Siddham Calligraphy Of Sanskrit Hieronyms

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Prof. Lokesh Chandra is currently the Director of the International Academy of Indian Culture which is a premier research institution for Asian cultures. He has been a Vice-President of the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) and Chairman of the Indian Council of Historical Research. He is a well-known historian and a renowned scholar of Tibetan, Mongolian and Sino-Japanese Buddhism. He has also served as a member of the Indian Parliament. In 2006 he was recognized with India's Padma Bhushan award.

He is the son of the world-renowned scholar of Oriental Studies and Linguistics Prof. Raghuvira. He was born in 1927, obtained his Master's degree in 1947 from the Punjab University at Lahore, and followed it with a Doctorate in Literature and Philosophy from the State University of Utrecht (Netherlands) in 1950. Starting with an understanding of the most ancient of India's spiritual expression enshrined in the Vedic tradition, he has moved on to the interlocution between India, Tibet, Mongolia, China, Korea, Japan, South East Asia, and the Indo-European languages. He has studied over twenty languages of the world. He has to his credit 613 works and text editions.

It gives me immense pleasure that this book Siddham Calligraphy of Sanskrit Hieronyms, based on a Japanese xylograph of the 17th century, is being published by the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts. Detailed introduction of Prof. Lokesh Chandra provides a comprehensive view of the evolution of Siddham calligraphy in Japan and the reproduction of the xylograph is the heavenly magnificence of the brush and wooden pen. The Siddham script has been used over the centuries for writing dhärani-mantras, and symbolic syllables (bijakşara) or hieronyms of deities. The linear aesthetics of the Indian script and its sanctity have hallowed homes and monasteries in Japan. Eminent Indian äcāryas like Subhakarasimha, Vajrabodhi and Amoghavajra wrote their texts and mantras in Siddham and they shimmer today in the samskära of Siddham

There are a few works to highlight the history of Siddham in East Asia. Though Siddham calligraphy has been researched by Japanese scholars in their language, this is the first book to view Siddham calligraphy as a landmark in the cultural interflow between India and Japan.

Calligraphy is a vital cultural value in the sinocentric paradigm. First grade children start to practise Chinese ideographs with a brush, where every stroke is a Pureland of the heart. Japanese monks calligraph Siddham after pränäyäma. The Chinese word for calligraphy is shufa which means "the dharma of writing". In the ideographic culture of East Asia, calligraphy is an ode to serenity and a profound communion with virtue and wisdom.

The IGNCA is a grateful to Prof. Lokesh Chandra for presenting the beauty of our script from the Land of the Rising Sun as an inspiration and challenge. From every curve of thought and form sprout new beginnings.