Master Hsuan Tsang, also known as the Tang Monk, is arguably the best-known Buddhist monk in the history of Chinese Buddhism. He lived a colorful life and enjoys a legendary status. Above all, he stands out as a figure of great courage and perseverance for his journey to India, a trip he embarked on despite government regulations against it and the dangers and hardship it promised. From his odyssey came achievements that have had long-lasting influences.

Ever since the Buddhist scriptures were introduced to China, Chinese monks had been trying to translate them. However, the results were less than satisfactory: there were often discrepancies between different interpretations of the same scripture, or the translations were simply poorly done. In the early Tang Dynasty (618-907), a monk named Hsuan Tsang felt the need to clarify the confusion that had caused so much controversy among Buddhist monks concerning various Buddhist scriptures. So he traveled on foot all the way to India, where he spent years immersed in the profound knowledge of many outstanding monks. He returned to China and oversaw the translations of hundreds of volumes of Buddhist scriptures which he had brought back from India, thus contributing greatly to the enrichment of the Chinese Buddhist canon.

Hsuan Tsang's enormous influence reached areas other than Buddhism. The book in which he gave a first-hand account of his travels still helps modern-day scholars to conduct research in the areas from western China to India. Furthermore, the legend of his travels inspired the famous epic-like fairy tale composed in the Ming Dynasty, Journey to the West, which is now a classic known to virtually every Chinese reader. In this issue, I would like to briefly introduce the story of this great traveler, monk, philosopher and translator.

His early years

Hsuan Tsang was born in 602 under the reign of Emperor Wen of the Sui Dynasty. He was the fourth child in his family and was given the name Chen Hui. At a young age, he showed exceptional abilities and many considered him brilliant.

In China at that time, a person who wanted to become a monk had to be granted permission by local government officials. He had to pass certain tests before he was allowed to enter a monastery and become a monk. One year, the royal court decreed that it was time again to select outstanding people who wanted to become monks, and hundreds of people applied in response. Chen Hui was too young even to take the test, so he stood outside the examination hall and looked in through the front gate. The main examiner, Chen Shan-kuo, walked by and noticed him.

"Young man, what is your name?" asked Chen Shan-kuo.
"I am Chen Hui."
"You keep looking into the building. Are you thinking of becoming a monk?"

The boy reacted as though he had been caught stealing. His face turned red and he nodded.

The examiner then asked him, "You are still so young, why do you so want to become a monk?"

He did not expect the extraordinary answer that Chen Hui gave him: "Because I want to take up the Buddha's vow and propagate his teachings."

Chen Shan-kuo was amazed by this answer and realized that although Chen Hui was only a boy now, he was fully aware of what he wanted to do. He then decided to make an exception by allowing Chen Hui to become a novice first. "It is easy to find someone who can recite the Buddhist scriptures, but not so easy to find someone with a fine temperament," Chen Shan-kuo later remarked to his colleagues. "I believe he will become a great monk in the future. It's too bad we probably won't live long enough to see the day."

Thus, Chen Hui became a novice and was given the religious name "Hsuan Tsang." His second oldest brother, Chang Chieh, was also a Buddhist monk, so he stayed with his brother and studied with him in the same temple. Hsuan Tsang was an intelligent novice and his studies advanced very quickly. In five years, he read all the books in the temple. However, at that time the Sui Dynasty was ruled by a debauched tyrant, Emperor Yang. Under his reign war was rampant, causing a sharp decrease in donations to the temples and making life very difficult for the monks. Hsuan Tsang said to his brother one day that they should move somewhere else, because the situation had become unbearable. They moved to Chengtu, a city in Sichuan Province, central China.

Many other monks went to Chengtu because it was far removed from the war zones and surrounded by mountains, which helped maintain the stability and prosperity of the city. With more and more monks in Chengtu, more and more Buddhist seminars and lectures were held. Hsuan Tsang never gave up such wonderful opportunities and he attended all the lectures, which helped him to strengthen his comprehension of Buddhist ideas. Like a sponge he absorbed a great deal of knowledge, and he also developed his own views after he digested what he had heard at the lectures. His discussions with other monks made him famous. Among lay followers, monks and nuns, he established a reputation as a young yet very knowledgeable monk.

The social unrest and political turmoil following the fall of the Sui Dynasty ended when China was again united under the rule of the Tang Dynasty (618-907). In 622, Hsuan Tsang turned twenty and received the full precepts to become a monk. He and his brother were both outstanding in their knowledge of Buddhist philosophies. However, Hsuan Tsang wanted to leave Chengtu so he could learn more while his brother preferred to remain there. So Hsuan Tsang left Chengtu alone and traveled to many places in search of more knowledge from other famous monks.

