Vietnamese Buddhism

See also: South Vietnamese Buddhist crisis and coup of 1963

See also: Buddhist crisis of 1966

While Buddhism is the majority religion in Vietnam, different Buddhist factions were critical in the political processes of the Republic of Vietnam (i.e., South Vietnam).

The factions were less differentiated on theological, but rather on ideological, grounds. There also were political and religious groups based on variations of Buddhism, such as the Cao Dai.

Theology

Even though the Vietnamese factions were more politically differentiated, Buddhism itself had its own mainstream Vietnamese version, as well as new sects that were spinoffs from Buddhism, such as the Cao Dai and Hoa Hao.

The core of Vietnamese Buddhism comes from the Mayahana (Greater Way, Ðài Thừa in Vietnamese) rite, but with influences from Confucianism and Taoism. The Vietnamese tendency to absorb cultural influence and create their own synthesis is essential to understanding the country. Vietnamese cuisine is recognizably Asian, but has French influences, as with a delicately baked cake flavored with a scent-tamed durian custard. In a more serious vein, one cannot understand the governing pattern of Ngo Dinh Diem until one understand his Vietnamese minority Catholic outlook had a strong Confucianist influence.

Politics

A major area of conflict was that Ngo Dinh Diem, president from 1954 to his overthrow in 1963 was a Catholic, and gave preferences to the Catholic majority. Even so, there were later events such as the Buddhist crisis of 1966 involving activist Buddhist groups, even though they were protesting against a government whose leaders were primarily

Perhaps the most activist major faction was led by Tri Quang. Arguably, he maintained the largest political organization in South Vietnam, other than the Viet Cong.