Tag Archives: Temples

Ancient Greece, Europe, Greece, Greek Temples, Temples

Sanctuaries of Apollo

Gallery February 21, 2017 Leave a comment

Ancient Greek temples were deliberately placed in the landscape with relation to salient features that were considered holy. The topography of different locales was seen as the manifestation of telluric energies that revealed and reflected the nature and characteristics of the deities that inhabited them. The practice is clearly demonstrated by the contrasting natural settings of the sanctuaries of the god Apollo, corresponding to different aspects of his cult, at the sites of Delos, Delphi and Epidaurus.

Birthplace of Apollo and Artemis on Delos. (Click on photos to enlarge)

Apollo is one of the most important and complex Greek deities. He is a god of the sun and light, prophecy and healing and patron of the arts. He was the son of Zeus born, together with his twin sister the chaste huntress Artemis, on the small, barren island of Delos in the middle of the Cyclades.

Apollo was hailed as Phoebus (‘bright’) and as Apollo Helios he became identified with the sun, (while his sister Artemis was associated with the moon) and on sun-drenched Delos the almost surreal intensity and clarity of the sunlight seems a tangible manifestation of his presence.

Mountain Vert — Extensive ruins of Delos

Apollo represents harmony and balance, clarity, reason, order and restraint. The term “Apollonian” contrasts with the “Dionysian” qualities of the god of wine. As his complementary opposite, Dionysus represents chaos, impulse, excess and ecstasy. He was worshiped by the frenzied maenads dancing wildly in the woods. This dichotomy was perceptively explored by the 19th century German philosopher Nietzche in “The Birth of Tragedy.” The ancient Greeks seem to have recognized the need to integrate these disparate forces, and both deities were worshiped in turn on alternate seasons at Delphi. Inscribed on Apollo’s temple there were the famous maxims: “Know Thyself” and “Nothing in Excess.”

Overview Horiz — Temple of Apollo at Delphi

Delphi, on the slopes of Mount Parnassus, offers one of the most striking natural settings in Greece and the dramatic scenery reflects the ancient myths associated with the site. Here Apollo had fought and vanquished the giant snake Python, a powerful earth deity that may represent a primitive cult of the mother Goddess, and established his famous Oracle. A priestess called the Pythia presided at his temple and, in a trance induced by fumes or psychotropic plants, would utter prophecies believed to come from the god himself. The Oracle was consulted before major undertakings such as wars, and its influence spread even beyond Greece. Delphi was considered the cosmic center of the Greek world, symbolized by the ‘omphalus’ or navel stone dropped from the sky by Zeus’ eagles to mark the spot.

Horns & Temple HORIZ — Sacred horned peaks soar above the Temple of Apollo at Delphi.

Omphalos stone symbolizing Delphi as the center of the Greek world.

The ruins of the temple of Apollo visible today date from the 4th century BCE, superimposed on two earlier buildings. The winding route up the slope to the sanctuary, called The Sacred Way, was lined with votive statues and treasuries built by Greek city states to store the offerings made to Apollo in thanksgiving for his guidance.

Treasury HORIZ — Treasury of the Athenians on the Sacred Way up to the Temple of Apollo.

Museum Charioteer Vert — Bronze “Charioteer of Delphi”

Higher up above the temple, offering a panoramic view of the site, the semi-circular bowl of a theater has been cut into the side of the mountain. This theater and a nearby stadium were locations for the Pythian Games, one of the four Pan-Hellenic Games of ancient Greece. They were held in honor of Apollo every four years and, in contrast to the Olympic Games that honored Zeus, featured art and music as well as athletic competitions.

Apollo was the patron of music and poetry, often portrayed playing a lyre surrounded by the Muses who were personifications of the arts.

Medicine and healing were also associated with Apollo through his son, the famous healer Asclepius, whose snake-entwined staff remains a symbol of medicine to this day. The most famous sanctuary of Asclepius was located at Epidaurus, where pilgrims flocked to be cured of their illnesses. Contrasting with the towering cliffs and chasms of Delphi, Epidaurus lies in a shallow valley enclosed by gentle hills. In keeping with the healing qualities of the god manifested here, the setting is salubrious, calm and protective.

