city,shanxi province ,70km from wutai county town ,140km from xinzhou city town and 240km from taiyuan city in the southwest and 210km from datong in the north ,with a total area of about 2837sq.km.wutai mountain scenic spot area is situated in the region with taihuai town as center in the
north part of wutai county ,with an area of 376sq.km. it is a national –level
scenic spot area at nation level and a national class 4a tourist scenic spot area wutai mountain has peaks rising one higher than another and chain of mountains in stagger like a coiling dragon and crouching tiger .the whole mountain has more than 1100 varieties of plant and ,among them ,the wutai mountain mushroom is both the good food for eating and valuable drug and was determined as an article of tribute by an emperor in history
wutai mountain is the highest mountainous land in north china region ,with the north platform top being at an altitude of 3058m above sea level and called “roof ridge of north china ”,wutai mountain had its name because it has five main peaks with flat and broad platforms .it has five called cool mountain by the buddhists believers and is one of the five main buddhist holy lands in the world and also a famous activity place of buddhism in china ,ranking first among the “four main buddhist famous mountains in china ,where often reside 1200 monks and nuns now ,from north wei to qing dynasty ,the emperors of the past dynasties all have arrived wutai mountain and the eminent monks and great teachers of wutai mountain came forth in large numbers ,these great teachers and grand masters in the history of chinese buddhism have made outstanding contributions for the buddhist culture of wutai mountain so that wutai mountain has become an institution for the overseas believers to study abroad and listen to scriptures and written down a brilliant historic volume of sino-foreign cultural exchange.
wutai mountain is a treasure –house of ancient architecture of china ,where the cultural relics gather together and treasures come together in crowds .now , wutai mountain has 47 temples ,and among them are 4 national-level key cultural relic preservation units and nearly 20 are provincial –level key cultural relic preservation units .of the four wood –structure buildings of tang dynasty kept in shanxi ,two are in wutai mountain ,tang song ,liao ,jin ,yuan ,ming and qing dynasties ,and minguo all left behind large buildings of typical wood structure and this itself is a volume of vast and numerious ancient architectural history of china.
wutai mountain has long cultural history and magnificent natural sight .in the temples of the whole mountain ate kept 17445 buddha statues ,224pieces of stone tablets, 58 pieces of horizontal boards, 7297 volumes of scriptures books in 928 cases,frescoes of 911sq.km and 1355 pieces of valuable cultural relics such as musical instruments used in buddhist mass and offering wares .all these are the valuable materials for studying the ancient history .science and culture and arts of china . wutai mountain was also renowned for the revolutionary base area .in the initial period of the war of resistance against japan, wutai mountain was the first base area of resistance against japan behind enemy’s lines in china and the birthplace of shanxi –chahar –hebei border area .in the years of revolutionary war ,the revolutionaries of old generation such as mao zedong ,zhou enlai ,liu shaoqi and zhu de and the international communist fighter batune fought and worked here.
