"Brahmā’ s Request" refers to the important event of Brahmā inviting Sakyamuni to preach to the people soon after Sakyamuni attained enlightenment. Images of Brahmā’s Request appear again and again in the Qiuci Grottoes, paintings in which the Buddha sits in the center and Brahmā kneels beside; in some paintings there is a tree god above the Buddha. The depiction of the tree god in Brahmā’ s Request might have been associated with the spread of the Lalitavistara Sutra in the Kucha region and the episode of the tree god supplicating the Buddha, a story which was popular at the time as Gandharan art from the same period evinces. The researchers conjecture that, given the cultural exchange between Qiuci and the surrounding regions, the images of Brahmā’ s Request in the Qiuci cave paintings likely served as a prototype for murals of the same theme in Cave169 of the Binglingsi Grottoes.
