White Dagoba Temple 白塔寺
阜成门内大街171号
Part of A Better Guide to Běijīng’s coverage of West of the Imperial City
The site is more correctly known as the Miàoyīng Sì (妙应寺), or Temple of the Miraculous Response, but the white Tibetan-style dagoba at the rear, in the shape of an inverted goblet, gives the temple its more common name. It’s both bigger and earlier than the dagoba in Běi Hǎi Park, both known as ‘peppermint bottles’ to the foreign residents of the 1930s.
The 51m dagoba was originally constructed by a Nepali architect on the site of a Liáo dynasty temple during the reign of Khubilai Khan and completed in 1279 as the main centre for the Yuán dynasty’s Buddhist observances. The dagoba was renovated or rebuilt a number of times, including in 1668 by the Kāngxī emperor and in 1753 by the Qiánlóng emperor, who placed many cultural relics here. Damage caused by the Táng Shān earthquake in 1976 (still treated as a state secret by the Party, which only admits to around a quarter of a million dead, although other sources believe the figure to have been at least double that) revealed miniature copper stupas placed inside the dagoba by the Qiánlóng emperor, and repairs in 1978 turned up Hàn to Qīng dynasty coins and some scriptures.
For years access was restricted to one hall and to the dagoba itself, as the front half of the temple had been put to more practical uses. It all finally reopened to the public after a rebuild completed in 2000. During this restoration a tiny solid gold Buddha encrusted with 43 rubies was discovered in the top of the dagoba.
The layout is conventional, although the Hall of the Deva Kings is sans kings, but full of sutras in cases, black and white photos of past temple fairs and other Buddhist bits and pieces, with English explanations.
The first major hall is the five-bay Dàjué Diàn (Hall of the Great Enlightened Ones), where the major statues would once have been but which is now used for an exhibition of Tibetan Buddhist artefacts. This includes a large and impressive collection of Buddha statues, showing the development of style over the centuries from the very slender, high-cheekboned Indian to the plumper, rounder shapes of later Sinicised figures. From plain, calm, seated images to threatening multi-armed 11-faced ones, it seems as if almost the entire Buddhist pantheon is here, many of them labelled in English, and providing an introduction to which hand positions indicate which figure. Some are showered in banknotes by visitors.
Side halls hold an exhibition on the temple’s history and Mongol involvement with Buddhism, and suggest that the site’s boundaries were originally defined by having arrows shot in four directions, although the creation of a daoist temple just to the northwest in 1433 nibbled away at the site.
The attendants throughout the temple seem drawn from the devout, often found in prayer and bowing to visitors with their hands together.
Behind this is the Hall of the Seven Buddhas, which in fact holds three, two attendants and 18 luóhàn. These are said to be Yuán dynasty and made of long-enduring nánmù cedar wood. At the rear there’s a fine multi-armed Guānyīn, Goddess of Mercy.
The Hall of the Buddhas of the Three Periods (past, present and future) is unrestored and contains dusty Yuán and Míng Buddhas, the obligatory Qiánlóng calligraphy board, and some Qīng thangka (Tibetan hangings with Buddha images). At the rear of the site, the very substantial flask-shaped dagoba on a stepped base towers over its raised brick plinth and is topped with a copper umbrella. If you go around it, do so clockwise so as to gain merit and drive evil away, or simply to be polite.
▶ Bái Tǎ Sì, Fùchéng Mén Nèi Dàjiē 171, t 6613 9073, 9am–3.30pm, Tue–Sun. ¥20. nb Optional audio tour ¥30; deposit ¥100. m Xī Sì (Line 4). b to 白塔寺 : 13, 42, 101电车, 102电车, 103电车, 409, 603, 604, 612, 685.
It’s short walk west to the Lǔ Xùn Museum, or east to the Temple of Ancient Monarchs and the Guǎngjì Sì, all on the same north side of the road.
Next in West of the Imperial City: Stupa, Dagoba, Chorten, or Pagoda? (story)
Previously: Sex and the Citizen (story)
Main Index of A Better Guide to Beijing.
For discussion of China travel, see The Oriental-List.
