[61]In the Ceylon pagoda at Kelany I saw the Buddhists perform the sĕmbah in the very same manner as done by the Javanese, and Siam’s king and queen when on the Båråbudur and in tyanḍi Mĕndut, and in the same manner I saw this mark of veneration hewn on all the buddhistic imageries known to me. Perhaps, it was the Buddhists who once introduced this sĕmbah in Java.
[62]See my illustrated work “In den Kĕdaton te Jogjåkartå” published in 1888 by E. J. Brill at Leyden, picture II, and the IXth. photo of my illustrated work “De garĕbĕgs te Jogjåkartå” (published by the “Royal Institute” in 1895).
[63]At Parambanan and Pĕlahosan we already knew these deities to be Bodhisattvas. (See my above mentioned works: “Tyanḍi Parambanan na de ontgraving” and “Boeddhistische tempel-en kloosterbouwvallen in de Parambanan vlakte”.)
Some time before the digging up of Parambanan Mr. Groeneveldt wrote to me: “The theory as if these sculptures should represent known princes we must give up.”
Çiva was one of the lokiçvaras of the Buddha-pantheon, and we know even other brahmin deities to have been admitted into this. Such is also the case with the holy queens of Leemans’ work who are Târâs or Çaktis (wives or powers of deities).
[64]Till 1896 I also thought that these small Buddha images, we see in the crown, characterised the wearers as Bodhisattvas, that is, the Bodhisattvas of the Dhyâni-Buddhas whose small images were hewn in the crowns. The king of Siam denied this. Because of his being a buddhistic prince himself he also wore such small images in his crown. Moreover, I never saw another image in these crowns, except the one with the two hands in his lap, which is to signify the mudrâ dhyâna or meditation, a posture the Mahâyânists gave to the fourth Dhyâni-Buddha, Amitâbha, the Redeemer of this world. If now these small images were to characterise Dhyâni-Bodhisattvas, why, another Bodhisattva but Padmapâni the fourth, would have been never hewn.
Should they refer to buddhistic princes it then may be easily imagined that they never referred to another Buddha but the one of this their world. On undeniable images these small ones therefore only point to the buddhistic character the northern church adjudicated to these deities.
[65]The crescent of the moon Leemans ascribes to this sculpture we don’t see anywhere, but is to be perceived on the preceding one, 105.
[66]On the fourteenth sculpture on the front-wall of this gallery the sun and moon have been sculptured with seven stars (planets?).
[67]“Oudheidkundige aanteekeningen” IV, p. 55-58.