Abaton Closeup Det — Two views of the Abaton at Epidaurus.

Dream Fragment Delos — Fresco depicts a dream scene.

Supplicants would spend the night in the holiest part of the sanctuary, the Abaton. Any dreams or visions were recounted to a priest who would interpret them and prescribe the appro-priate therapy. Surprisingly for the times, medical practices at the Asclepeion seem to recognize a psychological dimension to the treatment of illness.

Theater Gate Vert — Theater of Epidaurus

Likewise, the emotional catharsis produced by dramatic perfor-mances was thought to have therapeutic effects. Theaters are prominently incorporated in many religious sites. Epidaurus boasts a magnificent theater with world-famous acoustics built in the 4th century BCE that holds 14,000 spectators and is still used for performances today.

Religion provided the context for almost all communal activities in ancient Greece. Public spectacles like theatrical performances and athletic contests were held as part of festivals honoring the gods. The ethos that promoted excellence through competition applied to the arts as well as athletics. Plays were presented and judged over the course of five days at the annual spring festival of the Dionysia in Athens. In ancient Athens, drama developed as a public art form that explored before mass audiences ethical issues affecting the individual and the community, reaffirming common values.

Theater of D Horiz — Theater of Dionysus in Athens.

The Theater of Dionysus at the foot of the Acropolis was the setting for debut performances of the tragedies by Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides counted among the greatest classics of Western literature. They explore grand themes of pride and downfall, individual responsibility and fate that still engage us to this day.

Architecture of Mesoamerica, Maya Civilization, Maya Temples, Mesoamerica, Mexico & Guatemala

The Majesty of Tikal

Gallery October 10, 2015 Leave a comment

From the highlands of Oaxaca and Chiapas in southern Mexico the terrain gradually descends towards the Guatemalan region of the Peten, traversed by great rivers like the Usumacinta and covered by dense tropical jungle. Yet this region, which today appears so wild and inhospitable, was for over a thousand years the heartland of Maya culture which reached its apogee during the Classic period from 250 to 900 CE. The tops of the temples at Tikal soar high above the treetops seemingly floating over an endless ocean of green. Tikal is the largest known Maya center. This great city, which in its hey-day covered over 16 square kilometers, built the tallest and most impressive monuments of the Maya world.

TIKAL roofs over jungle close — Roofs Above the Jungle Canopy — (click photos to enlarge)

TIKAL temple short TREES — Approaching the Great Plaza

The architects of Tikal developed one of the most characteristic elements of the classic Maya temple, the ornamental projections called roof combs which are used to extend the height of buildings. Another important structural innovation was the corbel-vaulted ceiling. The Mayas combined these two elements to build impres-sively tall structures; but the massive walls needed to support the weight of the roofs resulted in very limited interior spaces.

TIKAL plaza temples — The Great Plaza of Tikal and Pyramids in the Distance

Two great pyramids face each other, as if in dialogue, across the great ceremonial plaza. The tallest is the temple of the Great Jaguar built in the early 8th century CE. Its slender silhouette is made up of nine levels, a number sacred to the Maya, crowned by a tall roof comb that extends the building’s height to an impressive 155 ft. The sculptures covering the roof comb represented a king seated on his throne. He has been identified as Jasaw Chan K’awill, one of the most powerful of Tikal’s rulers whose tomb this was. The pyramids of Tikal most clearly embody the concept of the Maya temple; a sacred space poised between heaven and earth, surrounded by clouds of incense atop a magic mountain where only priests and royalty could step.

TIKAL temple tall VERT — Temple of the Great Jaguar

TIKAL Pyramic Up — Ascending the Pyramid

The central plaza is bounded by the buildings of the north acropolis containing the tombs of the ruling families of Tikal. From the begin-ning of the Classic period the Maya erected dated commemorative stone altars and stelae, and a collection of these monuments adorns the plaza. In recent decades, great advances in deciphering Maya hieroglyphic inscriptions and their iconography have revealed that these sculptures represented a cult of the rulers. They memorial-ized their accession to the throne and recorded the alliances, wars and victories of the great dynasties that ruled the Maya city-states.

