Xuanzang Levels Up

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The year 629 AD.

The Taklamakan Desert, Western China.

A fugitive breathed heavily as he stumbled across one of the lowest and most inhospitable places on Earth.

Teklamakan itself means once you get in, you don't get out.

It's a vast topographical marker where it's not easy to travel in either direction.

You have to know where you are going.

Across the north, there's one route, and across the south, there's another route.

You can't cut across the desert.

If you don't know where you are going to get water, then you will have a huge problem.

The man stumbled past the skeletons of many others who tried and failed to cross the desert's northern route before him.

The sun scorched his skin.

Dust storms are quite common.

It's a very dry place.

You don't see any people at this stage.

There are no places nearby that you can see.

His feet and throat ached.

Four days ago, he'd lost his water bag.

It was a miracle he was still alive, but he knew he might not be for much longer.

So he must be experiencing these kinds of physical problems that somebody traveling this vast distance in the seventh century might be encountering.

The winds, the dust storm, all make you hallucinate.

The terrain is one reason that this kind of hallucinations happen.

Start seeing ghosts and devils and mirages and many other things.

The man's name was Xuanzang.

As he stumbled on, he clung to the hope of finding an oasis, but had no idea what lay ahead.

This 27-year-old Buddhist monk was on the run from the Tang Emperor, and he would not give up.

Xuan Zhang had to find out the truth.

So he had to lay down on the sand and call upon divine intervention to come and help him.

This is a very important trope that we see among traveling monks.

Suddenly, everything went dark.

For BBC Radio 4, this is history's history's heroes.

People with purpose, brave ideas, and the courage to stand alone.

I'm Alex von Tunselmann.

I'm a historian and today's episode is about Xuan Zhang, a 7th century monk who undertook an incredibly dangerous journey from China to India to find lost knowledge and who became a folk hero, then a legend.

I do play some historical video games.

Dr.

Tan Sen Sen is a historian at New York University's Shanghai campus in China.

As a historian, I like civilization.

It's an interactive game as Wukung is.

Black Myth Wukung is a Chinese action role-playing game.

When it was released in 2024, it became the fastest-selling Chinese game of all time.

I'm owered by the surrounding that's presented in the video game.

It's a 3D version and it's amazing to see the character do various things.

That character, Sun Wukung, an anthropomorphized primate, is inspired by the main character from the classic Chinese novel Journey to the West, first published during the Ming Dynasty.

It's very different from the Journey to the West.

It's a new story that they have created in the video game.

Journey to the West is a mystical tale of a group of companions, a monkey, a pig, a sandman, and a monk, traveling from China to India.

Sen first heard the story during his childhood in India.

My father came to work in China in the 80s, and as a filial child, I had to follow my parents.

Every evening in his new home, Sen watched the popular Chinese television adaptation of Journey to the West.

His parents translated a comic book of the story into Bengali.

It was available in Chinese as well.

Sen was intrigued by the monk, fictionalized in the novel, but inspired by the real-life monk, Xuanzang.

We read about him in our textbooks in schools in India.

So it was quite interesting as an Indian looking at this figure that I've read about and seeing him depicted on a Chinese TV screen.

Even before Journey to the West, Xuanzang's life story was mythologized.

There is no actual description of this person.

Some of the hagiographical literatures portray him as eight feet tall, which every hero seems to be at that time.

But we don't know.

Some of the records also say that he was a handsome person.

We don't know.

So who was the real Xuanzang?

I think the real Xuanzang is something we should not be looking for because a real and the legend are closely combined.

I think we should be looking at the legend of Xuanzang from both historical as well as the fictional point of view.

We need to embark on our own epic quest, starting when Xuanzang was born around the year 600 or 602.

Ready?

Said?

Go!

Xuanzang grew up in central China.

He was a sensible, bookish boy.

He is supposed to be the youngest of four children.

His brother had already become a monk.

After years of conflict, the Sui dynasty had collapsed.

Though political tensions remained in this period of uncertainty, religious diversity was tolerated.

Buddhism grew fast.

That starts around the first century BCE, BCE,

most likely in what is present-day Afghanistan and spreads from there.

This is a period when you see Buddhism being practiced not only by monks but also by the lay people and because of that you see many kinds of artistic representations that appear in caves, temples, creation of various kinds of pagodas, architecture and so forth.

Xuan Zhang was a devout follower of Mahayana Buddhism.

He enjoyed the peace of mind he found studying Buddhist texts and foreign languages like Sanskrit.

