Buddha Image

For 300 years after the Buddha's death there were no Buddha images. The people's practice was an image of the Budha, there was no need to externalize it.

But in time, as the practice was lost, people began to place the Buddha outside of their own minds, back in time and space.

. . . Gotama Buddha repeatedly reminded people that the experience of truth comes from one's own mind.

- Joseph Goldstein,
The Experience of Insight