The Sitting Buddha

At Wat Suthat Thepwararam, a royal temple of the first grade, the Buddha statue Phra Sri Sakayamuni offers a striking image. You are overwhelmed at once by the statue's immense size and beauty. The aesthetics of Thai arts and the Buddhist ideals are inseparable. Beauty is defined by a combination of an appropriate size and proportion. And Phra Sri Sakayamuni is created with an appropriate size and proportion to become a perfect piece of art, a rendition of the force of Metta and an embodiment of the Four Brahmaviharas. The creation of this Buddha image reflects the Golden Age of the Sukhothai Kingdom, which marked one of the early cradles of the Suvarnabhumi civilisation.

Wat Suthat is located at the centre of Old Bangkok on Bamrungmuang Road of Phra Nakhon District. In front of this temple stands the Giant Swing, a relic of Brahmanic ceremony. The Giant Swing is made of 20-metre tall red lacquered teak logs. In the ceremony, a group of men would push the swing until someone could snatch a bag of gold from a 15-metre bamboo pole with his teeth. Nearby are a Brahmin Shrine, the Dev Mandir Temple and the headquarters of the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration.






Phra Srisakayamuni represents the historical Buddha Sitharta.

A narrow street in front of Wat Suthat leads to the broader Rajadamneon Klang Road, where the Democracy Monument stands frugally as a symbol of modernity. Yet most motorists driving around the circle of the Democracy Monument hardly draw any inspiration from what it stands for. The Democracy Monument, created after the 1932 Revolution that toppled Absolute Monarchy, looks more like a crumbling symbol of what has gone wrong with modern Thailand. Surrounding the Democracy Monument are buried arsenals, chained together in a circle as a curse against the true Thai ideals.

The main Viharn of Wat Suthat houses Phra Sri Sakayamuni, while Phra Buddha Trilokachet is placed in the Ubosot (Ordinary Hall) and Phra Buddha Setthamuni in the Sala Kan Parien (Meeting Hall). When you cross the threshold of the main gate into the temple, you immediately enter the layers of Heaven, symbolised by both the Hindu and Buddhist ideals. Chinese and Thai arts also blend together in an order of conformity. Most important, you witness the Ayutthaya heritage in a recreation. The verandah around it was built in the style of Wat Mongkhon Bophit in Ayutthaya.

The early Bangkok people called this temple as Wat Phra Yai or Wat Sao Ching Cha. King Yodfa named it as Wat Mahasuthawat, which means the temple endowed with the beauty of the Brahma Heaven. Later on King Mongkut, one of his grandsons, renamed this temple as Wat Suthatthepwararam. The new name also came with a heaven-like connotation from Hinduism. It means the Temple that resides on the Mount Meru, the central part of Heaven where Indra takes residence. For bronze horses, beautifully cast with polished surface, are located at each direction to represent the four continents surrounding Mount Meru. Wat Suthat, like all other temples in Bangkok, is a holy place, endowed with the highest Hindu and Buddhist ideals. This temple also represents a central corridor connected to the innermost part of the centre of Heaven situated at Wat Pho and the Temple of the Emerald Buddha.





Wat Suthat

In 1807, King Yodfa commissioned the construction of Wat Suthat. King Lertla would help carved the door panels, which turned out to be a masterpiece. The carved doors are now being kept at the National Museum. But Wat Suthat would not be completed until 1847 during the reign of King Nangklao. A true nation builder, King Nangklao presided over the building and rennovation of most of the temples in Bangkok.

King Yodfa was conscious of the glory of Ayutthaya "when the country was still prosperous". He would like to recreate Ayutthaya, both its spirit and its physical features, in the new capital he built. Reviving the morale of the Siamese through Buddhism was his most important task, which included building new temples, renovating the old ones and moving the Buddha images from the old capitals and major cities to keep them in Bangkok. During his reign, King Yodfa ended up having 1,248 Buddha images moved to the new capita for preservation. Of these, the three most important Buddha images of the land were the Emerald Buddha of the Temple of the Emerald Buddha, Phra Srisakayamuni of Wat Suthat and Phra Srisanphet, a standing Buddha image installed inside the grand pagoda Phra Maha Chedi Srisanpetchadayarn at Wat Pho.

The new temple in the middle of Bangkok would be called Wat Phra Yai (Temple of the Big Buddha Image) because King Yodfa would like to model it after Wat Phanan Cherng of Ayutthaya. Located outside Ayutthaya's inner city on the riverbank in the south of the Old Capital, Wat Phanan Cherng was built probably in the year 1324 before the founding of Ayutthaya. The large Buddha image in the Vihara was called Phra Chao Phanan Cherng, whose name was later changed to Phra Puttha Trairatana Nayok. But the Ayutthaya people call this Buddha image simply as Luang Pho To. Most Thais also called Phra Sri Sakayamuni by a secular name of Luang Pho To.

