Reactions to the Destruction of Buddhist Monuments in Afghanistan

By Nancy Hatch Dupree, James Lally, John C. Huntington, Helmut and Heidi Neumann and Peter Marks

Photos of dust clouds billowing in front of the big Buddha in the Bamiyan valley ended any hope that worldwide appeals would prevail following the Radio Sharia announcement on 26 February 2001 that all non-Islamic sculptures in Afghanistan must be destroyed. The threat became a reality on 8 March. As the dust cleared, it could be seen that the lower half of the figure had been blown away; large holes were gouged into the head. On the 9th, the small Buddha suffered the same fate. In Ghazni, the 7th century Buddhist site of Tepa Sardar was trashed.

Bamiyan valley (Photograph courtesy of Deborah Klimburg-Salter)

These acts in defiance of unprecedented international outrage have become symbols of intransigence. The Taliban can forget about winning recognition and other cherished desires from the international community. Even missions from numbers of Muslim countries, including the Organization of the Islamic Conference and clerics from Al-Azhar University in Egypt, the fountainhead of the Muslim world, joined the chorus of world condemnation. The 26 February announcement stated that Mullah Omar, the supreme Taliban leader, had acted on orders from the Council of Ministers, who in turn had followed the judgement of the ulema (religious scholars). Which ulema is not revealed, but the council is the same body which earlier gave explicit directions to government departments regarding their responsibilities for protecting cultural property. Significantly, the new orders were issued after hours of debate, without consensus. Politics, not Islam, appears to be the driving force behind their actions.

And the mayhem continues. On 17 March, objects in packed cases of museum artworks which had earlier been shifted to the Ministry of Information and Culture for safekeeping were taken out and smashed. Interestingly, rumours now have it that the next targets may be Islamic shrines. If so, this clearly points to non-Afghan influences, because Afghans have shown great regard for shrines for centuries. The nation's most impressive monuments dating from the dawn of Islam celebrate the resting places of many distinguished Islamic theologians. If these stellar creations are also to be obliterated, the light of Afghanistan's cultural heritage will be truly extinguished.

Taliban leaders fault the international community for making a fuss over ancient objects while ignoring the needs of drought-affected populations. This argument dismisses the considerable aid still flowing into the country; and it disregards the fact that the Taliban themselves remain irresponsibly detached from their obligations to these same populations. They seem not to be aware that literate and non-literate Afghans alike are aghast at their actions, and unmindful that they must ultimately bear the opprobrium of their own people as well as the world community.

Nancy Hatch Dupree, Society for the Preservation of Afghanistan's Cultural Heritage Peshawar, Pakistan

The situation in Afghanistan right now is very sad and discouraging. First of all, it must be said that the fate of the tens of thousands of dispossessed and starving refugees, and the desperate circumstances of the entire female population, which has been deprived of human rights for years, must be regarded as far more serious than the destruction of ancient sculptures, as deplorable as that may be. Nevertheless, we must never stop protesting against all these atrocities, however slight the effect of our protest might be on the immediate situation.

It is beyond our power to stop the destruction of ancient works of art and the other crimes being perpetrated in Afghanistan today, because these are not simply the result of individual criminal activity - they are the result of national policy. The state, backed by a powerful army and police force, can ignore with impunity protests raised by individuals inside or outside their national boundaries.

The state-sponsored destruction of one important category of ancient art in Afghanistan is deplorable, but such actions are far from unique to that country. The many important and multi-layered sites of early Bronze Age, Hellenistic and Roman art discovered at Zeugma in Turkey have been almost obliterated by government policies and decrees. The Turkish government has consistently failed to allocate funding or allow time for serious archaeology, while pressing forward with a hydroelectric plan which completely ignores the existence of the ancient sites. The massive loss of heritage and art at Zeugma is not an aberrant event in Turkey; it is entirely consistent with the national policy of desecrating Orthodox Christian sites and harassing those who would seek to preserve them. In China, the vast Three Gorges dam project in Sichuan province has already displaced millions of people and will soon inundate thousands of archaeological sites. The question of how to salvage or protect the artistic heritage affected by the project has never been seriously addressed in China. The budget allocated to archaeology in Sichuan is minuscule, and no outside assistance has even been contemplated. Again, this destruction of artistic heritage in China is not merely an aberration; rather, it is just the most egregious recent example, following the obliteration of more than 90 per cent of the monasteries and temples in Tibet, and the cultural havoc perpetrated by the Red Guards during the Cultural Revolution.