today ,what we will tour at first is xiantong temple ,xiantong temple is situated at the south foot of lingjiu peak in the central district of taihuai town and is one of five main mediation places of wutai mountain .it is also the leader temple most worshipp ed in the buddhist circle of wutai mountain .xiantong temple occupies a land of 43700sq.km and has 400 houses and 65 halls in total .it
was initially built in the eleventh year of yongping period ,east han dynasty and has a history of nearly 2000 years to date .since the peak of posa top is very similar to the vulture peak of india (the place where sakyamuni taught scriptures of his disciples),it was named lingjiu temple after the name of the mountain later ming emperor of han dynasty added two characters “da fu”in chinese (meaning grandness and creditability )before “lingjiu temple ”so that the complete name of temple was dafu lingjiu temple .it was rebuilt in xiaowen emperor period of north wei dynasty and spanided into 12 courtyards .it was also called garden temple because of the garden in front .later ,it war rebuilt once again by taizong emperor of tang dynasty and renamed great huayan temple by wu zetian because the newly translated huayan scriptures were collected here .it finally was granted a horizontal board “large xiantong temple ”by zhu yuanhang,the taizu emperor of ming dynasty[bell tower]bell tower is of two –storeyed and three-eave structure ,and on the beam in the tower is hung a bronze bell,the largest one in wutai mountain .such bell was called long ringing bell and also called nether world bell and cast in july of the forty-eighth year of wanly period ,ming dynasty .with a weight of up to 9999.5jin.[dragon and tiger tablet s]there is no heaven king hall but only two pieces of stone tablets in xiantong temple ,the dragon and tiger tablets we see now .these two tablets have the implied meaning that dragon and tiger is guarding the gate and there is no need to trouble the four main heaven kings .[front courtyard ]the tablet board “rosy clouds decorated heaven city” in gold characters on the top of gate was personally written by qinanlong emperor .in the hall are worshipped 3 statues of bodhisattvas ,with guanyin bodhisattva in the middle and wenshu bodhisattva and puxian bodhisattva on both sides separately ,so it was also called “three-main-scholar hall ” it was also called scripture collection hall because scripture books are fully placed on both sides. in each of the left and right tablet pavilions outside guanyin hall is a tablet .the two tablet pavilions are completely the same in size of tablet ,shape system and pattern, one piece engraved with “tablet inscription of xiantong temple personally written by emperor “ and the other being characterless and called characterless tablet .the stone tablets of wutain mountain are roughly spanided into imperial tablet .official document tablet ,merits and virtues tablet ,event record keeping tablet ,poem and writing tablet ,tomb tablet and the special buddha foot tablet and characterless tablet .among the special characterless tablets at home ,three pieces are most attractive ,i e
the first is the characterless tablet left on the top of taishan mountain for guarding against the six states after qinshi emperor defeated the six states ;the second is the characterless
tablet set up by wu zetian at qian tomb in xi’an ,meaning that merits and demerits as well as right and wrong would be left behind to the later generations to comment and no handwriting was left ;the third is the characterless tablet we see just now ,which was set up by kangxi emperor .the characterless of the tablet seemed to praise that xiantong temple was so grand and magnificent and buddhism was so broad and profound that it was difficult to express them in written language.as record in “annals of cool mountain ”,under the two pieces of stone tablets were two circular water ponds .according to legend ,after kangxi arriving at wutai mountain at that time ,as soon as he entered xiantong temple he saw at far distance that the decorated arch on posa top looks like a big dragon-head .the two wood poles look like dragon horns ,and the 108 flight steps look like dragon tongue s ,after entering xiantong temple ,kangxi asked at one the old buddhist abbot said just coincided with what kangxi saw ,the old buddhist abbot said that ,when the sun shines on the water ponds at noon ,there would appear two light rings on both sides of the decorated arch of posa
top and posa top was just a live dragon .then,kangxi gave an order to let the monks of xiantong temple fill up the two water ponds and set up two pieces of stone tablets ,with one tablet bearing written language and the other characterless .[large wenshu hall]wutai mountain is the place where wenshu bodhisattva makes buddhist
rites ,and in most of the temples were build wenshu hall .while the name of this wenshu hall was prefixed with a “large”, and such a word “large” contains 4 meanings ; the first is that xingtong temple is the oldest temple in wutai mountain ‘the second is that xiantong temple is the temple with largest floor area among the temple of wutai mountain ‘the third is that xiantong temple is the temple most completely preserved in wutai mountain ;the fourth is that the number of wenshu
