The letter goes on: "In the name of the Buddha and the development of Bodhgaya, the villages are being affected adversely. Self-sufficient, agro-based communities are deteriorating rapidly. The negative effects of the tourist industry and market forces are daily staring us in the face. A few local people have overnight become millionaires—but a great many are reduced to poverty."
So, what is the statue for?
In his response to the villagers' concerns, Peter Kedge, the project director, explained: "The great quality of holy objects is that, irrespective of motivation, circumambulating, making offerings, making prayers, and otherwise venerating them creates positive karma in proportion to the size of the holy object. Building holy objects is, therefore, the easiest way to offer benefit to living beings."
Motives Questioned
The initiative for the project came from a Tibetan Buddhist monk, Lama Thubten Yeshe, who conveyed his desire to a disciple, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, the project's spiritual adviser.
"Lama Yeshe advised me before he passed away to build a very large statue of Maitreya Buddha at Bodhgaya," said Lama Zopa. "Our main goal is not the statue itself. It is the peace and happiness of all beings."
Huge images have been a feature of Buddhism for at least 1,700 years. The two giant Buddhas in Afghanistan destroyed by the Taliban this year may be no more than a memory now, but huge Buddhas—modern as well as ancient—can be found in Thailand, Sri Lanka, Japan, and other Buddhist countries.
India, however, is no longer a Buddhist country. Today, the main Buddhist pilgrimage sites in Bihar, including Bodhgaya, are supervised jointly by Hindu and Buddhist priests. Hinduism has adopted Buddha as an avatar of the god Vishnu, and squabbling is endemic.
But the objections of the villages are more fundamental.
"The unrest and suffering in the world today is a product of the consumer/materialist culture," the villagers said in their letter. "Can peace be attained through devotion to a statue? What will our villages have to gain?"
(C) 2001 The Independent
