Wenshu Hall

Shaolin Wenshu Hall is to the east of the Thouaand Buddha Pavillion, and to the south of Guanyin Hall. It is famous basically for one thing: the stone of Damo.

It wasn't easy to get, as pictures are absolutely forbidden within some of these temple pavilions. But, this was a popular request, so, I got it. We won't discuss how that happened....

The Damo stone was removed from the Damo cave, high up on Songshan mountain above the Shaolin temple, many many years ago. Supposedly, it has the image of Damo burned into it, a result of the nine years that he supposedly spent meditating in that cave. If you look carefully, the blackened area to the right of the stone contains an image which looks somewhat like a small Damo (he is looking to your left). Use your imagination, and you might see it.

I apologize for the quality of the photo. The glass case which encloses it is absolutely filthy. When viewing this in real life, as opposed to a photo, it is very difficult to discern the Damo image, so don't feel bad if you can't see it here. You can see the Damo image more clearly in the second picture.

This image file size is very large, because of the ability to enlarge and zoom around, so please be patient while the file downloads. The smaller upright carved Damo stone is from the Bamboo museum; it was not in the Wenshu Hall. It is in this gallery for comparison purposes only.

Here are two high resolution versions of the Damo Stone in Wenshu Hall: They were taken in 1998.

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