Since ancient times, the story of Buddha conquering Mara-Papman and his demonic legion and daughters during his sermon has been an essential material for Buddhism literatures and iconography. The Dunhuang Caves contain mural paintings of conquering demons during Northern Wei to late Tang Dynasty or Five-Dynasty Period. In Dunhuang Manuscripts, there is also the Bianwen work of Destruction of Mara Transformation Texts, which adapts the story of Buddha conquering the demons. This study will compare the mural paintings and the Bianwen with the theme of demon conquering passed down in the Dunhuang area, seeing the combination of various scriptures and presenting civil characteristics in different orientations. When showing the story of conquering demons, the mural paintings that appeal to vision mostly present images of large demonic legion with hideous faces to stun the eyes of viewers; the hideous image then, along with the Buddha in peace, forms a clear comparison of “human/non-human”, “good/evil”, and “static/dynamic”. As for the Bianwen of Destruction of Mara Transformation Texts that appeals to audition, the contents focus more on Papman’s daughters seducing the Buddha and then being transformed into old women, resulting in the comparison of “lust/discipline” and presenting the concept of “impermanence”. From the mural paintings and the literature, we can know that one emphasizes the demonic legion, and the other emphasizes Paraman’s daughters, seeing that, when the Buddhism want to transmit the same theme to the world, creators present different descriptive orientation in response to the characteristics of different media. Mural paintings must confine the story to a limited space, and thus the presentation focuses on Buddha to fight against the carrying weapons demons in terms of visual image, thereby emphasizing the Buddha’s divinity and meditation to make viewers feel the awe in it. In contrast, the abstract concepts such as lust symbolized by Paraman’s daughters are not easy to be presented by iconography, and therefore they only occupy a small corner of the paintings. As for the Bianwen, performers must face the audience and sing out the story. Therefore, the narrators focus on the “desires” that can be felt in minds of people in their daily life, making them in tune with the story. As time passes, with the plots of Paraman’s daughters seducing the Budhha and eventually being transformed into old women, the audience are guided to understand the “impermanence” of life as well as to see that the demons are conquered by Buddha’s “mercy” in the plot of Paraman’s daughters repenting to the Buddha and restoring their beauty, just as told in the scriptures.
