Introduction to Leshan Giant Buddha

Leshan Giant Buddha, also known as Lingyun Giant Buddha, is located on the side of Lingyun Temple on the east bank of the Nanmin River in Leshan City, Sichuan Province, near the confluence of the Dadu River, Qingyi River and Minjiang River.

The Big Buddha is a seated statue of Maitreya Buddha with a height of 71 meters. It is the largest cliff-carved stone statue in China.

The Leshan Giant Buddha was excavated in the first year of Kaiyuan of the Tang Dynasty (713) and completed in the 19th year of Zhenyuan (803), which took about ninety years.

The Leshan Giant Buddha Scenic Area, which consists of Lingyun Mountain, Wuyou Mountain, Giant Reclining Buddha and other attractions, is a national 5A tourist attraction.

On October 8, 2018, the Jiuqu Plank Road in the Leshan Giant Buddha Scenic Area was closed before construction began.

Construction history:

In ancient times, at the confluence of three rivers in Leshan, the Minjiang River, Qingyi River, and Dadu River converged at the foot of Lingyun Mountain. The water was so fierce that boats were often overturned at this point.

During summer floods, the river flows directly into the mountain walls, often causing tragedies of shipwrecks and fatalities.

Zen Master Haitong initiated it in order to reduce the power of the water and save all living beings. He recruited manpower and material resources to build the chisel.

The construction of the Buddha statue began in the early years of Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty (AD 713). When the Buddha reached its shoulders, Monk Haitong passed away.

After Haitong's death, the project was temporarily suspended.

Many years later, Zhangqiu Jianqiong, the military governor of Xichuan in Jiannan, donated his salary. Haitong’s apprentices led the craftsmen to continue building the Buddha. Because the project was huge, the imperial court ordered a tax on sesame salt, which made the project progress rapidly. .

When the Leshan Giant Buddha was repaired to its knees, Zhangchou Jianqiong, the person who continued the construction, moved to his home as Minister of Household Affairs, and the project was stopped again.

Forty years later, Wei Gao, the governor of Xichuan in Jiannan, donated his salary to continue the construction of Leshan Giant Buddha.

Thanks to the efforts of three generations of craftsmen, it took 90 years to complete in the 19th year of Zhenyuan (AD 803) of Emperor Dezong of the Tang Dynasty.

Structure of the Buddha statue:

1. Basic appearance

The head of the Leshan Giant Buddha is flush with the mountain, with its feet on the river and its hands on its knees. The Buddha has a well-proportioned body and a solemn demeanor. , carved into a mountain and sitting dangerously close to the river.

The Buddha is 71 meters high, with a head height of 14.7 meters, a head width of 10 meters, 1021 buns, ears 7 meters long, a nose 5.6 meters long, an eyebrow 5.6 meters long, and a mouth and eyes 3.3 meters long. The neck is 3 meters high, the shoulders are 24 meters wide, the fingers are 8.3 meters long, 28 meters from the knees to the insteps, and the insteps are 8.5 meters wide. More than a hundred people can sit around the insteps.

On the cliffs along the river on the left and right sides of the Big Buddha, there are also two stone carvings of Dharma Protectors with a height of more than 16 meters. Together with the Big Buddha, they form a pattern of one Buddha and two Heavenly Kings.

Along with the Heavenly King, there are hundreds of niches and thousands of stone carvings, which seem to form a huge Buddhist stone carving art group.

To the left of the Big Buddha, along the "Dongtian", is the beginning of the Lingyun Plank Road excavated in modern times, with a total length of nearly 500 meters.

On the right side is the Jiuqu Plank Road, the construction and Buddha worship passage left behind when the Buddha was excavated in the Tang Dynasty.

After the Buddha statue was carved, it was covered by a seven-story pavilion (some say nine or thirteen stories), which was called the "Big Buddha Pavilion" or "Big Image Pavilion" at that time; the Buddhist pavilion was repeatedly built and destroyed. In the Song Dynasty, "Lingyun Pavilion" and "Tianning Pavilion" were rebuilt; in the Yuan Dynasty, the "Baohong Pavilion" was built; in the Chongzhen period of the Ming Dynasty, the "Buddha Pavilion" was built, and in the Qing Dynasty, the "Buddha Pavilion" was built, but they were eventually destroyed.

2. Curly stones

There are 1051 snails on the top of the Buddha. These were numbered with chalk during maintenance in 1962.