TIKAL plaza stele — Monuments of the Great Plaza

TIKAL two stele REV — Stelae Depict Tikal’s Rulers

Architecture of Southeast Asia, Buddhist Temples, Hindu Temples, Southeast Asia

Magical Angkor

Gallery September 27, 2015 Leave a comment

The renowned temple complex of Angkor Wat is only one of many impressive monuments spread across 200 sq. km. in northwestern Cambodia. This region was home to several successive capitals of the Khmer empire over a period of 400 years from the 9th to the 13th centuries CE. Many buildings have collapsed or have been covered up by jungle so that today only forty accessible sites remain, known collectively as Angkor. Although the sites have been cleared of vegetation and carefully restored, the humid exuberance of the tropical jungle is overpowering. Some structures have been left purposely untouched still tangled in vines and tree roots fulfilling every traveler’s romantic notion of a mysterious lost world.

Angkor Moat Spires — Angkor Moat and Spires — (click photos to enlarge)

According to legend, an Indian nobleman conquered the land and married a local Naga princess (who was half-human and half-serpent). The ancient tale mythologizes the union of these two cultures and attests to the importance of water in Khmer society. In the 9th century Jayavarman II, who had been educated at the indianized Sailendra kingdom of Java, became ruler of the Khmers and introduced the cult of the devaraja (divine king) which identified the person of the king with the Hindu deities Shiva and Vishnu. The Indian concept of a sacred temple-mountain was also adopted so successfully that it would become synonymous with Khmer monumental architecture.

Angkor Overview LG — Overview of Angkor Wat

Angkor is located in a large basin bounded by the Tonle Sap lake to the south and mountain ranges to the north. The Mekong River and its tributaries traverse Cambodia, flowing from their source in the Himalayas to the South China Sea. After the rainy season, silted channels cannot accommodate the excess water and the river backs up, flooding the Tonle Sap and doubling its size. The flooded area becomes an ideal habitat for fish and rice cultivation. The rulers of Angkor achieved feats of hydraulic engineering to control and manage this water supply as their source of power and prosperity. Two large reservoirs, the East and West Barays, supplied the city’s water. Like the verdant backdrop of vegetation that surrounds it, the reflective expanses of these vast water features greatly enhance Angkor’s aesthetic appeal.

Angkor Moat — The Moat Serves as Water Supply

In the flat landscape of the region several isolated hills stand out and their promontories became the site of the first temples. By the 10th century, the basic design of a single tower atop a stepped platform was expanded into a five-tower design, where a large central tower symbolizing Mount Meru is surrounded by four smaller ones at each corner and stairs at the four cardinal directions in a cruciform plan. These basic elements multiplied throughout the monument form the radiating geometric pattern of a cosmic mandala diagram. Unlike other monuments at Angkor and Hindu temples in general, Angkor Wat faces West, the region of the dead, not East and the rising sun. It may have been built as a funerary monument for Suryavarman II (1113 -1150 CE), one of the greatest Khmer rulers.

PLAN SKETCH Angkor Wat — Plan of Angkor Wat

Angkor Wat (wat means temple) is immense, bounded by three con-centric walled enclosures and surrounded by a wide moat. The moat is crossed by a stone causeway leading to a tall gopura or entry tower (derived from South Indian temples). Towers also rise at the corners of the enclosure walls and over each of the four entrances. The walls are not defensive in nature, but rather function as psychological barriers circumscribing a sacred space. Steep stairs lead to the central summit of five towers whose tapering profiles resemble sprouting lotus buds. Only the king and priests were allowed on the top level. Thus at Angkor Wat as one moves inward into the heart of the temple complex one simultaneously ascends, physically enacting the symbolism of climbing a sacred mountain.

