Bögü Qaghan makes Manichaeism the religion of the Uyghurs
In 762 the Uyghur khagan Bögü, who by the Chinese histories had first marched south at Shi Chaoyi’s invitation, went over to the Tang against the last rebels of the An Lushan rebellion. At Luoyang he met Manichaean priests, and in 763 he took four of them home and proclaimed their faith the religion of his realm — the first ruler to make Manichaeism a state religion. With a brief interruption it remained the faith of the Uyghur court until the fall of the khaganate in 840.
- Date
- between 762 and 763exact date unknown: an interval is given
- Place
- Ordu-Baliq (Karabalgasun)today: Khar Balgas ruins in the Orkhon valley, Khotont district, Arkhangai Province, Mongolia · Central and Northern Asia
- Participants
- Bögü Qaghan, Uyghur Khaganate, Sogdians, Tang dynasty
- Threads
- Central Asia and the steppe (6th–10th c.)
- Also known as
- Uyghur Manichaeism; Bügü Qaghan; Tengri Qaghan; Mouyu Qaghan; Ruixi; Karabalgasun inscription; Religion of Light; Уйгурское манихейство; Идигянь; Богю-каган; Жуйси; Карабалгасунская надпись; Религия света
Manichaeism, the religion founded by the prophet Mani in Sasanian Mesopotamia in the 3rd century, had spread along the Silk Road with Sogdian merchants and reached Tang China, where in 732 Chinese subjects were forbidden to adopt it. In 762, after first weighing an attack on the weakened empire, Bögü Qaghan led his army to the aid of the Tang, and the Uyghurs helped to retake Luoyang from Shi Chaoyi, the last leader of the rebels. The trilingual Karabalgasun inscription, set up at the Uyghur capital in the early 9th century, relates that while encamped at the Eastern Capital the khagan took four priests, among them Ruixi, back to his country; his officials declared that they repented of their former errors, carved images of demons were burned, the worship of spirits was abandoned, and a land of “reeking blood”, in the inscription’s words, became a land of vegetable food.
The conversion, which later Manichaean tradition celebrated, bound the khaganate still more closely to the Sogdians, who served the Uyghurs as merchants, scribes and advisers; historians such as Denis Sinor explain the khagan’s choice by this alliance and by a wish to show independence from the Tang. Manichaean teachers came to the khaganate, and in 768 the Uyghurs asked Emperor Daizong to allow Manichaean temples in China, which he was obliged to grant in 771. When Bögü planned a new invasion of China after Daizong’s death, his minister and cousin Tun Baga Tarkhan killed him in 779 or 780, together with about two thousand of his followers and Sogdians. Manichaeism was suppressed for a time, but later khagans restored it, and it remained the religion of the Uyghur court until the Yenisei Kyrgyz destroyed the khaganate in 840; in the Uyghur kingdom of Qocho in the Turfan oasis it long survived beside Buddhism.
Connections
Related events
- The Uyghurs overthrow the Turks: the Uyghur Khaganate744 · Central and Northern Asiathe khaganate founded in 744 adopted Manichaeism under its third khagan
- An Lushan rebellion16 December 755 – 17 February 763 · East AsiaIn 762 Bögü, who by the Chinese histories had first marched south at Shi Chaoyi’s invitation, went over to the Tang against the last of An Lushan’s rebels and met the Manichaean priests at Luoyang
Same participants
- Qutayba ibn Muslim conquers Transoxiana705–715 · Central and Northern Asiavia Sogdians
- Trisong Detsen: the Tibetan Empire at its height and the founding of Samyebetween 755 and 756 – 797 · Central and Northern Asiavia Tang dynasty
Same place
- Bumin overthrows the Rouran: the Turkic Khaganate is foundedbetween February and March 552 · Central and Northern Asia
- Civil war and split of the Turkic Khaganate581–603 · Central and Northern Asia
- The Orkhon inscriptions: memorial stelae of Kül Tegin and Bilge Qaghan1 August 732 – 735 · Central and Northern Asia
- Karakorum becomes the Mongol capital1235 · Central and Northern Asia
- Death of Yaroslav II in Karakorum30 September 1246 · Central and Northern Asia
Adjacent events in the thread
- Battle of TalasJuly 751 · Central and Northern Asia
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