These are only a few instances from recent history. Other examples, such as German and Russian efforts to destroy the work of many modern artists, or American government policies which resulted in the wholesale loss of American Indian art, could also be cited as part of a long litany of state-sponsored destruction. The list is endless.

In recent decades we have heard a growing chorus of high-minded statements about the importance of protecting the artistic heritage of mankind. But the reality of what has been done, either through neglect or by direct action within nation states, shows that art and cultural artefacts around the world have become hostages to national politics. The only international entity which has consistently demonstrated the value of all art and thus generated widespread activities to preserve, study and protect it is the amorphous, multifaceted amalgam of collectors, dealers, curators and museums that we call the `art market'. In an ideal world, no one would destroy works of art. The most beautiful and the most important would be universally recognized. The great artistic achievements of mankind would be valued by all, and world artistic heritage would be carefully protected. In the real world, however, nations choose what to protect and what to destroy on the basis of ever-changing, often contradictory political calculations. It is hard to think of any instance of effective international intervention to stop the destruction of art by a state, but the activities of collectors, dealers, museums and curators around the world in the last fifty years has resulted in the preservation, protection and sharing of world heritage on an unprecedented scale. Nevertheless, we are constantly bombarded with calls for greater controls and regulations, all designed to give political bureaucracies in various nations greater power to curtail the freedom of action of art collectors, curators and institutions. The destruction of art by callous disregard or direct action within individual nations is a real and constant threat. We may not have been able to stop the destruction in Afghanistan this time, but we can resolve not to allow art around the world to become hostage to politics. A free and healthy international market is not a panacea or a perfect answer to the challenges of world heritage preservation, but it is the best realistic mechanism available.

James Lally, New York

There are, I suppose, some individuals in the Buddhist world who will look upon the current destruction of all Buddhist images in Afghanistan with as little concern as did the Chan (Zen) master Tanxia in the legend regarding the burning of a wooden Buddha:

When the Chan master Tanxia was visiting the Huilin temple, he felt cold and asked another monk for some wood to burn. Upon being permitted to look for some wood to use as fuel, he was told to be sparing in his use because there was little wood left. When Tanxia selected a small wooden image of a Buddha and kindled a fire beneath it, the abbot of the monastery saw him and exclaimed: `What are you doing? That is a Buddha you are burning!' At that point, Tanxia begin to sift through the ashes with his fingers. `What are you doing now?', asked the exasperated abbot. `Searching for relics [sharira]', replied Tanxia. `You fool,' exploded the abbot. `That's just a piece of wood.' Tanxia looked up, puzzled. `Then why did you not want me to burn it?' (Story adapted by the author)

Applied to the Taliban's reported destruction of all images in Afghanistan and in particular the great (brihad) images of Bamiyan, the `Tanxia principle' might cause us to look upon the act as simply rearranging some meaningless sandstone and clay. Intrinsically, there is no Buddha there. There are no relics to be found, and, like virtually every human endeavour, the images were destined to temporal ephemerality. If the Taliban had not wilfully destroyed them, eventually an earthquake or other natural event would have annihilated them anyway.

In Buddhism, there are many ways of understanding the dilemma posed above. For most Buddhists, the detachment of Tanxia is a long way (many rebirths) off. Whatever our personal practice methodology, most of us in the Buddhist world are in agony over this senseless act of hostility against all humanity. Truly, it is as if a bit of the heart/mind (citta) of every practitioner of the Buddha's way had been ripped out and fed to the carrion crows.

How, then, can an image mean nothing and everything? A Buddha image is a symbol of the great teacher, `The Enlightened One, Sage of the Shakya [Clan]' (Buddha Shakyamuni), or one of the myriad other Buddhas that explain some aspect of the Buddhist teachings to us. Thus, images are both simple reminders of the Buddha Shakyamuni and passive teaching devices whose message to the faithful is entirely dependent on the individual observer's state of learning and awareness. One person may have little or no faith in the Buddha's teachings and simply have his or her faith increased by recognizing that at one time a people of faith devoted so much time and energy to making a great image. On the other hand, a fully trained and devoted practitioner may be jolted to the very brink of enlightenment by a comprehensive understanding of the dual nature of the image - infinite and infinitesimal at the same time.

