple was already built on
Songshan Mountain (in north-central China) at that time,
since it had been founded in 495 by an Emperor of the
Northern Wei Dynasty, who wanted Buddhist texts translated
from Sanskrit into Chinese. The temple was meant to be a
translation center, and was led by another Indian monk,
Baddhabhadra, (called Ba Tuo in Chinese), who had traveled
to China decades before Bodhidharma and had been appointed
the first abbot of the Shaolin monastery.

Image from the Schøyen Collection of block-printed manuscripts
Illustration of miracles from the Lotus Sutra

One

Bodhidharma is said to have crossed the Yangtze River on a reed or single leaf when he traveled from southern to northern China. This is probably a mistranslation of the word for “reed boat.”

Two

When Bodhidharma arrived at the Shaolin temple, the monks allegedly refused to let him inside the monastery. He went into a cave near the temple and stayed there for nine years, facing the wall. During that time he meditated, “listening to the ants scream,” and it is said that his eyes bored holes in the rock wall (or alternately, that his silhouette was permanently engraved on the cave wall).

Three

While Bodhidharma was meditating, according to the legend, he became sleepy, and his eyelids grew heavy. In frustration, he tore off his eyelids and threw them on the floor, where they became the first tea plants—to be used from that time forth as a mild stimulant. (He is usually depicted with bulging, lidless eyes.

Four

Bodhidharma appears to be a “blue-eyed barbarian,” with different visual markers of foreign status: wild hair, darker skin, an earring, and striking eyes (lidless, extremely round, sometimes blue).

Five

When the Shaolin monks finally accepted Bodhidharma as their teacher, they were very weak: hunched over their translations every day, they were feeble and sickly. Bodhidharma gave them a set of physical exercises, based on Indian yogic practices, which strengthened the monks’ bodies and allowed them to meditate with more stamina. The monks may also have drawn on indigenous Chinese wushu martial arts.

Maitreya Buddha from 443 AD, Northern Wei Dynasty Period
Toyko National Museum
[Image in public domain]

Six

There was a monk named Shen Kuang who came to the Shaolin temple one winter in search of a teacher. Bodhidharma ignored his pleas for instruction and enlightenment, but Shen Kuang was resolved to wait as long as necessary. He stood outside Bodhidharma’s door in the cold night, while the snow fell all around him, and recited Buddhist scriptures. Finally, Bodhidharma came out and asked Shen Kuang if he was cold; the monk replied that he was not, but that he wished to learn from Bodhidharma. Bodhidharma professed his skepticism, and told the monk that he should go do something else, instead of wasting his time. (In some versions, Bodhidharma tells Shen Kuang he will never grasp Buddhism until the snow turns red.)

Shen Kuang went down to the temple kitchen, picked up a knife, and returned to the cave where Bodhidharma was staying. He cut off his left hand and placed it in front of Bodhidharma, dying the snow red. Bodhidharma renamed him Hui Ko and accepted him as a student. The one-handed greeting used by the Shaolin monks is said to derive from this story.

Seven

Bodhidharma died after 150 years, and was buried in the Shaolin temple. He was mourned by his students and by the Emperor of the Eastern Wei dynasty.

One day soon after his funeral, a messenger coming home from western China met Bodhidharma walking along the road, heading west. Bodhidharma was carrying one sandal. The messenger had not heard that Bodhidharma was dead, so he simply asked him where he was going. “I am going to the west,” Bodhidharma answered. When the messenger arrived home, the Emperor told him that Bodhidharma had died and been buried. They opened up his tomb in the Shaolin temple and found that it was empty, except for one sandal.