White Copper Nine-Syllable Mantra Demon-subduing Hand Pendant

Lin, bing, dou, zhe, jie, zhen, lie, qian, xing: nine characters, out of the chapter on crossing into mountains in Ge Hong's Baopuzi. The original setting is mountain travel, and the claim is that reciting these nine keeps whatever lives in the mountain from coming near. The same chapter also speaks of carrying a mirror and carrying talismans, all of it part of one set of methods. Later generations called the nine the nine-character mantra, and the esoteric tradition has a matching set, the same characters used to different purpose. Reciting them without sound is allowed, and the book itself says so.

The demon-subduing hand is the form of a mudra. The fingers are crossed, the index finger stands up, the palm faces outward, and the esoteric canon holds many seals of this kind, each with its own name. Made into a pendant, the gesture is frozen and hung on the body. A gesture is a subtle thing: move one finger and the meaning has changed. When the seal is formed, the order of the fingers cannot be shuffled, inside first and then out, or it is no longer that seal. Seals are clearest in thangkas, where the painter traces them stroke by stroke and even the bend of a finger follows a fixed form.

On this piece the knuckles are modeled clearly, the five fingers separated in thickness, length and bend instead of merged into one mass. The edge of the palm is thin and light passes between the fingers; at a distance it is a hand, and up close you see that each finger was made on its own. This kind of piece fails when it goes mushy, and mushy means a flat plate of copper. Space has to be left between the knuckles, because five fingers crowded together cast as a single lump that no longer reads as a hand. The palm is even in thickness, tapering gradually from the wrist to the roots of the fingers, and taper it too quickly and it looks like a flat cake.

Two versions, the single plaque and one with a chain. The seal faces outward, the palm turned to the world. Worn at the chest, it sits a little low, so that the seal lands at the stomach, and that height holds steadier than up at the collarbone. The seal reads from either side, the palm on the front and the back of the hand on the reverse, and a reverse left too plain does not look good. A seal pendant is not suited to wearing at the waist: set that low with the palm facing out, and there is nothing to see.

The gaps between the fingers are narrow, and dust wedged in them is hard to clear. Use the tip of a soft brush and work at it a little at a time, not with a needle. Copper against skin collects sweat and grime between the fingers, so run a toothbrush over it every few days and do not soak it in soapy water. After washing it has to be dried, because water in the gaps does not come out on its own. When the copper dulls, press it with a cloth. The high points of the knuckles are polished bright, so keep sandpaper away from them, since one pass of sandpaper mottles the surface.