Central Asia in Xuanzang's Great Tang Dynasty Record of the Western

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Recording the West: Central Asia in Xuanzang’s Great Tang Dynasty Record of the Western Regions

Master’s Thesis

Presented in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master Arts in the Graduate School of the Ohio State University

Laura Pearce

Graduate Program in East Asian Studies

Ohio State University

2018

Committee: Morgan Liu (Advisor), Ying Zhang, and Mark Bender

Copyrighted by

Laura Elizabeth Pearce

2018

Abstract

In 626 C.E., the Buddhist monk Xuanzang left the Tang Empire for India in a quest to deepen his religious understanding. In order to reach India, and in order to return, Xuanzang journeyed through areas in what is now called Central Asia. After he came home to China in 645

C.E., his work included writing an account of the countries he had visited: The Great Tang

Dynasty Record of the Western Regions (Da Tang Xi You Ji 大唐西域記). The book is not a narrative travelogue, but rather presented as a collection of facts about the various countries he visited. Nevertheless, the Record is full of moral judgments, both stated and implied. Xuanzang’s judgment was frequently connected both to his Buddhist beliefs and a conviction that China represented the pinnacle of culture and good governance. Xuanzang’s portrayal of Central Asia at a crucial time when the Tang Empire was expanding westward is both inclusive and marginalizing, shaped by the overall framing of Central Asia in the Record and by the selection of local legends from individual nations. The tension in the Record between Buddhist concerns and secular political ones, and between an inclusive worldview and one centered on certain locations, creates an approach to Central Asia unlike that of many similar sources. The influence of the Record and Xuanzang as a figure continued far after its publication and his death, but the unique approach to Central Asia would be lost in later works. An understanding of how Central

Asia was conceptualized in the Record and related works is crucial in understanding the history of Chinese thought regarding Central Asia, an issue which remains relevant today.

Acknowledgments

I would like to sincerely thank the members of my committee, Dr. Ying Zhang, Dr. Mark Bender, and especially my advisor Dr. Morgan Liu. This thesis would not have been completed without your support and critical insight. I would also like to thank Amy Carey of the East Asian Studies Center, whose administrative know-how eased this process immensely. And to everyone else I have worked with at the Ohio State University: thank you, I am a better scholar thanks to your efforts.

iii

Vita

2007……………………………………………………………………..Walnut Hills High School

2011…………………………………………….B.A. International Studies, Ohio State University

2014…………………………………….M.A. Folklore, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill

Fields of Study

Major Field: East Asian Studies

Table of Contents

Abstract……………………………………………………………………………………………ii

Acknowledgments…………………………………………………………….…………..…...…iii

Vita……………………………………………………………………………………………..…iv

List of Figures…………………………………………………………………………………….vi

Introduction: Xuanzang and the Great Tang Dynasty Record of the Western Regions………...…1

The Record and Its Antecedents…………………………………………………………………..7

Framing Central Asia in the World………………………………………………………………16

Creating a Moral Geography Through Legends…………………………….………………...…31

The Re-Centralization of China in Later Accounts……………………………………………...42

Conclusion: A Record of the World……………………………………………………………..53

Works Cited……………………………………………………………………………………..56

List of Figures

Figure 1. Map of Xuanzang’s Journey…………………………………………………………….2

Introduction: Xuanzang and the Great Tang Dynasty Record of the Western Regions

In 626 C.E., as the reign of the second emperor of the Tang dynasty began, the Buddhist monk Xuanzang left the Empire in order to journey to India, hoping to study there and bring back knowledge and sacred texts to benefit Chinese Buddhists and help the spread of Buddhism in China. Xuanzang journeyed through the Gansu corridor, around the Taklamakan desert, through the regions of Sogdiana and Bactria to reach the Indian states, and trekked through

Central Asia once more upon his return (Wriggins, fig. 1). After he came home to China in 645

C.E., his work included writing, with the aid of his court-appointed disciple Bianji, an account of the countries Xuanzang had visited. The result was The Great Tang Dynasty Record of the

Western Regions (Da Tang Xi You Ji 大唐西域記, henceforth the Record). This Record, along with its coverage of Indian states and Buddhist sites, provided remarkable detail concerning the areas in what is now the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in China, the former Soviet republics of Central Asia, and Afghanistan. The coverage of Central Asia provides some of the clearest insights into the tensions inherent in the text, and as such is a window into both

Xuanzang’s Buddhist worldview and the political expectations of his audience. Moreover, a close reading of Xuanzang’s portrayal of Central Asia not only provides critical insight into

Chinese attitudes towards Central Asia in an expansionist period, but brings into clearer focus the attitudes prevalent both before and after Xuanzang’s journey. Certain stereotypes of behavior and values have remained constant, while the specific ideological interests and historical circumstances of different authors have caused Central Asia to be framed and potentially received in different ways.

Figure 1, Map of Xuanzang’s Journey

“Central Asia” is, of course, a modern concept. For many from Imperial China at the time, including Xuanzang, concepts of geography were directional, not continental, and privileged the position of the Imperial center (Chang’an) relative to the rest of the world. In Xuanzang’s view, the areas which will be focused on here were part of “the West.” “The West,” as indicated by the

Record’s very title, could be conceived of as everything to the west or southwest of the heartland of the Tang Empire, dominated by particular groups of people whose genealogy and culture differed from those of the Tang elite. This conception of “the West” included modern India as well as Central Asia.

However, as laid out in the Xuanzang’s introduction and discussed in greater detail in chapter two, in the text of the Record Xuanzang distinguished between “the West” and “the

South.” The nations roughly corresponding to modern-day India, are part of “the South,” defined by their climate and great spiritual development (itself defined by the presence of Buddhism and significant Buddhist sites). “The West” is comprised of the nations between the Chinese empire proper (as opposed to tributary states) and “the South.” This area includes a number of states in the present-day Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region province of the People’s Republic of

China, but also encompasses nations in the region now considered “Central Asia,” including present-day Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Afghanistan. For ease of reference, and to help present-day readers conceptualize the geography in question, I will be using the term

“Central Asia.” I acknowledge, however, that is a term of convenience more than accuracy.

Following the example of Marc Abramson, I will be referring to the culture of the Tang elite at the heart of the Empire, as “Han Chinese.” Han (漢) was only one of a number of terms

Tang writers used to refer to themselves; others included hua (華), xia (夏), and qin (秦), all based, like han, on the names of dynasties of antiquity which were considered to represent a high point in cultural and political development (Abramson 2). Han has the advantage of being clearly an ethnic term to the modern reader, as well as evoking the sense of continuity which is central to all these terms. The Han Chinese culture of the Tang elite was premised on tradition, as well as locality. It was tied to political and religious thought derived from (or said to derive from) the great rulers and thinkers of antiquity. For the purposes of this study, the most crucial aspect of this Han Chinese culture is Confucian thought, but it also encompassed Daoist traditions and, at the very least, literature relating to religious thought predating both Confucianism and Daoism

(such as the Shan Hai Jing, which will be referenced in chapter 1). Crucially for the production

3 of the Record, Han Chinese culture at the time did not necessarily encompass Buddhism, which was still seen by some elites to be “foreign” and to promote dangerous concepts such as abandoning the family.

All this is not to say that Tang authors possessed a clearly defined notion of Han Chinese culture – this identity was constructed largely through being unlike (less civilized) others

(Abramson ix) rather than through clearly defined shared affiliations, and the importance of locality which helped define those beyond the borders of the Empire as Other also created tensions between regional identities within the Empire (Skaff 54). Elite Tang authors were still, however, shaped by recognizable traditions defining the civilized Self and the barbaric Other, as well as by contemporary political concerns. Xuanzang and his Record were far from immune to this influence, although Xuanzang’s Buddhist beliefs complicated the issues of civilized and uncivilized, central or peripheral.

The Record’s circulation, and possibly its influence, began even before writing was complete. According to Thomas Watters, “The first draft of this work was presented to the

Emperor in 646, but the book as we have it now was not actually completed until 648. It was apparently copied and circulated in Ms [manuscript] in its early form during the author’s life and for some time after (12-13).” The Record’s influence continued in official circles, as “most

Chinese official histories, at least from the Tang period onwards, depend, for their sections on

‘Western Regions’, to a greater or lesser extent, on the information found in Xuanzang’s great work. They sometimes even quote complete passages from the XJ [the Record] (Deeg 97).” It does not seem a stretch to say that the Record was a critical document in shaping the Imperial

Chinese view of Central Asia, a region which would be contested over and over throughout the history of the Empire1.

The Imperial government’s interest in Central Asia was military and economic, fueled a need to shore up the defense of the Empire and a desire for tributary goods or control of trade.

Xuanzang’s interest, however, lay primarily in the practice of Buddhism, in its spread and forms.

These dual points of interest, the tension between them and the means by which they are reconciled, are at the heart of Xuanzang’s treatment of Central Asia and are crucial in making this section of the Record compelling and deserving of examination. All of this is conceptualized and articulated through Xuanzang’s attention to place, contrasting the large regional scale with the treatment of individual countries, towns, and monasteries. Morality and relevance is determined not only through sweeping statements, but also through the selection of local legends which carry their own connections and morals.

This thesis is organized into four chapters. In the first chapter, I discuss the main (known) literary influences on the Record, most notably Faxian’s Record of Buddhist Kingdoms and the

Shan Hai Jing. The ways in which the Record conforms to or diverges from earlier works suggest Xuanzang’s ideology and intent. The second chapter discusses the way Central Asia is framed in the work through the introduction and conclusion, with a particular eye to how

Xuanzang’s audience likely shaped his approach. Chapter three is concerned with the use of local legends in Xuanzang’s coverage of individual nations. Xuanzang’s choices of local legends are deeply indicative of his worldview, and his decision to include them at all in the sections on

Central Asia makes Central Asia a more morally acceptable place, even as aspects of

1 Some consider modern-day Xinjiang to still be a “Central Asian” area in spite of its incorporation into the People’s Republic of China. From that viewpoint, it could be said that Central Asia has remained a contested area even after the fall of the Imperial and Republican governments, as the Communist government meets resistance there. Beyond Xinjiang, there is China’s involvement in development in the former Soviet republics, including the construction of energy pipelines to China.

Xuanzang’s worldview also alienate it. In chapter four, I discuss two of the most prominent works about Xuanzang’s journey to arise after his death: the biography Life of the Tripitaka

Dharma Master of the Cien Monastery of the Great Tang (Da Tang Cien si sanzang fashi zhuan,

大唐慈恩寺三藏法師傳) and the famous novel Journey to the West (Xi You Ji 西遊記).

Although these works carry forward some of Xuanzang’s ideas, in other significant ways they break from the presentation of the Record and conform to a greater extent with Han Chinese traditions. The Record is a unique document, which includes Central Asia in its conception of the world to an unusual extent but still ultimately places it at the margins, and which influenced later perceptions although many of its unique aspects came to be overlooked.

