Monastery returns pagoda body after 19-year nationwide search

Nearly 20 years after being stolen, a 1,300-year-old stone Buddhist pagoda body has been returned to its home of northern Shanxi province with the best wishes from pilgrims across the Taiwan Straits, officials said Sunday.

An expert panel was organized to compare the artifact and old pictures and files of the lost item in Shanxi. They determined the two matched perfectly and the Shanxi Museum and the monastery signed an agreement in August 2016 for the pagoda body to be returned.

"It was Wei Chueh's last wish to take this pagoda body back to enhance religion and art exchange across the Taiwan Straits," Abbot Jian Deng from the monastery said at ceremony marking the item's return.

Still, no one knows where the pagoda's top is.

"This is a remarkable event to set a good example for similar cases in the future," said Guan Qiang, deputy director of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage. "It encourages more people's good deeds to better protect cultural relics and bring more lost artifacts back."

The returned pagoda body will be exhibited in Shanxi Museum until May 21, and it is unclear whether it will be housed at the museum or moved it to Yushe county after, Shi said.

"If safety conditions allow, it's good to let it go back home in the village," Shi said.

(China Daily 04/17/2017 page3)