Since the early days of Buddhism, an important distinction has been made about images. In essence, there are three classes of relics. The first are the sharira (the body), or actual pieces of Shakyamuni's (or another Buddha's) physical body. These are actual relics, including the bones, teeth and hair that vivify stupa mounds and pagodas throughout the Buddhist world with the presence of Shakyamuni. Next in rank are the paribhogaka ([a place of] enjoyment), objects and places that the Buddha Shakyamuni used and places he visited. The life-event sites of Buddha Shakyamuni, the `eight great conjuror's illusions' (ashta-maha-pratiharya) that I wrote about in this journal some years ago are eight of the most famous of these sites (`Sowing the Seeds of the Lotus: A Journey to the Great Pilgrimage Sites of Buddhism', Parts I and II, in Orientations, November 1985, pp. 46-61 and February 1986, pp. 28-43). By going to such a site, one participates in the activity of the Buddha which took place there, and through the darshan (literally, `seeing', but more in the sense of `participating and being changed through seeing'), one comes away with a modified psyche that is different from what it had been previously. Finally, there is uddeshaka (literally, `point to' or `illustrate'), essentially `reminders' of the Buddha Shakyamuni or other teachers. These are the least powerful of the various types of relics. Uddeshaka may consist of texts, pieces of fabric from the clothes of teachers, vivified objects, and other `Dharma treasures' including all images of Buddha. Such things were supplemental to relics of other orders and were sometimes used as surrogates for actual physical relics. In reality, such objects have nothing to do with Buddha Shakyamuni or any other Buddha except that the humans who placed them in the relic container or other objects imbued them with a personal and heartfelt sanctity. In one sense, they are more relics of a practitioner's individual, or a Buddhist community's collective, devoted heart-mind than of any specific Buddha.

However, because of both their human form and their scale, the uddeshaka (`illustration'), images have a kind of `life' of their own. In Mahayana Buddhist practice, especially in Tantra, the premise of one's own enlightenment is the `womb of the Buddha' (Tathagata-garbha) that resides in the `heart-mind' (citta), the seat of our psychic persona - physically, an imaginary central spot just below the sternum. Although practice methodologies vary, the core of all Buddhist practice is awakening the nascent Buddha nature within the heart-mind and bringing it, fully developed, to the forefront of our heart-mind. One minor but key aspect of that awakening process is seeing images of Buddhas, bodhisattvas and the like. In short, what you are seeing when you behold an image of a Buddha, is not an image of a Buddha. Rather, it is like looking into a deep mirror, one that pierces the very core of your own heart-mind. What one sees in an image is one's own arising Buddha nature within and one's own potential Buddhahood. Consider, then, what that means when confronting the vast scale of the brihad Buddha in Bamiyan. Imagine! That is in your heart-mind. From the outset, its scale was understood as a representation of the boundlessness and immaculateness of the Dharma. The Buddha Dharma is an unlimited, all-encompassing teaching intended to provide the direction (soteriological methodology) to lead all beings everywhere, throughout the `infinity of space' (sarvakasha) to the pure, `altruistic compassion' (karuna), and the wisdom (prajna) to assist others in their own journey of advancement.

Even the wall paintings in the niche reflect the Buddha-emanated celestial realms where the manifold Buddhas of the other worlds (every star in the sky is a Buddha world) and the future Buddhas (bodhisattvas) slowly wend their way towards their own perfection. Further, by being in the mountain, the image also represents the Buddha nature at the core of Mount Meru. Mount Meru is the individual world system that is at once a meditational construct of the totality of the physical world and at the same time an imagined infinitesimal point within one's own heart-mind. The message is simple, the Buddhist Dharma (methodology) is all-pervading, and it exists throughout all worlds and world systems, beyond any scope imaginable. Yet it is your choice, you may choose the path of achieving and learning of your own Buddhahood, or not. Someday, maybe a trillion lifetimes from now, you will want to. Seeing a Buddha at this time, even for a vehement disbeliever, is a little nudge of awakening.

