Significance of the Śrāvastī Miracles According to Buddhist Texts and Dvāravatī Artefacts

Abstract

The story of the Śrāvastī miracles is one episode of the Buddha’s biography that is depicted in the art forms of Dvāravatī from about the 7th to the 11th centuries CE. The fact that many artefacts were produced—in such variety, over such a long period, and at so many sites—shows the popularity of the scene of the Śrāvastī miracles in the Dvāravatī culture. The objective of this research paper is to analyze the significance of the story of the Śrāvastī miracles that affected the creation of Dvāravatī art in Thailand by examining the textual sources together with the Dvāravatī artefacts. The analysis shows that the stories of the Śrāvastī miracles were significant in various ways, being one of the Buddha’s necessary deeds, a principal miracle only performed by the Buddha, a means of converting others to Buddhism, and a key source for the idea of making Buddha images as an act of merit. These significant features may explain the popularity of the Śrāvastī miracle theme in Dvāravatī culture.

The Śrāvastī Miracles: Some Relationships Between their Literary Sources and Visual Representations in Dvāravatī

“…They are filled with a wide variance of opinions and have caused considerable confusion. 3 This is not surprising as in my previous studies (Sirisawad 2019), I have shown that there are at least 17 narratives of this theme extant in Pāli, Sanskrit, Gāndhārī, Chinese, Tibetan, Mongolian, and Thai. And they were transmitted by the Mūlasarvāstivādins, the Dharmaguptakas, the Theravādins, and by those of unidentified school-affiliations.…”

“…As discussed in detail elsewhere (Sirisawad 2022b(Sirisawad , 1201, these miracles are presented [56] in an attempt to position the Buddha as supreme to leaders of non-Buddhist religious sects and as one of the necessary actions of the Buddha to inspire his audience with awe and to subdue his opponent, perhaps as a prelude to the extraordinary expositions of the Buddha that comes later to convert them to Buddhism. The narrative of these miracles may be relevant and important in establishing Buddhism in Dvāravatī by using votive tablets as a means.…”