He discussed them with his brother and other monks.

That played an important role in him understanding Buddhism from different perspectives.

He gets ordained by the age of 20.

Power up.

Xuanzang settled in the city of Chang'an, the capital of the newly formed Tang dynasty.

The dynasty reunified China and started to look outwards.

People call it a cosmopolitan age because of the presence of many different people in this area, but it's also a period when people from Tang China go out in many different places.

So this is a moment of a change that is taking place, beginning of something great that is going to come.

Chang'an attracted merchants, monks and envoys from across Asia and beyond.

Xuanzang focused on learning.

He was a geek.

All monks are geek.

He was very studious.

He starts learning about some of the key Buddhist texts, what he said authentic form of Buddhism as practiced in India.

But when he read some translated texts, he was shocked to discover mistakes.

Some parts were missing altogether.

Xuan Zhang was passionate about his Buddhist faith, and these gaps in his knowledge really bothered him.

To fill them he needed to go back to the source.

So he decides to actually go to India to find these texts that are not available in China to bring back texts that he thought are authentic and needed in China and translate them himself.

He knew the physical challenge would be immense.

It's basically walking, riding horse or riding elephants, most likely following a route that was used by traders.

And there were many sub-routes.

There was no one fixed route.

So for him, it was a road of unknown.

For centuries, monks had attempted similar journeys.

So there was a two-way traffic of monks going from China to South Asia, from South Asia to India.

Not all of them were successful in making that trip to India.

Like them, Xuanzang wasn't necessarily prepared for extremes of climate and terrain.

Buddhist monks have summer retreats, which is different period in China and India.

During that period, Mongol usually live in caves and wait until the rains are over.

He didn't know what to put in his luggage or how to prepare, but he did pack a water bag.

Maximum health points!

He applied to the imperial authorities for permission to travel, but was refused.

The area between Chang, China, and the borderlines was unstable and unsafe.

Then there was a food shortage.

In response, the Emperor issued an edict declaring that people could travel for food and provisions.

And Xuanzang seems to have taken that opportunity to, let's say in quotation marks, escape from Tang China and proceed towards Central Asia.

He found a guide and one night began to travel west.

He is into an unknown territory.

He would have felt challenges every step he was taking.

Xuanzang stood at the Jade Gate, the boundary between Tang China and the outside world.

Before him lay a journey of 10,000 miles.

As they made their way across a desert route marked only by skeletons and horse dung, Xuanzang's guide began to fear he wouldn't make it.

He drew a sword and bow and threatened Xuanzang, telling him he feared for his family if it was found out he'd broken the law by helping a fugitive.

Xuanzang made him a solemn vow he'd never implicate him at any trial, and the man fled back, leaving him alone.

Soon, Xuanzang was hungry, tired, and weather-beaten.

He could have turned back himself, but he tightened his sandals and walked on.

Respawn.

Weeks passed.

Xuanzang's feet blistered and tore.

He kept hobbling west until he reached Gaochang.

There, he was welcomed by the king, a devout Buddhist.

They got along so well that the king wanted Xuanzang to stay and teach him instead of continuing his journey.

Xuanzang then starts to not eat, try to go on a hunger strike.

He seems to have not eaten for three or four days to make a protest, to make his point that he really wants to go to India.

The heartbroken king let him go, but only when he promised that he would return on his journey home.

Xuanzang smiled as he departed on good terms.

The king gave him letters of introduction for rulers of other kingdoms along the way.

He was no longer a fugitive, but an official pilgrim.

Speedrun!

Outside the settlement of Kucha, Xuanzang and some merchants who were traveling with him were pursued by bandits on horseback.

He knew he must not fight.

He then gives whatever valuables that he has to the bandits.

They were allowed to continue in peace, but some merchants broke away from the group, keen to get to their destination faster.

A short while later, Xuanzang came across a gruesome sight.

He sees all these merchants who had escaped were killed by the robbers.

As Xuanzang approached the soaring Tian Shan Mountains, he felt his hair stand on end.

He thought about the sacred Buddhist sites that lay ahead.

The hope of what he'd find in India kept him going, despite his profound fears.

He is suddenly feeling the climatic changes.

He is encountering the challenging environment, a difficult terrain.

A few months later, he reached Samarkand, an ancient city and a crossroads of Central Asia, once conquered by Alexander the Great.

The Sogdian city was cosmopolitan.

Most of the population were Zoroastrian, but there were also Hindus, Buddhists, Jews and Christians.

He took the opportunity to visit a Buddhist monastery.

