FILE PHOTO: The “Monument and Pavilion for the Japanese Missions to Sui and Tang Dynasties” in Luoyang, Henan Province, was established in 1985 by several organizations, including the Kashihara City Cultural Association (Nara, Japan) and the Luoyang Branch of the Chinese People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries.

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Chinese civilization has long embraced openness and exchange, maintaining sustained contact with neighboring countries through various channels such as the Silk Road, maritime trade, and official diplomatic missions. The Tang Dynasty (618–907), the height of imperial China’s power and prosperity, was a period of remarkable political, cultural, and technological advancement that attracted neighboring states seeking to engage in multifaceted exchange. Among these interactions, Japan’s official missions to Tang China—known as “kentōshi”—stood out for their scale and organization. As state-sponsored diplomatic delegations, they exemplified East Asian civilizational exchange and marked an early pattern of mutual learning among regional cultures.

Historical path of the kentōshi

The establishment and development of the kentōshi system was an important practice of cultural exchange in East Asia during the 7th to 9th centuries. It reflected Japan’s historical motivation to actively learn from the Tang Empire due to its political, economic, and cultural needs during its period of social transformation. Politically, after the Taika Reforms, Japan sought to centralize its bureaucratic system, and the Tang Dynasty’s sophisticated legal and bureaucratic system offered an ideal model. Economically, Tang China’s advancements in agriculture, metallurgy, medicine, and architecture introduced key technologies that helped enhance Japan’s material production methods.

Japan officially began dispatching kentōshi in 630, continuing the practice until 894—a span of nearly 270 years, during which 19 missions were sent. These delegations were substantial in size, comprising officials, scholars, monks, and artisans. 

The development of the kentōshi can be divided into distinct phases. The initial phase (630–663) was exploratory, during which Japan focused on studying Tang China’s political institutions. This led to the adoption of the Chinese-style legal code, laying the foundation for Japan’s ritsuryō system and culminating in the Taihō Code (Great Treasure Code). During the peak period (702–777), coinciding with the zenith of Tang power and cultural influence, Japan sent frequent and large missions to engage in comprehensive study across politics, culture, religion, and technology. According to the Shoku Nihongi (Second of the Six National Histories of Japan), Japanese envoys such as Kibi no Makibi travelled to China twice, bringing back innovations such as the Da Yan Calendar—a sophisticated lunisolar system—which was used to reform Japan’s calendar. They also incorporated Tang rituals into Shinto practice, leading to new court ceremonies that blended Chinese and indigenous traditions.

The adjustment phase (804–838) saw the kentōshi missions increasingly engage with Tang religious culture. Key figures such as Kūkai studied Chinese Esoteric Buddhism at Qinglong Monastery in Chang’an, later founding Japan’s Shingon school of esoteric Buddhism. Another monk, Saichō, synthesized Tendai teachings with native mountain worship, giving rise to Sannō Shintō [a belief system that held Buddhist deities to be manifestations of native kami sent to save sentient beings]. This fusion reinforced the Shinbutsu-shūgō system [the syncretism of Shinto and Buddhism that remained Japan’s dominant religious structure until the Meiji period]. It also helped legitimize the sacred authority of the Tennō [a Japanese term for the Emperor of Japan] and expanded the influence of religion in state governance and social order.

The final kentōshi mission, dispatched in 838, was composed primarily of technical specialists such as doctors, artists, and musicians, reflecting a shift from wholesale emulation to selective absorption of Tang culture. When the Japanese scholar-official Sugawara no Michizane later declared the Tang Dynasty to be in decline, it signaled Japan’s growing cultural self-awareness and the emergence of a more autonomous developmental trajectory. This transformation, reflected in both institutional reform and cultural identity, laid the groundwork for “Wakon Kansai” [lit. the Japanese spirit imbued with Chinese learning—a concept that encapsulates the integration of Japanese identity with Chinese knowledge and influence].

Major aspects of China-Japan civilizational exchange

The cultural exchange fostered by the kentōshi missions reflected Japan’s selective absorption and transformation of Chinese influences within its indigenous context, spanning dimensions such as literature, institutions, and technology.

In literature and the arts, this interaction revealed a deep fusion of civilizations. Japanese waka poetry drew heavily on Tang poetic traditions, as seen in the Man'yōshū (Collection of Ten Thousand Leaves), where many of the over 4,500 waka poems bear the stylistic imprint of Tang verse. Approximately 1,300 poems in the anthology employ man'yōgana—the use of Chinese characters to phonetically represent Japanese sounds—a practice that later laid the groundwork for the later development of the hiragana and katakana syllabaries.

