China Religions and Beliefs Essay Example

From time immemorial, China has been a country with many religions. For instance, Confucianism has been well known as an indigenous religion, which is the passion of the Chinese culture that enjoys majority support among Chinese people. Consequently, Confucianism at some point became the controlling ideology for feudalism culture, although it never advanced into a national belief. Indeed, Confucianism has made the Chinese culture more tolerant to other people, hence, enabled other religions to have been brought into the country through dissimilar dynasties. However, none of these dynasties has developed into more potent in history since they only provide different spiritual support for individuals (Arthur, 2019). There are various religions in China such as Buddhism, Confucianism, Christianity, Islam, and Taoism. Buddhism was introduced in China more than two thousand years ago, where it was gradually accepted leading to its widely spread among many of the Chinese. Consequently, Buddhism ended up developing into three primary division such as Southern, Tibetan and Han Buddhism. In this sense, Buddhism led to the development of dissimilar religions as well as a different culture that affected the local culture on three major components that are ideology, art, and literature (Arthur, 2019). For instance, there are numerous well-known poems, which have ideas that originate from Buddhism. On the same note, there are many Buddhist stones statutes, which can be found in China today that shows the massive influence that was brought by Buddhism. At the same time, Buddhism has been found to be significant in the sense that it helps to promote China's intercultural communication with other countries. Currently, Buddhism has developed to become among the most significant religions in China.

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Even though Confucianism is not a real religion but a philosophical and ethical system that was advanced from Confucius ideologies, which later were treated as a type of belief to train the general public, Confucianism gained its stability during the sovereignty of Emperor Wu of Han Dynasty between 202BC and 220 AD. Confucianism becomes the philosophy of the society during the feudal system. Accordingly, the principles and traditions of Confucianism have been a significant milestone in the formation of different teaching styles and thinking patterns among Chinese people (Ching, 2016). On the other hand, Taoism originated during the dynasty of Han between 25 -220. Today nearly 300 Taoist Templates are spread across China. For more than 1800 years Taoism has significantly influenced the local Chinese culture and particularly their traditional literature and medicine (Ching, 2016). Islam is another religion that was introduced in China in the seventh century during the Tang Dynasty. Presently, Muslims live everywhere, although a majority of the individuals live in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, Qinghai Province, and Gansu Province. Lastly but not least, Christianity, which was initially introduced in China during the Tang Dynasty. It was referred to as Nestorianism during the introduction period. Currently, Christianity has spread across the country, and it has more than 30 million Chinese as Christians mainly living in the Southern region of the country.

References

Arthur, S. (2019). Contemporary Religions in China. London: Routledge. https://content.taylorfrancis.com/books/download?dac=C2018-0-83222-1&isbn=9780429443596&format=googlePreviewPdf

Ching, J. (2016). Chinese religions. Berlin: Springer. https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=mv6-DAAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PR12&dq=China+Religions+and+Beliefs&ots=yxmkAXVRRH&sig=2VAljzLs7y_azTbEkHD4_FxM4VQ