Anshan Jade Buddha is the largest jade

Jade

Jade is an ornamental stone.The term jade is applied to two different metamorphic rocks that are made up of different silicate minerals:...

 Buddha

Gautama Buddha

Siddhārtha Gautama was a spiritual teacher from the Indian subcontinent, on whose teachings Buddhism was founded. In most Buddhist traditions, he is regarded as the Supreme Buddha Siddhārtha Gautama (Sanskrit: सिद्धार्थ गौतम; Pali: Siddhattha Gotama) was a spiritual teacher from the Indian...

 statue in the world. It is located in a large temple complex of 22,104 square metres situated beside Dongshan Scenic Reserve within 219 park of Anshan City in Liaoning province

Liaoning

' is a province of the People's Republic of China, located in the northeast of the country. Its one-character abbreviation is "辽" , a name taken from the Liao River that flows through the province. "Níng" means "peace"...

, China

People's Republic of China

China , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres...

.

The statue was sculpted from a piece of jade 7.95 meters high, 6.88 meters wide, 4.10 meters thick, weighing 260.76 tons. The front of the stone has been carved with an image of Sakyamuni(aka. Gautama) Buddha. On the back of the stone Guanyin (aka. Avalokitesvara) Buddha has been carved. The jade stone was found on 22 July 1960 in Xiuyan County of Anshan which is known as the "hometown of jade" (Xiuyan jade is not really jade, but serpentine). It was declared a treasure of the State and listed as a protected property by Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai

Zhou Enlai

Zhou Enlai was the first Premier of the People's Republic of China, serving from October 1949 until his death in January 1976...

. Anshan city government commissioned the carving which took a team of 120 sculptures 18 months to complete. The temple complex was opened on the 3rd of September 1996. The building that houses the Jade Buddha statue is 33 metres tall, representing the 33 layers of heaven in Buddhism. It claims to be one the tallest buildings of ancient Chinese architectural style in China.