Chapter 1: The Record and Its Antecedents

The Record was influenced by, and in direct conversation with, a number of earlier works and existing genres. Most obviously, Xuanzang was impacted by an earlier account of a similar journey, but he was influenced as well by long traditions of geographical writing in prose and poetry, as well as by accounts of the strange. The ways in which the Record aligns with tradition, and the ways it diverges from it, are crucial to understanding Xuanzang’s worldview and the particular position the Record occupies. The tension in the Record between Xuanzang’s desire to promote Buddhism and the knowledge that the work had been commissioned for political purposes is not only a matter of statements in the text, but shapes the combination of genres and influences Xuanzang draws upon, and thus the form of the entire work. In comparison with earlier work, we can also see the tension in Xuanzang’s approach to Central Asia. Xuanzang follows some existing patterns marking Central Asia as particularly dangerous, yet elaborates on them or de-emphasizes them so that Central Asia is rendered, if not familiar, relatively approachable.

Xuanzang and Faxian

The most prominent antecedent to Xuanzang’s Record is a fifth century prose account,

Faxian’s Record of Buddhist Kingdoms (Foguo Ji 佛國記, henceforth Buddhist Kingdoms). Like

Xuanzang, Faxian was a Buddhist monk who travelled from China to India in order to study and obtain scriptures. Faxian too travelled through Central Asia to India, though unlike Xuanzang he did not revisit the area on his return trip, instead travelling by ship. Although Faxian makes some mention of the basic facts of various countries, he is not focused on such details. In covering

Central Asia, Faxian relates Buddhist festivals that he himself experienced, but no general legends about holy sites or the countries themselves2.

The discussion of Central Asia in the Buddhist Kingdoms begins with a description of the

Taklamakan Desert, “in which there are many evil demons and hot winds (12).” The reader is informed that “there is not a bird to be seen in the air above, nor an animal on the ground below.

Though you look all round most earnestly to find where you can cross, you know not where to make your choice, the only mark and indication being the dry bones of the dead (left upon the sand) (12).” On the way to Khotan, “the difficulties which they encountered in crossing the streams and on their route, and the sufferings which they endured, were unparalleled in human experience (15-16).” Of the Pamir mountains, Faxian reported that “There are also among them venomous dragons, which, when provoked, spit forth poisonous winds, and cause showers of snow and storms of sand and gravel. Not one in ten thousand of those who encounter these dangers escapes with his life (24).” Beyond the Pamirs Faxian’s group found safety after crossing the Indus, but there was a final danger when the party wandered north of the river again.

In a mountain range which Legge identifies as the Spīn Ghar, Faxian and his companions were

“struck by a cold wind which made them shiver and become unable to speak (40).” One of

Faxian’s companions dies as a result, after urging the others onward to safety (41). It is only after this trial and crossing the Indus again that Faxian reaches “central” India, which is blessed everywhere by a flourishing Buddhist community.

Whatever dangers are present in India, in contrast, do not threaten Faxian and his party directly. Travelers to the deserted city of Kapilavastu, the Buddha’s birthplace, “have to be on their guard against white elephants and lions (68).” This report lacks the hyperbolic language surrounding the dangers in Central Asia, and is not as long as the description of the Gobi.

2 Faxian does relate Buddhist legends in his coverage of India.

Moreover, this is a warning received secondhand, lacking the personally devastating as the dangers of the Spīn Ghar.

It is worth noting that in Faxian’s narrative, danger is not confined to Central Asia, but surrounds all of India. Until he reaches the seas surrounding China, Faxian’s voyage is continually threatened by storms, damage to the ships, and heretical Hindus (111-114). Yet even these dangers are not as comprehensively threatening as those of Central Asia. While the hardships of Central Asia are continuous and unavoidable, complete disaster on the sea is warded off by appeals to Guanshiyin3 and constant pious thoughts concerning the mission to bring back sacred texts (113). There is no incident such as the death encountered in the Spīn Ghar.

Xuanzang, in perhaps his most direct references to any previous Han Chinese travel writing makes almost direct use of a number of Faxian’s descriptions of the dangers of Central

Asia. Xuanzang, too, explains that hostile dragons can bring near-certain death to unwary travellers. If the dragons are provoked, “a fierce wind will arise all of a sudden with sand flying in the air and pebbles raining down from the sky. Those who encounter such a catastrophe are sure to die, [or at least] it is difficult for them to escape alive (26).” Regarding the Taklamakan,

Xuanzang reports that “as no trace of wayfarers can remain visible on the sand, travelers often lose their way in the vast wilderness and do not know what to do. Therefore they have collected the skeletons of the dead to serve as landmarks (387-388).” Xuanzang, in fact, goes further than

Faxian, claiming that the Taklamakan is plagued by “ghosts and devils (388).”

Yet Xuanzang’s references differ from Faxian’s presentation in crucial ways. Faxian simply writes that the dragons of the Pamirs will torment travelers “if provoked.” Xuanzang,

3 The bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara, known as Guanshiyin (觀世音) or Guanyin (觀音) in China, became a popular figure in East Asian Buddhism, due at least in part to early translation of the Lotus Sutra, which features the bodhisattva (Campany 4). Guanshiyin would later become associated in China with tales of filial piety (see Dudbridge 2004 and Idema 2008).

9 however, provides explicit instructions on what travelers must do to avoid the attention of the dragons: “Passengers going by this path should not wear garments of reddish brown color, nor should they carry calabashes, nor shout loudly (26).” It is only if these rules are broken that the dragons will attack. The description of the Taklamakan is not presented near or at the start of the journey, as in the Buddhist Kingdoms, but rather as one of the last locations Xuanzang passes through before returning to China. The result is a presentation of Central Asia which is navigable.

As harsh as the landscape may be, it is possible to pass through if a traveler is careful. Faxian’s ability to travel through the lands outside of China and India is miraculous; Xuanzang’s success is not necessarily exclusive to him.

More importantly, the descriptions of dangerous terrain in the Record do not dominate the account of Central Asia in the way they do in the Buddhist Kingdoms. This is partly because the account is more depersonalized – if Xuanzang lost any travelling companions to mountains or deserts, he does not see fit to mention it. The greater reason for the reduced effect these reports have in the Record, however, is its expanded coverage of Central Asia. Xuanzang devotes considerably more time to a considerably larger number of Central Asian nations, providing detailed geographic insight. Faxian does not relate any local Buddhist legends from

Central Asia; Xuanzang makes them a regular occurrence, making the coverage of Central Asia more similar in form and content to his coverage of Indian countries.

Accounts of Travels, Accounts of Anomalies

To truly understand the form, content, and unique character of the Record, however, it is necessary to reach back to other Buddhist genres and travel genres. As Buddhist monks, both authors were likely influenced by domestically-focused collections which were designed to

10 familiarize Han Chinese readers with Buddhist beliefs and make Buddhist morality compatible with Chinse values. Both the Record and the Buddhist Kingdoms place themselves in the ji (記) genre of prose travel accounts, a genre which saw particular development in the early medieval period and the conventions of which the works follow to differing extents.

Xiaofei Tian comments that a “form of travel writing, written in plain unrhymed prose and often referred to as a ‘record’ or ‘account’ (ji 記), began to make its appearance in the

Eastern Jin; documents of this type were produced in rather large quantities at the turn of the fifth century (82).” Tian describes the hallmarks of the genre: “A ji typically gives exact locations of notable geographical features and famous sites, explains a place name, recounts the past and present of a place, and records pertinent local lore (83).”4 Both the Buddhist Kingdoms and the Record are consistent with this general pattern, although with a particularly Buddhist bent, focusing on Buddhist sites and choosing to describe the present of a place by counting the number of monks and monasteries, as well as the type of Buddhism practiced.5

Both Faxian and Xuanzang were likely inspired to include legends by collections of

Buddhist miracles anomalies, a subset of the zhiguai (誌怪, accounts of anomalies) genre.

Although a less respectable prose genre than history, accounts of anomalies appear to have been produced often enough to suggest a level of popularity. As with many medieval texts, current knowledge of these collections is largely dependent on catalogs and later collections which made use of selections from the originals. Nevertheless, Robert Ford Campany, in Signs from the

Unseen Realm: Buddhist Miracle Tales from Early Medieval China, is able to identify nine

4 Tian goes on to identify the pertinent lore as being primarily anecdote. While anecdotes, personal tales about events in the lives of named figures with whom the the author may share a social group, are included in the examples Tian cites, so are tales which I would classify as “local legend.” 5 As followers of Mahayana (the “Greater Vehicle”) schools, neither monk is keen on areas where Hinayana (the “Smaller Vehicle”) dominates.

11 collections of Buddhist miracles and anomalies (to say nothing of other zhiguai) produced in from the late fourth century to the sixth century.

The genre was comprised of supposedly true accounts, presented as coming from reliable sources and confirming the power of Buddhist divinity. As Campany explains:

One particular feature of the miracle-tale genre must be made clear at the outset to avoid misunderstanding: the stories are not parables or fables; like fables, they are marshaled to make doctrinal or moral points, but unlike fables they are not presented as having been made up for this purpose. Rather, each story claims to represent someone’s personal experience as relayed via a relatively short chain of transmission (17).6

Although the tales they present are at a greater remove from the original sources and the presumed reader, both Faxian and Xuanzang include tales of strange or miraculous events in their accounts of Central Asia and India. In moral and form, those tales not relating directly to the life of the Buddha bear similarities to those collected in Buddhist miscellanies. These may be tied into the lives of notable personages, such as local kings. Most crucially, they are typically tied to place, creating the image of a world imbued with Buddhist significance.

Mountains and Seas

Although the Buddhist Kingdoms, the ji genre as a whole, collections of anomalies, and even poetic travel accounts undoubtedly influenced the writing of the Record, the work which

Jian Bo in his preface to the Record and Bianji in his concluding note directly compare the work is the Han dynasty (206 B.C.E.-220 C.E.) Classic of Mountains and Seas (Shan Hai Jing, 山海

6 Campany classifies the miracle tales in these collections as memorates, a genre of folklore in which the teller recounts someone’s notable experience. One of the hallmarks of the memorate is that the teller is either relating their own experience or they have a direct link (via social group or, often, familial ties) to the story’s subject. Campany’s primary reasoning for this classification in his study of Signs from the Unseen Realm is that the subjects and sources in the tales are typically named. I classify the tales in Faxian and as Xuanzang’s work as legend, the genre memorates enter into when they are more widely transmitted and take on more formalized structure. Legend will be discussed in greater detail in the third chapter, for now it is most pertinent to note that although actors in Faxian and Xuanzang’s tales may be named, sources are general “people” if they are mentioned at all. Themes in the miracle memorates and Buddhist local legends may be similar in a number of cases, and they share the element of supernatural occurrences, but the relationship between source and audience is different.

經, also called the Book of Mountains and Seas, henceforth the Shan Hai Jing). The Shan Hai

Jing is invoked both as a key precedent and as an explanation of the Record’s significance, as the

Record goes beyond the Shan Hai Jing. In the first preface, Jing Bo discusses how necessary the

Record’s discussion of India is because its territory and history “is neither recorded in the Shan- hai-jing (Book on mountains and seas) nor mentioned in the Wang-hui-pian (Chapter on the royal meeting) (5).” In his concluding note for the Record, Bianji’s final words are “This Record may serve as a supplement to the Book of Mountains and Seas; let it be published as a chronicle and distributed for their general reference to the authorities concerned (399).”

Both a geographic treatise and a collection of myth, legend, and anomaly, the Shan Hai

Jing has been classified into different genres and treated with varying levels of respect since its writing. Ricardo Fracasco points out, however, that it is listed as a geographical text in the Sui

Shu (358), and thus it is reasonable to assume that it was largely accepted as a source at the time the Record was written.