bodhisattva worshipped here is most (6 statues of wenshu bodhisattvas in total ),so that it is called large wenshu hall ,since wenshu in 5 directions can be worshipped at the same time ,local people call it “convenient pilgrimage platform” [daxiong precious hall]
daxiong precious hall was also called large buddha hall
,it is the main building in xiantong temple and also the center of the whole temple. in the hall is worshipped the horizontal buddha of the third generation
. daxiong was the honorific title of sakyamuni, saying he was “a warrior fearing nothing ” the hall was built in the architectural form with the wood structure as primary part and the upper four –a-shaped roofs and lower four extending corridors as secondary ,with 108 wood columns supporting the whole large hall and the walls having only the function of shielding off the wind and resisting the cold ,when you enter the hall ,you will feel that it is very spacious .this hall occupies a land of 1.2 mu and is the largest daxiong precious hall in xutai mountain ,it is also the place for holding grand buddhist activities in the temple .this is the first feature of xiantong temple –complete wood structure.[beamless hall]
beamless hall is a white complete-brick architectural structure .it was built by completely laying up bricks without use of beams and hence its name “beamless hall ” ,it looks like a european –style building in appearance and was painted white .white represents pureness in the west ,while symbolizes the buddhist pure land and boundless brightness here .since this hall is mot supported by beams and columns ,the weight of hall top is borne by the thick and heavy wall bodies on
four sides ,to form a sharp contrast with form of emulating wood structure ,and the brick-laid
round columns and dipper –like arches and carved extending raves embody typical combined chinese and west styles .the whole large hall seems to have 7 rooms when you are looking externally ,but actually it has only 3 rooms . it looks like having two floors when you are looking outdoors but ,internally , it is a one-storeyed building ,the interior of the hall adapted the form of internal dipper –like arch ,which is reduced floor by floor to form a roof style of natural vault .this large hall was built in the thirty –seventh year of wanly period , ming dynasty and has a history of nearly 400 years till now .this is the second feature of xiantong temple-architecture of complete brick structure .in the middle of hall is worshipped lushena buddha ,the body statue of the ancestor of buddha and stands duohao buddha pagoda ,the thirteen –storeyed wood pagoda of ming dynasty, which is also the only wood pagoda in wutai mountain .beamless hall was also caked “seven-place and nine- meeting hall”, which means that sakyamuni has taught scriptures in seven places for 9 times ,therefore ,it looks like having seven rooms.[thousand alms –bowl wenshu hall]
the wenshu with one thousand alms bowls ,one thousand hands and one thousand sakyas worshipped in thousand alms –bowl hall may be rated a rare rush in the casting history .it was cast in the ninth year of wanly period ,ming dynasty through designing and financing fund s by hanshan himself ,a grand master of the age . [large bronze hall]
large bronze hall is of world renown ,when you are looking externally ,you can find that it is of double eaves and lying –mountain top and spanided into the upper and lower floors .on each of the four sides of upper floor are nounted 6 lattice-fans ,and on the upper and lower ends of each lattice-fan are carved and cast grass ,trees ,flowers and plants as well as birds and beasts .on each of the upper and lower parts of the four column and column base being one integrated mass and fixing the 100 thousand jin heavy bronze hall .the four sides of the upper floor of the bronze hall are surrounded by about 1m high rails .in both ends of the roof ridge of hall are cast separately two legendary animals appearing vividly to fly ,with a wind millstone and precious bottle in the middle ,the bronze hall looks like two floors in appearance but actually is only one room ,4.2m in row depth ,about 4.7m wide ,5m high and carved with 10 thousand statues of buddhas from inside ,therefore, somebody also called it ten-thousand –buddha
hall .this hall was built by miaofeng ,the founder of a sect of buddhaism ,through begging alms of one wanly period .ming dynasty ,the saying “xiantong, xiantong, hundred-thousand-jin bronze” spread among the people originated from his behavior .since this hall was completely made of complete bronze by casting ,it embodies the third feature of xiantong temple –architecture of complete bronze structure.
the first bronze pagodas and bronze halls were cast in one and the same period ,and represent the five orientations and five platform tops of wutai mountain .the middle three ones among them are ruined later while being supplementarily cast in recent years .[back high hall]
behind the large bronze hall is back high hall situated in the highest position ,which was called scripture collection pavilion in the past .now ,here is worshipped sweet dew wenshu with a sweet dew bottle held in hand ,to mean that the sweet dew is sprinkled extensively .in the both flanks are eight grand expounding masters ,who were the buddhist grand master specially engaged in teaching and translating scripture texts .
