PACIFIC WORLD - The Institute of Buddhist Studies

Yamabe: Practice of Visualization and Visualization S¥tra 125By considering these elements, we should be able to discuss thebackground of these meditation texts, including the Visualization S¥traitself, on a much more solid basis. With this intention in mind, I would liketo examine the mural paintings at Toyok in some detail below.THE CAVESToyok is the oldest site of Buddhist cave temples in the Turfan area,dating approximately from the fifth century. 9 Since the caves are dug intofragile cliffs, many of the caves are badly damaged now. Of the survivingforty-six caves that have been assigned cave numbers, only nine retainmural paintings. 10 Among them, the most important caves for our purposeare Caves 20 and 42.Cave 20 is on the western cliff of the valley and forms a part of a largetemple complex. See the plan shown in Figure 1.Figure 1 11(Upper Arrow: Stein Cave VI. vii; Lower Arrow: Cave 20)