Four Buddhist Persecutions in China - Third

Third

In 845, Taoist Emperor Wuzong of the Tang Dynasty initiated the "Great Anti-Buddhist Persecution" in an effort to appropriate war funds by stripping Buddhism of its financial wealth and to drive "foreign" influences from China. Wuzong forced all Buddhist clergy into lay life or into hiding and confiscated their property. During this time, followers of Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Manichaeanism and Zoroastrianism were persecuted as well. The persecution lasted for twenty months before Emperor Xuanzong ascended the throne and put forth a policy of tolerance in 846.

Several reasons led to the proscriptions, among them the accumulated wealth by the monasteries and the case that many people entered the Buddhist community to escape military service and tax duty, which lasted through the Song Dynasty. The increase in the number of temples and priests and nuns put financial pressure on the state, which prompted the successive dynasties to regulate Buddhism. A third reason was the rise of the Neo-Confucians who wrote manifests against the foreign religion, believing its egalitarian philosophies destroyed the social system of duty and rights of the upper and lower classes.