Longxing Temple

 

         Longxing Temple is located in Zhengding County, Shijiazhuang City, Hebei Province,

known as the Temple of the Great Buddha because of its giant bronze statue of the Buddha.

        It was built in established in Sui Dynasty. It covers an area of 85,200 square meters and

the halls remaining on the premises stand along the axial line.

        The Mahavira Hall, stands on a unique plan in the shape of a cross. Inside there is a

statue of Sakyamuni in the company of his two major disciples, Manjusri and Samantabhadra.

The 33-meter-high Mahakaruna Pavilion houses a 22-meter-high Song Dynasty bronze

sculpture of Guanyin. The statue has 1,000 hands and 1,000 eyes, and, due to its sheer size,

the bronze sculpture is a rarity in China.

        A unique piece of wood architecture from the Song Dynasty in the Longxing Monastery

is the Pavilion of the Rotating Library, which was restored in the 20th century. The pavilion

houses a rotating bookshelf which was formerly used to store holy texts and Buddhist sutras.

This rotating book case archive dates back to the 12th century, and is the oldest existent

rotating repository of its kind (refer to the article Technology of the Song Dynasty).