My beloved deceased mother Mary-Lynn snapped this photo of me kneeling before the Golden Buddha in the temple of Wat Traimit, Bangkok, Thailand.  I have long been a Buddhist, or at least one who wishes he practiced Buddhism more frequently.  Indeed, I consider the Buddha, Sidharth Gautama, to have been one of history’s most brilliant and wonderful people.

The origins of this statue are uncertain. It is made in the Sukhothai Dynasty style of the 13th-14th centuries, though it could have been made after that time. The head of the statue is egg-shaped, which indicates its origin in the Sukothai period. Given that Sukothai art had Indian influences and metal figures of the Buddha made in India used to be taken to various countries for installation, this suggests the Golden Buddha statue may have been cast in parts in India.The shape of the statue’s head dates it to the Sukothai period

The really interesting thing is that at some point, the statue was completely plastered over to prevent it from being stolen. The statue was covered with a thick layer of stucco, which was painted and inlaid with bits of colored glass. It is believed that this plastering-over took place before the destruction of Ayutthaya kingdom by Burmese invaders in 1767. The statue remained among the ruins of Ayutthaya without attracting much attention.

In 1801, Thai King Buddha Yodfa Chulaloke (Rama I), after establishing Bangkok as a new capital city of the Kingdom, and after commissioning the construction of many temples in Bangkok, ordered that various old Buddha images should be brought to Bangkok from the ruined temples around the country.

At the time of King Rama III (1824-1851), the statue, still covered with stucco, was installed as the principal Buddha image in the main temple building of Wat Chotanaram in Bangkok.

When Wat Chotanaram, located near Chinatown, fell into disrepair and was closed, the statue was moved to its present location at the nearby Wat Traimit in 1935.  At the time, Wat Traimit was a pagoda of minor significance (like hundreds of other Buddhist temples that exist in Bangkok). Since the temple didn’t have a building big enough to house the statue, it was kept for 20 years under a simple tin roof. The true identity of this statue had been forgotten for almost 200 years.

In 1954, a new Viharn building was built at the temple to house the statue. It was moved to its new location on 25 May 1955; there are a variety of accounts of what exactly happened next, but it is clear that during the final attempt to lift the statue from its pedestal, the ropes broke and the statue fell hard on the ground. At that moment, some of the plaster coating chipped off, allowing the gold surface underneath to be seen. Work was immediately stopped so that an evaluation could be made.

All the plaster was carefully removed and during the process, photos were taken and are now displayed in the Temple for visitors. Pieces of the actual plaster are also on public display. When all the plaster was removed, it was found that the gold statue actually consisted of nine parts that fit smoothly together. A key was also found encased in plaster at its base, which can be used to disassemble the statue, allowing for easier transportation.

The golden statue was discovered very close to the commemoration of the twenty-fifth Buddhist Era (2500 years since Gautama Buddha’s passing) so the Thai news media was full of reports and many Buddhists regarded the occurrence as miraculous.

Mother Mary-Lynn and I travelled to the Far East on a cruise in 2013, right after I met my future bride Bonnie.  Here, we are visiting the temple of Wat Traimit, where the Golden Buddha is housed.

We started off in Bejing, and travelled to Shanghai, Hong Kong, Vietnam and Bangkok.  I was shocked at how the environment had been so damaged by civilization there.