Institutionally, Japan’s adoption of Tang models was accompanied by growing structural rationalization. In the Taihō Code, the Tang legal system was adapted and modified to suit local needs. For instance, Japan curtailed the powers of the prime minister, enhancing the central authority of the Tennō. While drawing from Tang administrative principles, Japan retained its hereditary aristocracy and did not fully adopt the Tang imperial examination system, instead selecting officials by lineage. In education, Japan modeled its academic institutions on the Tang-era Guozijian (Imperial College), establishing the Daigaku-ryō (Imperial University) at the national level and kokugaku (provincial schools) at the local level. This system, centered on Confucianism, created a stratified academic structure. The Daigaku-ryō admitted aristocrats and bureaucrats, while the kokugaku educated the lower and middle classes. The curriculum was divided between two tracks—the study of Confucian classics and history and biographies studies—and was taught by scholars returning from Tang China.

The kentōshi also brought back techniques in architecture, sculpture, and lacquerware, which were adapted and refined with local characteristics. At Tōshōdaiji Temple—the first Japanese temple devoted to one of the Chinese Buddhist denominations—the Tang-style column-and-beam structure was preserved, but the roof pitch was reduced from 45 to 30 degrees to better withstand Japan’s frequent typhoons. Similarly, Tang-style brocade preserved in the Shōsō-in [the treasure house of Tōdai-ji Temple] was reimagined by Japanese artisans using indigenous plant dyes, giving rise to the distinctive kusakizome [plant-dyeing] tradition.

Such adaptive innovation was particularly evident in metallurgy. Tang straight-bladed sabers were reengineered by Japanese swordsmiths into the kiriha-zukuri form, optimized for both slashing and thrusting. Japanese tempering methods even influenced Chinese weapons manufacture, as noted in the Song-era military compendium Wujing Zongyao. 

In science and medicine, Tang China’s advanced knowledge had a lasting impact. For instance, the Xinxiu Bencao [Newly Revised Materia Medica, a Chinese medical text compiled during the Tang era], was incorporated into Japan’s Ishinpō [the oldest extant Japanese medical text]. Through localized application, this knowledge evolved into the principle of “one-third dosage reduction” [a principle in the Japanese adaptation of traditional Chinese medicine, whereby the dosage of herbal prescriptions inherited from classical Chinese texts is reduced to one-third when applied in the Japanese context]. Notably, medicinal materials introduced by the Chinese monk Jianzhen during his eastward journey—such as musk and agarwood—were later cultivated in Japan, reclassified as Japanese medicines, and later re-exported to China during the Song Dynasty, exemplifying a cycle of technological reciprocity.  

In religion, the Shingon school founded by the Japanese monk Kūkai was later transmitted back to Chang’an in the 9th century. Its systematic esoteric Buddhist doctrines and ritual practices revitalized Buddhist expression in China’s Central Plains. The lotus pedestal motifs of the Mahāvairocana statue excavated at Qinglong Monastery features floral patterns combining Tang iconography with solar and lunar emblems from Japan’s Shintō traditions, illustrating a localized re-interpretation during doctrinal transmission.

Cultural influence also extended into aesthetics. The Japanese aristocracy’s refined taste for imported Tang luxury goods (Tōbutsu) began to influence the connoisseurship of late Tang literati. One particularly compelling example comes from music archaeology: the Gagaku tradition [traditional court music and dance of Japan] preserved the Tang-era composition King Lanling. Compared with pipa scores discovered at the Mogao Caves in Dunhuang, the 28-beat structure of its po section more closely aligns with the musical style of the High Tang than later Chinese sources such as the Yuefu Zalu of the Song Dynasty. To this day, this piece remains a cherished link to Tang cultural heritage among Japanese scholars and the public alike.

Contemporary value of the kentōshi missions

Historically, the kentōshi system established a systematic pathway for sustained cross-cultural learning and exchange, offering valuable lessons for contemporary China in its efforts to engage in global cultural exchange. The Japanese experience—characterized by selective adaptation and contextual transformation of Tang political, religious, and artistic forms—demonstrated that successful cultural transmission requires both the “preservation of the core” and “innovation” in its form. This approach, which adapts communication strategies to local conditions while maintaining core cultural values, can enhance the effectiveness and sustainability of cross-cultural engagement.

In conclusion, the kentōshi missions represented a formalized mechanism of civilizational exchange between China and Japan and exemplified China’s early commitment to openness and engagement. Over more than two centuries, these missions enabled the transmission of political systems, religious thought, cultural concepts, and scientific knowledge, reflecting the foundational structure of early East Asian civilizational exchange. In an era of profound global reordering and reshaping of international perceptions through digital communication, the challenge of advancing civilizational dialogue—in values, expression, and dissemination mechanisms—has become increasingly urgent. The legacy of the kentoshi system offers enduring insights for navigating this new cultural landscape.

Qu Zhen is from the School of Education at Renmin University of China.

Edited by  REN GUANHONG