The origin of Phra Srisakaymuni was from the Vihara of Wat Mahathat, the ancient city of Sukhothai in the North of Thailand. Phra Mahathammaraja Lithai, King of the Sukhothai Dynasty (1347-1375) had Phra Sri Sakayamuni Buddha image cast. The work was finished in 1361. Wat Mahathat was one of the royal temples of the first grade within what is now the Sukhothai Historical Park. The temple was left to decay with time under the scorching heat of the sun and the humidity of the rain. Phra Sri Sakayamuni, the main Buddha image in the chapel, was also left neglected. The Sukhothai Empire lost its power after the rise of Ayutthaya.

In 1808, King Yodfa commanded that Phra Phirenthep made a journey to Sukhothai to retrieve this Buddha image and bring it down to Bangkok. Phra Sri Sakayamuni was floated by raft through the Chao Phraya River before it disembarked at Tha Chang, a pier just outside the Grand Palace. Festivities followed for seven nights and seven days to celebrate the arrival of Phra Sri Sakayamuni, which would be transported via a sledge to the main vihara of the new temple.

The Buddha image was carried in a huge raft, floating down the Chao Phya River until it reached Tha Chang, some dozen steps away from the Grand Palace. Phra Srisakayamuni was installed temporarily there for celebration for seven days and seven nights. King Yodfa had a very fragile health at that point. Still, with his bare-footed, the King led a procession to move the Buddha image from Tha Chang, a new pier just outside the Grand Palace, to the new temple. Apparently, the King was committing the last virtuous act of restoring the glory of Buddhism to his land. The founder of Bangkok, who spent most of his life on the battlefield, was a deeply religious man. He was navigating the last part of his life toward Enlightenment and Heaven. He died shortly after this grand celebration of Phra Srisakayamuni at the age of 72.

Inside the Viharn where the Buddha image Phra Sri Sakyamuni is installed, there are murals portraying Thai Buddhist cosmology and scenes of the Himavanta forest with lotus ponds, Kinnara and Kinnari and their children. The Buddha image is seated at the centre of the Heaven.

At about eight metres in height and six metres in width, Phra Sri Sakayamuni is one of the largest and oldest bronze-cast Buddha images in Thailand. The Buddha image is seated in a classic mediating posture after his victory over King Mara. The Buddha image is in a crossed-legged position, with the right hand placing on the right knee while the left hand resting below the navel, dwelling on the upper thigh in front of the abdomen, with the palm facing up. The base on which the Buddha image sits resembles lion's feet. Under this base the royal ashes of Rama VIII are kept.



Goddess of Earth, bear witness to my overpowering the Mara.

Indeed, Phra Sri Sakayamuni is styled after the Buddha's Subduing of the Mara. According to the Buddhist legend, the Mara King rode on elephant back ahead of a fierce army, trying to disrupt the Buddha's path to enlightenment. The appearance of the Mara King is a recurring theme of a fight between Good and Evil. The Lord Buddha called Vasundhara, or the Goddess of Earth, to witness this confrontation with the Mara King and his army. The Goddess of Earth said she would return to the Buddha the water he had poured on the earth in an act of making merit (tham boon kruad nam). Thus she began to wring water from her hair. All of a sudden, the water flowing from her hair became a mighty ocean, sweeping away the Mara King and his army to the ends of the earth and killing most of them. Frightened by this power, the Mara King fled in disgrace. The Lord Buddha's confrontation with the Mara King has deeply caught the imagination of Thai artists, inspiring them to create statues and paintings of the Buddha in the act of subduing the Mara King.


The Sitting Buddha communicates to us several profound meanings. When you wake up from a long sleep, the first thing you do is to sit up on your bed. This sitting allows us to clear the dizziness in our head and to prepare a sound mind for the day. If you assume a loving-kindness mode or Metta without holding on to your elusive self, you will be starting your good day with auspicises.

Likewise, the Sitting Buddha assumes a mode of serenity and Metta, the first quality of the Four Brahmaviharas. The way his hands are posed signifies that they are empty. The Buddha image's hands are not holding to anything. They are in effect in a "letting go" posture. The Buddha has let it go. He does not hold on to anything. To him, all the things in the universe are subject to change. Nothing lasts forever.

As we pray before Phra Sri Sakayamuni, with a lotus, a candle and three joss sticks to represent the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha, we feel that the image is radiating Metta onto you. The image's eyes penetrate our mind. We are overwhelmed by this Metta force. We are already entering the realm of Brahma.

Phra Sri Sakayamuni also looks into himself. He is in a meditation mode. The Buddha image looks inward, into his inner most self to realise that impermanence, suffering and anatta are the essence of this universe. The Buddha, or the Awakened One, attained enlightenment because he looked inward rather than outward to attain the perfect knowledge. While meditating under a bodhi tree near the River Neranjana, the Buddha discovered the Four Noble Truths. He saw through the nature of suffering (Dukkha), the fundamental cause of all suffering (Samuddaya), the escape from suffering (Nirodha), and what effort a person can go to so that they themselves can attain emancipation (Marga).

Once the Buddha became enlightened, he had the wisdom to understand thoroughly the world from within and the world from without. All the things come into beings, temporarily hold on to their status and then pass away, only to endlessly repeat this cycle or vatta. The Buddhist Nirvana he led us to is a place of absolute tranquillity.

