“Could you hear a kettle?” someone asked, and I replied, “I suppose so. I
guess if you listen for it there does seem to be a sound of some sort.” Even
as one puts one’s face up into the gravestone, one thinks more of listening
for Rikyu’s kettle than one does of the fact that the stone is a grave.
“Legend has it that Rikyu liked this stupa so much he stole it from the
grave of the retired Emperor Nijo, at the foot of Mount Funaoka,” I said.
It’s said that treasure stupas have their origins in the eleventh chapter of
the Lotus Sutra, “The Appearance of the Treasure Stupa.” When
Shakyamuni preached the Lotus Sutra on Mount Gridhrakuta, a stupa
adorned with the seven treasures erupted from the ground and hovered in
the air. Out of that magnificent stupa there came a voice which praised
Shakyamuni extravagantly. With the fingers of his right hand Shakyamuni
opened the door of the stupa, and there sitting in the lion seat was the
Buddha Many Treasures. Many Treasures offered Shakyamuni half of his
seat. “Then the assembled priests saw the two Buddhas sitting with their
legs crossed in the seat of the lion in the stupa adorned with the seven
treasures, and they all thought, ‘The Buddhas sit in a place high above us,
far away. Oh, how fervently I wish that the Buddhas would use their godly
powers to bring us up into the sky with them!’ And instantly the Buddha
Shakyamuni made use of his godly powers to summon the many priests, to
carry them into the sky.” Then Shakyamuni said, “The Buddha Many
Treasures is usually found wandering in the ten directions. It is only for the
sake of this sutra that he sits in this treasure stupa now.” Thus wherever the
Lotus Sutra is preached, the stupa of the Buddha Many Treasures appears.
It is for this reason that doors are carved on the front, and sometimes on
all four sides of the so-called “axle” of the lowest of the three segments that
make up a stone treasure stupa. Rikyu’s stone stupa—scooped-out where its
door ought to be, and carved entirely from one rock, though it’s more than
six feet tall—is unusual even in terms of its shape.