The Shan Hai Jing could easily be classified as a prototype for the ji genre. The structure of the Buddhist Kingdoms and Record bear great resemblance to that of the Shan Hai Jing. For example, coverage of one country in “the West” in the Shan Hai Jing goes as such: “Grownman

Country lies to the north of Bindbird Country. Its people wear caps and carry swords in their belts (116).” A typical entry for a Central Asian country in the Record reads thusly: “The country of Khulm is over eight hundred li in circuit and its capital city is five or six li in circuit. There are more than ten monasteries with over five hundred monks. To the west is the country of Baktra

(34).” Faxian’s approach is more personalized overall, but still bears similarities: “After travelling for seventeen days, a distance we may calculate of about 1,500 li, (the pilgrims) reached the kingdom of Shen-shen, a country rugged and hilly, with a thin and barren soil (12-

13).” The selection here from the Shan Hai Jing is, it must be said, not as outlandish as other entries in the same section, featuring as it does people who may be assumed to have the normal number of heads and limbs. Yet the Shan Hai Jing’s marriage of religiously-inspired conceptions of the overall world and a specific geographic approach form an important precedent for the relatively unfanciful Buddhist Kingdoms and Record.

Another key comparison of the Shan Hai Jing to the Record, and one which separates both from the Buddhist Kingdoms and other examples of the ji genre, lies in the depersonalized style. Tian notes that prose travel accounts such as ji allowed for authors to relate striking personal details about their journeys (Tian 2011 85-86). In poems composed on travel, Tian explains, emotion is primarily centered on the historic events being referred to. Prose accounts, by contrast, feature more of the author’s personal sentiments and experience. Personal anecdotes, which there is significantly less room for in poetry, were the primary vehicle for the author’s subjective experience (Tian 2014 46). The Buddhist Kingdoms is certainly in line with these personalized prose accounts. Faxian makes regular mention of his travelling companions and their comings and goings, as well as other personal details such as where the party stayed and for how long.

Xuanzang, in contrast, refrains almost entirely from relating his personal experiences, emotional reactions, or companions, and does in fact refrain entirely in the portions covering

Central Asia7. Prose here allows for more detailed depictions, far more detailed than the Shan

Hai Jing itself, but not more personal ones. Xuanzang’s approach is a hybrid one, drawing on an officially recognized classic of geography, Buddhist worldview, and perhaps even poetic

7 Details later authors cite of Xuanzang’s experience on the journey, such as encounters with various rulers and monks, come from Huili’s posthumous biography of Xuanzang, with only a few exceptions from Xuanzang’s accounts of Indian nations.

14 geographic accounts which, like the Record, “present a cultural itinerary on a cultural map (Tian

2014 44).”

A Hybrid Record

Xuanzang’s approach is still like Faxian’s in that the cultural map is a Buddhist one, even if other items may intrude onto it. The Record, like the Buddhist Kingdoms, seeks to document the prominence and spread of Buddhism by showing the number of Buddhist sites, practices, and miracles found throughout the world. The non-Buddhist intrusions, however, are critical to the

Record’s unique identity. To represent a Confucian world as well as a Buddhist one, a political world as well as a spiritual one, Xuanzang must turn to the conventions of other works, removing his own religious quest from the narrative and centering instead the facts of the geography.

The Record falls between a number of written traditions, concerning history and personal experience. It adopts the form of personal accounts, but downplays its author’s presence. It details geography in the manner of traditional Han Chinese cosmographical geographies, but imbues the world with Buddhist meaning. The effect is one that emphasizes history and morality

(as will be demonstrated), even though it remains “unofficial.” It is an approach that is born of and creates tensions: tensions between the different audiences Xuanzang had in mind, tensions between a Buddhist worldview and a Confucian one. The conflict inherent in Xuanzang’s approach leads to a particularly conflicted account of Central Asia, which cannot be as significant as China or India by certain criteria, yet is undeniably part of the Buddhist world and of critical strategic influence. The ways in which Xuanzang both includes and excludes Central

Asia will be the theme of the next two chapters.

Chapter 2: Framing Central Asia in the World

To understand the Record’s approach to Central Asia, it is critical to consider the audience for which Xuanzang was writing and the way in which Central Asia is framed before any specific nation is discussed. The presumed Court readership joins with Xuanzang’s religious interests to create a narrative that speaks specifically to political concerns as well as illustrating a

Buddhist world. The implications of this approach for the portrayal of Central Asia is particularly vivid in Xuanzang’s introduction, which marginalizes Central Asia by describing the region as lesser, even if it merits some special attention and is included by implication in certain passages. The Record’s introduction, as well as its brief conclusion, deserve close examination as the ideological frame through which the readers were invited to classify the world.

The Record as a Court Document

Although it has since been circulated as a work of Buddhist interest, the Record was initially produced as a Court document. The Record would likely never have been written had

Taizong not commissioned it from Xuanzang. At the time, the Tang dynasty was expanding westward. During the years Xuanzang spent on the road and studying in India, Taizong defeated the Eastern Turks and brought much of modern provinces of Inner Mongolia and Gansu under

Tang control. Some of the oasis city-states in modern Xinjiang, such as Khotan, became vassals of the Tang Empire. In the early 640s, immediately before Xuanzang’s return to China, the Tang used military force to bring the oasis city-state of Karakhoja directly under Tang rule and reinforced Karashahr’s status as a tributary state when that entity attempted to break with the

Tang (Wechsler 225-226). A document dealing with the “Western Regions” was thus not simply a curiosity – it had great potential to serve state interests.

The framing texts of the Record support reading it as an imperial document. The two prefaces which became standard inclusions in the work are not by Buddhist monks, but Court officials. The preface with, according to Thomas Watters, the widest distribution is currently recognized as being written by Yu Zhining, the Duke of Yan and a close advisor of Taizong (16-

17). A second preface, which appears to be standard in modern editions, is by Jing Bo, an official and scholar whose expertise was in writing history (16). Even Bianji, the monk who aided

Xuanzang in compiling the Record and whose eulogy for Xuanzang was eventually appended to the end, was connected to the Court. He was one of the monks appointed by the emperor to aid

Xuanzang in this project and in his translation work. All these writers admire Xuanzang’s piety and devotion to deeper Buddhist understanding, but also understand the Record’s strategic importance, highlighted by the comparisons Jian Bo and Bianji make to the Shan Hai Jing. Their presence creates an official state-sponsored frame for a work which, although it clearly keeps its imperial audience in mind, is ultimately deeply concerned with relatively esoteric Buddhist matters such as which monasteries follow what school and the exact size of the Buddha’s tooth relics housed in various stupas.

The possibility must be considered, at this point, that Bianji played a role in the development of the Record as a Court document. Bianji is typically understood as simply a transcriber – he himself states that “I respectfully listened to the words, committed them to writing, and put them in proper order (397).” Yet putting Xuanzang’s words in “proper order” may have entailed constructing the Record to bear similarity to the Shan Hai Jing, and could have included the omission of particular Buddhist or personal episodes which were seen as being

17 less relevant to the state. Bianji was under secular orders, not monastic ones, to aid in the creation of the Record. Yet while Bianji may have helped shape the Court-friendly elements of the Record, it was Xuanzang himself who made a point to visit the courts of rulers in Central

Asia and India, a fact which supports the possibility that Xuanzang knew that he would have to provide political intelligence to be welcomed back by the Emperor.

It is undeniable that the Record was received first as a Court document. Max Deeg has called for particular attention to be paid to the Record’s possible official functions. Deeg suggests that many of the legends regarding royalty related in the Record were meant to

“‘educate the emperor’ or speak to a wider imperial context (103).” As an example, Deeg cites a legend concerning a prince who suffered as a result of being framed for adultery by his step- mother the queen. The tragic outcome of the legend could have been intended, in Deeg’s view, as a warning to Taizong, his crown prince (future emperor) Gaozong, and young consort (future empress) Wu Zetian. “For the father and emperor Taizong there was tacit encouragement not to react to rumours, and to the suspected lovers a dire warning to not commit adultery (or at least to desist from it) (106).” Whether this legend was meant as a warning for specific actors in the

Tang court is, of course, speculation.

The fact is, however, that the Record does include a large number of legends involving royalty with obvious morals. These legends frequently involve the importance of proper

Buddhist reverence, such as legends in which royalty who seek to take a monastery’s treasure are turned away by supernatural events. It is easy to speculate, like Deeg, that such legends may indeed have been intended as lessons for the emperor specifically. Although Buddhist sources, including the Record and later works concerning Xuanzang, have put forward a picture of

Taizong as a supporter of Buddhism, the emperor’s policies towards the religion were mixed.

Taizong performed Buddhist ceremonies and dedicated Buddhist temples, but he provided more support for Daoism overall and enacted policies limiting the growth of Buddhist institutions, such as punishing illegal ordination for the purposes of tax evasion (Wechsler 217-218). As

Wechsler puts it, “the emperor’s interest in the spiritual goals of Buddhism was limited to those areas in which they coincided with state interests (218).”8 Legends such as those warning against taking from Buddhist monasteries thus may have been intended to warn the emperor off potential actions. At the very least the overall portrayal of Taizong in the Record as supportive of

Buddhism may have been a way of persuading the emperor that such behavior would be beneficial to him, connected as it is in the Record to general admiration of his qualities as a leader.

Deeg further points out the relationship the Record had to foreign affairs. The clearest manifestation of this is the care given to reporting some issues of strategic interest (note that

Deeg refers to the Record as the XJ):

“Reading the text of the XJ it is striking that Xuanzang does not describe all the places on his way from Xi’an to the northern rim of the Taklamakan desert, but starts his report with the region which was of the greatest strategic interest for the Tang empire at the time of his return; he is also more precise and detailed in his description of Central Asian regions than of India proper, precisely because these regions lay in within the circle of influence or interest of the expanding Tang empire (107).”

As mentioned above, the oasis city-states surrounding the Taklamakan in modern Xinjiang were of particular interest in the 640s when the Record was being composed. The greater precision in the sections of the Record devoted to Central Asia has been noticed by others as well – Thomas

Watters spends considerable effort in some segments analyzing Xuanzang’s depiction of India

8 Taizong may have become sympathetic towards Buddhism late in life, as evidenced by his finally composing a preface to one of Xuanzang’s translated sutras in 648 (Wong 47-48). However, such developments only occurred after the initial version of the Record had been written and presented to the emperor, and thus likely had little impact on the overall editorial choices in the Record.

19 attempting to locate the sites described, while there is little confusion regarding Central Asian sites.9

Deeg goes further to speculate that Xuanzang was not simply providing basic intelligence concerning geography and local customs, but in some cases giving advice by positioning other rulers as possible allies. Deeg points to Xuanzang’s reporting on certain north Indian kings, who in the Record are characterized as being admiring of Tang culture and would have been positioned militarily to fight fractious tribes in modern southwestern China or to help contain

Tibetan forces. Deeg may be overstating the case – such passages may as easily be intended to flatter Taizong by telling of how well-respected the Tang are worldwide, rather than to encourage specific action. The flattery of Taizong in the introduction hints that Xuanzang may have simply wished to ensure he remained in the emperor’s good graces. The fact that the

Record can support such a reading, however, speaks further to its connection to the Tang court, a connection which is still highlighted by a reading of these passages as pure praise.

