The History of the Formation of Early Chinese Buddhism

The History of the Formation of Early Chinese Buddhism: A Study on Discourse Characteristics analyzes the process of the sinicization of Buddhism. It provides a comprehensive investigation on how the perceived similarities between Buddhism and Daoism originated and how traditional Daoist terminologies were applied in the translation of Buddhist texts. By doing so, the text critiques the Daoistization of Buddhism and also offers a comparative overview of the general human ways of thinking in India and China by focusing on the relationship between universal ways of understanding the world during the Wei-Jin era. By analyzing commentaries by scholarly Chinese monks in the Wei-Jin era, and the philosophical nature of Neo-Daoism thought that played the most direct role in the Chinese transformation of Buddhism, this book is an attempt to understand why such discourses on the imperishability of the spirit became the main discussion topic in early Chinese Buddhism, and how colossal Buddhist statues that remind us how an Absolute Deity came to be established in China.