ABSTRACT
Long ago, Korea was a Buddhist country pre-eminently, and there are nominally 1,472 temples left, but later it certainly is not in any large sense a Buddhist country. The Southern Buddhism of Ceylon has a slightly different line of Patriarchs. In his edicts, he claims that Buddhism had spread far beyond the bounds of India. Buddhism entered China, not from the south where the Himalayas rear themselves like a great wall, but from the west. Shortly after Buddhism was first introduced into Korea, Koreans began to make pilgrimages to the great temples and teachers of the law in China. Relics, particularly those of Buddha himself, are worshipped by Buddhists everywhere. In 1512, a great bronze Buddha from Silla was brought to Seoul and melted down to get the metal for the making of arms, an act of vandalism that could hardly have happened in any other age of the country.