ANGKOR door tower — Ascending the Temple Mountain

The central summit, home of the god-king, is ringed by long raised galleries with vaulted stone roofs and colonnades open on one side. The inner walls are covered with exquisite bas reliefs depicting the Hindu Ramayana epic, court processions and battle scenes. The galleries also feature over 1,500 reliefs of apsaras (celestial dancers of Hindu mythology) no two alike. They stand in graceful poses, gorgeously attired and bejeweled, enchanting visitors with their timeless allure. Walking down the deserted corridors and empty galleries, through slanting shafts of light and darkness, one can almost hear their long-vanished whispers and lilting laughter emanating from the walls.

Angkor Dancer — Dancer Resembles Ancient Counterparts

The nearby city of Angkor Thom was built by king Jayavarman VII (1181-1220) in an area slightly to the north of Angkor Wat. The city was laid out in a quadrilateral ground plan and surrounded by an enclosure wall and moat. A bridge leading to the city gates crosses the moat, ornamented on each side with a row of mythological figures holding the body of a giant serpent as the railing. The entryway gopuras feature the distinctive colossal faces looking out toward the four directions. At the very center of the city, Jayavarman VII placed his own temple-mountain, the Bayon, dedicated to the Buddha. His monument evinces the interplay between Hinduism and Buddhism prevalent at that time.

Angkor Bayon towers — Faces on the Towers of the Bayon

Over 200 faces carved on 54 towers give the temple its surreal and enigmatic character. They feature the famous “Smile of Angkor,” downcast eyes and serene expression considered the epitome of Khmer art. They have been interpreted as representing the omni-presence of the king in the guise of his patron deity the Bodhisattva Lokeshvara. Angkor Thom was designed as a microcosm of the universe, a giant mandala divided into four quarters with concentric monuments radiating outward from the central temple-mountain of the Bayon, seat of the powerful god-king and cosmic link between heaven and earth.

Hindu Temples, Java & Bali, Southeast Asia

Art and Nature in Bali

Gallery September 25, 2015 Leave a comment

The beautiful tropical island of Bali boasts a rich and complex culture belying its small size. For centuries Bali was culturally and politically linked to neighboring Java, home to a powerful maritime empire influential throughout Southeast Asia. After the spread of Islam to the Indonesian archipelago in the 16th century, the Hindu aristocracy of Java with its priests, scholars, artists, dancers and musicians fled to the secluded sanctuary of Bali, adding to the small island’s cultural heritage. Today Bali is the last stronghold of Hinduism in Indonesia. Balinese Hinduism is a fascinating mixture of adopted Indian philosophy and rituals overlaid upon the island’s indigenous animism with its ancestor worship and magical practices. In Balinese cosmology spirits are everywhere, and their propitiation through daily offerings and rituals maintains the cosmic order and the balance between good and evil forces. The famous Balinese dance dramas depict this mythic world of gods and nature spirits, with their flower bedecked and gorgeously costumed dancers gracefully gesturing to the hypnotic music of the gamelan.

Barong Dance — Balinese Dance Drama — (click photos to enlarge)

The range of towering volcanoes at the center of the island is con-sidered to be the realm of the gods, with Gunung Agung, the highest mist shrouded peak being the home of Shiva. Perched on its slopes is Pura Besakih, Bali’s most sacred “Mother Temple” originally dating from the 14th century. It consists of a series of courtyards connected by steep stairways, each containing multi-roofed thatched shrines resembling pagodas. They are called “meru” harking to the Hindu mythical mountain at the center of the universe. Temple courtyards also function as performance spaces for sacred music and dance. They are entered through unusual split gateways with no top lintels and each side ending in a pointed wing-like projection. As the place of transition between secular and sacred space, temple doorways are decorated with protector masks and flanked by guardian figures.

Pura Besakih Climb — Climb to Pura Besakih

PuraBesakih Roofs — Merus at Pura Besakih

Balinese art is imbued with a baroque sensibility inspired by the exuberant tropical environment. The cave of Goa Gajah dates from ca. 1,000 CE. The side of a low hill has been carved with intertwined plants, animals and decorative scrolls which seem to move and writhe as they emerge from the dark depths of the earth, bursting forth in astonishing profusion. They surround a giant stone face whose mouth forms the entrance to a small natural cave. The face is said to represent Bhoma (born of the earth) the son of Vishnu, ruler of the waters, and the earth goddess whose union ensures the fertility of the soil and brings forth vegetation. Nearby is a ritual bathing pool fed by natural springs and decorated with statues of women holding pots from which the water pours into the pool. Thus cave and pool symbolically represent the importance of water in Balinese life.