From a distance, the bun and the head appear to be integrated, but in fact they are made of stones embedded one by one.

There are obvious splicing cracks at the root of the single-piece screw bun, and there is no mortar bonding.

The surface of the bun is plastered with two layers, and the inner layer is lime, with a thickness of 5-15 mm each.

During maintenance in 1991, three remaining pieces of snail stones were found in the recessed part of the right leg of the Buddha statue. Two of them were relatively complete, 78 cm long, 31.5 × 31.5 cm at the top, and 24 × 24 cm at the base.

3. Wooden ears

There is a hole about 25 cm deep on the inside of the earlobe of the Buddha's right ear. The maintenance workers took out many broken objects from it. Upon closer inspection, it turned out to be rotten wood. mud.

This confirms what Fan Chengda of the Southern Song Dynasty recorded in "Wu Chuan Lu": "The Buddha statues are the largest in the world, and their ears are made of wood."

It can be seen from this that three sections of wood are exposed inside, forming the finished glyph.

It shows that the raised bridge of the nose is also lined with wood and decorated with hammered gray exterior.

However, it is impossible to verify whether this was the case when it was completed in the 19th year of Zhenyuan in the Tang Dynasty, or whether later generations used this craft to repair it during maintenance.

4. Drainage system

Leshan Giant Buddha has a very clever drainage system.

The Leshan Giant Buddha has a cleverly designed and invisible drainage system behind its ears and head, which plays an important role in protecting the Giant Buddha.

Prevent the Buddha statue from being eroded by rainwater.

Wang Shizhen, a poet of the Qing Dynasty, wrote a poem about the Leshan Giant Buddha: "The spring flows from the ancient Buddha's bun."

Among the 18 layers of screw buns on the head of the Buddha, the 4th, 9th, and 18th floors each have a horizontal drainage ditch, which is decorated with hammered ash bricks. It cannot be seen from a distance. out.

There are also drains on the collar and folds of the clothes. There is a drain on the front of the chest that breaks down to the left side and is connected to the drain on the back of the right arm.

Behind the two ears, against the cliff, there are caves connected to the left and right, 9.15 meters long, 1.26 meters wide, and 3.38 meters high. There is a hole at each end of the back of the chest, which has not been dug through each other. The right hole is 16.5 meters deep. , 0.95 meters wide and 1.35 meters high. The left hole is 8.1 meters deep, 0.95 meters wide and 1.1 meters high.

These wonderful ditches and caves form a scientific drainage, moisture isolation and ventilation system, which have played an important role in protecting the Buddha and preventing erosive weathering for thousands of years.

Since the two caves connected to the left and right can collect mountain springs, a calcareous compound about 5-10 cm thick has been condensed on the inner cliff. However, the cliff on the side of the Buddha is still red sand original rock and is relatively dry. .

The walls of the two caves that are blocked on the left and right are moist, and water accumulates at the bottom. Water is constantly flowing out of the cave entrances, so the chest of the Buddha is about 2 meters wide and soaked in water.

Obviously, this is because the hole is not penetrated.

I don’t know why the builders didn’t open it up back then

5. The broken chest monument

According to Huang Gaobin and Robert Heng, the people in charge of the maintenance in 1962, they found that There is a closed hole in the chest of the Buddha.

When the hole was opened, it was found that it was filled with scrap iron, worn-out lead sheets, bricks, etc., and the door-sealing stone turned out to be a remnant monument commemorating the reconstruction of Tianning Pavilion in the Song Dynasty.

After the completion of the Giant Buddha in the Tang Dynasty, a wooden pavilion was built to protect it from the sun and rain.

From the many remaining pillar foundations and pile holes on the knees, legs, arms, chest and insteps of the Big Buddha, it is proved that there was a Big Buddha Pavilion.

It was rebuilt in the Song Dynasty and called "Tianning Pavilion", but was later destroyed.

But for some unknown reason and year, the fragmentary monument of Tianning Pavilion was actually embedded in the chest of the Buddha.

The maintainers moved the remaining monument to Haitong Cave for preservation, but unfortunately it was destroyed in 1966.

Extended information:

Design features:

The Leshan Giant Buddha has a cleverly designed and invisible drainage system, which plays an important role in protecting the Giant Buddha. .

Among the 18 layers of conch buns on the head of the Buddha, there is a horizontal drainage ditch on the 4th, 9th and 18th floors. There are ditches on the left side of the chest and on the right arm. The rear side is connected by a ditch.

