Question

Evaluate the role of Buddhist missionaries in printing culture.

Hint:

Show three things: how missionaries carried the technology from China to Japan, which early printed book they produced, and why religious practice created a demand for thousands of identical copies.

Answer 1

Concept:

• The earliest kind of print technology was developed in China, Japan and Korea, and it grew up around the copying of religious texts.
• Buddhist missionaries carried both the faith and the technique of printing from one country to another.

Step 1: They carried the technology from China to Japan.
Buddhist missionaries from China introduced hand-printing technology into Japan around AD 768 to 770. Printing arrived in Japan not through traders or rulers but through people carrying a religion.

Step 2: They produced the earliest printed books.
The oldest Japanese book, printed in AD 868, is the Buddhist Diamond Sutra. It contains six sheets of text and woodcut illustrations, and it survives as the earliest dated printed book known.

Step 3: They created a steady demand for printed matter.
Buddhist texts had to be copied in very large numbers, since merit was believed to come from reproducing and distributing scripture. Hand copying could not meet such demand, so printing was the natural answer.
Pictures were printed on textiles as well, and the technique spread beyond books.

Step 4: They helped printing reach ordinary people.
Because religious literature was meant for everyone and not only for scholars, the printed material produced under Buddhist influence circulated widely. In Japan poets and prose writers were regularly published, and books became cheap and abundant.

Final Answer: Buddhist missionaries carried hand printing from China into Japan around AD 768 to 770, produced the Diamond Sutra of AD 868 which is the oldest dated printed book, and created the steady demand for copies of scripture that kept early printing alive and spreading.