bas - Reliefs

Welcome to Borobudur, one of the sacred buildings of Buddhism as a World Cultural Heritage site. The splendor and beauty of Borobudur has its own historical value for Indonesian people. The Indonesian government has designated Chandi Borobudur as a major tourist attraction, and also a priority tourist destination for domestic and foreign visitors.

Chandi Borobudur attracts extraordinary enthusiasm to visit and explore several narrative sources in thematic tours, with the aim of getting to know more closely the history, architecture and fine arts of this building.

The friendly Pamong Carita will accompany and guide you to provide explanations and narratives about Borobudur and its surroundings. Introducing 'Upanat', namely special footwear worn when visiting the terraces through a corridor with a series of relief panel galleries, leading to the top of the circular upper terrace with a row of stupas at Borobudur Temple. Explore history and admire the beauty of architectural art, as well as the origin of the name Chandi Borobudur.

Relief Borobudur

Source: Guiding Technique Chandi Borobudur arisguide. Foto arisguide. 

Welcome, nice to meet you on the Borobudur tour, You will now step on and visit the splendor of Chandi Borobudur which is one of the world's cultural heritage sites. The reopening of Borobudur sends an interesting opportunity to explore several narrative sources about the existence of the Borobudur in the insights of travel guides on to Borobudur.

Mentioned in the history of Borobudur, there is one of the relief panels carved on a hidden foot, based on the text of Karmawibhangga, panel number 150, concerning about the offering of footwear called 'Upanat', which is dedicated to Brahmins.

The bas-relief of the foot wall is hidden in the Karmawibhangga text panel number 150, regarding the offering of footwear with the name 'Upanat', the footwear offered to Brahmins, in order to obtain rewards and prosperity in life.

The relief found on the wall of hidden foot, based on the Karmawibhangga text panel 150, concerns the offering of a footwear as its name 'Upanat', a special footwear offered to Brahmins, to obtain merit and prosperity in life.

Introducing 'Upanat', a footwear used to visit on the terraces of Chandi Borobudur, with the aim of getting to know the monument better, learning history, doing thematic tours and admiring the splendor of Chandi Borobudur as a sacred temple for Buddhists. The trip will be part of an appreciation in learning, admiring, and participating in safeguarding and protecting the world cultural heritage site located at Borobudur Indonesia.

It's fun going around the temple to get a source of explanation guided by a tour guide. Opportunity to find out the source, explanation of the written history of Chandi Borobudur and study about panel reliefs Borobudur.

Welcome to Chandi Borobudur

You will now step on and visit the splendor of Chandi Borobudur which is one of the world's cultural heritage sites.

Source: Guidance Technique Chandi Borobudur arisguide. Foto arisguide.

Step on Borobudur

Chandi Borobudur is one of a world cultural heritage site or World Heritage Site, a Buddhist temple located in Borobudur, belongs to Magelang regency and located in Central Java province. To reach the monument is approximately 96 kilometers from Semarang, the capital city of Central Java, and approximately 86 kilometers from the city of Surakarta, and about 40 kilometers from the city of Yogyakarta.

Chandi Borobudur is located right above the hill and built in the middle of several mountains and hills. Looking to the west, there are Mount Sundoro and Sumbing. Looking to the east you can see Mount Merbabu and an active volcano, Merapi. View to the north, it is approximately 15 kilometers from Borobudur, there is Tidar hill, and to the south it is bounded by the Menoreh hill range. Borobudur is located at the confluence of two rivers, they are Progo and Elo, located right in the middle between the east of Chandi Borobudur and Chandi Pawon.

Chandi Borobudur or Barabudur 

is a 9th–century Mahayana Buddhist temple, which consists of nine stacked platforms, six square and three circular, topped by a central dome, surrounded by 72 stupas and decorated with 2,672 relief panels and 504 Buddha statues.

Source: Guidance Technique Chandi Borobudur arisguide. Foto a screenshot arisguide.

The bas - Reliefs

On the walls of the temple at every level except on the terraces of Arupadhatu, carved bas-relief panels are made very carefully and delicately. The reliefs and decorative patterns of Borobudur are in a naturalist style with ideal proportions and refined aesthetic taste. These reliefs are very beautiful, even considered as the most elegant and graceful in the art of the Buddhist world.

