Why was religion so unimportant in China and so important in India?
Answer Dear Chastity, Yours is a good question, but I’m afraid the space provided cannot afford it the justice it deserves. I shall however briefly address your question: Religion is usually born under a tide of religious yearning. This, in turn, is usually indicated when a country or its people are suffering or in turmoil. One distinction between the CHinese and the Indians is that China was largely ruled by a centralized govt for over three thousand years – this is absolutely not true of India – so there was to a large extent political stability. And while China was the wealthiest and most powerful nation on earth until the Rennaissance, India is and has always been beset by political uncertainty, and economic strife, and this affects the people. People turn to faith for reassurance when such happens. Another reason is because China has always had an extremely important scholarly class, which proselytized philosophy, and not religion, as the way of life. The Chinese frowned upon such
