y the sculptures of Boroboedoer are the most
definite expression which we shall ever have of its earlier phases.
Since they contain images of the five superhuman Buddhas and of
numerous Bodhisattvas, they can hardly be called anything but
Mahayanist. But on the other hand the personality of Sakyamuni is
emphasized; his life and previous births are pictured in a long series
of sculptures and Maitreya is duly honoured. Similar collections of
pictures and images may be seen in Burma which differ doctrinally from
those in Java chiefly by substituting the four human Buddhas[440] and
Maitreya for the superhuman Buddhas. But Mahayanist teaching declares
that these human Buddhas are reflexes of counterparts of the
superhuman Buddhas so that the difference is not great.

Mahayanist Buddhism in Camboja and at a later period in Java itself
was inextricably combined with Hinduism, Buddha being either directly
identified with Siva or regarded as the primordial spirit from
which Siva and all gods spring. But the sculptures of Boroboedoer
do not indicate that the artists knew of any such amalgamation nor
have inscriptions been found there, as in Camboja, which explain this
compound theology. It would seem that Buddhism and Brahmanism
co-existed in the same districts but had not yet begun to fuse
doctrinally. The same condition seems to have prevailed in western
India during the seventh and eighth centuries, for the Buddhist caves
of Ellora, though situated in the neighbourhood of Brahmanic buildings
and approximating to them in style, contain sculptures which indicate
a purely Buddhist cultus and not a mixed pantheon.

Our meagre knowledge of Javanese history makes it difficult to
estimate the spheres and relative strength of the two religions. In
the plains the Buddhist monuments are more numerous and also more
ancient and we might suppose that the temples of Prambanan indicate
the beginning of some change in belief. But the temples on the Dieng
plateau seem to be of about the same age as the oldest Buddhist
monuments. Thus nothing refutes the supposition that Brahmanism
existed in Java from the time of the first Hindu colonists and that
Buddhism was introduced after 400 A.D. It may be that Boroboedoer and
the Dieng plateau represent the religious centres of two different
kingdoms. But this supposition is not necessary for in India, whence
the Javanese received their ideas, groups of temples are found of the
same age but belonging