The connection to the Court is further emphasized by contemporary sources which recognize Xuanzang’s feats of diplomacy, rather than piety. As Tansen Sen points out, “when recording the arrival of the first embassy from Kanauj [capital of the Empire of Harsha in northern India] at the Tang court in 641, Chinese scribes give full credit to Xuanzang for opening the diplomatic channels between the two courts (20).”

None of this, however, should obscure the fact that the Record is in large part a Buddhist text. The Emperor was unlikely to care about how many monasteries there were in any given foreign nation, or what schools they followed. Any later Buddhists making a similar journey, however, might find the information invaluable in terms of finding potential places to stay and

9 See, for example, pages 366-368, in which Watters discusses the potential actual location of the Indian country of Kosambi in contrast to where the Record places it.

20 locations of spiritual importance. Xuanzang’s Buddhist beliefs are expressed throughout the

Record through his selection of tales – an indirect warning to the king to keep Buddhist sites intact is, after all, a warning on behalf of the Buddhist community. The Record was produced for the Court, but Xuanzang may have been looking ahead to wider Buddhist audiences.

Introducing the World

The complicated presentation of the Record, both an imperial work offering vital intelligence and a record of the power and reach of Buddhism, can be understood through an examination of Xuanzang’s introduction. This positioning has particular implications for Central

Asia. As a particular strategic interest Central Asia merits particular detail, and the Buddhist

Central Asian nations may be accorded respect or interest based on their moral merit. However, in making a first appeal to readers at the Tang imperial court, in the introduction Xuanzang characterizes Central Asia along familiar, Confucian grounds which emphasize Han Chinese superiority.

Xuanzang introduces the Record not with an account of his purpose or of the first lands he traveled through, but with praise for China, both overt and couched within a general description of the world. Xuanzang immediately establishes the cultural and political superiority of the Tang Empire by referring to the feats of various early emperors and their replication by

Taizong, who is further portrayed as surpassing the emperors of old. The primacy of China,

Xuanzang claims, is recognized far beyond its borders.

From the Tang Empire up to the land of India, all the people either of secluded regions with different customs, or of isolated places and alien countries, accept the Chinese calendar and enjoy the fame and teachings of the Emperor. The praise of his military feats has become a topic of conversation, and the commendation of his civic virtue is the most popular theme (17).

By making praise to the Emperor his first consideration, Xuanzang made his loyalty to the

Emperor abundantly clear. It is also possible that such a performance of loyalty was intended to make the Emperor look favorably on Buddhist institutions and projects, and particularly

Xuanzang himself. After all, Xuanzang would rely on the Emperor’s support for his great project translating the sutras.

Following this praise, Xuanzang is careful to lay out a Buddhist cosmology, emphasizing that every place to be discussed ultimately falls under this world view. The entire human world

“is the sphere of the spiritual influence of one Buddha (17),” presumably Gautama Buddha. The human world, according to Xuanzang, is shaped spiritually and physically by the blessings of

Buddhist figures. The rivers of India, Central Asia, and China are all ultimately provided by a bodhisattva who transformed into a naga10 and made it his purpose to supply the world with water (17). This story places a vital center of the world outside of China, in the vicinity of the

Pamir Mountains. Furthermore, this description equates China with the rest of the Buddhist world, as all benefit in a similar manner. However, in this description China is referred to not through metaphor (as happens later in the introduction) or through less typical names (as Faxian chose to do to in order to center India), but by the typical name of “Central Kingdom” (zhongguo

中國) (3). Xuanzang makes his Buddhist conception of the world clear, but chooses his language carefully so as not to entirely challenge the Sinocentric order of things.

Indeed, the next portion of the introduction glorifies China on the whole. Xuanzang turns to address geography which is more recognizable than the metaphysical continents mentioned

10 Lowell W. Bloss describes the naga as a “snakelike deity, often portrayed sculpturally in human form with dilated cobra hoods springing from the back of the neck.” According to Bloss, “the naga is most accurately described as a folk deity possessing those powers of nature, particularly rain, which so totally determine the character of the agriculturalist’s existence (37).” Bloss further points out that nagas are often tied to, and seen as protectors or possible destroyers of, specific places (38).

22 before. According to Xuanzang, the human world is divided into four parts, one for each of the cardinal directions.

The dominion under the sovereignty of the Lord of Elephants in the south is hot and humid in climate, and it is fit for breeding elephants. In the west the Lord of Treasure rules over the land beside the sea, where there are plenty of precious substances. The place of the Lord of Horses in the north is cold and bracing, and it is good for rearing horses. The country of the Lord of Men in the east is well-populated with amiable inhabitants (18).

These four realms are connected to India in the south, Central Asia in the west, Mongolia in the north, and China in the east. The basic descriptions set China apart from the start. The south, west, and north are each linked to one of the area’s products. The south is “suitable” (yi, 宜) for elephants, and thus that is where they come from. The north is likewise “suitable” for horses.

The west is “full of” (ying, 盈) treasure. The east, however, has an abundance (duo 多) not of a particular kind of livestock or trade good, but “amiable” (hechang 和暢) people. China, then, is the natural source of people (ren 人), or at least of pleasant ones (3). Those outside of China are dehumanized, reduced to economic interest (horses and treasure) or curiosities (elephants).

From this general overview, Xuanzang continues to more specific summaries of each area, providing a statement about the character of the people before mentioning methods of dress and social organization. Here, Xuanzang establishes a more complete view of which lands should be considered superior and which should be dismissed. The north and west clearly fall into the latter category, receiving harsh evaluations. According to Xuanzang, the inhabitants of the north “are of a furious disposition and are cruel man-slayers (19),” while those to the west

“know nothing of propriety and righteousness and overestimate wealth and property (19).” The south fares better, receiving the mixed verdict that “the people…are impetuous by nature, but they are devoted to studies and are especially skillful in miraculous arts (18).” With this

23 description, Xuanzang establishes India’s potential as a religious center, even if its people are flawed in other respects. As for the east, its description is as glowing as the ones of the north and west are damning, as Xuanzang proclaims that “the people are clever and skillful with obvious sentiments of kindness and righteousness (19).” China receives not only a basic description of clothing and dwellings, but the further detail that “their carriages and clothes are classified according to the ranks and orders of the people, and they are attached to their native land and unwilling to leave it (19).” Indeed, who would want to leave a land full of kind and righteous people.

Xuanzang continues on this theme of China possessing a proper order which other nations lack, along with elaborating on the idea of India as another center. “Excluding the Lord of Men, the other three lords hold the east as the superior direction. Their people build houses with doors opening to the east, and early in the morning they pay reverence toward that direction.

In the land of the Lord of Men, the people respect the southern direction (19).” This sets up two centers for the world – the overall center that is China and to which every other nation pays homage, and the religious center of India which even China must respect. Xuanzang explains in more detail:

As regards the etiquette observed between a monarch and his subjects and that between the superior and the inferior, and the cultural institutions and political systems, the land of the Lord of Men excels all other countries; while as to instructions concerning the purification of the mind, and liberation from worldly burdens, as well as teachings to relieve one from birth and death, the theories are best in the country of the Lord of Elephants (19).

China, then, excels in political ethics, but India is the authority on spiritual matters. After centering China, Xuanzang decenters it in a specific way that validates his Buddhist beliefs and his journey to India. The value Xuanzang places on the East and South proves evident even in

24 coverage of the West – throughout the portions of the Record covering Central Asia, Xuanzang emphasizes the influence of the two world “centers” of China and India.

Central Asia and Mongolia do not benefit from any language decentering China. The segments of the introduction leading to this mention all four regions, but when it comes to describing what lands “excel” at various undertakings only China and India are mentioned. The reader is left with the image of murderous Mongolians and greedy Turks. The impression of the

Turkic peoples of Central Asia as being inferior is reinforced at the end of the introduction, when

Xuanzang writes:

Up to the Black Range [in Kapisa in modern Afghanistan], the customs of the Hu people are prevalent. …They are mostly aborigines, living in walled cities, engaging in agriculture and rearing cattle. They value wealth and property, and to despise kindness and righteousness is their custom. They have no ceremony for marriage and no distinction between the superior people and the inferior. The wife’s word is authoritative, and the husband occupies a low position. They cremate the bodies of the dead and have no fixed period of mourning, but they scrape their faces, mutilate their ears, cut off their hair, and rend their garments. They slaughter domestic animals as sacrifices offered to the manes of the dead. On happy occasions they put on white clothes, while at sorrowful events they are dressed in black. This is a brief account of the common or similar customs of the tribes; the different politics and various institutions of diverse countries will be described separately as the occasion arises (20-21).

Hu (胡), as Marc Abramson explains, was a term “often used in the Tang to denote Central

Asians (3).” Xuanzang’s language in this portion is more direct, as he uses an ethnic term rather than speaking in direction-based metaphor. The terminology foreshadows the shift from the introduction, with its strong elements of Buddhist philosophy, to Xuanzang’s accounts of individual countries, which foreground objective detail even when discussing Buddhist matters.

It connects its list of strange or barbaric practices to a specific group of people, rather than an abstraction.

The introduction forms the readers’ expectations before they are introduced to any specific Central Asian nation. Crucially, this summary leaves out any reference to the presence

25 of Buddhism in many of these countries. In the main text, Xuanzang uses aspects of Buddhist culture and overall Buddhist identity in particular to render certain nations more familiar and morally acceptable (Xuanzang’s tactics in this regard will be discussed in chapter three), as well as possibly to demonstrate through geography the universal wisdom of Buddhism. In the introduction there is no mitigation of the strangeness or immorality of Central Asia, or sense of its belonging in the wider world.

Instead, there is a focus on the violation of Confucian norms, such as the failures to observe social hierarchy (by granting status to women) or proper mourning (by having no defined period for it). This is in line with other Sui and Tang writing on Central Asia, in which, as Abramson notes, “one of the most common motifs illustrating the ethnic Other’s savagery was incomprehension of proper Confucian virtues, particularly xiao, filiality, and li, a concept that incorporated…general understanding of how to interact within a hierarchical society (42).” Even if such practices are not mentioned in the coverage of individual countries that follows, the reader may assume they are present based on the fact that such customs are “prevalent.” The introduction encourages distance from Central Asian nations before the reader is offered the opportunity to connect with them, and combines the various states into one immoral group.

In his examination of concepts of ethnicity in the Tang Empire, Abramson notes that

The preponderance of available sources (and all surviving materials from the Tang Empire itself) were written in Sinitic and composed by ethnically Han authors. Therefore, most of our examples construct ethnic difference using literary Sinitic terms – themselves strongly loaded with associations that linked common terms for China, Chinese culture and Han ethnicity with abstract conceptions of civilization and culture – and posit the ethnically non-Han as the explicit Other in opposition to an implicitly understood and largely undefined Han self. …Virtually all Han tended to essentialize the ethnic Other as monolithic, manifested in the universal use of overarching designations such as hu and fan and similarly vague yet hegemonic assumptions regarding behavior and nature (ix).

The Central Asian nations are differentiated within the body of the text, not only by name but by their rulers, their local products, the prevalence of Buddhism and what type of Buddhism is observed. The universalism present in these chapters is the universalism of Buddhism, with an accompanying implication of inclusion (though that itself is not without its drawbacks, as will be discussed). The introduction, however, hews closely to established understandings of ethnicity and culture. It asserts the superiority of the Han Chinese culture, which is described through the implication of what it certainly is not. If the body of the text promotes, to some extent, understanding through specifics, the introduction lends legitimacy to the Tang Empire’s hegemonic interests through reduction.

