Buddhism Dbq Research Paper

“The Third Noble Truth is the Truth of the Stopping of Sorrow: It is complete stopping of that craving…being released from it, giving no place to it” (Document1). The spread of Buddhism in China was due to the appeal it had on the people and the influence it made on the culture, like the Third Noble Truth states, stopping sorrow leads to one being content and being released from any heavy sorrow weighing you down, a life which describes and explains the spread of this particular religion in China, the way of life appealed to the people. Although many officials and scholars disagreed to the Buddhist ways, it did not stop others from converting and spreading the religion. In this essay I will discuss the spread of Buddhism in China and the impact
Tang Emperor Wu suggested that the religion destroyed the ways of the Chinese people and ruined the customs that the country had been loyal to for years. Wu believed that by spreading the Buddhist religion and culture, the people of China were actually suffering, “Buddhism wears out the people’s strength, pilfers their wealth…” (Document 6). Han Yu, a Confucian scholar and official at the Tang imperial court based his opinions on the spread of Buddhism on the fact that “Buddha was a man of the barbarians who did not speak Chinese and who wore clothes of different fashion,” (Document 4), Yu believed that since the practice of the Buddhist religion didn’t originate or apply to the Chinese government, that there was no need to practice it as a Chinese citizen. Yu stated that Buddha didn’t understand the meaning of family and customs of the Chinese culture because Buddhism didn’t originate in China, so because of the lack of Chinese culture centered on the religion, Yu didn’t believe that the Chinese people should follow such a way of life. By analyzing these two documents one must assume that Chinese government officials did not feel the spread of Buddhism was good for their country, they felt
Mi doesn’t put one on a higher pedestal than the other and doesn’t bash one religion and favor another based on purely his beliefs. Zong Mi in “On the Nature of Man” is the least bias of the other 6 Documents; he believed that each teacher deserved respect and honor because at one point, their teachings fit the need of the time and the people. Document 1 consists of “The Four Noble Truths” of Buddhism, preached by the Buddha as a result of long meditation in order to discover the reason of sorrow and suffering. The Buddha preached this sermon to share with his people, the cause of sorrow, the stopping of sorrow and the arising of sorrow. “The Four Noble Truths” is the beginning of the Buddhist religion. Documents 5 and 1 are the least bias of the 6 and are based on the beliefs of Buddhist monks and Buddhist scholars, by discovering the cause of sorrow Buddha based a religion which spread throughout China and other neighboring countries, Zong Mi is supportive of the spread of Buddhism and “The Four Noble Truths” is the cause of the religion and its appeal to the Chinese