Speaker Bio

Huang Rong is a Visiting Assistant Professor at New York University’s Institute for the Study of the Ancient World. She received her PhD and MA from Harvard University and her BA from Tsinghua University. From 2021 to 2023, she was the William R. Tyler Fellow in Byzantine Studies at Dumbarton Oaks, where she co-curated the exhibition “Garden and Nature in the Medieval World.” Her research focuses on the religious and cultural history of medieval China and Central Asia, with particular attention to the Silk Road and cross-cultural exchange. She studies how East Syriac Christianity (“Jingjiao”) took root in Tang China (618–907) and how it engaged, adapted to, and was shaped by Chinese Buddhist and Daoist intellectual and material worlds.

Recapping the Academic Seminar “Blurred Boundaries: Jingjiao and Religious Life in Tang China” on 24 February 2026

Dr. HUANG Rong from the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World at New York University delivered an academic seminar entitled “Blurred Boundaries: Jingjiao and Religious Life in Tang China” on 24 February 2026.  Her talk examined the arrival of Jingjiao in China in the seventh century, emphasizing that its development was a dynamic process of translation and cultural adaptation rather than a simple transplantation of a foreign religion.

Dr. HUANG discussed the Xi’an Stele (781 CE) as an example, whose iconography blends Christian, Daoist, and Buddhist motifs—with a cross positioned above clouds (a Daoist symbol) and a lotus (a Buddhist motif) at the base.  She also highlighted that the name of Jingjiao was changed from “Persian Religion” to “Da Qin Religion” in 745 CE, likely to distinguish it from Zoroastrianism.

Archaeological discoveries from Dunhuang and Turfan further confirm the activities of Jingjiao in China. The finds from Dunhuang include six Chinese Jingjiao texts and a silk banner bearing a cross. Although their attribution to Christianity or Manichaeism is still under debate, these discoveries reveal the circulation of religious symbols across different traditions. In Turfan, over 1,100 fragments of manuscripts in various languages such as Syriac and Sogdian have been unearthed, including biblical and ascetic writings. In addition, the discovery of a Tang‑era Eastern Syriac church site in Xinjiang in 2021 provides additional evidence of an active monastic community in the region.

Textual evidence demonstrates the adaptation process of Jingjiao in China. Early works present fundamental doctrines in simple Chinese, while later texts authored by Jingjing, the priest, demonstrated a more sophisticated engagement with Chinese intellectual traditions, reworking texts of Syriac origin rather than translating them verbatim.

Dr. HUANG concluded that Jingjiao was developed through continuous negotiation of cultural boundaries, inhabiting local forms and integrating vocabulary from Buddhism and Daoism. Its history in Tang China represents a cross-border narrative of translation, creation, and religious exchange.