Affectionately regarded in the legend and lore of Buddhism, the popularity of the ox-herding pictures has derived, in part, from their usefulness. Anyone interested in Zen is likely familiar with this series of ink and brush pictures which, providing a symbolic model, depict the story of a herdsman taming an unruly ox. It is significant that this superb simile of the dynamnics of meditation practice - where the ox stands for the mind and the herdsman for the person engaged in meditation - goes back to very ancient and "pre Zen" times.
The earliest known use of the ox and ox-herder in Buddhist teachings is the following poem which may be traceable to the third century B.C. It expresses clearly and concisely the analogy of the taming of a calf to the taming of the mind.
"Just as man would tie to a post a calf that should be tamed,
Even so here one should tie one's own mind tight to the object of mindfulness."
Ever since, practitioners and commentators have enlarged and elaborated with more details and explanations, and artists eventually came to depict this same idea; the similarity of the gradual training of the mind to the taminf of a wild ox.
The first ox-herding pictures are from China. Now lost, these pictures are attributed to a zen teacher, Seiko, from the period of the SUng dynast (11th and 12th centuries). Seiko illustrated the stages of spiritual progress by a series of pictures which showed the gradual whitening of an ox until it disappeared - depicted by a circle.
That this disappearance, which seemed to imply that a oneness, or unity of sorts resulting from effacement of both Self and Other, was an ultimate goal or eventual result of zen training, was challenged pictorially by another 12th century Chines monk; Kakuan of the Rinzai school, who added two more pictures beyond the circle to clearly illustrate that the person of most spiritual development continues to live in the same reality as everyone else and moves there with the utmost freedom amongst ordinary men, whom he inspires with his compassion and radiance.
Kakuan's revision and improvement of the ox-herding series - because of both its aesthetic appeal and its thorough and consistent symbolic expression, and hence its usefulness in practice to this day - has become most widely known and influential.
The original pictures drawn by Kakuan unfortunately have not survived. What we have today are copies made by a 15th century Japanese artist/ monk, Shubun, which are preserved in a monastery in Kyoto where Shubun practiced.
The pictures here, and in my book (which also includes all the traditional verses associated with each picture) are drawn after the pictures of Kakuan and I have colored them lightly with water colors and pencils .
This is the first version that includes MUSIC; one brief composition for piano for each picture. I composed these short, abstract pieces. They are offered in the spirit of homage, programmatic commentary, and as meditative aids.