Mongolia: Chinese-donated monumental Maitreya under construction
A ~20-metre statue of boddhisattva Maitreya, donated by the Yonghegong 雍和宫 temple in Beijing and built in Sichuan, is now being assembled at Dashchoilin Дашчойлин བཀྲ་ཤིས་ཆོས་གླིང་ monastery in Ulaanbaatar.
The Dashchoilin Maitreya. Picture by Paweł Szczap.
The Yonghegong's involvement in the project was reportedly being discussed at least a decade ago. The statue itself was finished by 2013:
The statue in 2013. Based on the sign on the next building, these are the manufacturer's facilities in Pidu 郫都 district (then still Pi County 郫县) near Chengdu. Via Жавзандамба хутагт төв.
A ceremony was held in 2014 for the delivery of (at least) the statue's feet to the Dashchoilin.
Then-ambassador Wang Xiaolong 王小龙 delivers speech at the ceremony (via CRI).
Here's what the building will look like:
Artist's impression via CRI.
Artist's impression. Picture by Paweł Sczczap.
Work on the building that will house began only in May. Here's Gao Fengying 高凤英, an attachée at the Chinese embassy, helping lay the foundations:
Picture: Chinese embassy in Ulaanbaatar.
Now it finally started, construction seems to be going quickly. Here's another picture of its current state:
Picture by Paweł Sczczap.
The Yonghegong's involvement is quite significant, as it was at the Beijing monastery where most Mongolian reincarnated lamas were selected. Current PRC religious policy increasingly seeks to instrumentalise (in this case Tibetan) Buddhism for geopolitical purposes. I a recent piece discussing these policies, I quoted the Party secretary of the Beijing Tibetan Buddhism Academy: exchanges between China's state-managed religious institutions and countries along the 'Belt and Road' can serve the dual goals of showcasing "the results of our Party and country’s ethnic and religious policies, displaying the healthy heritage and development of Tibetan Buddhism" in China, while reducing "the Dalai clique's space of activity, upholding national sovereignty."
The Yonghegong has an important role in these exchanges, of which the Maitreya donation can be seen as an instantiation. Beijing does indeed cultivate relations with the less-Dalai Lama friendly members of Mongolian clergy, such as Sanjdorj Санждорж, the outspoken abbot of Ikh Khüree Их хүрээ monastery in Ulaanbaatar, whose views Chinese media were happy to quote during last year's Dalai Lama crisis. A few months earlier, Sanjdorj had visited the Yonghegong accompanied by officials from the Central United Front Department.
Dashchoilin temple, the beneficiary of the Maitreya donation, doesn't actually belong to the anti-Dharamsala persuasion. Its abbot, Dambajav Дамбажав, has met the Dalai Lama on several occasions, including during the last trip, that Beijing found so hard to stomach. That clearly hasn't led to a change of mind on the donation, possibly a reflection of the importance of good relations with Dambajav, given his role as vice-president of the World Fellowship of Buddhists.
Another, arguably competing, similar project is underway outside Ulaanbaatar: an even taller (54-metre) Maitreya statue, a stupa twice that height, and a cultural centre. The Grand Maitreya Project has a rather different affiliation from the Yonghegong gift, with connections to Dharamsala and under the "spiritual guidance" of the Dalai Lama.
Judging by the pace of construction at the Dashchoilin, the Chinese-supported project should be finished before the DL-guided one, although the latter expects to have a smaller Buddha statue ready this month as a "first phase" of the project.
As I recently commented on Language Log, there's a linguistic issue related to the name of the Sichuan-based company the Dashchoilin Maitreya was ordered from (owned by Könchok Tashi དཀོན་མཆོག་བཀྲ་ཤིས། 根秋扎西, a Tibetan artist and entrepreneur). The company's name is Karma Bisha, rendered in Chinese as 噶玛博秀 Gámǎ bóxiù, a phonetic transcription. In the original Tibetan, the name is ཀརྨ་བི་ཤྭ། Kar.ma bi shwa, which seems to be an inversion of Bi shwa kar.ma, the Tibetan transcription of the Sanskrit name of the mythical sculptor (or architect deity) Viśvakarman, the 'All-Maker'. If that reading is correct, the Chinese name of the company could have been based on attested names for Viśvakarman in the Chinese Buddhist tradition, such as 毗首羯磨 Píshǒujiémó or, as in Hui Lin 慧琳's expanded Yiqie jing yinyi 一切经音译, 毗湿缚羯磨 Píshīfùjiémó.
[A few paragraphs in the above are essentially recycled from an earlier piece for CPI: Analysis]
[Thanks to Paweł Szczap.]