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Buddhism in Khotan comprised bodies of Buddhist religious doctrine and institutions characteristic of the Iranic Kingdom of Khotan as well as much of Western China and Tajikistan. It was the state religion of the Kingdom of Khotan until its collapse in 1000.〔 〕 Influenced by Mahayana Buddhism, the kingdom’s vast collection of texts, which included the indigenous ''Book of Zambasta'' and a Khotanese translation of the ''Sanghata Sutra'' (the earliest translation of the Sanskrit text to date), helped Khotan influence the Buddhist practices of its neighbors, most notably Tibet. ==History== Local legend suggests that one of Ashoka's sons founded the Central Asian city of Khotan, once the capital of a prominent Buddhist kingdom alongside the famous Silk Road. According to this same legend, Ashoka’s son was abandoned by his father and nurtured by the Earth, with the ground swelling in the shape of a female breast. For this reason the child was named "Earth’s Breast", or Go-stana. As he grew up, settlers from the Indian subcontinent and China began to settle within the oasis surrounding the “Earth’s breast.” Together with an unnamed son of the Chinese emperor, the son of Ashoka helped Indian expatriates settle within the region and found a city named after the son, called Khotan. Even so, the famous Chinese pilgrim Xuanzang and Tibetan records both suggest that Buddhism would not be introduced to the kingdom until Go-stana's grandson Vijayasambhava was born 170 years after the city’s establishment. In Vijayasambhava’s fifth year of life, according to Xuanzang, a Kashmiri missionary named Vairocana arrived in Khotan and practiced meditations in the woods. Gaining the people’s interest, he became a spiritual teacher for the Khotanese people and established the first Buddhist convent in Khotan. His contributions helped introduce Vijayasambhava to the concepts of Buddhism, thus founding the Vijaya dynasty within Khotan and ultimately laying the foundations for the Buddhist faith to become its official religion by 130 BCE. A thriving Silk Road center of trade, the Kingdom of Khotan quickly established trade, diplomatic and religious relationships with its neighbors, most notably with Ancient China. While Khotan’s relations with the Chinese were initially not smooth due to an ill-fated revolt that killed a Chinese commander in the 2nd century, the Khotanese sent embassies to the Three Kingdoms between 202 and 222 CE. This led to the formation of close relations with the Jin Dynasty throughout the fifth and sixth centuries.〔 Because of Khotan’s expansion and relations with its neighbors, its culture and its interpretations of Buddhism became a melting pot of all the cultures that existed along the Silk Road. By 665 CE., the Tibetan army had conquered the city of Khotan.〔 〕 Ironically, while the Tibetans occupied the Khotanese kingdom, it was the Khotanese who influenced the Tibetans. This was most notable in the cases of the technical vocabulary and the translation techniques used for Buddhist texts. Much like the modern-day Tibetan alphabet, the Khotanese alphabet utilized a Cursive Gupta script, most likely influenced by Sanskrit from its nearby neighbors. While writing down a translation of a Sanskrit work, Khotanese scribes would render Buddhist technical vocabulary though an etymology of each syllable.〔 〕 This helped the Khotanese maintain the accuracy of their translations, even if they were more concise than the Sanskrit and Pali originals. The Tibetans had long sought to translate Buddhist Sanskrit texts in a more efficient matter, because at that time they did not share a common alphabet. The occupation of the Central Asian kingdom however gave Tibetans an opportunity to learn the Khotanese alphabet. By the 9th Century, the Tibetans had adapted the Khotanese alphabet for their language.〔 〕 While Islam had earlier been introduced into Central Asia, it was not until 982 C.E. when the Islamic Kara-Khanid Khanate of Kashgar began to invade the Kingdom of Khotan.〔 〕 By the time the city of Khotan fell to the Karakhanids in 1006 AD, most of the residual monks had already fled to Tibet, taking many of their sacred texts with them. Not long after the Karakhanids began their occupation, Islam became the dominant religion in Khotan, marking an end of Buddhism in the region. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Buddhism in Khotan」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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