In the early centuries of the Common Era, the knowledge of Buddhism had infiltrated China from northern India via the Silk Road - that network of land trade routes that helped to connect China with India and indeed the western world. Practitioners could be found in the major centres along the Road and their beliefs spread among the scholarly circles of China. Some such scholars were dissatisfied with Chinese approaches to the world and the universe and felt that Buddhism offered them answers to some questions that were not otherwise available. However, not enough was known about the beliefs and more documentation was required by the Chinese, for whom the written text has always been an important starting point for serious study.
As a result, certain monks and scholars took it upon themselves to travel to the home of Buddhism at Lumbini in India and other important centres of Buddhism both to learn more and to obtain texts which could be translated into Chinese and the information disseminated more widely among learned circles.
Among this small group of monks was a certain Sehi, who was born in Shansi province at the end of the C 4th CE, at a time when Buddhism was receiving an almost unparalleled degree of imperial support. In 402, Sehi set forth with his companions. His journey took a number of years but was ultimately successful. Happily, he subsequently decided to write a quite detailed account of his journey and this provides us with many fascinating details of his trip and the people he met. Sehi himself (he took the name Fa Hsien - 'Splendour of Religious Law' - at a later date) had three older brothers, who all died in infancy. He was enlisted in the monkhood at a very early age and remained there, exhibiting great devotion and faith, despite the wish of his family to support his widowed mother. His life was long and filled with scholarly diligence.
Sehi begins his account with the reasons for his journey:
"Fa-hien had been living in Ch'ang-gan. Deploring the mutilated and imperfect state of the collection of the Books of Discipline, in the second year of the period Hwang-che, being the Ke-hae year of the cycle, he entered into an engagement with Kwuy-king, Tao-ching, Hwuy-ying, and Hwuy-wei, that they should go to India and seek for the Disciplinary Rules."
The comrades therefore set forth, travelling across a fierce desert which was believed to be inhabited by wild demons who would pounce upon the unwary. After many travails, they arrived in northern India and then travelled the whole length of the country, visiting monasteries and other communities. Eventually, they reached Sri Lanka and then set sail for the homeland. Even then, the difficulties were not past for a fierce storm drove them off course and they were obliged to spend five months on Java before finding another ship to take them back to China. Even then, another storm caught up with them and they suffered severe threat of starvation before finding port again on the northern coast of their homeland. Nevertheless, they were willing to sacrifice anything rather than yield up their precious books to the waves, as the merchants accompanying them wished them to do.
As a result, certain monks and scholars took it upon themselves to travel to the home of Buddhism at Lumbini in India and other important centres of Buddhism both to learn more and to obtain texts which could be translated into Chinese and the information disseminated more widely among learned circles.
Among this small group of monks was a certain Sehi, who was born in Shansi province at the end of the C 4th CE, at a time when Buddhism was receiving an almost unparalleled degree of imperial support. In 402, Sehi set forth with his companions. His journey took a number of years but was ultimately successful. Happily, he subsequently decided to write a quite detailed account of his journey and this provides us with many fascinating details of his trip and the people he met. Sehi himself (he took the name Fa Hsien - 'Splendour of Religious Law' - at a later date) had three older brothers, who all died in infancy. He was enlisted in the monkhood at a very early age and remained there, exhibiting great devotion and faith, despite the wish of his family to support his widowed mother. His life was long and filled with scholarly diligence.
Sehi begins his account with the reasons for his journey:
The comrades therefore set forth, travelling across a fierce desert which was believed to be inhabited by wild demons who would pounce upon the unwary. After many travails, they arrived in northern India and then travelled the whole length of the country, visiting monasteries and other communities. Eventually, they reached Sri Lanka and then set sail for the homeland. Even then, the difficulties were not past for a fierce storm drove them off course and they were obliged to spend five months on Java before finding another ship to take them back to China. Even then, another storm caught up with them and they suffered severe threat of starvation before finding port again on the northern coast of their homeland. Nevertheless, they were willing to sacrifice anything rather than yield up their precious books to the waves, as the merchants accompanying them wished them to do.
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