There though, his disciples were attacked by Sogdians.

That is something that locals perhaps don't like.

They tried to drive the Buddhists out with fire.

An attempt to kill him.

Xuan Zhang escaped with his life.

Later, though, the king of Samakand found out about the assault.

He had the perpetrators arrested.

And he is about to cut off their hands when Xuanzang intervenes and says that no such punishment should take place and the king should let them go.

This act of mercy impressed the king.

Xuanzang was allowed to ordain a number of new monks.

Achievement unlocked.

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A month later, Xuanzang rubbed his forearms and squeezed his eyes tightly shut.

He was scaling ice-covered mountains.

He has to go through various passes.

Some of them are blocked by stones.

Some of them are iced over.

some of them are covered with snow.

He is suffering.

The weather was not his only fear as he made his way across the icy wastes of the Pamirs.

The height, how he's experiencing this height as he goes up the mountain and comes down the Hindu Kush or the Pamirs.

In the travelogue later written of Xuanzang's journey, he speaks of the perils of dragon attacks.

Travelers across the Pamirs, he said, shouldn't wear reddish-brown coloured clothing, carry calabashes, or speak loudly.

If you broke the rules, stones would rain from the sky.

Of course, the dragons didn't literally exist, but they represented the dangers and unknowable nature of the journey.

He made it through the mountain passes and on to the Indus Valley.

Xuanzang descended from the high peaks towards the plains through thick forests.

Very, very green, very, very dense.

This is where the monsoon brings in rainfall.

The grass and the trees are flourishing all over the place.

It was beautiful, but full of dangers.

Dangerous area for a traveler.

Animals inside the forest, robbers inside the forest.

He made his way across the holy river Ganges in a wooden boat with other passengers.

It's difficult to cross this river.

It's difficult and cold.

Many were attempting to cross the waters, believed by Hindus to hold the power to cleanse sins and offer liberation.

Xuanzang focused on the fertile banks he could see on either side.

He was exhausted.

Then suddenly, ten boats began to pursue them.

His boat is then attacked by pirates who kidnap all the people on the boat and take them to a temple of a Hindu deity called Durga.

Buff battle!

The pirates prepared a a clay altar in a forest clearing.

Xuanzang didn't want to show weakness.

As part of these rituals that the pirates perform, they sacrifice a human being to the goddess Durga.

The pirates said they needed a man of good quality.

Slowly, all eyes turned to Xuanzang.

The pirates then identify Xuanzang because he is a handsome-looking guy.

He is then about to be sacrificed.

Two men with scimitars led Xuanzang up to the altar.

He showed no fear and closed his eyes.

He called upon the bodhisattvas, individuals who seek spiritual enlightenment, for their divine intervention.

There's black wind, a black storm that appears, and that then makes the pirates very, very uncomfortable.

Xuanzang's fellow passengers told them he'd come from China as a pilgrim.

To kill him before he'd completed his pilgrimage would be very bad luck.

Something strange is happening.

Other people on the boat point out he should not be sacrificed, and that's when the pirates let him go and do not sacrifice him.

The pirates apologized to Xuanzang and returned the clothes and jewels they'd stolen from his fellow passengers.

Xuanzang looked triumphantly to the skies.

High score!

The village of Bodh Gaya in northeastern India, the holiest site of Buddhism.

There are various sites across the Gangetic regions where the Buddha actually did his first teaching.

The Buddha attained enlightenment, the Buddha passed away.

These are the key pilgrimage sites even for the Buddhists today.

Xuanzang limped through the site.

There's something called the diamond throne where the Buddha sat under a Bodhi tree and attained enlightenment.

He saw the tree and then he starts regretting that he was not born in that location.

He was not born during the time of the Buddha.

He prostrated himself on the ground and then he starts weeping that he has finally come as close as possible to a place where the Buddha lived.

A human feeling that Xuanzang is reflecting that is common among many foreign monks visiting that area.

After a while, he picked himself up.

He'd not forgotten the main aim of his journey, to collect original Buddhist texts that China lacked.

Bonus stage.

Xuanzang remained in India for over a decade.

He spent much of that time at the Nalanda Monastery in the east.

He also traveled extensively throughout the subcontinent, touring monasteries and other Buddhist sites.

This allowed him to collect both an extraordinary knowledge of Buddhism and sacred items, relics, artifacts and images.

He also learnt about Indian communities and customs.

Taking notes about what he is seeing, the people who live in these states, the food they eat.

Finally, he sought permission from the Tang Emperor to return home to Chang'an.