Xuanzang’s concluding remarks are nowhere near as extensive as his introduction, but merit attention for the distillation of Xuanzang’s dual motivations. In the final note, Xuanzang insists that purpose of the Record is simply to describe the conditions and customs of the

Western Regions, as accurately as changing circumstances and limited time would allow. Yet he also, at last, acknowledges an ideological motivation, to “keep a record of the spread of the edification of Buddhism.” This Buddhist mission, however, cannot be allowed to stand on its own, as Xuanzang immediately follows it with an assertion that even in the west “people are living under the beneficence of the Emperor, whose ultimate virtue is admired by all within reach of his moral influence (388).” Portions of Central Asia were certainly by this point living under the influence of Taizong. Whether they admired the virtue of their conqueror is doubtful.

In both the introduction and conclusion, Xuanzang asserts a Tang Imperial worldview, implicitly and explicitly connected to the Han Chinese worldview, alongside a Buddhist one. In light of the fact that he was so moved to acquire Buddhist knowledge that he left China against

Imperial decree, and in light of his refusal of any official post, it must be assumed that on a

27 personal level Xuanzang’s Buddhist beliefs dominated. But the Record is not a personal work. It shows a distinctly Han Chinese and Buddhist worldview shaped by the circumstances of its writing as well as its author.

A Tang Record, a Buddhist Record

Abramson asserts that “by using descriptions of foreign customs and physiognomies

Buddhist authors sought to decenter China and the Central Kingdom and posit a hierarchical equivalence between China and Buddhist lands (78).” As an example, Abramson turns to

Xuanzang and his Record, pointing out that Xuanzang’s account stands in contrast to other written traditions, such as accounts of anomalies and even official histories, which describe

Central and Southern Asians as having animal features. This assessment, however, simplifies the actual hierarchy Xuanzang presents and overlooks Xuanzang’s initial emphasis on the moral failings of the “Hu.” In the introduction, Xuanzang does not create an equivalence between

China and all Buddhist lands, but specifically sets up the countries of India as excelling in an area where China is lacking, while remaining inferior to China in other ways. Although it is true that Central Asians are typically granted the dignity of being portrayed as fully human,

Xuanzang still presents them as ethnic Others. Yet Abramson is correct that in Xuanzang’s account China is taken from being the center to being a center. The introduction focuses on

Imperial Chinese superiority more than anything else, but the Record itself focuses primarily on

India.

Crucial to the balancing act of the introduction, Xuanzang justifies his focus on India on practical grounds as well as moral ones. Having established India as the premier source of spiritual wisdom, Xuanzang also states “As to the customs of the land of the Lord of Horses and

28 the country of the Lord of Treasure, they are fully described in historical records, and we can give a brief account of them. But as to the country of the Lord of Elephants, it has never been described accurately in our ancient literature (20).” Xuanzang does make reference as well to the necessity of understanding vassal nations, in order to predict when they will come to offer tribute.

These nations are assumed to be Central Asian. Yet intelligence about them is not as vital, being tied as it is to specific circumstance and acknowledgment of them having come after the statement that Central Asia need only be briefly addressed. Whether influenced by the perceived spiritual superiority of India or by a genuine belief in the importance of adding more accurate information about India to the official record, Xuanzang frames Central Asia as being less crucial, even if the text of the Record devotes particular detail to Central Asia.

The greatest tension lies not in praising both China and India, but in Xuanzang’s approach to Central Asia. Central Asian states do not, in Xuanzang’s worldview, have the status of China or Indian nations. Yet these states are still, in many cases, active participants in

Xuanzang’s worldview due to their Buddhism. On the more local level, in the main text,

Xuanzang is willing to find admirable people in the uncivilized wasteland. Sui and Tang writers often attributed culture and character not only to broader ethnic identities or geographic regions, but to fairly limited localities, down to the provincial level (Skaff 54), and may have considered other nations to have such distinctions. This outlook, combined with the simple fact that there is much more coverage devoted to individual countries, may have mitigated some of the introduction’s Sinocentrism, allowing Central Asian states to be considered on their own merits.

But Central Asian states were still ultimately confined by Xuanzang’s framing, which rendered them political and spiritual lessers, in keeping with the thinking which likely dominated at Court.

As a court document and Buddhist text, the Record recognizes that Central Asia merits attention, but that attention is mixed and ultimately marginalizing.

Chapter 3: Creating a Moral Geography through Legends

Jane H. Hill uses the phrase “moral geography” when explaining how the geographic placement of a narrative event can have implications for what that event means. In her example, order generally prevails in the center, while disorder and harm come about in the periphery. In

Hill’s study, “moral geography is constructed through three devices: by the specification of physical locations of episodes, by the themes of the conversations which are at the core of each episode, and by the journey [of the teller] (112).” In the Record, Xuanzang’s personal journey is largely left implied, leaving the combination of reported legends and their location to convey much of his moral intent. The legends included in the coverage of Central Asia include those nations in a universal worldview, but a worldview defined by forces outside Central Asia and weaker within it. Central Asia is granted the potential to be included, but not on the terms of its own culture.

In creating a moral geography through his travel account, Xuanzang was again following in the pattern established by writers such as Faxian. In Visionary Journeys: Travel Writings from

Early Medieval and Nineteenth-Century China, Xiaofei Tian characterizes Faxian’s account as

“go[ing] through hell to reach the Buddhist heaven that was central India (6).” In Faxian’s

Record of Buddhistic Kingdoms the moral center of the world and the narrative is India, which he even refers to as the “Middle Kingdom (zhongguo 中國),” a phrase traditionally reserved for

China itself (Tian 5). China, in Faxian’s view, is on the periphery, and Central Asia, though in possession of some Buddhist bright spots, is a peripheral land fraught with hazards.

Xuanzang’s moral geography is, however, more complicated than Faxian’s. There is first the fact that he positions the world as having two centers of different kinds, as detailed in his introduction. Crucially for this study, there is also the fact Xuanzang’s Record does more to

31 include Central Asia. This is accomplished by including a greater number of Central Asian countries and reporting their local legends. Although the overall framing of the text presents

Central Asia as barbaric (the introduction) or separated from China by the dangerous

Taklamakan (the end), the Record lacks the consistent emphasis on deadly peril found in

Faxian’s account. Moreover, due to the fact that many of the legends concern Buddhist subjects, they are similar to the legends from Indian countries Xuanzang shares (though distanced from the Gautama Buddha himself), and may have felt familiar to readers who had consumed collections of Buddhist legends set within the Chinese empire.

Legends admittedly appear less frequently in the sections on Central Asia - a significant factor in why Indian countries typically receive greater and deeper coverage in the Record. When the legends do appear, those of any length tend to be connected not only to monasteries or stupas, but to countries that can be called Buddhist overall. In countries where Buddhism is less prevalent, Xuanzang either records only tales relating to holy sites or neglects legend altogether

– these places are footnotes in Xuanzang’s moral geography.

Xuanzang is also willing to relate secular historical narratives when they relate to

Buddhist countries in both India and Central Asia, as in his unusually extensive discussion of

Khotan, a state in the modern Xinjiang region. Among stories establishing that the country is home to devout Buddhists led by a long line of Buddhist kings, Xuanzang relates tales of how the royal family came to Khotan and established the country (375-376). The fact that a state is

Buddhist, and thus morally sound, can make it worthy of record on the whole.11 In much the same way that Imperial Chinese historians might use anecdotes to illustrate the character of a biographical subject (Tian 2014 39), Xuanzang uses legend to characterize countries.

11 Kotan was also likely a strategic interest. However, its status as a strongly Buddhist nation, which also caused Faxian and Xuanzang’s posthumous biographer Huili to give it particular attention, should not be overlooked given Xuanzang’s strongly Buddhist worldview.

Legend, Worldview, and Credibility

Before continuing, I wish to clarify the criteria I am using to identify “legend.” Most folklorists use a definition of “legend” similar to the one laid out by the Grimms. I refer specifically to the general definition, based on the Grimms’, laid out by Heda Jason in

“Concerning the ‘Historical’ and ‘Local’ Legends and their relatives.” As Jason explains:

The definition includes three main factors: 1. the legend fits within the narrator’s concept of historical time…2. the legend fits the narrator’s concept of geographical space, that is, it is connected with a definite place; 3. the legend is a true story; although it deals with supernatural events it is ‘believed’ by its bearers, and it is regarded as pertaining to the real world (174).

The legends I discuss here all conform to these criteria. Xuanzang relates them specifically because their location is under discussion, and so they are clearly “connected with a definite place.” Although the legends are not tied to any specific dates, they are understood to have occurred within a specific time period, such as during the reign of a particular king, since the establishment of the nation in question, or since the founding of Buddhism. I hold that the legends can be regarded as “true” in that they often contain morals which Xuanzang presumably believed in and hoped his readers shared. Thus while readers may or may not have believed in the miraculous restoration of body parts, dragons, or other remarkable issues, the stories containing them were still relevant to ordinary life and contained philosophical truth.

Xuanzang further establishes the believability of the legends he relates through the fact that the legends provide additional, specific information and by appealing to a form of authority

– oral authority, rather than written. Like later Tang authors who turned to gossip and anecdote,

Xuanzang attempts to “fill in details not recorded elsewhere (Allen, Shifting Stories, 76)” in a way that reflects his own worldview and that of his presumed audience. As with those later texts,

33 the history Xuanzang conveys rests on oral, rather than written, sources. On six occasions in the portions on Central Asia Xuanzang introduces a legend with the phrase “I heard old people say that in former days…” (wen zhi lao jiuri, 聞之老舊日), or a variation on it. Three other tales are prefaced with “according to local custom…” (wen zhu tusu 聞諸土俗). In “Oral Sources and

Written Accounts: Authority in Tang Tales,” Sarah M. Allen concludes that “citations of oral sources are used to bolster the immediacy, and hence accuracy, of the writer’s sources (82).”

Allen is referring to tales recorded about various public figures, but the fact remains that orality had a place in recorded history. The use of “I heard” may have been a way of establishing

Xuanzang’s authority through direct contact with a local source.

Buddhist Legends

Many of the stories told in the Central Asian portions of the Record reflect popular themes in Buddhist legends12, and particularly in Buddhist legends favored in Imperial China.

Although Xuanzang is discussing the world outside the heart of the Tang Empire, the familiarity of the overall format (being similar to zhiguai collections as well as portions of the Buddhist

Kingdoms) and certain themes may have rendered the outside world more recognizable (as well as distinctly Buddhist) to Han Chinese readers. Granting even Central Asia this form of familiarity suggests a comprehensible world in which many nations are united by certain beliefs.

Those beliefs, however, come from particular sources, of which Central Asia is not one.

Legends in the Record are not confined to Buddhist themes, but Buddhist themes are overwhelmingly dominant (the section on Khotan has an unusually high number of non-Buddhist

12 As well as in other genres, such as memorate.

34 legends, but they are still only four out of the fifteen total). A few notable examples of legends will be examined here.

One of the first legends Xuanzang conveys, and a particularly striking one, tells the story of a king’s younger brother. When the king leaves on a tour of holy sites, he puts his brother in charge. Before the king leaves, the brother cuts off his own genitals and puts them in a casket, which he presents to the king with instructions that he may find out what is in it when he returns.