The reliefs of Borobudur also apply the disciplines of Indian art, such as various gestures that have certain aesthetic meanings or values. Reliefs in the form of noble humans such as hermits, kings and noble women, apsaras or beings who reach the degree of purity like gods, such as tara and bodhisatwa, are often depicted with the body position of the tribhanga.

This body position is called "curve of three" that is curved or bent slightly at the neck, hips, and ankles with only body weight resting on one foot while the other foot is curved to rest. This flexible body position implies elegance, for example the figure of the female angel Surasundari standing in a tribhanga posture while holding a long-stemmed lotus.

Borobudur is constructed in such a way that it reveals various levels of terraces, showing intricate architecture that goes from being heavily ornamented with bas-reliefs to being plain in Arupadhatu circular terraces.

Borobudur contains approximately 2,670 individual bas reliefs (1,460 narrative and 1,212 decorative panels), which cover the façades and balustrades. The total relief surface is 2, 500 square metres (27,000 sq ft), and they are distributed at the hidden foot (Kāmadhātu) and the five square platforms (Rupadhatu).

The archeologists discovered colour pigments of blue, red, green, black, as well as bits of gold foil, and concluded that the monument— a dark gray mass of volcanic stone, lacking + color — was probably once coated with varjalepa white plaster and then painted with bright colors, serving perhaps as a beacon of Buddhist teaching. The same vajralepa plaster can also be found in Sari, Kalasan and Sewu temples. It is likely that the bas-reliefs of Borobudur were originally quite colorful, before centuries of torrential tropical rainfalls peeled-off the color pigments.

Narrative panels on the wall read from right to left, while those on the balustrade read from left to right. This conforms with pradaksina, the ritual of circumambulation performed by pilgrims who move in a clockwise direction while keeping the sanctuary to their right.

One of the famous renderings 

of an 8th-century Southeast Asian double outrigger ship is Borobudur Ship Samudra Raksa, sailed from Indonesia to Africa.

Source: Guidance Technique Chandi Borobudur arisguide. Foto a screenshot arisguide.

The following summary shows how the various series of reliefs are arranged.

Wall of hidden foot - Karmavibhangga - 160 panels.

First gallery

main wall: a) Lalitavistara - 120 panels.

b) Jataka/Avadana - 120 panels.

balustrade: a) Jataka/Avadana - 372 panels.

b) Jataka/Avadana - 128 panels.

Second gallery

main wall: Gandavyuha - 128 panels.

balustrade: Jataka/Avadana - 100 panels.

Third gallery

main wall: Gandavyuha - 88 panels.

balustrade: Gandavyuha - 88 panels.

Fourth gallery

main wall: Gandavyuha - 84 panels.

balustrade : Gandavyuha - 72 panels. 

Total : 1460 panels.

Karmavibhangga

The reliefs on the ‘hidden foot’ are devoted to the inevitable law of karma. The 160 panels do not relate a continous story, but each provides one complete illustration of cause and effect.

The first 117 panels show various actions producing one and the same result, while the remaining 43 demonstrate the many results that can follow from one kind of act. Blame worthy activities, from gossip to murder, with their corresponding purgatorial punishments, and praise worthy activities, like charity and pilgrimages to sanctuaries, and their subsequent rewards, are both shown. The pains of hell and the pleasures of heaven, and scenes of daily life are represented in a full panorama of samsara, the endless cycle of birth and death, the chain of all those forms of delusional existence from which Buddhism brings release.

The encasement base of the Borobudur temple was dissembled to reveal the hidden foot, and the reliefs were photographed by Casijan Chepas in 1890. During the restoration, the foot encasement was reinstalled, covering the Karmawibhangga reliefs. Today, only the southeast corner of the hidden foot is revealed for visitors.

Lalitavistara

The series does not provide a complete biography of the Buddha. It starts with the glorious descent of the Lord Buddha from the Tushita heaven, and ends with his first sermon in the Deer Park near Benares. Showing the birth of the Buddha as Prince Siddhartha, son of King Suddhodana and Queen Maya of Kapilavastu (in present-day Nepal), is the southern staircase.

