Is there any evidence that the fall of the Tibetan empire led to an increase in Buddhism?
score:5
I'm not really sure we can apply the concept of "state religion" to Imperial Tibet. While Buddhism thrived during this period, many court ministers and nobles remained faithful to their Bön beliefs throughout. Even at the height of Buddhist power, powerful court ministers were still Bon believers. This would prove instrumental.
As you noted Buddhism reached new heights in the early 9th century, when they found in Emperor Ralpacan a ruler eager to pamper Buddhists. In addition to great wealth, Ralpacan even gave monks high political offices, causing widespread resentment. This eventually led to a vicious reprisal starting from ~840, as the traditional Bon powers pushed all the way back and suppressed Buddhism for over a century. Heavy devastation was inflicted as temples and scriptures were destroyed and monks killed.
After the fall of the Tibetan empire, Buddhism was said to have been preserved in Kham. It took over a hundred years before it re-established a strong presence in Tibet, when monks once again brought Buddhism to the Tibetan heartland of Ü-Tsang.
(Below was written in response to the original question)
Would it be reasonable to assume a causal link between the fall of their empire and the peak of Buddhism?
You could say that, but kind of in a somewhat convoluted way. The immediate trigger in Tibetan Empire's fall was the assassination of its last emperor, Langdarma. His death plunged the empire into a succession crisis and an accompanying civil war, leading to the Era of Fragmentation.
There's a link to Buddhism because the regicide was supposedly carried out by a monk, Lhalung Pelgyi Dorje. He was dissatisfied with the Tibetan government's oppression of Buddhism. The anti-Buddhist policies were in turned enacted by court ministers of the Bön faith, either under Langdarma's direction (traditional account) or merely using him as a figurehead (revisionist account).
These ministers were traditionally held to have assassinated the previous emperor Ralpacan. Ralpacan was a great patron of Buddhism over the period you mentioned in the question. As the story goes, this irked his Bön following ministers which ultimately led to his death and replacement by Langdarma. Though some have argued that he died of natural causes/illnesses/accidents, in which case his ministers merely exploited the opportunity to turn the table on Buddhists.
In this way the peak of Buddhism led to the disintegration of the Tibetan Empire, though how much of a link that really is would be up to individual opinion I suppose.
Upvote:2
Tantric Buddhism absorbed many of the Bon (shaman) concepts and the two religions co-existed in many ways. It was more an overlay of Buddist theology over Shaman practice and beliefs, than a total ousting of one by the other.
On the other hand with respect to the previously warlike Tibetan Empire which the Chinese had feared, with the adoption of Buddhist values Tibet retreated into more of a hermit kingdom eschewing interaction with neighbouring states.
Whilst various sects like Karma pa and Gelugs pa clashed with each other, their focus was inward and the impetus for territorial imperialism which had existed under former kings vanished.
More post
- 📝 Are there any surviving historical written records about Black individuals in Sub-Saharan African languages?
- 📝 Was any pope imprisoned during his service to Catholic Church?
- 📝 How can we be confident that Tacitus really wrote his Histories and Annals?
- 📝 What would people have been smoking in 700 AD Central / Eastern Asia?
- 📝 Were there ever actual organizations of pirates?
- 📝 What is the reasoning behind these huge numbers for participants in the Battle of Grunwald 1410?
- 📝 Do we know of other examples of modern Utilitarian/Poltical 'cannibalism' (as defined by Carlyle), besides the French Revolutionaries and the Nazis?
- 📝 Was the name "William the Conqueror" (or its translation) actually used in William's lifetime?
- 📝 Inviting rulers vs taking power
- 📝 Are there any good records about the alleged 17th Century bucaneer Vincenzo Alessandri?
- 📝 A common find of metal detectorists across Britain is the silver "love token", from around 1700. Do any contemporary sources describe the custom?
- 📝 What percentage of modern day Turks are of Bulgarian/Circassian/Greek/Serbian descent?
- 📝 New Zealand uniform or elsewhere?
- 📝 What policies governed freedom of speech under Marcus Aurelius?
- 📝 What percentage of NAACP in the 1910s was Jewish?