The spectacular contoured rice terraces that blanket the hillsides of the central highlands depend on an elaborate irrigation system, one of the oldest in continuous use in the world. Water from streams and mountain lakes has been diverted into aqueducts and channels that are maintained through communal work and rituals tied to the social and religious organization of the surrounding farming villages.

The town of Ubud in the central highlands is the cultural heart of the island. Away from the tourist traffic of the beach resorts, it is still possible to experience the unique integration of nature and culture that is traditional Bali: a verdant landscape animated by the spirits of forests, waters and mountains kept in ecological and spiritual balance by the power of rituals and the beauty of art.

Architecture of India, Hindu Temples, Hinduism, India, Temples

The Temples of Khajuraho

Gallery August 25, 2015 1 Comment

The temples of Khajuraho are the most sublime expressions of medieval Hindu architecture. Despite its currently remote location, Khajuraho was once the capital of the Chandela Dynasty which ruled most of central India from the 10th to 12th centuries. There were reputedly over 80 temples of which some 20 have survived scattered over a wide area. The most famous are the Western Group located in a spacious park sprinkled with brightly colored bougainvilleas.

BK Khajuraho Flower NEW — Profile of the Chitragupta Temple — (click photos to enlarge)

BK Khaju Small Temple SQ — Soaring Temple Spires

The elaborately carved sandstone temples are elevated on high platforms like sculptures placed atop pedestals. Often four small shrines are added at each corner of the platform representing the cardinal directions, with the main building centered as the cosmic axis mundi. The interior layouts and famous silhouettes of Khajuraho typify the essential elements of a classical Hindu temple. Aligned on an east-west axis to face the rising sun, there is a covered entrance porch leading to a large pillared hall, followed by a vestibule preceding the sanctuary. The worshipers thus proceed through a series of increasingly sacred spaces, leaving the profane outside world in their symbolic journey to the center.

BK Khajuraho pointy spire REV — Spire and Rear View of Kandariya Mahadeva Temple

Khajuraho Sculptures Detai — Closeup View

The sanctuary contains the image of the deity to whom the temple is dedicated, and is customarily small, dark and unadorned, resembling a cave. Contrastingly, the structures above with their sculpted profusion of plants, animals, humans and deities, simulate a vast mountain range that rises to a peak. Each section of the temple has a separate roof structure, from the lowest over the entrance porch to the highest over the sanctuary. While the first three have roughly pyramidal shapes formed by superimposed horizontal tiers, the roof section directly above the sanctuary rises as a tall spire called shikhara (mountain peak); its soaring height emphasized by the repetition of vertical bands and other carved decorations.

BK Khajuraho spire — Peaks of the Sacred Mountain

Khajuraho is especially renowned for the exquisite sculptures that cover the outside of the temples with their graceful elongated forms. Not only deities but beautiful men and women are represented engaged in all the activities of worldly life. Many are shown as amorous couples whose acrobatic postures reflect an esoteric code, for Khajuraho was reputedly a center for Tantra, yogic practices exalting the goddess Shakti. Shakti is the creative life energy of the universe manifesting as the feminine principle, Mother Nature, the Great Goddess. Shakti energy can be expressed as sexuality but it can also be sublimated and channeled as spiritual power, for Tantric philosophy teaches to “use the senses to go beyond the senses.”

At Khajuraho, sculpture and architecture meld together in a harmonious synthesis reminiscent of the great European Gothic cathedrals. With their serene expressions, graceful postures and refined gestures that recall the art of classical Indian dance, the sculptures of Khajuraho illustrate our inherent capacity for trans-cendence, from the human to the divine.

