NO. 2 FOLK RELIGION IN SOUTHWEST CHINA — GRAHAM 59 



During the past centuries Buddhism has won and held the loyalty 

 of the Chinese common people because it has adopted and accommo- 

 dated itself to the primitive practices and superstitions to which they 

 were accustomed and was believed to make available magical or 

 superhuman povv^er. By the worship of the gods, the chanting of 

 sacred books, and other religious ceremonies, and the use of charms 

 and incantations to protect people from demons and various calami- 

 ties and to guarantee success and happiness and the satisfying of 

 human needs and desires in this world and in the world to come, 

 it won the hearts of the common people of China. But in the latter 

 part of the 19th and the early decades of the 20th century, there 

 was a great intellectual awakening and enlightenment in China, to- 

 gether with disastrous foreign wars, the weakening and final collapse 

 of the Manchu dynasty followed by chaotic conditions, many civil 

 wars, two world wars in which China became much involved, the 

 Communist uprising, and growing economic distress which caused 

 many families to become bankrupt and hundreds of millions to en- 

 dure the hardships of poverty. Consequently, conditions in China 

 became fluid and changing, and many of the people of China ques- 

 tioned and even rejected Buddhism and Taoism because of their 

 many superstitious teachings and practices. 



In an article, "Buddhism and Chinese Culture," and in a later 

 book, "Buddhism in Chinese History," Prof. Arthur F. Wright di- 

 vides the history of Buddhism in China into four periods (Wright, 

 1957, 1959). The first he calls the Period of Preparation, A. D. 

 65-3 1 7- He shows that the political, social, and intellectual events of 

 these years were such as to make the people skeptical of their own 

 and susceptible to a foreign religion and its cultural accompaniments. 

 The Han dynasty weakened and fell, and society was disintegrating. 

 Former moral, social, and political ideals and customs were ques- 

 tioned and discredited. At the same time the Buddhist sacred books 

 were being translated, and Buddhist teachings and practices were 

 being adapted to those of the Chinese (Wright, 1957, pp. 19-24; 

 1959, pp. 21-41). 



The next period, A. D. 317-589, he calls the Period of Domesti- 

 cation. He states that the process differed in the north and in the 

 south, but everywhere Buddhism attracted all classes of society, from 

 the rulers and educated aristocrats to the lowly peasants. Buddhist 

 ideas and customs were brought to the Chinese, but very many of 

 them were Sinicized and adapted to those of China. This resulted 

 in new literature, new forms of art and architecture, new laws, 