- 📝 What went wrong with India's scientific development as a society?
- 📝 Were there any developed countries that became "undeveloped" for reasons other than war?
- 📝 Why was capturing the south of Okinawa necessary?
- 📝 What wiped the Buddhism traces from Kerala History?
- 📝 Is there any evidence to support the claim that the United States was "suckered into WW1" by Zionists, made by Benjamin Freedman in his 1961 speech?
- 📝 Did Portuguese fisherman visit New England prior to 1492?
- 📝 Did anyone besides Heinz Guderian believe that Germany needed to "liberate" Soviets to prevail on the eastern front?
- 📝 How likely would it have been for a rural Bohemian to encounter someone with darker skin?
- 📝 What is the band beneath Nefertitis crown?
- 📝 What was housing like in early Medieval Scotland?
- 📝 Has Morocco ever claimed ownership of the Canary and Madeira islands?
- 📝 What did whistling bombs actually sound like?
- 📝 Was there any way to deal with infections in pre-modern times?
- 📝 Did the Byzantines ever attempt to move their capital to Rome?
- 📝 Was "the modern c**ktail" intended to mask the foul taste of Prohibition-era liquor?
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 Is there any evidence that the fall of the Tibetan empire led to an increase in Buddhism?
- 📝 Is there any evidence to support the claim that the United States was "suckered into WW1" by Zionists, made by Benjamin Freedman in his 1961 speech?
- 📝 Is there any evidence that Cleopatra and Caesarion considered fleeing to India to escape the Romans?
- 📝 Is there any evidence that the Catholic Church slowed innovation during the Middle Ages?
- 📝 Is there any evidence to support the claim that the US Strategic Defense Initiative played any significant role in undermining the USSR?
- 📝 Is there any evidence besides the scriptures that the Ark of the Covenant existed?
- 📝 Is there any evidence that the book of Isaiah was written before Cyrus?
- 📝 Is there any evidence to support the claim that Richard Burton told John Speke he would return home via Jerusalem after their Nile Quest?
- 📝 During World War II, were there any parts of the Japanese overseas empire that was capable of local re-supply?
- 📝 Is there any evidence to corroborate the claim that Rudolf Höss was physically abused by the Allies after his capture?
- 📝 Is there any evidence that Mileva Marić (first wife of Albert Einstein) had the knowledge to build an atomic bomb herself?
- 📝 Is there any evidence that the US strategy at Midway was deliberate?
- 📝 Is there any historical evidence that Sultan Mehmed II bought the Hagia Sophia?
- 📝 What led some people to (correctly) believe that there was no land under the ice cap at the North Pole?
- 📝 Is there any evidence of armies enrolling women in fighting roles in significant number in antiquity or the middle ages?
- 📝 Is there any documentation that indicates the Aztecs were as violent as they are made out?
- 📝 Is there any archaeological evidence for the Dorian Invasion of Greece?
- 📝 Is there any possible way to count provinces of the Achaemenid Empire to be 127?
- 📝 Are there any historians who believe that the crusades were not motivated as a distraction from internal conflicts?
- 📝 Were there any pilots that declined to carry out the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki?
- 📝 Is there convincing evidence that the language of Bulgars (proto-Bulgarians) was not Turkic, but Indo-European?
- 📝 Is there any country(former colony) in the world that obtained independence and then again tried to join its colonist ruler?
- 📝 Is there any truth to the claim that freed slaves who moved to Liberia enslaved the local population?
- 📝 Is there any evidence of post-landbridge travel across the Bering Strait?
- 📝 Was the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan one of the major reasons that led to the fall of Soviet Union?
- 📝 Are there any historical sources that support the claim that ancient high-speed archers held multiple arrows in their hand?
- 📝 Is there documentary evidence that Stalin intended/prepared to fight Germany after the Nazi-Soviet pact?
- 📝 Is there evidence that working for the Pony Express was dangerous, or not dangerous?
- 📝 Is there any science behind this graph that suggests we'd be exploring new galaxies if not for the dark ages?
- 📝 Is there evidence that the annual pilgrimage to Mecca facilitated cultural exchanges?