The Taliban have said that the images are `idolatrous', and therefore against Islamic law. The Oxford English Dictionary describes idolatrous as: `of a person: worshipping images or idols; given to the worship of idols or false gods'. As discussed above, the Buddhas (for that matter, all Buddha images) are reminders of the great teacher and, in the case of the Bamiyan conveyors, of a teaching about a personal path. By any definition of `idol' (any thing or person that is the object of excessive or supreme devotion, or that usurps the place of God in human affection, according to the Oxford English Dictionary), Buddha images are neither idols nor the subject of idolatrous attention. Rather, they are memorials, commemorations and reminders, but not `idols' in any sense.

In fact, there is no God in Buddhism for the `idols' to replace! Buddhist canonical literature never broaches the subject. There are residents of both higher and lower realms, and those of the higher realms are collectively called devas, which is conventionally translated as `gods'. These gods, however, are all mortal beings, have finite lifespans, and are subject to the same laws of karma and retribution in the next rebirth as humans. Simply, Buddhas are not `Gods' to be worshipped because there is no Abrahamic (Judaeo-Christian-Islamic) tradition of `God' in Buddhism. A further misunderstanding by those of non-Buddhist traditions arises from what in the Judaeo-Christian-Islamic mind-set is the prayer-like gesture of clasping the hands in front of the chest. When viewed by non-Asian visitors to Asia, it is still often interpreted as demonstrating the act of `praying to the gods'. However, this gesture is nothing more than a traditional greeting still used in Asia. The namaskarmudra (`symbolic gesture of respectful salutation'), as it is known, is made in the process of greeting others or showing veneration to images of great beings. The devotee of the Buddha greets the respected teacher of the past, and greets his or her own teacher for actual instruction. However, by seeing (taking darshan of) the great image, the devotee understands a little more about the transformation that he or she is seeking within, essentially indicating his or her wish: `Someday may I have that much wisdom, that much compassion, that much understanding and that much detachment from my own egoistic desires.' What have we lost with the Taliban destruction of images? To attained beings, like Tanxia, the answer is nothing. Karma retribution will take care of everything. To those of us of lesser attainment, a big chunk of everything real and promising about Buddhism has been lost. Through their ignorance, the Taliban have uselessly cost the world one of the most expansive, challenging and thrilling visions of the potential of individual human perfection that humanity has ever created. They have torn a beautiful page out of human history and deprived future generations of firsthand experience and knowledge of how one of humanity's great religions expressed its vision of individual human perfection. In the sense of the Buddhist religion, they have deprived others of the practice of their religion (specifically enjoined against in the 108th Shura of the Koran). Ultimately, the Taliban have shown the most abominable contempt for humanity, world history, and their own people's history. Indeed, they have shown themselves for what they really are: ignorant, contemptible, childish bullies that beat up women and girls, publicly torture criminals rather than trying to help them, and then break things because nobody likes them. May Allah, the Merciful, have great mercy on their souls. The Buddhists, from whose heart-minds the Buddha can never be removed, already wish them forgiveness.

John C. Huntington, The Ohio State University

The grandiose valley of Bamiyan will never be the same again after the complete destruction of the two gigantic standing Buddha statues in what is certainly the greatest loss to world cultural heritage in recent years. No less devastating than the loss of this most important testimony to Afghanistan's cultural history is the progressive extinction of the living culture by war, famine and the destructive rule of the Taliban. The people of Afghanistan, from different ethnic origins but with a similar cultural past at the crossroads of Central Asia, are unforgettable to all who, like myself, have had the chance to travel extensively in remote parts of the country. These local inhabitants have suffered terribly over the last two decades.

The loss of the Bamiyan Buddhas is only the most prominent example of the recent devastation. The Taliban edict called for the obliteration of all artefacts from pre-Islamic cultures, and there cannot be much hope now for any that may remain in the country. Does this mean that not a single major piece is left of the ancient culture of Afghanistan?

Fortunately not, particularly since it was one of the last countries to discontinue the custom according to which finds from archaeological excavations were divided between the country of origin and that of the archaeologists. In Afghanistan, where most of the excavation was carried out by the Mission arch‚ologique Fran‡aise en Afghanistan, this meant that the objects were divided between the Kabul Museum and the Mus‚e Guimet in Paris. This was apparently practised in Afghanistan up to the early 1970s and explains why, for example, half the famous Begram ivories and the Fonduqistan terracottas can still be admired in the recently reopened Mus‚e Guimet in Paris.

