Travels in Tartary, Thibet, and China During the years 1844-5-6. Volume 2Huc, Evariste Régis
General
Travels in Tartary, Thibet, and China During the years 1844-5-6. Volume 2
Huc, Evariste Régis
Asia, Central -- Description and travel; China -- Description and travel; Tibet Autonomous Region (China) -- Description and travel
Besides the reformation which Tsong-Kaba introduced into the liturgy, he
rendered himself further famous by a new edition of the “Body of
Doctrine,” left by Chakdja-Mouni. The most important of his other works
is entitled _Lam-Rim-Tsien-Bo_ (the Progressive Path to Perfection).
Upon the most superficial examination of the reforms and innovations
introduced by Tsong-Kaba into the Lamanesque worship, one must be struck
with their affinity to Catholicism. The cross, the mitre, the dalmatica,
the cope, which the Grand Lamas wear on their journeys, or when they are
performing some ceremony out of the temple, the service with double
choirs, the psalmody, the exorcisms, the censer, suspended from five
chains, and which you can open or close at pleasure; the benedictions
given by the Lamas by extending the right hand over the heads of the
faithful; the chaplet, ecclesiastical celibacy, spiritual retirement, the
worship of the saints, the fasts, the processions, the litanies, the holy
water, all these are analogies between the Buddhists and ourselves. Now,
can it be said that these analogies are of Christian origin? We think
so. We have indeed found, neither in the traditions nor in the monuments
of the country, any positive proof of their adoption, still it is
perfectly legitimate to put forward conjectures which possess all the
characteristics of the most emphatic probability.
It is known that, in the fourteenth century, at the time of the
domination of the Mongol emperors, there existed frequent relations
between the Europeans and the peoples of Upper Asia. We have already, in
the former part of our narrative, referred to those celebrated embassies
which the Tartar conquerors sent to Rome, to France, and to England.
There is no doubt that the barbarians who thus visited Europe must have
been struck with the pomp and splendour of the ceremonies of Catholic
worship, and must have carried back with them into the desert enduring
memories of what they had seen. On the other hand, it is also known
that, at the same period, brethren of various religious orders undertook
remote pilgrimages for the purpose of introducing Christianity into
Tartary; and these must have penetrated at the same time into Thibet,
among the Si-Fan, and among the Mongols on the Blue Sea. Jean de
Montcorvin, Archbishop of Peking, had already organized a choir of Mongol
monks, who daily practised the recitation of the psalms, and the
ceremonies of the Catholic faith. Now, if one reflects that Tsong-Kaba
lived precisely at the period when the Christian religion was being
introduced into Central Asia, it will be no longer matter of astonishment
that we find, in reformed Buddhism, such striking analogies with
Christianity.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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