When the king returns, a courtier falsely accuses the brother of having committed adultery during the king’s absence. The brother, having prepared for this very occasion, then instructs the king to open the casket, proving his innocence. Later, the brother encounters a herd of bulls being led to castration. He reflects on the sad fate of the bulls, and considers that it must be due to his own past evil deeds that he was put into a position that led to castration. He buys the bulls to save them from the pain he had experienced. His consideration for other living creatures is rewarded in the form of his genitals growing back (24-25).

The magical restoration of a body part given up for a noble cause, such as to perform an act of healing or prove the purity of one’s faith, can be seen in other Buddhist. In China, what would come to be a particularly popular story about the human life of the bodhisattva Guanyin involves Guanyin, called Miaoshan in life, giving up her eyes and arms to heal her father. Later, she regains these parts through divine grace. While the earliest known texts of the Miaoshan legend, according to Glen Dudbridge, postdate the Record by roughly 500 years, both the

Miaoshan legend and the legend Xuanzang conveys here can be seen as a confluence of Buddhist and Confucian morality (a fact which contributed to the later popularity of the Miaoshan legend).

Family members give up part of themselves for the benefit of the family member of higher rank,

35 and for their virtue are eventually compensated. A tale such as the one of this king’s brother may have held particular appeal for a Han Chinese audience.

Some legends in the Record follow the pattern of what Eugene Watson Burlingame, in his introduction to the tales in the Dhammadpada Commentary, calls the “Fruit of Past Deeds and Rebirth” motif. One longer legend concerning a lake and neighboring monastery in Kapisi, provides insight into multiple ways this motif can be used. Xuanzang “heard some old people saying (43)” that there had been a living saint in the area who was regularly invited by the naga king to eat with it. On one occasion the saint’s attendant novice snuck himself in along with his master. The naga fed the novice inferior food to what the saint was given, and though the naga repented after hearing a sermon by the saint, the novice would not forgive the king. The novice prayed that the good deeds he had performed so far in life would allow him to replace the naga king. And indeed, his past deeds bore fruit – that night he died and was reborn as a naga, and usurped the naga king of the lake. The novice-turned-naga threatened the lake and its surroundings, and the king was informed. Eventually, the king was forced to come at the naga with military might, and himself prayed that his good deeds would manifest in power sufficient to overcome the naga. Again, past actions bore fruit, and a magical fire came to surround the king. The naga came and surrendered. The two agreed to a truce, so that neither would suffer karmic retribution for hateful actions (43-45). Good Buddhist deeds here bear tangible rewards in a variety of ways, allowing rebirth along ideal lines and granting magical power. The peace established in the end is for the sake of preventing a negative cycle of violent deeds and karmic punishment (which would inevitably include being reborn in a lower form). Good or bad

Buddhist behavior has both immediate and long-term effects.

Perhaps the most consistent theme in the Record is the importance of treating holy sites, relics, and people with proper reverence, and the dangers of failing to do so. Two separate tales in the coverage of Central Asia tell of foolish royalty who attack a monastery for its treasures and are turned away, one by a dream (34-35) and one by an earthquake (41). The message is clear: not even those of the highest social station may rob the holy. In another story, the mistreatment of a living saint invites disaster. When a saint visits a town to worship an image of the Buddha which had magically appeared there, the townspeople throw dirt at him and refuse to feed him. One man does at last feed the saint, and he is warned that the town will soon be swallowed up in a sandstorm as punishment for its irreverence. The man attempts to warn others, but is laughed off. In the end, he alone escapes, the image of the Buddha following him to his new location (386-387). These legends illustrate both the dire effects should proper reverence not be observed and how faith is believed to shape place. Once a monastery or bejeweled Buddha has been established, it must not be disturbed, but remain part of the landscape, elevating it to something more holy. If the people of a location disrespect Buddhism and its proponents, the landscape can be altered to become more friendly by removing the disrespectful.13

The Record and the legends, like those mentioned directly above, are deeply tied to locality. The narrative of the Record itself is one of progression through the landscape. By working in the ji genre, Xuanzang is often able to remove himself from this progression altogether, foregrounding the land instead. Legends are always tied to place, whether that is a country as a whole or a particular stupa. As the narrative moves from one place to another, it

13 Legends along these lines are also found in the sections on Indian countries. For example, Xuanzang tells of a stone bearing Gautama Buddha’s footprints which various devout kings tried to take with them, and one nonbeliever king attempted to destroy. The stone resisted any attempts to move it and any damage done to it was miraculously reversed (226-227).

37 moves from one Buddhist legend to another. Xuanzang thus uses the framework of his chosen genre to create a geography where Buddhism is a constant.

Other Legends

Xuanzang’s choice of legends does also, on occasion, portray nonreligious aspects of his worldview. The nonreligious legends tend to relate to China or supernatural occurrences.

Xuanzang matter-of-factly reports on the history of people in a region having been descended from dragons, or spirits leading travelers astray in mountain passes. Like miracles, these are part of the landscape. These details, unlike the inclusion of Buddhist legends, are more in keeping with pre-existing Han Chinese writing on Central Asia. Xuanzang explains that the horses of

Kucha are particularly fine because they are descended from dragons (22-23), a concept which

Edward H. Schafer dates back to Chinese records of the second century B.C.E. Yet as Schafer points out, such legends may have been related to Persian traditions regarding winged horses

(60). Presence in the Han Chinese tradition does not necessarily divorce a legend from the traditions of its subject.

Han Chinese worldview may, however, be more definitively presented through choices of theme. One of the many fifteen legends from Khotan which Xuanzang shares can be seen as reflecting Confucian values of service. A river in the country dried up, which the people attributed to the river’s dragon being unhappy. When the king performed a sacrifice for the dragon, a woman appeared and said that the river had dried up because her husband had died. If she, the dragon, could have one of the king’s ministers for a husband, the river would flow again.

The king was reluctant to give up a minister. However, the minister the dragon had favored eagerly gave himself to the cause, saying that he had doubted his capabilities to serve the state as

38 well as he had wished as a minister, and this was an opportunity to truly benefit the king and country. The minister descended into the river, and the river has flowed constantly ever since

(384-385).

Sacrifice for the benefit of one’s Confucian superior, whether a parent or a king, is a popular Confucian theme. The possibility that such a legend is meant to encourage Confucian beliefs is given additional credence by the fact that along with commenting on how well the leaders of a state follow Buddhist precepts, Xuanzang at times makes note of whether they preserve a Confucian hierarchy or governmental order. Failing to do so, of course, is frowned upon, as in the case of Suli, where “they take account of money matters even between father and son” and “there is no distinction between the well-born and the low-born,” all part of their

“perfidious and deceptive” natures (27).

However, Confucian or secular legends, as opposed to general judgements, do not exist in isolation in the Record. Such legends are related in the midst of Buddhist legends, and in the context of locations which have somehow been marked as Buddhist, for example by describing the site of a superstitious story in relation to Buddhist temples (23). The framing of these stories suggests that they should not be considered independently, but in relation to the Buddhist aspects of the narrative. The minister marries the dragon in order to aid the good Buddhist king. Other aspects of Xuanzang’s worldview are subservient to and incorporated into his Buddhist outlook.

A Buddhist Geography

In his framing of the Record, Xuanzang makes little reference to the religious purpose of his journey. Instead, he focuses on praise for the current Tang emperor and promoting the cultural superiority of China. The speech most consistently recorded in the body of the work,

39 however, does not praise the emperor, but expresses Buddhist beliefs.14 The consistent inclusion of Buddhist legends reminds the reader that, whether Xuanzang truly admires the emperor or not, the monk’s true purpose in his journey was religious.

As in the narrative observed by Hill, Xuanzang conflates location and morality –

Buddhist institutions and sites such as monasteries contain and radiate virtue. The narrative arc of the Record contains a clear center: India, the home of Buddhism. What Xuanzang makes complicated by including Buddhist legends in his coverage of multiple Central Asian countries is the question of what is peripheral. These are not central countries, but they can be the site of many of the same kinds of legends that are found in the center. Central Asian peoples are, in a sense, included in the wider conversation about Buddhism through the inclusion of their legends.

The Record is an archive of legend as much as it is a geographical treatise. In pointing out that an archive is never unmediated, Diana Taylor writes that “what makes an object archival is the process whereby it is selected, classified, and presented for analysis (19).” Xuanzang’s primary criterion for selection appears to be the relation of items to belief. By including local

Buddhist legends in his chapters on Central Asia, Xuanzang uses the narrative of the Record to construct a Buddhist world in which Central Asian states are active participants, just as Indian states are and as readers may have considered the Tang Empire to be.

Yet Taylor also points out that the act of archiving “succeeds in separating the source of

‘knowledge’ from the knower – in time and/or space (19).” The extent to which Xuanzang’s reports reflected actual local traditions, or indeed who any of his sources are (beyond the fact that they were typically old), is unknown. Xuanzang’s very inclusion of Central Asia may have had little or nothing to do with Central Asian practices, and everything to do with domestic

14 There are exceptions, most notably at one of the few points in which Xuanzang discusses a personal experience: a conversation with an Indian king who related the wonderful things he had heard about Taizong (145-146). This is, however, a notable break from the overall approach taken in the work, and not a pattern in the main text.

40 agendas – either convincing skeptical members of the Court of the worldwide prominence of

Buddhism or making the existing and potential Central Asian members of the Empire less foreign to his Han Chinese readers.

In this, the treatment of Central Asia is, in fact, similar to some the treatment of India.

Nations in both areas are shown as devout followers of Buddhism – if they were not both shown to be, Buddhism could not be a universal moral force. Potential Indian allies are shown to be directly admiring of the Tang empire and Han Chinese political philosophy, and Central Asian subjects of the Empire such as Khotan are shown by implication to hold values similar to those of the presumed Han Chinese reader. Yet the treatment of Central Asia is distinct in its relative lack of religious concerns. Coverage of India includes tales of righteous monks or bodhisattvas striking down the arguments of heretics15, as well as a host of legends concerning the life and deeds of Gautama Buddha himself. There is no such direct connection to the source of the religion, or such concern with religious tenets, in the coverage of Central Asia; instead there is a greater degree of focus on precise geography. Xuanzang’s Buddhist conception of space and morality contained within the text of Central Asian legends is, due to the framing of Central Asia and the contrast with India, potentially lost to the political context.

15 See, for example, pages 241-242, in which a bodhisattva’s disciple defeats a heretic in debate and is rewarded by the king with a fief, where he founds a monastery.

Chapter 4: The Re-Centralization of China in Later Accounts

Almost certainly, Xuanzang would have wished for his primary legacy to be the sutra translations he devoted his life to following his return from India. It was to gain and share the deeper knowledge of Buddhism represented by the sutras that Xuanzang travelled to India in the first place, and according to later biographies Xuanzang turned down the official post offered to him by the emperor in order to focus purely on translation (Huili 188-192). It is, however, as a traveler that the image of Xuanzang has most persisted. The Record is a crucial aspect of this, but it would after Xuanzang’s death become conflated with Huili’s biography of Xuanzang, providing a different image of the journey. And both these texts would be far eclipsed in popular imagination by the tales of adventure most definitively codified in the novel Journey to the West

(Xi You Ji 西遊記).