Although it may sound cynical to those for whom the preservation of cultural relics in the `country of origin' is a major preoccupation to be followed with missionary fervour, it has to be mentioned in this context that the distribution of these objects to other countries has allowed some parts of Afghanistan's ancient material culture to survive. Afghanistan is not unique in suffering such heavy loss of its cultural heritage: China - and even more prominently, Tibet - were devastated during the Cultural Revolution, with great loss of human life and the demolition of a major part of the material culture. Many countries in Asia, America, Africa and Europe suffered similar fates in previous centuries. Iconoclasm was particularly frequent in mediaeval Europe. Preservation of cultural heritage rarely ranked high for those in power.

The treasures of the Basel cathedral, presently shown in a major exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York also illustrates this point: two thirds of the objects in this important mediaeval treasury were sold in the 19th century by the newly founded canton of Basel-Landschaft for their monetary value. As citizens of this canton, we are grateful to those individuals and museums in other countries who then bought these objects, thus saving them from being melted down for their gold and silver content. And we feel `recomforted' by their present safekeeping in the Hermitage, the Mus‚e de Cluny and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, among others. In this sense they are world cultural heritage, comparable to the sculptures created in Afghanistan's pre-Islamic period. As the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas was felt as a severe loss to world culture, should we not stress this aspect rather than mourning the loss of `the nation's' cultural heritage? Even in this century, many countries are preoccupied by other issues - not only the new nations of Africa and Oceania, but even those with a long recorded cultural history. Why do we expect the people who presently live in a certain region to particularly cherish what is remaining from cultures which previously flourished in the same area? In many cases their cultural background is completely different, making it difficult if not impossible for the present inhabitants to really understand and appreciate these objects.

The real issue is the preservation of the cultural heritage of mankind. In this sense it is less relevant where cultural objects from a particular country and culture are presently located; what is more important is that they are kept accessible and safe with the greatest possible chance that they can still be admired by future generations.

Helmut and Heidi Neumann Bottmingen, Switzerland

By now the horrific reality of the destruction of the colossal Buddhas at Bamiyan has sunk in. But there remains an aura of disbelief, as if we have witnessed an unexplained natural calamity and are wandering dazed through the wreckage. The attack remains profoundly `other'; it is impossible to enter the minds of the clerics who gave the order or those who actually participated in the work itself. The wilful destruction of historic objects and monuments is inconceivable. But it happened. Photographs show the empty niches in the cliffs that originally framed the statues, their outlines carefully left intact as a reminder of what was once there.

There are various and complex prohibitions against imagery and idolatry in the Koran and the Traditions of the Prophet from which the orders of the Afghan clerics derive their authority. The Taliban has forbidden images, such as shop signs, in contemporary Afghan culture. This we can understand. So be it. But what is incomprehensible is invoking traditions to justify behaviour that is contradictory to notions of rational, civilized conduct - the destruction of important and irreplaceable historic works of art. The demolition of the Buddhas is an act of cultural terrorism. We are deeply frustrated by our powerlessness to prevent it. As outsiders, we view this assault as desecration, not piety; as righteousness run amok. This vandalism is a profound insult to our own values, a tragic event which will henceforth be identified with quintessential intolerance.

There have been other recent instances of destruction of monuments; as accidents of battle, and by calculated design as part of cultural aggression. Hundreds of mosques and churches were razed in the Balkans during the recent war. The Chinese obliterated thousands of Buddhist monasteries in Tibet during the Cultural Revolution. These and similar catastrophes were given scant attention on the nightly news. But events at Bamiyan have been covered by the world press to an unprecedented extent. How is this instance different?

On the most superficial level, the monuments were conspicuous for their size. For the moment, they upstaged everything else going on in Afghanistan. They were remnants of an ancient, pre-Islamic Buddhist tradition, silent living memories rather than subversive symbols of active resistance to Islam; yet they were perceived by the Taliban as a potential threat, having been worshipped in the past. That the teachings of the Buddha are based on pacifism, toleration and compassion, and do not conflict with the Koran, do not mitigate the extreme violence of this iconoclasm.

