Zhenrong to Ruixiang: The Medieval Chinese Reception of the Mahābodhi Buddha Statue

Two related historical trajectories surround the medieval Chinese reception of the Buddha statue at the Mahābodhi Temple in Bodhgayā, India: first, the shift in the perception of the ontological status of the image from "as if real" to the "real," and second, the transmission and the subsequent replication of the foreign image in China as ruixiang, or an auspicious image. While the awareness of the Indian prototype as substituting the real presence of the Buddha grew stronger, the medieval Chinese produced ruixiang China as a material mediation of the divine presence.