Xuanzang’s approach to Central Asia, as has been discussed, was complicated, both including and excluding based on Buddhist and Confucian values. The later authors who would come to shape Xuanzang’s legacy, however, would prove to have more straightforward views of

Central Asia. Xuanzang’s negative framing of Central Asia and ultimate placement of it at the margins, not the attention paid to the merits of individual nations or its inclusion in the patterns of the Buddhist world, would be the elements picked up by later authors.

Life of the Tripitaka Master of the Great Ci’en Monastery of the Great Tang Dynasty

Some time after Xuanzang’s death in 664 C.E., his disciple Huili wrote the hagiographic

Life of the Tripitaka Dharma Master of the Cien Monastery of the Great Tang (Da Tang Cien si sanzang fashi zhuan, 大唐慈恩寺三藏法師傳, henceforth the Life). The Life consists of two

42 main parts: the first deals with Xuanzang’s early life and his journey to India, while the second treats Xuanzang’s interactions and translation efforts after his return to China. As the Life demonstrates, even shortly after Xuanzang’s death his experience was used to move Central Asia further to the margins once more.

The Record implies the liminality of Central Asia by framing it in terms of its nations’ compliance with standards from other lands (Buddhist or Confucian). Huili’s Life makes explicit that Central Asia is lesser, not simply through a broad characterization (as in Xuanzang’s introduction), but through anecdotes regarding Xuanzang’s encounters. In Kucha, according to

Huili, Xuanzang was introduced to a prominent local monk who had once studied in India. This monk claimed that Xuanzang could study the most important sutras there in Kucha, without bothering to go to India or find more texts. When challenged by Xuanzang on the sutras in question, however, the monk’s knowledge was found lacking (39-40)16. In Ghur, Xuanzang met another local monk who had trained in India – he too proved to have knowledge of the sutras inferior to Xuanzang’s (46-47). These episodes contrast with Xuanzang’s encounters with Indian monks, the first of whom Xuanzang met in Balkh, where both were travelling. This monk’s knowledge proved to live up to his reputation, and Xuanzang studied with him for a month before they both continued south (48-49).

Xuanzang’s superiority to even the monks of Central Asia is demonstrated again in an anecdote from Kapisi. As Xuanzang did in the Record, Huili relates a legend of treasure buried under a statue of the Buddha, which was defended from a greedy king by a miraculous earthquake (Xuanzang and Bianji 41, Huili 51). Huili, however, does not end the story there, as

Xuanzang does. Instead, he continues on to explain that the monks had attempted to dig up the

16 All references in this chapter use Li Rongxi’s translation of the Life, published as A Biography of the Tripitaka Master of the Great Ci’en Monastery of the Great Tang Dynasty.

43 treasure themselves in order to pay for monastery repairs. Yet even they were met with an earthquake. When Xuanzang was told of this, he went and prayed, afterwards telling the monks to dig again. This time, with the guidance of Xuanzang, the dig was successful and the monks were able to fund the repairs (51-52). In the Record, Xuanzang writes that there was an inscription explaining that the treasure was to be used for renovations when the monastery required them (41). Huili omits this detail, and instead has Xuanzang in prayer personally assure the powers watching over the treasure that he oversee the distribution of the treasure to make certain that only what is needed for the repairs is taken. In the Record, there is only danger to those who would use the treasure improperly, and the monks would presumably be safe. The legend is one of those which serve as a warning that no earthly power, however royal, may interfere with the Buddhist landscape. Huili’s elaboration turns the tale ultimately into a reification of Xuanzang, but just as importantly casts all Central Asians, regardless of their relationship to Buddhism, on the same moral level as a greedy king.

In the Life, Xuanzang is also able convert nonbelievers with great ease. Huili reports that in Samarkand Xuanzang converted the king overnight, and as a result the country as a whole turned to Buddhism (45). On another occasion, a khan of the Turkic Khaganate invited

Xuanzang to explain Buddhism at a banquet. The khan was amazed at Xuanzang’s teachings and accepted Buddhism immediately (42-43). Although India remains a moral center in the Life,

Huili credits some of the spread of Buddhism in Central Asia not to diffusion from India but to the efforts of a pious Han Chinese monk.

Xuanzang’s miraculous virtue is a theme throughout the Life, not limited to his actions in

Central Asia. Huili does, in fact, relate a number of occasions during Xuanzang’s time in India in

44 which he converts or reforms the unbelieving or degenerate17. However, in India Xuanzang is tested against outlaws – people at the social and moral margins. Indian monks are valuable teachers, and Indian kings are already true believers. In Huili’s view, Central Asian leaders are on the same moral level as outlaws in more “central” nations.

The Life simplifies the moral geography found in the Record. Xuanzang presented two centers of the world, equal in authority in separate moral realms. Huili acknowledges the importance of India as a spiritual center, but places greater emphasis on Imperial China by praising the transcendent Buddhism of a Han Chinese figure who even converts nonbelievers in

India, as well as by devoting half the Life to events in the Tang Empire. Dorothy Wong notes that the Life specifically takes care to paint Xuanzang as a good Confucian-trained scholar as well as a model Buddhist, establishing Xuanzang as a model Han Chinese figure at a time when some still voiced concerns over the foreign origins of Buddhism (52). Xuanzang’s presentation of

Central Asia confirmed its status as subservient to China and the India, but also treated individual nations and areas no differently than any other part of the Buddhist world. Although

Huili does repeat a number of the legends so important to the Record’s moral geography regarding Buddhist locations in Central Asia, he reduces their number. More importantly, as seen above, these legends are not as notable as the praise for Xuanzang’s actions, and, as in the case of the treasure in the monastery, could even be converted from a legend warning against earthly greed to an anecdote glorifying Xuanzang. Central Asia is included not as part of the Buddhist world or an area of critical political interest, but as a stage on which Xuanzang’s superiority (and

Central Asia’s inferiority) can be proven over and over.

17 In one case, Huili states that a group of Hindu pirates had chosen Xuanzang to be a sacrifice, but as he focused intently on the Maitreya Bodhisattva a windstorm arose and protected him. Xuanzang then converted the pirates (76- 78). Although beyond the scope of this study, it may be worthwhile to examine motifs such as the ones in this tale with those which appear in Journey to the West.

Since its publication, the Life has proved more accessible and popular than the Record, and has often been paired with the Record in later understandings of Xuanzang and his journey.

The Life offers the general reader something lacking in the Record: a sense of a personal arc and exciting episodes about Xuanzang himself during his travels. It is not in the Record that

Xuanzang is detained by the King of Turfan, who wants the monk to become a spiritual leader for that country. This is only in the Life (26-29).18 This incident, in which a king is so taken with

Xuanzang’s command of Buddhism and moral behavior that he only allows Xuanzang to continue westward after the monk threatens a hunger strike and promises to visit again on his return journey, is illustrative of the Life’s approach on the whole. In the Record, Xuanzang removes himself almost entirely from any events which are related. In the Life, the events are centered on Xuanzang. In addition to providing more narrative incident, the Life, free of any need to provide information to a Court audience, foregrounds Buddhism and explicitly makes

Xuanzang a Buddhist hero,. Thus while elements of the Life are geared towards making

Xuanzang properly Han Chinese (including the opening, which traces Xuanzang’s lineage to a prominent official of, in fact, the Han dynasty), the incidents overall could appeal to any

Mahayana Buddhists (or to anyone with an interest in adventures in foreign lands).

Its circulation and influence show that the Life had a greater appeal than the Record, a fact likely related to the greater emphasis on Buddhist practice in the Life, which made the biography relevant and accessible across Buddhist communities. A Uighur translation of the Life, dated to the tenth century (Barat iii) has been discovered; no Uighur translation of the Record seems to exist. In Japan, where Xuanzang’s significance to the Yogācāra school of Buddhism was an especially important part of his reputation, it was “much more the ‘Life’ than the XJ that attracted, and lent substance to, the developing ‘cult of the saint Xuanzang’ (Deeg 98).”

18 The Record, in fact, skips Turfan entirely, starting with the journey out from one of the cities in that country.

Xuanzang’s significance as a figure, and thus the significance of documents relating to him, depended in following centuries more on the Life than the Record.

Journey to the West

Neither the Record or the Life are, however, most likely to be the first association to arise when the name “Xuanzang” is mentioned. That honor belongs to the fictional Journey to the

West. Published in the late 16th century and typically attributed to Wu Cheng’en, the novel

Journey to the West is itself simply what has become the most popular and enduring collection of the cycles of folktales concerning Xuanzang’s journey which emerged in the centuries after his death.19 As Glen Dudbridge describes it, “The stories and legends which came to form the long popular tradition…bore hardly more than a nominal relationship to this man as an historical figure (12).” Anthony C. Yu, in the introduction to his translation of Journey to the West, is a bit more kind to the transformation. “The theme of the pilgrimage for scriptures is never muted, but added to this basic constituent of the story are numerous features which have more in common with folktales and popular legends than with history. The account of a courageous monk’s undertaking, motivated by a profound religious zeal and commitment, is thus eventually transformed into a tale of supernatural deeds and fantastic adventures, of mythic beings and animal spirits, of fearsome battles with monsters and miraculous deliverances…(Yu 5-6)”

Xuanzang the traveler who left China in defiance of Imperial edict and faced the perils of his journey head-on becomes, in Journey to the West, a good but naïve man who must be constantly

19 Literary versions of this story complex, complete with the addition of the Sun Wukong character, can with reasonable certainty be dated as far back as the Song dynasty (960-1279 C.E.) (Dudbridge 26-27). For a through discussion of Journey to the West’s many literary precedents and speculation on contributing factors in oral tradition, see Dudbridge 1970. For the purposes at hand, the focus will be on the 16th century novel, which holds a place as a pillar of Chinese fiction and can be said to most comprehensively influence popular culture following its publication.

47 protected by supernatural helpers. Xuanzang is, in fact, no longer the main actor in his own journey; he is upstaged by his main helper, the trickster Monkey King Sun Wukong.

What Yu suggests, however, is that for all the incorporation of fantastic elements, the

Journey presents some level of continuity of worldview with previous accounts of Xuanzang’s travels. The Journey contains more Taoist elements than Xuanzang or Huili would likely approve of, but is still a tale in which the ultimate moral focus is on Buddhism. The pilgrims find in the uncivilized world a series of opportunities to test, prove, and ultimately refine their faith, until they return to China as transcendent figures, with Xuanzang and Sun Wukong even obtaining Buddhahood. Although the pilgrims in the Journey face demons and impossible geographic hazards, while the Xuanzang of the Life faced bandits and nonbelievers, in presenting a narrative in which the journey to obtain scriptures provides the traveler(s) with a series of remarkable circumstances proving their innate virtue before returning to China with even deeper understanding the two works have a similar trajectory.

But perhaps a clearer continuity with earlier work is in the Journey’s characterization of

Central Asia. In the Journey, the area between China and India is a land of constant supernatural danger (albeit much of it sent by the Buddha to test the pilgrims). The chapters set in what is, more or less, a thoroughly fantastical Central Asia for the central part of the novel and provide its most notable conflicts, as well as some of the most famous individual episodes. Although these episodes of peril are, on the surface, in contradiction to the Record’s relatively evenhanded treatment of the individual nations of Central Asia, it can also be considered a logical extension of Xuanzang’s moral geography which placed Central Asia in the periphery, and particularly of

Xuanzang’s framing at the beginning and end of the Record of Central Asia as strange, immoral, and possibly hazardous. It is certainly a continuation of Huili’s concept of Central Asia as the

48 realm in which the superior virtue of the Han Chinese hero may be definitively proved.

