Visit one of the wonders of the ancient world on your Indonesia vacations
March 23, 2010 - Posted in Indonesia Vacations
The first time I heard about the ancient Buddhist temple of Borobodur was in my geography lessons at college. The geography lecturer spent many Indonesia vacations visiting this man-made mountain and taking photographs for his lecture slide shows.
Since then, I’ve been fascinated by this great wonder of the ancient world. Nobody quite knows when it was built but archaeologists think it’s been constructed sometime between the end of the 7th and the beginning of the 8th century AD.
For some time it served as a spiritual center of Javanese Buddhism. At some point it became lost and forgotten and was only rediscovered in the 18th century.
The excavation of this monument was ordered and overseen by the new British Governor of Java at that time, Sir thomas Stamford Raffles.
When you look at it from above, you can see that it resembles a lotus, the sacred flower of Buddha. The whole structure is pyramid-like, built on and around a hill and composed of lava rock.
Being recognized as the largest Buddhist temple in the world, it has no central altar. What is most impressive and interesting is that the galleries are like guiding the faithful on a spiritual journey. Moving upwards from terrace to terrace, each level symbolises a higher plane of consciousness. Pilgrims may have come here to journey the pathway to enlightenment.
Some scholars believe that, as Indonesia and the Javanese converted from Hinduism and Buddhism to Islam around the 14th century, Borobudur was abandoned.
After its restoration, Indonesia’s most visited tourist attraction has again become a place of pilgrimage for Buddhists. At the same time it’s also a place where, on your Indonesia Vacations, you can wonder at the mysteries of the ancient world.
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