After having studied with the great monks, Hsuan Tsang discovered some problems that needed to be addressed. First, those reverend monks belonged to different Buddhist sects and held different interpretations of the same scripture. Second, the Chinese scriptures, translated either directly from Sanskrit versions or indirectly from other languages, often omitted important passages or contained many errors.

Was there a way to solve these problems? Hsuan Tsang decided to head to India to retrieve the original scriptures. Traveling to India from China during that time was not as easy a task as it is now. Travelers on land had to pass through deserts and many unknown and dangerous places, and there was always the possibility of running into hostile tribes. Traveling by sea was equally dangerous with the always unpredictable weather. However, Hsuan Tsang was not the type to give up easily. Besides, he had other reasons for wanting to go to India. There were already other monks who had gone to India to retrieve the original texts and he wanted to follow them. Furthermore, an Indian monk named Prabhakaramitra had come to China and introduced Silabhadra of the Nalanda Institute to Hsuan Tsang. Silabhadra was said to be the oldest and the most knowledgeable monk in India, and Nalanda was the largest Buddhist institute in India. After learning about this, Hsuan Tsang became even more determined to go to India. He invited some monks who were also interested in traveling to India to submit a joint request to Emperor Taitsung. However, the emperor prohibited anyone from leaving the country and refused to give them special permission. All the monks gave up, except for Hsuan Tsang. He was still determined to go, and he continued to make preparations for the trip.

From China to India

The time finally arrived for Hsuan Tsang to make his move. Severe frost and hail had destroyed crops and the emperor was allowing people to move freely to other places to find food. There was a mass exodus from the national capital, Changan, as people left for other cities that had food. Hsuan Tsang took this great opportunity, sneaked out with all the refugees and headed west--and thus his long journey began.

One of the noteworthy events during Hsuan Tsang's travels took place in Sichuan Province. Seeing a poor, sick person by the road, he compassionately took him to a temple and gave him clothes and food. Out of his deep gratitude toward the monk, this person gave him a copy of the Heart Sutra and told him to chant it if he ever ran into any difficulty. Sure enough, by chanting the sutra, Hsuan Tsang escaped intact from many dangerous situations. Because of this episode, the Heart Sutra became popular throughout China.

Hsuan Tsang's journey from China to India took roughly three years. He mostly traveled alone, but when he was lucky he would be joined by other travelers who accompanied him to his next destination. He passed many states along the way, and the kings of these states bequeathed him generous amounts of goods and treasures and dispatched guards to accompany him to the next state.

In India

After the grueling, tiresome journey through many kingdoms and all kinds of terrain and weather, Hsuan Tsang finally reached northern India in 630. India was not united at that time. It was said there were more than seventy states in India when Hsuan Tsang arrived. In India, Hsuan Tsang traveled to many places to visit famous Buddhist relics and to study under renowned Buddhist monks. He went to Nalanda and spent five years there studying all the available Buddhist teachings. The institute was first built in 5 a.d. and had undergone several expansions. When Hsuan Tsang arrived there, it was estimated that at least ten thousand monks were living and studying in the school.

As he traveled around India, Hsuan Tsang also gave lectures. Because he was so well versed in Buddhist teachings, he always won debates against the Brahmins. He traveled throughout India for eleven years and finally left for China in 641. As he was leaving, a king sent over twenty horses to help him carry 657 volumes of scriptures back to China.

Return to China

Hsuan Tsang finally reached Changan, capital of the Tang Empire, in 645. Before he reached China, he sent a letter to Emperor Taitsung apologizing for his unauthorized departure and reporting his return. The emperor was not angry with Hsuan Tsang and even ordered officials to escort him back to the capital. He went to visit the emperor and requested accommodations where he could translate all the scriptures he had brought back from India. The emperor enjoyed the conversation with Hsuan Tsang and agreed to his request at once. However, since the emperor was about to go on a military campaign in Korea, he ordered the prime minister to help Hsuan Tsang with his needs. Hsuan Tsang made a list of ten special things that would be needed for the translation of the scriptures, and requested major temples around the country to recommend any capable monk to him. It was estimated that more than twenty monks were assembled to participate in the translation of the scriptures.

Between 645 and 663, the team produced seventy-five scriptures and commentaries. The scope of the translations and the highly organized translation procedure were unprecedented. The team also helped to lay the foundation for future translation projects.

