Siddham calligraphy — meditation with the brush

In East Asia, in China, Japan and Korea, calligraphy has always been regarded as the queen of the arts. It goes well beyond what we usually mean by beautiful handwriting, because a good piece of calligraphy is written with ki 氣, and you can still see that centuries later. In this article I'd like to tell you what that means, how it connects with the Siddham script (Bonji in Japanese) and why it matters for the Reiki symbols.

Shodō, writing with ki 書道

I came to calligraphy as a student in Heidelberg. There I found my calligraphy master through a note on the bulletin board. He was a Chinese-Japanese Zen monk who had come to Germany specifically to study Sanskrit, because at that time it was hard to do that properly in Japan. I practiced with him every day, and I still remember my first lesson. When I wrote with his brush, I had the feeling that the brush was guiding my hand.

My master always made a clear distinction. On the one hand there is shūji 習字, literally "practicing characters", which is about the correct stroke order and form. That's how calligraphy is taught in Japanese schools. On the other hand there is shodō 書道, "the way of writing", which for him meant writing with ki. Both should be practiced at the same time, but they are not the same thing.

The main way to learn writing with ki is to copy the works of the old masters, who wrote with ki themselves, again and again, starting with Wang Xizhi (303–361), the most famous calligrapher of China. Of course there are also technical exercises, such as the right breathing. In short, East Asian calligraphy is about much more than the correct technique.

The ink as the beginning 墨

Before the first stroke is drawn, the ink has to be prepared. A stick of solid ink (jap.: sumi 墨) is rubbed in circles on a moistened ink stone (jap.: suzuri 硯), and the black slowly mixes with the water. The smell of pine soot reminds many people of temples and incense.

For many calligraphers this rubbing is already part of the practice, because with every circle the mind becomes a little calmer. When the ink is ready, you are usually ready too.

The seal of the mind 心印

How highly calligraphy was valued in East Asia is shown by a nice story. The Chinese emperor Ming (r. 58–75) of the Eastern Han dynasty is said to have sent a messenger to the deathbed of an exemplary calligrapher, asking him to write ten more letters. The emperor wasn't interested in the content but in the writing itself. Through the characters, as a kind of "seal impression of the mind", he could connect with the artist in spirit.

Since the Tang dynasty (618–907) people in China have also spoken of the traces of ink or brush that reveal something about the personality of a calligrapher. That is a bit like handwriting analysis, only that in China the writer usually intended to create a work of art.

Kūkai and the Siddham 悉曇

In the Shingon tradition the Siddham characters are written, the sacred seed syllables that each stand for a Buddha or bodhisattva. Kūkai, the founder of Japanese Shingon, placed great value on calligraphy and wrote many calligraphic works in Siddham. Among them is the Mantra of Light (jap.: kōmyō shingon 光明真言), which became especially important from the 12th century on for initiations, rituals and meditations.

Following Kūkai's example, eight Shingon monks up to the 14th century produced calligraphies and explanations of the Siddham. What they all had in common was that they used the Siddham as symbols in meditation and ritual, and that they came to understand them through meditation. Siddham are still written in Japan today, for example on talismans (jap.: ofuda 御札) and on the wooden grave tablets (jap.: sotoba) that you see in temple cemeteries.

In Shingon there is also the term nyūga ganyū 入我我入, "the Buddha enters me, and I enter the Buddha". In meditation and ritual the boundary between the practitioner and the Buddha dissolves. When a monk writes the syllable a, he isn't simply writing about Dainichi Nyorai. For the moment of writing he connects with him.

Copying sutras (jap.: shakyō) has a long tradition in Buddhism too. It is seen as meditation and as a way of creating good karma. Put simply, karma is the law of cause and effect, and copying a sutra is a seed for a good harvest.

The body writes 感

Calligraphy is a very physical practice. You feel the weight of the brush in your hand, the soft give of the tip when it touches the paper, and the moisture spreading. A good stroke doesn't come from the wrist alone, but from the center of the body, the hara, and flows through the shoulder, the arm and the hand into the brush. The breath plays a big part as well. When you hold your breath, the stroke easily becomes stiff.

In this respect calligraphy is related to kotodama, the "soul of words" in Japanese tradition, where what matters is also the source the sound comes from.

The connection with Reiki 靈氣

For the Reiki symbols, writing with ki is also very important. In my book on the Reiki symbols I wrote that the more you manage to write the symbols with ki, the stronger their effect in practice, and the more it supports your own subtle and spiritual development. On top of that, such symbols look a lot more beautiful.

It makes a difference whether you scribble a symbol like an address on an envelope or write it with the attention of a calligrapher. In Shingon Reiki the symbols are treated as living signs in the tradition of the Siddham. How to write them is something that belongs in the practice and in the community, and not in a blog article.

Have you ever tried writing with a brush, and did you notice how your breath changed?