Pure Land And Nirvana

My dissertation discussing the statues in the main Buddhist hail of xiaoxitian temple in Xixian County, Shanxi Province, is separated in two parts:Chapter one is a historical research made on the origin of these statues. My dissertation made a detail research on the basic issues such as the time when the fane was constructed, the person who constructed it, how the temples was disposed, the renovation In the following dynasties and something about when and who made the statues in the main Buddhist hall. Based on these researches the dissertation probed into the historical circumstance on how the features about the image content, the conceive and the art form of the statues was evolved. On one hand, the image content, the conceive and the art form of the statues have intimate relations with Daoliang who was in charge of the construction and craftsman Zhang Junming. On the other hand, it was a creation effected both by temple culture of Xizhou and statue creative style in temple in Ming and Qing dynasty.From Chapter two to Chapter five this dissertation made a graphical research on the statues. According to the disposal of statues in the main Buddhist hall, this dissertation discussed the five buddha icons in the central altar first, then the ten disciple icons in the two altars below the north frontispiece and the south frontispiece, and then the wall-statues "Six Heavens of Desire" and "Coloured Glaze Holy Ground" on the both north and south walls. This dissertation also revealed the relations between the images and the theme of "'pure land"" and "nirvana", which was expressed by the images as a whole.The intention of this dissertation is to study the development of Buddhist art and Buddhism belief in later historical-time by clarifying some basic facts of thestatues In the main Buddhist hall of xiaoxitian temple, such as the time of construction, the constructor, the historical background, the contents expressed by the images, the relation of the images in meaning and the religion and conception conveyed by the images integrately.