As the name Phra Sri Sakayamuni implies, this Buddha image represents the historical Buddha, or Sithartha Gautama, who lived more than two thousand years ago. The Buddha was born into the royal Sakaya family. Since there are no photos or paintings of the Buddha, artists or artisans can only create the Buddha in their own images or imaginations. Phra Sri Sakayamuni has a facial look of a man who is and is not of this world. The part that belongs to this world must have reflected a common feature of one of the ancient persons of Suvarnabhumi, who was gentle and kind. Phra Sri Sakayamuni represents an ideal superman man of Suvarnabhumi, one who was noble, bold, religiously tolerant and having a Metta heart.


The Sukhothai artists achieved the high art of beauty through the creation of Phra Sri Sakayamuni, which could not be more perfect. The Buddha image also embodies the highest virtue of goodness because it represents the Buddha's Dharma teachings. Moreover, Phra Sri Sakayamuni also teaches us about absolute reality through his bare left hand, which does not hold on to anything because in absolute reality there is nothingness. In our life, we all aim to realise the highest ideals of beauty, virtue and truth. In Phra Sri Sakayamuni, we can realise these highest ideals of beauty, virtue and ultimate truth all at once.

By placing Phra Sri Sakayamuni in Wat Phrayai in Bangkok, modelled after Wat Phanan Cherng, King Yodfa created a necessary link between the three kingdoms into an unbroken line. The Thon Buri Kingdom would represent a ring that ties the knot between Sukhothai and Ayutthaya Kingdoms with the Bangkok Kingdom. Without King Taksin the Great, who consolidated Siam after the fall of Ayutthaya in 1767, the Suvarnabhumi civilisation would have ceased to exist. King Yodfa took on from the Thonburi Kingdom to found the new capital and to restore the glory that was Ayutthaya. But he also consciously had a vision of Suvarnabhumi, through Sukhothai ideals, in his mind when he built Bangkok as the new capital. Wat Suthat would represent the glory of Sukhothai through Phra Sri Sakayamuni, the grandeur of Ayutthaya through the modelling of its spirit, and the celebration of the Bangkok Kingdom.

The surrounding courtyard, a blend of Chinese and Thai arts so prevalent during the reign of King Nangklao, contains 156 Buddha images. A statue of King Rama VIII stands in one of the corners in front of the Vihara. On the door and windows panels there are pictures of guardians and divinities. At the lower terrace of the base there are Chinese pagodas, seven pagodas on each side making 28 of them to signify the 28 Buddhas born onto this earth. Buddhists believe in the reincarnation and a perfect being in the Buddha. Phra Sri Sakayamuni is one of a series of the Buddhas born into this world to lead human beings to salvation. He was the historical Buddha, or the Buddha that had flesh, blood and feeling like all of us. And he was the Awakened One, or the Enlightened One, who understood thoroughly the impermanent of the universe.



The Sakayamuni Buddha’s teaching would only last 5,000 years before it goes into oblivion. We have already passed the middle of Buddhist era. After Sri Sakayamuni, a new Buddha will be born to lead us to redemption again. The next Buddha is called Maitreya.


Wat Suthat provides a platform for Sri Sakayamuni to pass on the candle of Dharma to the next Buddha, or Maitreya. For all of his Metta, Phra Sri Sakayamuni gives blessing of compassion for Maitreya, who waits for his turn to come down to this world to attain the complete enlightenment.

Sakayamuni spoke about the Buddha of the Future, who would follow him as follows:

"He will have a heavenly voice which reaches far; his skin will have a golden hue, a great splendour will radiate from his body, his chest will be broad, his limbs well developed, and his eyes will be like lotus petals. His body is eighty cubits high, and twenty cubits broad. He will have a retinue of 84,000 persons, whom he will instruct in the mantras. With this retinue he will one day go forth into the homeless life. A Dragon tree will then be the tree under which he will win enlightenment; its branches rise up to fifty leagues, and its foliage spreads far and wide over six Kos. Underneath it Maitreya, the best of men, will attain supreme enlightenment - there can be no doubt on that. And he will win his enlightenment the very same day that he has gone forth into the homeless life.

“And then, a supreme sage, he will with a perfect voice preach the true dharma, which is auspicious and removes all ill, i.e. the fact of ill, the origination of ill, the transcending of ill, and the holy eightfold path which brings security and leads to Nirvana. He will explain the four Truths, because he has seen that generation, in faith, ready for them, and those who have listened to his Dharma will thereupon make progress in the religion. They will be assembled in a park full of beautiful flowers, and his assembly will extend over a hundred leagues. Under Maitreya's guidance, hundreds of thousands of living beings shall enter upon a religious life."



The Buddha of the Future

Phra Srisakayamuni has witnessed it all. He saw the glory of Sukhothai 700 years ago and Suvarnabhumi as well as their decline. In the middle period represented by Ayutthaya, Phra Srisakyayamuni was completely forgotten. Now this Buddha image is about to make his move by passing on the legacy of Buddhism and the Middle Path principle to the next Buddha. The Standing Buddha of Phra Sri Ariyamaitreya at Wat Indhraviharn in Bangkok’s Bangkhunphrom area is about to take over as the next Buddha as a new chapter of Suvarnabhumi begins.

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