SAGA DAWA PILGRIMAGE BLESSINGS: Visiting Fo Guang Zhan on Saga Dawa, the world’s tallest seated Buddha Statue and Buddha’s tooth relic (Taiwan III)

On the Saga Dawa day this year (11 June 2025), after attending 7th Gyaton Rinpoche’s teachings on Milarepa (see here), as there was nothing planned for its commemoration at that Palpung centre,  I decided to use the opportunity to visit Fo Guang Shan (佛光山) and what is said to be the biggest bronze Buddha statue in Taiwan (and the world!) but also the Buddha’s tooth relic housed there.

Founded in 1967 by Venerable Master Hsing Yun, Fo Guang Shan has grown into an international organization with numerous branch temples worldwide and is one of the largest Buddhist organizations in Taiwan.  . The monastery is known for its impressive architecture, including the Fo Guang Shan Buddha Memorial Center, and for its promotion of Humanistic Buddhism. To enshrine the Buddha’s tooth relic, Venerable Master Hsing Yun founded the Fo Guang Shan Buddha Museum in Dashu district in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. A grand ceremony was held to commemorate the laying of the foundations of the Buddha Museum in 2003. After nine years of construction, the museum was opened to the public on December 25th, 2011. It is now a major attraction and includes the world’s tallest bronze seated Buddha statue, various pagodas, and a museum housing Buddhist artifacts and art, including one  of the Buddha’s tooth relics.

This is a report of my visit there, with some shared photos. I have visited and seen many stunning Buddha statues during my pilgrimages in India, SE Asia and so on, over the past fifteen years or so. However, this has to be one of the most stunning for sure, mainly in terms of its backdrop and surroundings.  Although it is not historically old, the design, size, aesthetic backdrop of clouds and pagodas, was the perfect backdrop and ending to an afternoon visiting the wonderful Buddha museum there with its sacred, historical objects and tooth relic housed above a magnificent pure white Jade reclining Buddha. All the food outlets there were vegetarian only too, a major relief and difference from other sacred Buddhist pilgrimage sites in India, Thailand and other SE Asian countries where freshly murdered animals are often served right outside the main Buddhist temples there! So Fo Guang Shan is not only more humanistic it seems, but also kinder to animals, the planet and one’s health.

Getting There from Kaohsiung: Bus

Going to the Fo Guang Shan Buddha Museum and statue complex is relatively easy if you go to the High Speed Rail of Kaohsiung (Zoyuing) and take the regular hourly buses that depart right outside the station. I initially tried to do it the more “local” way of going from the central Station and taking a local, longer bus that goes through the city to the temple, but it was almost impossible to find, or get it. So I gave up after an hour in the sweltering humid heat trying to find the right bus stop and instead got the metro to the HSR as I should initially have done!  The bus was great value (around 80 NTD/2GBP) and took about an hour to get there along the main highway. It was mainly Taiwanese people on it, in fact, there seemed to be very few foreign (white) tourists in Taiwan in general, but a solitary German male traveller also got on the bus when I did.

I headed first to the Sutra Depository which was almost empty and there was not much to see there other than some interesting art and calligraphy in an exhibition and a view of the huge Buddha statue below, see photos.

The Sutra Repository building housed an art exhibition and some calligraphy. Here are some photos of my favourites:

The huge Buddha statue

One of the main highlights of visiting the place was seeing the tooth relics housed in a shrine room inside the Buddha museum next to a reclining pure white Jade Buddha statue. However, first I took a walk to see the huge Buddha statue outside, said to be the world’s tallest seated Buddha statue, it was surrounded by columns of huge pagoda buildings. When I first got there it was a bit cloudy, but when I left before sunset, the backdrop changed to a blanket of clouds and blue skies, see photos below.

Reclining White Jade Buddha and one of Buddha’s remaining tooth relics

Another highlight of the Museum and complex was the gorgeous shrine room that housed a pure white jade reclining Buddha, and one of the Buddha’s tooth relics. The Museum website explains that:

“There are said to be three tooth relics remaining in the world after the Buddha’s bodily remains were cremated in 543 BCE. Two of these relics have been enshrined in Sri Lanka and in China. The third tooth relic was carefully kept in India for more than one thousand year. In the thirteenth century, during the Muslim invasion to Inda, the relic was secretly brought to Tibet and then was enshrined in the Sakya Namgyal Monastery. In 1968 during the Cultural Revolution, the monastery was destroyed and a Tibetan lama, Kung Dorje Rinpoche obtained the relic. Determined to send the tooth relic back to India, Kunga Dorje Rinpoche put his own life in danger crossing the Himalayas.”

(For my visit to Kandy, Sri Lanka to see the Buddha’s tooth relic there in 2024, read here).

The website for the Museum explains that:

“A reliquary was created to enshrine the relic. It consists of a base, body, and spire. The base has two tiers: the lower is round and inlaid with pearls, rubies, and emeralds; the upper resembles a lotus with eight petals, each fringed by obsidian and carved with one of the eight auspicious symbols. The spherical body is made of crystal, inside which a smaller reliquary enshrines the relic. A lotus-pattern band of rubies surrounds both the top and bottom. The spire consists of a harmika, 33 stacked rings, a lotus made from mother-of-pearl, and a crystal jewel with 103 facets.”

The pull and energy of the tooth relic was palpable and I made some aspiration prayers and wishes, including doing a closed retreat with a qualified “vajra master”.  It just came over me when I was there (if you will excuse the pun ha ha ).

Inside the Buddha Museum itself, Buddha’s  tooth relics and artefacts from Underground Caves and Palaces

Next to the huge Buddha statue is a big museum with lots of interesting exhibitions and historical artefacts. Including this stone statue below: