The Destruction of the Buddhas of Bamyan

Two of the largest and oldest statues ever created were the giant Buddhas near the small town of Bamyan, Afghanistan. They were carved directly into the sandstone cliffs near the town in the sixth century A.D. and stood 180 and 121 feet tall. They were considered the largest standing Buddha statues in the world. They stood for over 1,500 years, and are truly one of the marvels of the world.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the religious extremists in the Taliban government cracked down on all un-Islamic parts of Afghan society, banning television among other things. This crackdown eventually led to the declaration the monumental statues as un-Islamic. In March of 2001, in a shadow of perhaps what was to come later in September of that year, the Taliban government in Afghanistan ordered the Buddhas to be destroyed. It took almost a month, since the statues were carved directly into the mountain, but eventually, after repeated barrages of artillery fire, and other methods, the Buddhas were destroyed.

The condemnation of the act by the Taliban from the international community, was, as you might have guessed, universal. I believe that the human race lost a priceless piece of its heritage when the Taliban made that deplorable decision. On a positive note, since the Taliban government was overthrown, there have been plans to rebuild the monuments.


An old photo showing one of the Buddha's before it was destroyed:


During one of the barrages that eventually destroyed the Buddhas:

Dharasana Satyagraha

The Indian independence movement had many inspiring moments under the direction of Gandhi, but one story that has impacted me more than most is the non-violent raid of the Dharasana Salt Works in Gujarat.

Gandhi was arrested before the event when he notified the British authorities of his intention to lead the march, as were several other Indian leaders. But the march went ahead as planned, led by Gandhi's wife and a 76 year old retired judge. When the group approached the Salt Works, they were brutally beaten by the police, yet in the tradition of non-violence, none of the marcher's fought back, or even defended themselves. An American journalist, Webb Miller, documented the scene:

"Not one of the marchers even raised an arm to fend off the blows. They went down like ten-pins. From where I stood I heard the sickening whacks of the clubs on unprotected skulls. The waiting crowd of watchers groaned and sucked in their breaths in sympathetic pain at every blow.

Those struck down fell sprawling, unconscious or writhing in pain with fractured skulls or broken shoulders. In two or three minutes the ground was quilted with bodies. Great patches of blood widened on their white clothes. The survivors without breaking ranks silently and doggedly marched on until struck down. When every one of the first column was knocked down stretcher bearers rushed up unmolested by the police and carried off the injured to a thatched hut which had been arranged as a temporary hospital.

There were not enough stretcher-bearers to carry off the wounded; I saw eighteen injured being carried off simultaneously, while forty-two still lay bleeding on the ground awaiting stretcher-bearers. The blankets used as stretchers were sodden with blood.

At times the spectacle of unresisting men being methodically bashed into a bloody pulp sickened me so much I had to turn away....I felt an indefinable sense of helpless rage and loathing, almost as much against the men who were submitting unresistingly to being beaten as against the police wielding the clubs...

Bodies toppled over in threes and fours, bleeding from great gashes on their scalps. Group after group walked forward, sat down, and submitted to being beaten into insensibility without raising an arm to fend off the blows. Finally the police became enraged by the non-resistance....They commenced savagely kicking the seated men in the abdomen and testicles. The injured men writhed and squealed in agony, which seemed to inflame the fury of the police....The police then began dragging the the sitting men by the arms or feet, sometimes for a hundred yards, and throwing them into ditches."

This account has been credited for turning the tide of opinion against the British Empire in the Indian struggle for independence.

I first became aware of this story at a young age from the movie Gandhi, where the event is dramatized. To me this is the epitome of courage and resolve - the marchers believed so much in what they were doing that they submitted themselves to severe beatings without fighting back. I only hope that in my own life that I can have the courage equal to these men and women to fight for what is right.