Buddhism on the Silk Road: A Good Case for Religious Syncretism

“Buddhism on the Silk Road” is a topic with very rich contents. Buddhism developed from India to China through Inner Asia along the Silk Road. Naturally, it carried various influences that it adopted along the road from the peoples, cultures, and religious faiths. It would be significant to show different aspects of Buddhism in the following topics:

1. The development of Mahayana Buddhism on the Road;
2. Buddhism and Iranian influences;
3. Buddhism and local/popular religious beliefs;
4. Buddhism and Manichaeism;
5. Buddhism and Islam.

In general, this Issue will focus on religious syncretism, and the Silk Road is the most suitable place to show it and is the best place for the discussion. It would be helpful to study the above areas through these approaches: archeological, textual (e.g., manuscripts, monuments), fine arts (wall-paintings, sculptures), architectural, historical, and so forth. This Issue will provide a collection of the study of Buddhism from different perspectives with a pleasure.

Dear Colleagues,

The focus of this Special Issue is “Buddhism on the Silk Road.” It will, through articles selected from experts in their respective areas, show various faces of Buddhism, specifically pertaining to its unique characteristics in its development along the Silk Road (e.g., its sects, its rich impact on other religions, and vice versa). As a result, it will be used as a case study for religious syncretism. With this purpose, readers will be able to see Buddhism in a larger picture, and this Special Issue will provide a better understanding of history, cultures, peoples, and religions that have been connected and combined with each other and can never be clearly separated.

Scholars in these areas have done a tremendous amount of work in the past decades, for example, Paul Harrison “Searching for the Origins of the Mahayana: What Are We Looking for?” in Eastern Buddhist 28/1, 1995. pp.48 – 59; David Scott “Buddhist Responses to Manichaeism: Mahayana Reaffirmation of the ‘Middle Path?’ in History of Religions, Nov.1, 1995; 35/2. pp.149 – 162; Richard Foltz “When Was Central Asia Zoroastrian?” Mankind Quarterly 38/3, 1998. pp.189 – 200; Frantz Grenet “Religious Diversity among Sogdian Merchants in Sixth-century China: Zoroastrianism. Buddhism Manichaeism, and Hinduism,” Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East, Vol 27, Number 2, 2007. David Scott “The Iranian Face of Buddhism,” East and West, Vol. 40, No.1/4, 1990. pp.42 – 77; Nahal Tajadod “The Role of Iranians in the Spread of Buddhism, Manichaeism and Mazdaism in China,” Diogenes, 50.4 (Nov. 2003), pp.61 – 70. Painted Buddhas of Xinjiang by Jacques Gies, Laure Feugere and Andre Coutin, The British Museum Press, 2002; Valerie Hansen “Entryway into Xinjiang for Buddhism and Islam” in The Silk Road A New History. Oxford University Press, 2012. pp.199 – 234; Kato Kyuso “Cultural Exchange on the Ancient Silk Road,” Ethnological Studies 32, 1992. pp 5-20; Richard Foltz Religions of the Silk Road Premodern Patterns of Globalization. Palgrave/Macmillan, 1999; and Xinru Liu The Silk Road in World History. Oxford University Press, 2010.

Prof. Yuan Ren
Guest Editor

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• Mahayana Buddhism
• Zoroastrianism
• Manichaeism
• cultural exchange
• religious syncretism
• Buddhist art
• history