China: Religion (Notable Terms, Concepts, Figures, Writers, Characters or Deities, Events / Stories, Cults, etc.)

Chinese Buddhism (All Facts)

• Religion which came to China from the west along the string of oases known as the Silk Road

• It ran from the Kushan Empire in central Asia into China and from the east on the China and from the south via Burma 

• Its first practitioners were foreign merchants 

• Eventually, indigenous monasteries were founded, and the namesake emerged with a Taoist flavor 

• Large sections of the namesake population were converted 

• Was distinctly Chinese 

• Most of the Chinese translations of the namesake religion’s texts used Taoist terminology 

• No longer seen as a foreign religion, its promise of freedom from pain and suffering attracted millions of converts, having made it the fastest growing religion in China by the 60’s CE 

• By 85 CE, it reached the oases of Tarim 

• When the Xiongnu occupied Loyang, Confucian scholars fled, thus leaving the field open to the namesake monks who provided the barbarian Xiongnu conquerors with a literate civil service 

• By 399, during the Northern Wei Dynasty, it spread throughout China, working its way along the trade routes from Central Asia and India 

  • Regarded as something of an intellectual curiosity by the Han Court, it became a recognized religion 

  • During this time, Indian translators worked on the huge task of providing versions of its original teachings, which were written in Sanskrit, into Chinese 

  • It owed as much to the fall of the Han Dynasty and the “age of confusion” that followed 

  • The small states of the north which had easy contact with India were particularly receptive to the namesake 

148 CE - 180 CE - An Shigao (All Facts)

• Parthian Monk who becomes famous for being a Buddhist missionary to China after travelling from Parthia and arriving in Loyang 

• He initiated the first project for a systematic translation of Buddhist texts into Chinese from originals in Sanskrit or Prakrit 

344 - 413 - Kumarajiva (All Facts)

• Chinese Buddhist Monk and Kuchean Translator 

  • He was of Indian descent and born in central Asia

• He is considered one of the greatest translators of Chinese Buddhism

  • His excellent translations of Buddhist texts allowed the Chinese to gain a real understanding of Buddhism as a philosophy, which they had not been able to obtain up to that point 

• Taught at Changan in Shensi province

• He preached versions of Buddhism previously unknown in China

337 - 422 - Faxian (All Facts)

• Chinese Buddhist Monk

• He traveled on foot from Jin China to medieval India to acquire Buddhist scriptures

• He set out from Changan on a long pilgrimage, spending several years 

  • Walking the Silk Road

  • Visiting Temples

  • Studying with holy men

  • Recording the traditions and customs of the counties through which he passes

• He was one of a number of monks who found their own path to the secrets of Buddhism, having travelled along the Silk Road to study the true doctrine at the sources of (Chinese) Buddhism

365 - 448 - Kou Qianzhi (All Facts) 

• Court official of the Northern Wei Dynasty 

• He succeeded in establishing Taoism as the state religion of the Northern Wei Dynasty in China

Yungang Grotto (All Facts) 

• Large Buddhist Grotto fashioned in a cave temple in a sandstone cliff in the northern Shanxi province in China by thousands of employees 

• Consisted of imposing figures carved out of rock 

• Depicts Indian gods carved in a style similar to Greek statuary 

• Naively, its artists incorporated Greek mythological themes without understanding them 

  • To its smaller figures, however, there was a much more Chinese feel, in which they were carved by native craftsmen who were not inhibited by Buddhism’s non-Chinese (Indian) origins

602 - 664 - Xuanzang (All Facts)

• He founded Wei-Shi Buddhism

• Chinese Buddhist monk who traveled to India for 15 years and came back to contribute significantly to Chinese Buddhism by

  • Collecting Buddhist scriptures in India written in Sanskrit and bringing them back to China so he could translate them into Chinese

    • He ended up only being able to translate 75 sections of the 1300 or so sections of text, but these particular sections were very significant

• He sent many petitions to the Emperor at the time, Taizong of Tang, but the Emperor repeatedly refused, so he left for India without informing the Emperor, given how great his conviction was that Buddhism in China would benefit from his travels

Giant Wild Goose Pagoda (All Facts)

• Built during the Tang Dynasty to hold sutras and figurines of the Buddha that were brought to China from India by Xuanzang

Wei-Shi Buddhism (All Facts)

• Chinese branch of the Indian Yogacara Buddhist tradition

• Its central tenet is "consciousness-only,” which posits that no phenomena exist outside the realm of the mind; what we perceive as reality consists only of "dharma appearances" or "dharma characteristics"

• School of Buddhist thought founded by Xuanzang

Nestorian Christianity (All Facts)

• Religion introduced into China during the reign of Emperor Taizong of Tang

Manichaeism (All Facts)

• Religion introduced into China during the reign of Empress Wu Zeitan of the Wu Zhou Dynasty