What Is Kṣitigarbha (Jizō)?

A bodhisattva is one who seeks awakening while walking the Buddhist path together with people who suffer, and saves them. In the Sutra of the Original Vow of Kṣitigarbha, Kṣitigarbha puts his own buddhahood last and vows first to save every being who suffers in the six realms.

It is taught that after Śākyamuni Buddha passes into nirvana, a long age follows in which no Buddha appears in this world to teach, until the next Buddha, Maitreya, comes. At its opening, the Ten Wheels Sutra introduces Kṣitigarbha as the bodhisattva who guides living beings in this "age without a Buddha."

His help reaches all of the six realms (rokudō): the hells, hungry ghosts, animals, asuras, human beings, and heavenly beings. He leads the departed to peace, and if anyone has fallen into hell, he goes down there to bring them out. He also protects small children and travelers in their daily lives. It is because of this vow that Jizō has been so dearly loved in Japan.

In Sanskrit his name is Kṣitigarbha, which means "the treasury of the earth."

The Ten Wheels Sutra describes Kṣitigarbha's merits through a series of similes, and among them it shows the meaning of his name.

The Sutra of the Original Vow of Kṣitigarbha, traditionally said to have been translated by the Tripiṭaka master Śikṣānanda, records in these words the vow that Kṣitigarbha made before a Buddha in a distant past life, when he was the son of a great elder.

At the opening of the Ten Wheels Sutra, Kṣitigarbha appears at the assembly where Śākyamuni is teaching. He comes in the śrāvaka form (shōmongyō), that is, as a monk in training with a shaven head and a monastic robe.

In a defiled age without a Buddha, Kṣitigarbha takes the form of a renunciant, the form most familiar to people. In that form he goes anywhere in the six realms and stands beside those who suffer. Japanese images of Jizō are made with shaven heads and monastic robes, just as this sutra teaches.

Japanese ritual commentaries (jisōsho, books recording how the rites are actually performed) give three meanings for this form. First, it is the form of one who has left worldly life. Second, he stands at the crossroads of the six realms and saves those who pass by. Third, entrusted by Śākyamuni with the latter age, he saves the beings of a defiled world.

The Sutra of the Original Vow tells two stories of saving a departed mother. The brahmin's daughter and the maiden Bright Eyes each make offerings for their mothers and free them from suffering, and each then makes a great vow to save all beings. The sutra teaches that when children do good for their departed parents, the merit reaches the departed. In East Asia, these stories became one of the foundations of memorial practice.

The Sutra of Divining the Requital of Good and Evil Actions describes Kṣitigarbha as the bodhisattva who saves beings with special care in the age of the five turbidities (gojoku), the latter age in which the times, views, and life itself have become defiled. The same sutra names him "one who skillfully speaks comfort" (zen anni sessha).

Grounded in the vow taught in the sutras, devotion to Jizō spread in Japan in many forms. In the Edo period, collections of Jizō miracle tales (reigenki), stories of prayers that were answered, went through edition after edition. In one of them, the Jizō bosatsu ōgen shinki, which contains sixty-three tales, the most common are stories of illness healed. They show what people have prayed to Jizō for.

At Byodoji, Temple 22 of the Shikoku Eighty-Eight Temple Pilgrimage and a temple of Kōyasan Shingon Buddhism, we perform the Jizō goma on the night of the 24th of each month, the feast day of Kṣitigarbha.

The Jizō at Byodoji is a bronze seated image, made around 1750 through the donations of the people of Tsuyama in Okayama. He holds a monk's staff (shakujō) in his right hand and a wish-fulfilling jewel (hōju) in his left, seated on a lotus pedestal. The monthly Jizō goma on the 24th is performed with this bronze Jizō as its principal image.

Prayers for children and the departed, for a child's healthy growth, for children lost before birth (mizuko), and for ancestors, are offered through the fire of wisdom (chika) kindled in the goma.

The precincts also enshrine the Horidashi Jizō, who greets pilgrims beside the path.

The Horidashi (Unearthed) Jizō is a stone image about 1,200 years old, said to have been dug up by Kōbō Daishi. It is enshrined beside the well of Kōbō's sacred water.

A maṇḍala is a single picture in which esoteric Buddhism shows the whole world of the Buddhas. The Womb-Realm Maṇḍala is based on the Mahāvairocana Sūtra, translated by the Tripiṭaka master Śubhakarasiṃha and the Chan master Yixing, and was brought from Tang China by Kōbō Daishi Kūkai. In its north lies the Jizō Court, the section with Kṣitigarbha as its principal deity. Its position is fixed in the passage where the Mahāvairocana Sūtra explains how to draw the maṇḍala.

The Jizō Court consists of nine deities headed by Kṣitigarbha and is an independent court, standing alongside the Mañjuśrī Court and the Sarvanīvaraṇaviṣkambhin Court (Jogaishō-in). The nine deities are understood to show the virtues of Kṣitigarbha in separate forms. It is also understood that the Sarvanīvaraṇaviṣkambhin Court facing it represents great wisdom, while the Jizō Court represents great compassion.

Ritual texts of the Kamakura period hand down the procedure of the Jizō rite (Jizō-hō), a rite with Kṣitigarbha as its principal deity. When the principal deity is invited to the altar, the practitioner recites "Jizō, who guides and transforms the six realms" (rokudō nōke no Jizōson). In the dōjōkan, the visualization of the principal deity in the mind, the practitioner visualizes the same śrāvaka form as in the Ten Wheels Sutra. Kṣitigarbha's secret name (mitsugō, his name in esoteric Buddhism) is Higan Kongō, Vajra of the Compassionate Vow, a name made from his original vow itself.