The Introduction of Buddhism to Ancient China Research Paper

The Introduction of Buddhism to Ancient China - Research Paper Example That was how the religion began, and it has since moved and spread to all parts of the world although it is more concentrated in Asia. Buddhist believes in fundamental principles in which they operate. They include understanding universality of suffering, abandoning the desire in controlling things and causing suffering, making visible supreme truth and liberation of nirvana achieved through eliminating suffering as well as bringing the truth of eightfold ariya path that leads to the ending of suffering (IDCNJ Para. 2-4). It is the fundamental principles that this religion stood for that made it gunner more followers world wide. It was found in India, and latter found it way out to China and other parts of Asia. Therefore, this paper will discuss how Buddhism spread from India where it originated all the way to China and examine its impacts in the life of Chinese. History of Buddhism Movement to China Buddhism is mostly concentrated in the central Asia where its founder came from. Bu ddhism spread to central Asia under Ashoka. Different kinds of Buddhism got different influences from other religions, for instance Mahayana Buddhism was influenced by Iranian religions. On the hand, it had much appeal to the Chinese across the social spectrum. This made it gain more adherents to Chinese leading to the growth of Buddhist monastic movement. It attracted both men and women and had a tremendous impact on the Chinese arts. Despite its widespread in China, not everyone was a receptive to Buddhist teachings (Holt Para. 4). Most traditional account attributes that Buddhism was introduced in China in the reign of Han Dynasty (206 BCE -220 CE). This came after an emperor dreamed of flying golden man was thought to be Buddha. Although there are many evidences that Buddhism reached China during Han Dynasty, it did not have much influence or flourish until 220-589 CE during the time of six dynasties. After the fall of Han Dynasties, Buddhism emphasized on personal salvation and rejection of worldly ties which leading to its popularity. Most of the Chinese Buddhism has their beliefs pegged on Indian Buddhists beliefs which missionaries, traders, and diplomats who had traveled through the silk roads got (Saylor Para. 9). The golden age of Chinese Buddhism happened at the time of Tang Dynasty of 618-907. Buddhism was very popular among many societies at all levels. Despite many Tang emperors being Daoist, most of them favored Buddhism, and they were patrons to the temples and monasteries which Tang government controlled (Welter 63). Because of this, temples and Buddhist monasteries grew by acquiring more land. At Tehtiem of Tang Dynasty, many scholars also made several pilgrimages to India, and they returned with Buddhist texts making several Buddhist schools systemize large corpus of Buddhist texts as well as teachings. Due to social and economic factors in 845, Emperor Wuzong (840-846) resorted to persecuting Buddhists as many of their temples and shrines were destroyed and nuns and monks forced to start living a normal life (McKay Chapter 6). It is evidenced that Buddhism came to spread to China at the time of Tang Dynasty (618-649) due to the culture which they embraced. For instance, Tang culture led to the unification of south and north Asia hence creating conditions for revitalizing Chinese culture. There was consistent flow of people from outside China as they came with new ideas,