While Hsuan Tsang was carrying out the work with his fellow translators and scholars, he never allowed a day to go by in vain. He planned the work he would do each day. If he had to do something else in the daytime, he would work in the evening. He always rose at dawn and worked until midnight. The first thing he did after he got up was to read over the original scripture and mark the text that was to be translated that day. Then when the translation began, he, the main translator, would read out loud the original text in Sanskrit and translate it into Chinese. A second person examined the translation against the original copy. A third person double-checked to see whether Hsuan Tsang had made any mistake in reading the original Sanskrit copy. The transcribers would record Hsuan Tsang's translation. Literal translators then translated certain Sanskrit words based on their pronunciations. After the transcribers wrote down the translations, editors revised the translations and polished the language, rendering the translated text easy to read. Finally there were chanters who recited the translations to test whether they were pleasant to hear.

This is a basic description of the translation process and how the quality of the translations was maintained. If the translators had any uncertainty regarding the translations, they would pause to discuss the problems, and that meant a longer time would be needed to complete one scripture. But it is due to their diligence and attention to details that we have the lucid texts we read today.

While Hsuan Tsang was deep into the translation work, he also had in mind another task that Emperor Taitsung had assigned to him: to write a journal of his travels to India. Hsuan Tsang asked another monk, Pien Chi, to take dictation from him while he recounted his journey. They did this a few hours every day, and about half a year later they finally completed the journal and submitted it to the emperor. In this book, The Record of the West in the Tang Dynasty, Hsuan Tsang described the conditions, locations, weather, customs, local products, religious beliefs, etc., of each state he had traveled to. This book was thus a first-hand account and a perfect source for information on ancient states in central Asia, Kashmir, Nepal, Pakistan and India.

In 648, Hsuan Tsang took on yet another heavy responsibility. Prince Li Chih had built the Ta Chi En Temple in Changan to commemorate his deceased mother. In the temple, there was a translation hall especially designed for Hsuan Tsang and his team, and Prince Li Chih invited Hsuan Tsang to preside over the temple as abbot. The monk was initially reluctant to assume the position, because it entailed the duty of overseeing every affair in and around the temple, in addition to the already demanding translation work. However, he finally accepted the position and moved there with his translation team in 648. A year later Emperor Taitsung died, and Prince Li Chih ascended the throne as Emperor Kaotsung.

In order to protect and preserve the sacred Buddhist scriptures, statues and other important relics, Hsuan Tsang proposed the construction of a tower for their safekeeping. The emperor granted his request and the five-story Ta Yen Pagoda was built. Two more stories were later added.

Even though Hsuan Tsang had become the abbot of Ta Chi En Temple, he was fortunate that other respected monks also took up duties in the temple and shared the responsibilities. Hsuan Tsang held lectures after lunch and in the evenings, and he answered questions put forward by other monks who attended his lectures. The junior monks in the temple also went to him with all sorts of questions that ranged from temple affairs to interpretations of Buddhist scriptures. Moreover, because the temple had been built at the order of Emperor Kaotsung and Hsuan Tsang was highly revered by the emperor, court officials of all ranks visited the temple either to socialize with the abbot or to seek advice regarding their own problems. With amazing energy and wisdom, Hsuan Tsang always answered the questions put to him.

One day as Hsuan Tsang was mentally reviewing all the scriptures and commentaries he had translated, he suddenly realized that he had missed the most important scripture, the Great Prajna Sutra. This sutra consists of six hundred volumes, so Hsuan Tsang doubted whether he could complete the translation in his lifetime. Some people suggested that he abridge it, which seemed to him a good idea. But once he began work to condense the sutra, he started to have nightmares every night. He considered the nightmares warnings from the buddhas and bodhisattvas, who wanted him to translate the complete sutra, and so he decided to start over again and make an unabridged translation. Because people constantly visited him at the Ta Chi En Temple and he had to tend to many matters there, he requested permission to move to another temple where he could concentrate on the translation of the Great Prajna Sutra. Thus in 660, Hsuan Tsang and his team moved to Yu Hua Temple, about six hundred miles north of Changan, and began work. In 663, all six hundred volumes of the sutra were translated--the last translation work to be carried out by Hsuan Tsang. He died in 664 at the age of sixty-three.

When Emperor Kaotsung heard the news of Hsuan Tsang's demise, he was thunderstruck. With tears streaming down his cheeks, he sighed, "I have lost the nation's treasure." At the funeral, tens of thousands of people mourned along the streets where the coffin passed. The old monk was buried in Sian and a pagoda was built to house his relics. Now some of his bones are stored in the Hsuan Tsang Temple by Sun-Moon Lake in central Taiwan.