Behind the two ears and against the cliff, there are caves connected to the left and right; there is a hole at each end of the back of the chest, but they are not connected to each other. These ditches and caves form a scientific drainage, moisture isolation and ventilation system. system to prevent the erosive weathering of the Buddha.

Follow the Lingyun Plank Road on the left side of the Big Buddha to directly reach the bottom of the Big Buddha.

When you look up at the Buddha here, you will feel as if you are looking up high.

There is an ancient plank road with nine curves on the right side of the seated statue.

The plank road is cut along the cliff on the right side of the Buddha statue. It is extremely steep and has nine twists and turns before you can reach the top of the plank road.

This is the right side of the Buddha's head, which is the top of Lingyun Mountain.

Here you can see the carving art of the Buddha's head.

There are 1,051 hair buns on the top of the Buddha.

From a distance, the bun and the head appear to be integrated, but in reality they are made of stones embedded one by one.

There is a hole about 25 centimeters deep inside the root of the earlobe of the right ear of the Buddha. The 7-meter-long Buddha ear is not hewn from the original rock, but is made of wooden pillars as a structure and then decorated with hammer ash. Become.

A hole was also found at the lower end of the nostril of the Buddha, exposing three pieces of wood in the shape of Chinese characters.

It shows that the raised bridge of the nose is also lined with wood and decorated with hammered gray exterior.

There is a closed hole in the chest of the Buddha.

The sealing stone is a remnant monument chronicling the reconstruction of Tianning Pavilion in the Song Dynasty.

The hole contains scrap iron, worn-out lead sheets, bricks, etc.

It is said that after the completion of the Giant Buddha in the Tang Dynasty, a wooden pavilion was built to protect it from the sun and rain.

From the many pillar foundations and pile holes remaining on the edges, legs, arms, breasts and insteps of the Buddha, it is proven that there was a Grand Buddha Pavilion.

It was rebuilt in the Song Dynasty and was called "Tianning Pavilion", but it was later destroyed.

The maintainers moved the ruined monument to Haishi Cave for preservation, but unfortunately it was destroyed during the Cultural Revolution.

Religious connotation:

The Leshan Giant Buddha is a Maitreya Buddha.

Maitreya Buddha was worshiped in the Tang Dynasty.

Buddhist scriptures say that when Maitreya is born, "the world will be at peace." During the Wu Zhou Dynasty, Wu Zetian ordered the fabrication of a "Dayun Sutra" to prove that she was the reincarnation of Maitreya. ascended to the throne in the feudal era.

Due to Wu Zetian’s strong promotion, the trend of carving Maitreya became popular across the country.

The Leshan Giant Buddha was built only more than 20 years ago during the Wu Zetian era. Therefore, when Haitong built the Leshan Giant Buddha, he naturally chose Maitreya Buddha. Moreover, Maitreya Buddha is a future Buddha who can bring light and happiness, which can also calm floods. The requirements of Zhenjiang Buddha are consistent.

In the Buddhist culture of Han Dynasty, the changes in the statues of Maitreya Buddha are great. The first stage is the Jiaojiao Maitreya that was introduced to China from India; the second stage is the ancient statues with "Chinese characteristics". Buddha Maitreya; the third stage is Budai Maitreya.

The Leshan Giant Buddha is an ancient Maitreya Buddha with "Chinese characteristics".

According to the "Maitreya Sutra", the Maitreya Buddha statue has "thirty-two characteristics and eighty good qualities", which requires that his five senses, head, hands, feet and body have different characteristics. Characteristics of the average person.

The entire shape of the Leshan Giant Buddha is extraordinary. The bun on the head, broad shoulders, high and long eyebrows, and straight nostrils are all the "broad shoulders" of Indian Buddha statues built in accordance with the provisions of Buddhist scriptures. "Slender waist" disappeared from the Buddha, replaced by strong shoulders and plump breasts, reflecting the Tang Dynasty's fashion of advocating fat beauty.

The sitting posture of the Leshan Giant Buddha is with its feet hanging down naturally. This is also different from the "lotus posture" of the Indian Buddha statues, because the Giant Buddha was built to control water. This stable and stable posture The sitting position can give boaters the courage and determination to overcome rapids and shoals.

Budai Maitreya Buddha is based on the image of a monk named Qizi from the Five Dynasties period in China.