Responses to the Spread of Buddhism Dbq

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wanted to abolish it so that more people would go back to working and contributing goods to the economy of China. As a person can often times see in China once imperial control is in place Confucianism becomes popular and sponsored by the government while the other religions are attacked, which is largely responsible for Buddhism’s decline of popularity after 570.

In response to the two differing viewpoints many scholars attempted to show that people of different religions could live in peace. It is proven time and time again in history that when multiple religions are close to each other they will clash, however there are still examples of prospering areas of tolerance such as Spain in the years of 711-1492 CE. The notion of religious tolerance inspired many scholars to show that the same thing can take place in China. An unknown Chinese scholar in the year 500 CE, stated in “The Disposition of Error” that just because something isn’t written in the words of Confucius does not mean that it is not true, and that it is just not possible for the writings to contain everything (Doc 3). This scholar does a careful job of not insulting either Confucianism or Hinduism and doesn’t throw around words like “barbarians” as other scholars have done, instead they provided a point that just because the texts of one religion doesn’t mention the other doesn’t mean that the other religion is invalid. Another scholar was Zong Mi in 9th century CE who stated that Laozi, Confucius and the Buddha all deserve to be treated with respect for they encouraged good deeds while punishing wicked deeds and all three established their teachings due to the age that they lived in and the different demands of that age (Doc 5). Zong Mi was not only a Buddhist scholar but he was also favored in the Tang imperial household, which promoted Confucianism, this means that this man had unique insight into both religions which aided him well when speaking of religious tolerance. These scholars provide a unique response to the spread of Buddhism in China.

Usually the responses that people have to a new religion is mainly dependent on the political situation of the time. If the government is unstable and there are many conflicts a new religion, a new insight to human nature and salvation is very welcome. In contrast if the political situation is very strong a new religion could be seen as unnecessary and an attack to the current culture of the region, making it not welcome at all. However, there are always the people that are able to look through both sides and hope to find a compromise such as the peace loving scholars did.

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