The Taliban staged the incident as a tragic opera. Act one: they announced to the world their intention to demolish the Buddhas. Act two: they invited the world to watch - and plead with them to allow museums in the West to save the offending images by buying and removing them. These offers were denied. Act three: the inevitable destruction. Efforts of Western institutions and nations to save the sculptures and other artefacts through purchase and export failed to satisfy the Taliban's uncompromising belief that images of any kind, anywhere, are intrinsically blasphemous. Photographs of the act in progress were posted on the Internet. The task of obliterating the Bamiyan colossi was difficult, owing to the tools at hand: grenades and primitive artillery. The sweat and physical effort involved over a period of several days somehow makes it all the more horrendous, bringing to mind slow death by torture.

The Taliban then declared that their decision was a legitimate response to UNESCO offers to finance the protection of the giant sculptures while ignoring the plight of starving Afghan children. Surely this attempt at shifting blame is the dark side of public relations. While this cynical gambit was playing out, the plan was already in place as part of a larger programme to eliminate sculptures and works of art in Afghan museum collections.

We imagine a museum as a place that grants sanctuary to objects, but this idea of a safe haven and repository of the past has been violated. The collections of the Kabul Museum were never widely published, but the catalogue of the 1966 exhibition at the Asia Society in New York, Ancient Art from Afghanistan, which included Graeco-Roman objects, the Begram ivories and sculptures from Gandhara and Fonduqistan, gives some idea of the richness of these holdings. It is sad beyond words to know that every one of these objects is gone. Many of them were destroyed or looted before the Taliban came to power, but they finished off whatever was left in the Kabul museum and in other provincial museums. The archaeological site of Hadda has also been levelled, its stupas systematically reduced to rubble. John Henry Merryman, the doyen of specialists in cultural property law, coined the phrase `covetous neglect' to describe the retentionist policies of countries rich in archaeological treasures wasted and destroyed through apathy, corruption and post-colonial politics. While such policies put cultural objects at great risk, the effects seem benign compared with the Taliban's wilful and frenzied iconoclasm.

The book-burning of the Nazis is comparable, although it involved the destruction of words rather than images. The purpose was the same: to demonstrate an ideology that depended on the eradication of a culture, and in the German instance, ultimately a people. Yet while available books were burnt, numerous copies remained. As unique works of art, the Bamiyan Buddhas are lost forever, as are the thousands of art objects smashed to dust in Afghan museums.

In the postmodern world, taking a relativist position, one could argue that while Taliban iconoclasm is the expression of a particularly obsessive fundamentalism, it is a valid way of looking at the world. But it is an extreme distortion of relativism to condone violations of the rights of women in Afghanistan, for example, as merely part of another world view; as it is to say that Taliban destruction of images is validated or excusable by Islamic (or any) tradition. Certain modes of behaviour are prerequisite to civilized discourse between cultures, for instance simple respect, whether the dialogue is between two separate cultures, or between diverse cultures within one's own society.

Most of these works of art have perished, but a certain number of carpets, ivories, crystals, metal-work and wood carving have survived the various cataclysms that from time to time have swept over the Mohammedan world and they are now safely guarded from iconoclastic zeal in [Western] public museums, private collections, and - strangest fate of all - in the sacristies of Christian churches and cathedrals. (Painting in Islam: A Study of the Place of Pictorial Art in Muslim Culture, New York, 1965 reprint, p. 29)

Before the recent campaign, the Bamiyan Buddhas survived attacks by Mongols, Ghaznavids and Mughals. The damage done by the Taliban is final and irreparable. If any good can come from this barbaric episode, it will be the heightened awareness that circumstances in countries with a rich archaeological past may put their cultural objects at extreme risk from misplaced piety, ideological and political zeal, civil war, economic ambition and indifference.

Many ancient works of art from Afghanistan that reached the international antiquities market are part of public and private museums in the United States and Japan, whose interest in the Silk Road and early Buddhism has made it a rich repository of Gandharan and related art. Western collections of the archaeological art of Afghanistan, and of other ancient civilizations strongly support the notion that the movement of antiquities in an international market is a most practical and effective way to save what we can of the past.

Peter Marks, New York