Architecture of Southeast Asia, Buddhism, Buddhist Temples, Java & Bali, Southeast Asia

Borobodur: Ascending Toward Enlightenment

Gallery July 22, 2015 Leave a comment

In the first centuries of the Common Era, Indian traders began expanding their sphere of influence throughout Southeast Asia, establishing outposts that eventually flourished into independent indianized kingdoms. Their trade routes also spread Indian culture and religious ideas in a syncretic mix of Hinduism and Buddhism (which still coexisted at that time) colored by mystical Tantric elements. This Indo-Javanese period spans from the 7th to the 10th centuries CE, when the Sailendra dynasty ruled Java, Sumatra and the Malay Peninsula.

Boro Corner View — View of the Galleries — (click photos to enlarge)

The Sailendras were Buddhists, and their greatest achievement was the construction around the year 800 CE of Borobodur, the largest Buddhist monument in the world. This unique structure, built atop a low natural hill in central Java, is a three-dimensional architectural mandala. It is not a building in the normal sense of the word, as it is completely open to the sky and has no interior spaces. Its design incorporates the symbolism of Mount Meru (the sacred mountain at the center of Hindu and Buddhist cosmology), the geometric patterns of a mandala diagram (used to focus psycho-spiritual energies), and bell-shaped stupas (Buddhist monuments housing holy relics).

The scale of Borobodur is impressive: the monument rises up nine levels as a series of receding terraces that form a truncated pyramid. The base platform, shaped as a square with indented corners, measures 370 ft. on each side. It is surmounted by five square terraces and three circular ones, linked by four stairways that rise to the summit, which is topped by a large bell-shaped stupa.

Pilgrims traditionally ascend the eastern stairway to begin their clockwise circumambulation of the monument; a complete circuit of the four square terraces covers a distance of 3/4 of a mile. The square terraces are surrounded by balustrades that create partially enclosed galleries which are open to the sky. The galleries are decorated with over 500 life-sized Buddha images and some 8,202 linear ft. of exquisitely carved relief panels.

Boro Market Relief — Scenes of Daily Life

The entire sculptural program is conceived in didactic progression. Reliefs on the base level offer lively depictions of contemporary life that illustrate the workings of karma, the spiritual law of cause and effect, in human affairs. Most of these carvings were later covered up by the wide platform built in order to stabilize the structure. The relief carvings on the first terrace feature scenes from the life of the historical Buddha and fantastic tales of his earlier incarnations called Jatakas. These panels contain some of the most famous images from Borobodur. The next four terraces depict the education of Sudhana a young man who serves as a model for the spiritual seeker of Buddhism. The imagery of the upper galleries becomes progressively more esoteric as it focuses on the bodhisattvas, transcendent saintly figures of the Mahayana pantheon and their philosophical teachings.

Boro Buddha Relief — Scenes of Buddha’s Life

Boro Buddha Image — One of 500 Buddha Statues

In the upper circular terraces we pass from the world of forms into formlessness; from the wealth of figurative detail which decorates the lower terraces into pure abstraction. Seventy-two hollow stupas are arranged in three concentric circles, each one pierced by small diamond or square shaped openings that allow only partial glimpses of the Buddha images inside, all seated in the pose of preaching the first sermon, called “Setting in Motion the Wheel of the Law.”

Boro Ascent 2 SCAN — Buddhas and Stupas of the Upper Levels

The enclosed galleries of the lower terraces obscure the view so a person cannot see very far beyond their immediate surroundings; forcing one, as it were, to focus on the teachings being presented at whichever stage of the journey one is at. But once the topmost circular terraces are reached, suddenly the space opens up offering a magnificent 360-degree view of the light-filled surrounding plain. This exhilarating experience vividly illustrates a spiritual seeker’s progression from the darkness and limitations of ignorance to the clarity and boundless freedom of enlightenment.

Borobodur is a three-dimensional interactive exposition of Buddhist doctrine, capable of transforming consciousness through its very design. The pilgrim gradually ascends the sacred mountain while circumambulating in spiral fashion each level of the mandala, undergoing in the process a symbolic transformation; leading from the depths of ignorance, upward through successive stages of increasing self-awareness and knowledge of the dharma, to the final achievement of the heights of spiritual transcendence in nirvana.