User Comments - tabushuai

Posted on: Love Tangle 1: A Suspicious Text Message

I remember hearing somewhere that "wearing the green hat" has something to do with the military; the idea being that because soldiers tend to be away for long periods of time, it causes their wives to be unfaithful.  Can anyone confirm/disprove this explanation?

Posted on: Pregnancy Series 2: Pregnancy House Ar-rest

I've done a fair amount of research on religion in ancient China, and here's some solid info:  check out the Nestorian Stele, erected in 781 in Chang'an (Xi'an).  In it we learn that Christianity had gained enough notoriety by 635 AD to be officially recognized by Emperor Taizong (599-649), the second emperor of the Tang dynasty.  The stele was written in Chinese and Assyrian Neo-aramaic.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nestorian_Stele

They used to call it the religion of Rome.  The Nestorians definitely couldn't have entered China before the late 6th century AD, since that's when their movement really took off.  When the Jesuits came in the late 16th century, they didn't see anything that looked like Christianity because it had failed to gain any serious disciples in the Tang royal house.  And then there's syncretism... China has a pretty irresistible way of taking incumbent religions and making them its own.  Just look at what it did to Buddhism!  

Incidentally, as a committed Christian I have to apologize for well-meaning believers who see only what they want to see when looking at history. In all fairness, a lot of non-religious people do the same thing though.  Let's be civil and not deny the massive cultural significance of many different religions, especially when we talk about our beloved 中国.