ol and became popular as a protecting deity
of Buddhism. The name is possibly a mistaken transcription of
Skandha.]

[Footnote 868: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 869: [Chinese: ] See Levi and Chavannes' two articles in
_J.A._ 1916, I and II, and Watters in _J.R.A.S._ 1898, p. 329, for an
account of these personages. The original number, still found in a few
Chinese temples as well as in Korea, Japan and Tibet was sixteen.
Several late sutras contain the idea that the Buddha entrusted the
protection of his religion to four or sixteen disciples and bade them
not enter Nirvana but tarry until the advent of Maitreya. The
Ta-A-lo-han-nan-t'i-mi-to-lo-so-shuo-fa-chu-chi (Nanjio, 1466) is an
account of these sixteen disciples and of their spheres of influence.
The Buddha assigned to each a region within which it is his duty to
guard the faith. They will not pass from this life before the next
Buddha comes. Pindola is the chief of them. Nothing is known of
the work cited except that it was translated in 654 by Hsuan Chuang,
who, according to Watters, used an earlier translation. As the Arhats
are Indian personalities, and their spheres are mapped out from the
point of view of Indian geography, there can be no doubt that we have
to do with an Indian idea, imported into Tibet as well as into China
where it became far more popular than it had ever been in India. The
two additional Arhats (who vary in different temples, whereas the
sixteen are fixed) appear to have been added during the T'ang dynasty
and, according to Watters, in imitation of a very select order of
merit instituted by the Emperor T'ai Tsung and comprising eighteen
persons. Chavannes and Levi see in them spirits borrowed from the
popular pantheon.

Chinese ideas about the Lohans at the present day are very vague.
Their Indian origin has been forgotten and some of them have been
provided with Chinese biographies. (See Dore, p. 216.) One popular
story says that they were eighteen converted brigands.

In several large temples there are halls containing 500 images of
Arhats, which include many Chinese Emperors and one of them is often
pointed out as being Marco Polo. But this is very doubtful. See,
however, Hackmann, _Buddhismus_, p. 212.]

[Footnote 870: Generally they consist of Sakya-muni and two
superhuman Buddhas or Bodhisattvas, such as O-mi-to (Amitabha) and
Yo-shih-fo (Vaidurya): Pi-lu-fo (Vairocana) and Lo-shih-fo (Lochana):
Wen-shu (Manjus-ri) and P'u-hsien (