Buddhist Diplomacy: History And Status Quo. - USC Center on ...

22 BUDDHIST DIPLOMACY: HISTORY AND STATUS QUOschools, such as Huayan, Tiantai, and Chan, have prospered. InTibet, Buddhism interacted with the indigenous Bon religion andeventually gained dominance.Decline of Buddhism in AsiaBuddhism started to decline in India during the latter half ofthe Gupta Empire when Brahmanism saw a revival (320–550 CE).At the end of the 5th century CE, the Huna invaded NorthwesternIndia, destroying many monasteries and killing numerous monks.In the 7th century, Bengal King Sasanka invaded the Gangic plainand destroyed many <strong>Buddhist</strong> sites, including the Bodi tree atGaya, under which the Buddha reached his enlightenment. 84 Theemergence of Vajrayana Buddhism (Tantric Buddhism), for whichrituals, magic power, and sex are essential, in the 8th century alsogreatly caused the decline of Buddhism. 85 In the 12th century, theinvading Muslim troops dealt a lasting heavy blow to Buddhism bydestroying numerous monasteries, including the famous NalandaMonastery. Since then Buddhism gradually died out in the Indiansubcontinent.In East and Southeast Asia, Buddhism rooted itself andunderwent a long period of localization, but its dissemination wasmostly stagnated within the region. The 19th century saw a massivecolonization of Asia by European powers: the British colonizedthe Indian subcontinent. The French colonized Indochina. TheChinese empire was reduced to chaos by foreign invasions andcivil wars. Japan westernized itself while colonizing Korea. As aresult, Buddhism drastically declined in East Asia, Southeast Asia,and Central Asia, long after it became extinct in its native land ofIndia. Buddhism lost state patronage in many nations, and it hadto face pressure from Christianity first and later Communism. Forexample, Christian missionaries tried to convert Sri Lankan peopleto Christianity since the 16th century. In Burma, Buddhism wasdemoted as a state religion by the British. 86 Communists in SovietUnion and Mongolia banned Buddhism altogether until the 1960s. 87<strong>Buddhist</strong>s were persecuted in China for several decades.