Johan Elverskog

Buddhist-Muslim history is usually summed up in two historic events, one ancient and one modern: the destruction of Nalanda in 1202 and the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddha by the Taliban in 2001. But in Elverskog's words "shining a light on the history of Buddhist-Muslim interaction" is a far more nuanced and interesting story than most realize. Five chapters and 63 pages of extensive endnotes trace this history from its beginnings (700-1000 CE) linking the two religions through the Mongol empire (1100-1400 CE), to the 20th century. Economic goals and trade play a key role, but so do art, literature and philosophy. The regional focus is that area between Afghanistan and Mongolia known as the Silk Road, but where appropriate Elverskog dips into other territory.

Readers need an existing familiarity with the basic tenets of both Islam and Buddhism, but with such a foundation the riches of this book keep it a page-turner. Elverskog makes his intent known from the beginning: "What happened when Buddhists and Muslims actually came into contact with one another?" It is the discoveries of how each was transformed by such contact, especially during their early years, that is this book's reward. "The most well-known example ... is the borrowing of the Buddhist monastery as a model in the development of the Islamic madrasa, which itself became the basis of the university in the Christian West." There are countless more examples, such as the shape of Buddhist stupas influencing Islamic metalwork, medical knowledge, divination squares and "blockprinted Arabic amulets that seem to have a Buddhist origin".

And although the subject is more academic than popular, Elverskog's colorful choice of language ("Kurtzean images" ... "Buddhist death squads") keeps the pace active and the information rewarding. I've read many dozens of books on the Silk Road yet this volume contains information and ideas seldom found elsewhere--for example, the material sourced from the 13th century Compendium of Chronicles: Rashid ad-Din's Illustrated History of the World, which amongst many interesting facts confirms that there were Chinese Buddhists in il-khanid Iran.A COMPENDIUM OF CHRONICLES: Rashid al-Din's Illustrated History of the World (The Nasser D. Khalili Collection of Islamic Art, VOL XXVII)

I would have said that this wasn't a book for the general reader, or perhaps even someone who didn't have an academic disposition or position, but that was proven wrong this past autumn when, outside of Kashgar, our Uighur guide spotted this book and asked to borrow it. Rather than forcibly ripping it out of his hands at the end of the trip, we finally left it with him and bought two new copies.… (meer)

One of the most helpful books I've read about political conceptions on the steppe – in any era. My main interests are earlier than Qing, but he studies the Mongols’ political traditions, with great clarity, in order to see how these were changed under Qing.

He asks the how and why questions and his emphasis is on change. He feels that the Mongols’ political organisation under Qing is seen as a fait accompli (as Qing presented it, later) so he looks at what was there before, and why Mongols let the changes happen or agreed to the changes. Or initiated the changes, because he is keen to see Mongol agency – that the Mongols weren’t passive in this process.

In the second half he looks at the Buddhist conversion. Here, too, he wants us to see that there were more stages than a history written afterwards – an official history – allows. So that before a Tibetan orthodoxy there was a Mongolian Buddhism, that might have used Mongolian for liturgy. Elverskog says, “the Mongol use of Tibetan is often compared benignly with the use of Latin in Catholic Europe,” whereas he points to “the displacement of Anglo-Saxon, Saxon and Slavic liturgies.”

This book is insistently in a Mongolian viewpoint, that he thinks has been hidden, disguised or lost in orthodox, imperial re-writes of history – which our history books haven’t yet sufficiently questioned.

Qing isn’t my area but it was a fascinating story and shed light on other phases of history. Indeed, he isn’t afraid to use analogies, widely: with British India, with the European Union, with the Christianization of Rome.… (meer)