Thread by @seshanm

'#ThruChineseEyes
"How did China view India at the time Buddhism entered through its borders?" amp.scroll.in/article/102517…

" India, the country is said to have five regions – east, west, north, south and the middle or central region. In some accounts, the central region or the Gangetic plain is called Zhonguo or “Central Country” – a term that is usually used to denote China as the Middle Kingdom."

"In the writings of Chinese Buddhist monks and scholars during the Han, Sui and Tang dynasties (roughly from the first century BCE to the tenth century CE), it was India that was often described as the centre of the world, not China."

"This reverence for India was in sharp contrast to the later claim to centrality that marked Chinese narratives."

"We should note that in Chinese descriptions, India was not one single, unified entity but a civilised, even spiritual space, occupied by several kingdoms and

"ruled by several kings. There was a clear awareness of the country’s diversity but also an understanding of its overarching oneness derived from both culture and religious faith."

"Chinese contemporary awareness of India became a subset of its traumatic encounter with the West. The India in the millennial imagination of China as an independent centre of civilisation, spirituality and knowledge, but comfortably distant, had

"to be reconciled with a modern India which had become a “slave nation” under the British and a launch pad for the latter’s depredations against China."

"While India may have entered the Chinese imagination, in particular through the spread of Buddhism, there is almost no sign of China having registered in the Indian consciousness through its long history."

"It is only in the modern period that China emerged on the Indian radar screen, and despite a recognition of its impact on India and on Asia as a whole, little effort was made in India to become familiar with the country, its culture, its way of thinking and its world view."

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