Monuments of Buddhism: A tour of the Great Buddhist Statues

On Facebook someone posted an image of the giant triple-faced Guanyin of Nanshan. An astonishing figure of beauty and grace, standing 354 feet, it was dedicated in 2005. It set me to thinking a little about Buddhist images and especially our human propensity for making really big statues.

So, for instance, pretty much everyone is familiar with the great Buddha statue in Kamakura.

But it isn’t the only one. Here’s a top ten of the largest Buddha statues in the world. Buddhas, not bodhisattvas or arhats…

And, finally, opening up to other Buddhist images like that amazing Guanyin, while limiting the search to China & Taiwan, here’s a lovely tour…