Standing Buddha

Standing Buddha images with both hands raised, palms outward, are not common in most of the Buddhist world, but have been made in mainland Southeast Asia since the 1100s. The implications of the double gesture are far from clear, but in the nineteenth century the position came to be called "forbidding the ocean."

The episode in the life of the Buddha to which this phrase refers is little known; in it the Buddha performed miracles in order to convert an ascetic. A huge rainstorm created floods, but the Buddha used his supernatural powers to keep the area around himself dry.

Whether or not this story was usually in the minds of those who commissioned or made Buddha images in this position, evidence suggests that such images, when adorned with the crown and jewels of a king such as the standing image to your right [2006.27.5], had associations with living kings and their ancestors.