Artworks

One Hand Clapping

Artwork · Hakuin Ekaku · 1766 · kakemono

Hakuin’s own koan, “the sound of one hand”, explained in a letter of 1753, illustrated two years before his death: the monk Hotei stands on his cloth bag, one hand hidden in his robe, the other raised; his eyes, unusually, look straight ahead as if laughing. “Young people, no matter what you say, everything is nonsense unless you hear the sound of one hand.” 1 Mason 2005, pp. 325–326, fig. 379. ↩ Literatur Mason 2005: Penelope E. Mason, History of Japanese Art, 2nd, Pearson Education LTD. 2005.