Moreover, the Journey further perpetuates a notable detail from the Record which did conform to other Han Chinese writing which characterizes Central Asia as a land of unnatural phenomenon.

Dudbridge mentions five motifs mentioned in historical texts (the Record or biographies) relating to Xuanzang which found root in the tradition which led to the Journey (13-22). One is of crucial relevance to this study- the notion of a land of women. Dudbridge points out that this was an established legend about lands to the west by the time of the Record, having appeared in the Shan Hai Jing and in the Liang Shu (composed roughly contemporaneously to the Record)

(13). Xuanzang reports on two countries of women, one “Eastern” and “Western,” although the

“Eastern” example is only eastern in comparison to the other, resting as it does in the Pamirs south of Khotan (Xuanzang and Bianji 134). Both are among the few countries Xuanzang describes without seeing, relying entirely on hearsay and legend.

“West Women’s Country” is described as an island somewhere to the west of Persia, presumably in the Gulf (326). “Eastern Women’s Country,” also reported on in the Sui Shu

(another roughly contemporary work) (Dudbridge 13, note 4), is simply ruled by women, allowing men the limited roles of farming and serving in the military (Xuanzang and Bianji 134),

“West Women’s Country” only tolerates men from another country for a short time each year to ensure children, “as it is their custom not to bring up any male baby born to them (350).” Earlier in the Record, Xuanzang attributes the founding of “West Women’s Country” to an Indian princess set afloat who gave birth to a number of daughters after being “bewitched by a spirit

(326).” Both women’s countries are outside the ethical centers of China and India, and may have been mentioned in spite of Xuanzang’s not having visited them precisely because of their strangeness. The idea of a country run by or inhabited by women is a natural extension of the un-

Confucian state Xuanzang describes in Central Asia, in which “the wife’s word is authoritative

(20).”

In the 53rd chapter of the Journey, the party enters the country of women. “‘This is the

Nation of Women of Western Liang20. There are only women in our country, and not even a single male can be found here (39),’” they are told. The Journey presents an amalgamation of traditions regarding a “Nation of Women.” In accordance with the West Women’s Country of the Record and the country described in the Shan Hai Jing, the Nation of Women has no men. In a detail found in one of the many commentaries on the Shan Hai Jing, women conceive in the absence of men by drinking water from a particular source (Dudbridge 13 note 2). However, the

Nation of Women also has an apparent tradition of ceremonial king to accompany the ruling queen, similar to the setup the historical Xuanzang attributes to Eastern Women’s Country.

The Western Land of Women is one of the more outrageous accounts regarding national makeup in the Record, and especially striking since, unlike tales of people interbreeding with dragons in the distant past, it is understood to be the current state of a place. It is among the ideas most in keeping with other records of the Han Chinese imagination regarding “the West.” It is, therefore, significant that this is the country of note which the novelist (and, presumably, oral tradition) chooses to draw on. The Record, for the most part, contributed to some level of understanding of foreign nations. The Journey eschews any such understanding (including in terms of basic geography) and turns instead to the caricature of oddity promulgated by Xuanzang and others.

20 In the Chinese edition I have currently been able to use this reads as “西梁女國 (1342),” which would oddly place the nation in modern-day Hubei. This may, however, be an error, wherein the wrong “Western Liang” was chosen. The Western Liang which was a part of the Liang dynasty (502-587 C.E.) reads as above, while the Western Liang (400-421 C.E.) of the Sixteen Kingdoms period reads 西涼. I intend to check with other printings of the Journey. If the correct name is indeed 西涼, this would place the nation in the northwestern part of modern-day Gansu. It could, then, possibly be “located” beyond Yumen Pass and thus traditionally considered to be in the realm of Western barbarians, although the area has at times been within Chinese political control.

It is difficult to overstate the importance of Journey to the West. It is counted as one of the four great canonical novels of Chinese literature.21 The story has been adapted into every form of media: plays, films, television shows, other novels, short stories, comics, and even video games. In addition to its dominance in China, the story enjoys widespread popularity in Japan, and has served as a cultural touchstone in Chinese-American media. Although many later works primarily reference the story through inclusion of the character Sun Wukong, or a character based on him, many of the most high-profile works still adapt the journey itself or choose particular eventful episodes from the portion set in “Central Asia.” Xuanzang’s most recognized form has become the fictional character, and the vision of the world most widely seen is one in which journeying to the west of China brings leads to encounters not with a number of Buddhist lands with varying national products, but with supernatural evils, impossible rivers, and fiery mountains.

China at the Moral Center

As accounts of Xuanzang’s journey gained distance from the Record, they gained distance as well from Central Asia. To Huili, Central Asia was backwards. An insufficient number of people were Buddhist. If they were Buddhist, they were ill-informed. If they were, possibly, acceptably informed, they may still have not been acceptably pure, as in Kapisi. In the

Life, the saintly Xuanzang “reformed the wicked and enlightened the ignorant wherever he went

(45),” as he did by converting the king of Samarkand. Yet even Xuanzang’s exemplary activity in Central Asia is decentralized. The narrative format of the Life places greater emphasis on the

21 Alongside The Water Margin (Shuihu Zhuan 水滸傳), The Romance of the Threee Kingdoms (Sanguo Yanyi 三國演義), and The Dream of the Red Chamber (Honglou Meng 紅樓夢). Some considerations extend to five or six novels, including The Plum in the Golden Vase (Jin Ping Mei 金瓶梅 or The Scholars (Rulinwaishi 儒林外史).

51 ultimate goal of Xuanzang’s journey (obtaining the scriptures) than is present in the Record’s listing of countries and their particulars. The idea that Xuanzang’s greatest act is to further foster the moral development of China, which thus takes on aspects of a spiritual as well as political center, is emphasized by the devotion of the second half of the life to Xuanzang’s work after his return, and the imperial support he received.

The Journey divorces itself from any reality, but can still be seen as a logical extension of

Huili’s interpretation of events. In the Journey, Central Asia is a proving ground, full of enemies to be enlightened or defeated, as the Xuanzang of the Life enlightened the nonbelievers or defeated inferiors in battles of knowledge. The Life implied Central Asian people were on the moral level of criminals, in the Journey many of the inhabitants of “Central Asia” are not even human. Even the human inhabitants may be strange and behave in unnatural ways, as the women of the Women’s Country do. Crucially, the characters do not obtain enlightenment in India, but only after their return to China – their work is not to enlighten the world with the divine scriptures, but to enlighten China specifically. Spiritual knowledge may be gained outside of

China, and divine encounters may even happen at places such as India’s Vulture Peak, but it is

China which is the ultimate moral center of the world. Central Asia does not enter the discussion.

Conclusion: A Record of the World

The prominence of the Life in later understandings of Xuanzang, and the sheer popularity of Journey to the West, does not by any means mean that the Record itself has not continued to be recognized and used. Its combination of religious and secular concerns has made the Record a flexible text, able to serve different audiences, who could choose which aspect of Xuanzang’s worldview they wished to read. Just as the broader concepts of Xuanzang’s story was adapted to different interests and traditions by Huili and Wu Cheng’en, so too has the Record itself been adapted.

The importance of Buddhism to the continued interest in texts about Xuanzang is supported by where these texts survive. Watters, researching in the late 19th century, referenced four editions of the Record. The first was a “modern” reprint of a text used in Ming dynasty

Buddhist monasteries, the second a copy from a Buddhist monastery in Fuzhou which Watters speculated was based on a Song dynasty edition, the third a Japanese edition which Watters also believed was based on a Song dynasty text, and the fourth a then-recent reprint based on a

Korean edition which was part of a collection of Buddhist books published in Japan (3-4). These editions demonstrate that both inside and outside of China, the Record came to be viewed first as a Buddhist, not Court, text, and to be read in the context of Buddhist collections. And where the

Record could be found, the Life was often found as well. The Taisho (1912-1926) edition of the

Chinese Tripitaka (Buddhist canon), for example, includes both works.

The Record took on a dual meaning in China. Its Buddhist content was honored, but interest in the Record as a work of geography continued in China at least through the Ming

Dynasty (1368-1644). The edition of the Record which was eventually reproduced in Japan as

53 part of the Taisho edition of the Chinese Tripitaka includes at the end of the 11th chapter an account of Zheng He’s visit to Sri Lanka in the early 15th century. Li Rongxi attributes this passage to Zheng himself (3). Regardless of the author, the insertion of the episode into the

Record demonstrates that the Record continued to be considered a critical resource on India. Its knowledge was not replaced by more recent information from Zheng’s travels, instead the episode from Zheng’s voyage was used to supplement the Record. Yet the inclusion of this particular episode and not any other incident in Zheng’s journey may be due not only to Zheng’s direct experience with the island, but also to the fact that the episode involves a relic of the

Buddha, making the incident doubly relevant to potential readers of the Record.

The Record’s role as a work of geography and history came to the forefront again when it gained attention in the West. In the mid-19th century, Western translations of Buddhist biographies and travel accounts began to appear. In 1857, the French sinologist Stanislas Julien translated the Life into French, and the Record followed. Both works would later be translated into English by Samuel Beal: the Record in 1884 and the Life in 1888. These works fired the imaginations of Western archeologists and treasure-hunters, as Deeg explains:

“It was the work of the British archaeologist and colonel, and later general, Alexander Cunningham, who literally swept the landscape of northern India in search of Buddhist antiquities. With Julien’s translation of the XJ as a Cicerone in his hand, his approach, of using the XJ as the starting point for archaeological enquiry, became codified as the paradigmatic model of British colonial archaeology in India (93).”

These archeological projects were not limited to India, but also motivated discoveries in Central

Asia and modern Xinjiang. Xuanzang’s Record has shaped the understanding of Central Asian and Indian history not only in China, but throughout the world.

In 2013, Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan. There he expressed China’s desire “to forge closer economic ties, deepen cooperation, and expand

54 development space in the Eurasian region (“Xi Jinping Calls for Regional Cooperation Via New

Silk Road”).” The “One Belt One Road” (yi dai yi lu 一带一路) initiative which Xi’s speech heralded involves Chinese investment in infrastructure and development in Central Asia in order to create new trade routes and further develop existing ones (the initiative also encompasses the development of sea routes, with investment in Southeast Asia). This new Silk Road is an important part of China’s current international economic expansion and energy development, just as expanding along the Silk Road brought the Tang into contact with a variety of products unavailable in central and eastern China. In light of China’s renewed interest in Central Asia, it is important to ask: on which historical conception of Central Asia do contemporary Chinese leaders base their approach? Who is central, who is peripheral, and why?

Such questions can only be answered with a thorough understanding of the history of Han

Chinese thought regarding Central Asia, in which Xuanzang’s Great Tang Dynasty Record of the

Western Regions is critical. Views of Central Asian nations may no longer be based on Buddhist or Confucian judgements, but stereotypes linger22, and Xuanzang’s tactics remain relevant.

Inclusion of the other through shared narratives, and exclusion by centering one’s own country or a particularly admired country, are not methods confined to the past.

22 In Beijing in 2010, the group I was part of was warned by the Han Chinese director of our study abroad program that Uyghur merchants would be certain to try to price gouge us and we should stay away from them. The idea that Central Asian peoples value treasure above all does not appear to be dead.

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