Did you know Korea has one of the most comprehensive collections of Buddhist canons in the world?
A country’s cultural level is indicated in its printing technology and books because literature delivers the knowledge of the time. MugujeonggwangDaedaranigyeong (The Great Dharani Sutra) from Silla is the world’s oldest surviving book printed with wood blocks. Printing technology on the Korean peninsula continued to develop. About 300 years later, Goryeo printed and exported a vast number of books to China.
Goryeo(918-1392) was a leading cultural power. GoryeosaJeolyo (Concise History of Goryeo) documented that Emperor Zhezong of Song China ordered 5,200 books of 125 kinds from Goryeo in the year of 1091 alone. The emperor recognized the value of Goryeo’s books and ordered his servants to import them and copy them by hand if necessary. Among the most valuable documentary heritage from Goryeo is PalmanDaejanggyeong (Tripitaka Koreana), Korean National Treasure #32. It is also inscribed on the UNESCO Memory of the World Register in 2007.
PalmanDaejanggyeong, meaning Eighty-thousand Tripitaka, was given the name because over 80,000 wooden printing blocks were used to print the entire collection of Buddhist scriptures. Given that the thickness of each wood block is 1.6 inch, if all of the 81,352 blocks were stacked up, it would be higher than Baekdusan Mountain, the tallest mountain in Korea, rising over 9,000 feet above sea level. It would weigh 280 tons.
However, it is not just the vast quantity that makes PalmanDaejanggyeong great. The process of making each block required technology as complicated as producing semiconductor chips today. The entire collection of the great number of blocks were completed to perfection. It was a national project that involved more than 500,000 people for 16 years. Goryeo and Song China were the only countries that could organize this scale of a project for printing Buddhist scriptures. Buddhism was the dominant religion in Middle-age East Asia. Printing of this vast collection of Buddhist scriptures reflects the height of Goryeo’s cultural development.