Daibutsu. The name given to several colossal images of the Buddha (sometimes also to those of bodhisattvas) in Japan, notably three: (1) the 53 foot seated Buddha in the Todaiji temple at Nara, erected in 754 CE as a witness to the importing of Buddhism into Japan and its assimilation with Shinto, the national religion; (2) the one at Kyoto, also a seated figure, 58½ feet high, completed early in the 17th c., destroyed by earthquake in 1662 and replaced by the present one that dates from 1801; and (3) the image, 49½ feet high, of Amida Buddha at Kamakura, erected in 1252. It was built in celebration of the "Pure Land" Buddhist sect, which venerates the Buddha under the transcendental form of Amida, who is believed to lead his devotees to "Pure Land" of light.

Geddes MacGregor, Dictionary of Religion and Philosophy, New York: Paragon House, 1989