Even more remarkable is the admixture of Buddhism in Manichaeism.  The discoveries made in Central Asia make intelligible the Chinese edict of 739 which accuses the Manichaeans of falsely taking the name of Buddhism and deceiving the people.[533] This is not surprising for Mani seems to have taught that Zoroaster, Buddha and Christ had preceded him as apostles, and in Buddhist countries his followers naturally adopted words and symbols familiar to the people.  Thus Manichaean deities are represented like Bodhisattvas sitting cross-legged on a lotus; Mani receives the epithet Ju-lai or Tathagata:  as in Amida’s Paradise, there are holy trees bearing flowers which enclose beings styled Buddha:  the construction and phraseology of Manichaean books resemble those of a Buddhist Sutra.[534] In some ways the association of Taoism and Manichaeism was even closer, for the Hu-hua-ching identifies Buddha with Lao-tzu and Mani, and two Manichaean books have passed into the Taoist Canon.[535]

Nestorian Christianity also existed in the Tarim basin and became prominent in the seventh century.  This agrees with the record of its introduction into China by A-lo-pen in 635 A.D., almost simultaneously with Zoroastrianism.  Fragments of the New Testament have been found at Turfan belonging mostly to the ninth century but one to the fifth.  The most interesting document for the history of Nestorianism is still the monument discovered at Si-ngan-fu and commonly called the Nestorian stone.[536] It bears a long inscription partly in Chinese and partly in Syriac composed by a foreign priest called Adam or in Chinese King-Tsing giving a long account of the doctrines and history of Nestorianism.  Not only does this inscription contain many Buddhist phrases (such as Seng and Ssu for Christian priests and monasteries) but it deliberately omits all mention of the crucifixion and merely says in speaking of the creation that God arranged the cardinal points in the shape of a cross.  This can hardly be explained as due to incomplete statement for it reviews in some detail the life of Christ and its results.  The motive of omission must be the feeling that redemption by his death was not an acceptable doctrine.[537] It is interesting to find that King-Tsing consorted with Buddhist priests and even set about translating a sutra from the Hu language.  Takakusu quotes a passage from one of the catalogues of the Japanese Tripitaka[538] which states that he was a Persian and collaborated with a monk of Kapisa called Prajna.

We have thus clear evidence not only of the co-existence of Buddhism and Christianity but of friendly relations between Buddhist and Christian priests.  The Emperor’s objection to such commixture of religions was unusual and probably due to zeal for pure Buddhism.  It is possible that in western China and Central Asia Buddhism, Taoism, Manichaeism, Nestorianism and Zoroastrianism all borrowed from one another just as the first two do in China to-day and Buddhism may have become modified by this contact.  But proof of it is necessary.  In most places Buddhism was in strength and numbers the most important of all these religions and older than all except Zoroastrianism.  Its contact with Manichaeism may possibly date from the life of Mani, but apparently the earliest Christian manuscripts found in Central Asia are to be assigned to the fifth century.