The Emperor heard about the strong relationships Xuanzang built with various kings and rulers.

As he sought to expand his kingdom, the monk might be a useful diplomat.

He agreed to Xuanzang's return.

It had been 14 years since Xuanzang left China.

Now he embarked back on the long journey home, taking various souvenirs, including an elephant.

Level up!

Chang'an, 645 AD.

There was a carnival atmosphere in the city.

Crowds filled the streets, desperate to catch catch a glimpse of the famous monk who'd crossed Asia and back.

He has accomplished this journey that very few people have accomplished.

That's a big deal.

That's a long time.

He has gone through all these terrains.

Many people know how difficult this terrain is.

They have read the previous journeys.

During his years away, Xuanzang visited over a hundred kingdoms.

Locals strained to see the remarkable things he'd brought back.

The emperor was particularly particularly keen to hear his stories.

He brings information about foreign countries that very few people would be able to relate to the Tang Emperors.

The Emperor asked Xuanzang to write a chronicle of his travels.

One of the most important historical narratives of Indian history at this period, describing the places and people he sees and not about his own experience.

The journey Xuanzang had completed seemed so unlikely that the emperor thought the monk must have supernatural powers.

The Tang Emperor then invited him to come to a battlefield with the Koreans that he was fighting.

And obviously, Xuanzang, a peaceful, harmonious, calm person, turned him down saying that I'm too tired.

Instead, Xuanzang went to work on his travelogue and his translations.

He was one of the few monks who knew different languages.

He was bilingual and he could directly translate from one language to another.

His objective is not completed until he translates the text.

It seems he translated about 75 works that he had brought, which is a huge number.

With the emperor's support, he established a translation bureau in Chang'an.

His translations, including important Mahayana texts, are considered foundational to Chinese Buddhism.

Xuanzang also developed his diplomacy.

Sustaining the relationship between the Tang court and the Indian rulers that he encountered in India, he was instrumental in convincing the Tang Emperor to deal with India through diplomatic ways.

He would send diplomats.

The power this gave him could be useful.

That relationship at a very high level was important for the Buddhist cause in China itself.

Within two decades, biographies of Xuanzang started to appear, but these were often less concerned with finding the truth than with building a myth.

This biography of Xuanzang, written by two of his disciples, who really want to promote their master as this extraordinary figure that makes him into a very legendary figure.

His story inspired fiction writers even centuries later.

And the first evidence of this Xuanzang story being fictionalized appears in the 14th century as dramas.

Today, Xuanzang is still widely admired across both India and China.

He is not just this figure who went and came back, but he is also a figure who became a hero.

It's not just about the guy, it's about the journey.

There's a movie that came up and Xuanzang was played by one of the leading actors of China And this was a movie that was jointly produced by the Indian government and the Chinese government.

Because despite various kinds of tensions between the two countries, Xuanzang is a figure that is liked by both India and China.

While he was at university, Dr.

Sen took on parts of Xuanzang's heroic journey himself.

You can call me the Indian Xuanzang if you want.

In 1993, I and some of my friends from college actually traveled from Tunhuang, which is one of the leading oases in the Taklamakan, to different places, both on the northern and the southern parts of the routes.

We took two cars, there were six of us.

Unfortunately, we got arrested because that place was not yet open to foreigners.

Like Xuanzang, he faced bad weather and unusual challenges.

After we got arrested, we were supposed to leave as soon as possible after we had paid our fines.

And as we were leaving, there was a dust storm.

And our driver said that we couldn't go into the dust storm, we had to stay in this area that was out of bounds for the foreigners.

So we went back to the police station and asked the policemen what we should do.

And they said, Well, since you have already paid the fines, you can still stay on until the dust storm is over.

And that is the story of Xuan Zhang, traveler, translator, pioneer, diplomat.

I know of an Indian family in Shanghai who has named their son Xuanzang.

If there's one single Chinese individual that is known in India, throughout India, it's Xuanzang.

I think it's very important to understand how individuals can play a very important role in knowing about communicating between, introducing two very different cultures.

I mean, that goes back to my own experience as well between India and China, especially in a period when there are political tensions between the two regions.

It's not just the states that play an important role, but individuals.

And that's exactly what Truanzang accomplishes.

Bringing two different cultures together can happen.

And if you just have patience and persevere through these kinds of different agendas and problems, you can attain that.

Next time on History's Heroes, a rebel aristocrat becomes a civil rights activist.

Jessica Mitford finds her voice.

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