Sor Plynoi

Sor Plynoi

Amuletic Buddha Images : Belief and Faith

.....Belief and faith have been parts of human beings of all races and languages since the ancient time. For this reason, different forms of amulets and charms have been created through all historical periods to boost morale and give support to believers. In many times, when people were in a critical or perilous situation, they would think of things they had strong faith in or took as their protectors; they then would gain conscience and became determined to fight against obstacles and dangers. Their strong will enabled them to succeed. As a result, people of different times preferred to have amulets and charms for themselves.

. Later, human beings started to have religion as their guidance in life. Symbols of their former belief and faith were developed to be more artistic. Particularly, Buddhists loved to pay homage to the places related to important incidents in the Lord Buddha's life -- Place of Birth, Attaining Enlightenment, Giving the First Sermon and Entering Nirvana. Each year a large number of Buddhists visited there holy places and they also looked for objects of worship so as to take back to enshrine in their own country. The natives living close to those holy places created votive tablets for sale at inexpensive prices. What they did was well received, so the practice of creating votive tablets became more extensive.

The tradition of creating votive tablets in Thailand was not originally for sale as mentioned above. Thai Buddhists created votive tablets with a belief to prolong and firmly establish Buddhism. Therefore, a large number of votive tablets, after being created, would be interred under stupas. It was believed that when the stupas were ruined or destroyed, people might excavate the ruins and found the interred votive tablets. Then, they would realize how Buddhism had been established in this area and they would be reminded of the Lord Buddha's benevolence.

.. Later on, those who created votive tablets were those who had undergone ascetic practice and had thus gained a supernormal will power. They, therefore, made use of auspicious materials to create votive tablets as well as meditated and prayed to transfer the strength of their supernormal will power to the amuletic images they created. So in times of calamities -- diseases or warfare, the Buddhists who took the Lord Buddha's benevolence as their haven, would carry with them small Buddha images to boost their spirit. This started the belief in votive tablets as protectors from dangers. Though these images are not meant to give beleivers an eternal life, they are made to represent the Lord Buddha and are made of auspicious materials. Those who pay homage to the Lord Buddha's images and follow his teaching would bring upon themselves auspices and good fortune.
Auspices in a person would render happiness and prosperity to that person.