context: painting > Zen painting > Subjects

Hotei and a companion, by Sengai

Hotei

Hotei is my favourite Zen subject. He was apparently a real figure named Ch'i-tzu who died early in the 10th Century in China. He wasn't a Zen monk but Daoist/Taoist; and was later considered one of the seven gods of good fortune in Japan. He had a jolly, buffoonish appearance, but was supposedly a profound sage. He's very popular with children, and with his sack, in which he carried everything he needed in the world, and big belly, it's easy to draw (pointless) parallels with Santa Claus.

Most of the images I love are Hotei pointing at the moon. This is a Zen notion, so unlikely to make any useful sense, but most sources seem to claim that the meaning is that doctrine is like the finger, that you should never confuse it with what it is intended to point at. I've seen another book claim it means that "one would do better to look at the Earth than the heavens." I've no idea, but I suspect it's a cute image with lots of good options for compositions (rounded man, round bald head, extended arm, sack, round moon), and different artists probably bung in accompanying text to give it their own meaning, so they vary.

Sozan Genkyo's version points at the enlarged calligraphy reading 'moon'

Besides images here, there is another on Fugai's page. Those here include: one by the great Hokusai, by no stretch of the imagination a Zen painter; two by the wonderful Gibon Sengai, one of which seems to be Saturday Night Fever Hotei; and one by Sozan Genkyo from around 150 years ago where Hotei is pointing at the word Moon.

backwards: Daruma forwards: Enso

above by Hokusai

another by Sengai