Strange to say, the Nestorians, well received and honourably treated by Taitsung and Kaotsung, fall into disgrace, and are persecuted, as soon as Kaotsung's death leaves the supreme power in the hands of the Empress-Dowager Wu-hu, and her adviser Hwai-yi. The persecution of the Nestorians is instigated by the sane people as that against the followers of "Zendo, and much the same pretexts are alleged. Moreover, the persecution of the two bodies goes on for the same time, and relief comes to them simultaneously. Of the Nestorians we read that Huantsung (723-756), succeeding Wu-hu, rebuilds the "Temple of Felicity," as the Nestorian Church is called, that Huantsung's succeessor, Sutsung (756-763), coming into a disordered inheritance recovers Singanfu which was in the hands of rebels, and erects "luminous" temples in various parts of his Empire, and finally that the Emperor Taitsung (763-780), the same who discouraged the collaboration of King Tsing and Prajna, not only celebrated the Bon Festival with the Buddhists in the 7th month, but kept Christmas in the 12th with the Nestorians, "burning incense" in a "luminous temple" with the "luminous multitude." As to Zendo's followers, we find them gathering round a teacher named Ekan, not very long after the master's death. Ninety years after that event, a monk named Hosso is mentioned as acquiring great

fame, and in 793 Shoko makes Uryusan (#) the headquarters of the teachings promulgated by Zendo. But by that time the Emperor Taitsung was already dead (ob. 780), and the collaboration between Amidaist and Christian had already been prohibited.

When the Nestorian mission first arrived in China in A.D. 636. they procured from the Emperor Teitsung a decree authorizing the erection of a Tatsin (i.e. a Syrian) Temple. This name, however, may have led to confusion, for both Zoroastrians and Manichaeans might conceivably have claimed the title (loosely construed), and in fact, did so. When Huantsung, soon after 713, rebuilds the Nestorian Church, it is called a "Temple of Felicity." When Sutsung, in 756, recovers Singanfu, the Nestorian Churches are "luminous (#) temples," and this name has come to be identified with Nestorianism ever since, both in China and Japan.

When Zendo died, the Emperor Kaotsung (650-683) granted to the Temple in which he resided the honorific title of Komyoji (#), which is only another form of "luminous temple." The popular explanation of this name is obviously a fanciful one. Bright rays of light do not come out of the mouths of even the most eloquent preachers of any faith, nor do books, however holy and mouldy, glow with a phosphorescent light. Yet that was what Shoko is said to have seen issuing from the works of Zendo preserved in the library at the White Horse Monastery. [**] Kaotsung was an enlightened monarch, and