Along the Silk Road to China
Merchants and monks carry Buddhism across Central Asia to China, where it is translated, debated, embraced by emperors and finally becomes a Chinese religion.
- The Buddhist Conquest of China — Erik Zürcher, Brill (1959)
- Buddhism in China: A Historical Survey — Kenneth K. S. Ch'en, Princeton University Press (1964)
- An Introduction to Buddhism: Teachings, History and Practices (2nd ed.) — Peter Harvey, Cambridge University Press (2013)
- The Story of Buddhism: A Concise Guide to Its History and Teachings — Donald S. Lopez Jr., HarperSanFrancisco (2001)
Buddhism probably reached China in the first century CE with merchants and monks from Central Asia. Chinese tradition tells of Emperor Ming of Han dreaming of a golden figure and sending envoys west; the White Horse Temple at Luoyang is remembered as China’s first. By the mid-second century, the Parthian monk An Shigao was translating texts in Luoyang.
- The Buddhist Conquest of China — Erik Zürcher, Brill (1959)
- Buddhism in China: A Historical Survey — Kenneth K. S. Ch'en, Princeton University Press (1964)
At first, Buddhism looked foreign and odd to Confucians: monks left their families, shaved their heads and did not produce heirs. But after the fall of the Han in 220, in centuries of division, it spread among rulers and ordinary people alike. Kumarajiva, brought to Chang’an in 401, produced elegant translations of the Lotus Sutra and other texts that are still used. Great cave temples were carved at Dunhuang, Yungang and Longmen.
- The Buddhist Conquest of China — Erik Zürcher, Brill (1959)
- Buddhism in China: A Historical Survey — Kenneth K. S. Ch'en, Princeton University Press (1964)
- An Introduction to Buddhism: Teachings, History and Practices (2nd ed.) — Peter Harvey, Cambridge University Press (2013)
Under the Tang dynasty (618–907), Buddhism reached its height. The monk Xuanzang travelled to India from 629 to 645 and returned with hundreds of texts. Chinese schools such as Tiantai, Huayan, Pure Land and Chan (Zen) took shape. But monasteries grew so rich that in 845 Emperor Wuzong ordered thousands of them destroyed and hundreds of thousands of monks and nuns returned to lay life. Buddhism survived, increasingly through Chan and Pure Land, deeply woven into Chinese life alongside Confucianism and Daoism.
- Buddhism in China: A Historical Survey — Kenneth K. S. Ch'en, Princeton University Press (1964)
- The Story of Buddhism: A Concise Guide to Its History and Teachings — Donald S. Lopez Jr., HarperSanFrancisco (2001)
Why it matters today
China became the great centre of Mahayana Buddhism, and from it the faith passed to Korea, Japan and Vietnam. Chinese translations, made by monks like Kumarajiva and Xuanzang, are still the scriptures of East Asian Buddhism, and China today has more Buddhists than any other country, though estimates vary widely.