The Lalitavistara is a fundamental text of Mahayana Buddhism, whichthe title of the Sutra means The Elaboration of the Buddha and refers to the idea that the Buddha‘s last incarnation wasa performance intentionally given to enlighten mankind. The 120 panels which illustrate the Lalitavistara cover the upper half of the main wall around the first gallery.

jatakas and avadanas

Jatakas are stories about the Buddha before he was born as Prince Siddhartha. They have for main theme the meritorious acts which distinguished the Bodhisattva from any other creature. The accumulation of virtue is the characteristic of the preparatory stages to the attainment of Buddhahood. The hundreds of times the Bodhisattva was born and reborn, either as ananimal or in a human form.

Jatakas and avadanas are treated in one and the same series without any evident distinction in the reliefs of Chandi Borobudur. No particular system of alternation is evident. The lower row of reliefs on the wall of the first gallery, mostly depicts avadanas. Some jatakas are included by way of variation. The system in its upper row of the series on the balustrade is quite different. The reliefs are practically all jatakas, with just a few avadanas.

The first 20 panels in the lower series on the wall on the first gallery depict the Sudhanakumaravadana (The Saintly Deeds of Prince Sudhanakumara), derived from the Divyavadana. The story starts with the rivalry of two kingdoms: the prosperous kingdom of North Panchala, and the poverty stricken kingdom of South Panchala.

Gandavyuha

Gandavyuha, a part of the story of the Borobudur reliefs, is the story told in the last chapter of the Avatamsaka Sutra about Sudhana's tireless wanderings in search of the Highest Perfect Wisdom. It includes two galleries (third and fourth) as well as half of the second gallery, which consists of a total of 460 panels.

As the main character, it is told that a young man named Sudhana, the son of a very rich merchant, appears in the 16th panel. The previous 15 panels form the prologue to the miracle story during Buddhist samadhi in Jeta's Garden at Sravasti.

During his wanderings, Sudhana is said to have visited no less than thirty teachers, but none of them really satisfied him. He was then instructed by Manjusri to meet the monk Megasri, where he was given the doctrine for the first time. As his journey continues, Sudhana meets Supratisthita, the healer Megha (Spirit of Knowledge), banker Muktaka, then the monk Saradhvaja, the householder Asa (Spirit of Supreme Enlightenment), Bhismottaranirghosa, Brahmin Jayosmayatna, Princess Maitrayani, monk Sudarsana, a boy named Indriyesvara, lay devotees of Prabhuta, banker Ratnachuda, King Anala, Lord Siva Mahadeva, Queen Maya, Bodhisattva Maitreya and then returned to Manjusri. Each meeting with teachers, they have given Sudhana certain teachings, knowledge and wisdom. These meetings are shown in the third gallery.

The fifteen reliefs form the miracles produced by the Buddha’s samadhi (deepest meditation) on the assembly of a hundred disciples in the Garden of Jeta at Sravasti. Upon his arrival at the sanctuary of Vichitrasaladhvaya the people of the town rush out in large numbers to hear the Bodhisattva describe the wonderful deeds performed by the Buddha. After a brief meeting with Manjusri, Sudhana proceeds to the residence of the Bodhisattva Samantabhadra at fourth gallery of Chandi Borobudur.

Source: Guidance Technique Chandi Borobudur arisguide.

arisguide

It's fun on the temple trip with me.

KEBUDAYAAN BOROBUDUR - BELAJAR DENGAN PEMANDU WISATA.

Get more reading the materials about Chandi Borobudur in Barabudur atau Borobudur, Candi Buddha Pusaka Budaya Indonesia.

Reading is more fun exploring the thematic narratives, beyond travel guide its more detail in UPANAT - Wisata di Borobudur.

Reading in English is fun and also seems so interesting to translate into language that is easy and flexible, get readings in detail in Welcome to Borobudur Temple, the fabric of life in the Buddhist culture.

Explore, admire the beauty of art in pictures and photos by typing the detailed link in PHOTO IMAGE BOROBUDUR.