Idolatry

===Buddhism===
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According to Eric Reinders, icons and idolatry have been an integral part of Buddhism throughout its later history.<ref name="Pellizzi2005p61">{{cite book|author=Eric Reinders|editor=Francesco Pellizzi|title=Anthropology and Aesthetics, Volume 48: Autumn 2005|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SlMLvFIplLAC&pg=PA61|year=2005|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-87365-766-2|pages=61–63}}</ref> Buddhists, from Korea to Vietnam, Thailand to Tibet, Central Asia to South Asia, have long produced temples and idols, altars and malas, relics to amulets, images to ritual implements.<ref name="Pellizzi2005p61" /><ref>Minoru Kiyota (1985), [https://www.jstor.org/stable/30233958 Tathāgatagarbha Thought: A Basis of Buddhist Devotionalism in East Asia], Japanese Journal of Religious Studies, Vol. 12, No. 2/3, pages 207–231</ref><ref name="pori153">Pori Park (2012), [https://www.jstor.org/stable/23943371 Devotionalism Reclaimed: Re-mapping Sacred Geography in Contemporary Korean Buddhism], Journal of Korean Religions, Vol. 3, No. 2, pages 153–171</ref> The images or relics of Buddha are found in all Buddhist traditions, but they also feature gods and goddesses such as those in Tibetan Buddhism.<ref name="Pellizzi2005p61" /><ref>Allan Andrews (1993), [https://www.jstor.org/stable/3270396 Lay and Monastic Forms of Pure Land Devotionalism: Typology and History], Numen, Vol. 40, No. 1, pages 16–37</ref>

Bhakti (called ''Bhatti'' in Pali) has been a common practice in [[Theravada Buddhism]], where offerings and group prayers are made to [[Cetiya]] and particularly images of Buddha.<ref>Donald Swearer (2003), Buddhism in the Modern World: Adaptations of an Ancient Tradition (Editors: Heine and Prebish), Oxford University Press, {{ISBN|978-0195146981}}, pages 9–25</ref><ref>Karen Pechelis (2011), The Bloomsbury Companion to Hindu Studies (Editor: Jessica Frazier), Bloomsbury, {{ISBN|978-1472511515}}, pages 109–112</ref> [[Karel Werner]] notes that Bhakti has been a significant practice in [[Theravada]] Buddhism, and states, "there can be no doubt that deep devotion or ''bhakti / bhatti'' does exist in Buddhism and that it had its beginnings in the earliest days".<ref>Karel Werner (1995), Love Divine: Studies in Bhakti and Devotional Mysticism, Routledge, {{ISBN|978-0700702350}}, pages 45–46</ref>

According to Peter Harvey – a professor of Buddhist Studies, Buddha idols and idolatry spread into northwest Indian subcontinent (now Pakistan and Afghanistan) and into Central Asia with Buddhist Silk Road merchants.<ref name="Harvey2013p194"/> The Hindu rulers of different Indian dynasties patronized both Buddhism and Hinduism from 4th to 9th century, building Buddhist icons and cave temples such as the [[Ajanta Caves]] and [[Ellora Caves]] which featured Buddha idols.<ref name=cohen83>{{cite book|author=Richard Cohen|title=Beyond Enlightenment: Buddhism, Religion, Modernity|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=R5IPMKb4WFUC&pg=PA83 |year=2006|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1-134-19205-2|pages=83–84}}, '''Quote:''' Hans Bakker's political history of the Vakataka dynasty observed that Ajanta caves belong to the Buddhist, not the Hindu tradition. That this should be so is already remarkable in itself. By all we know of Harisena he was a Hindu; (...).</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last = Spink |first = Walter M. |year = 2006 |title = Ajanta: History and Development Volume 5: Cave by Cave |publisher = Brill Academic |place = Leiden |isbn = 978-90-04-15644-9 |url = https://books.google.com/books?id=UPqUHXlwXdcC |pages = 179–180}}</ref><ref name=malandra1993p13/> From the 10th century, states Harvey, the raids into northwestern parts of South Asia by Muslim Turks destroyed Buddhist idols, given their religious dislike for idolatry. The iconoclasm was so linked to Buddhism, that the Islamic texts of this era in India called all idols as ''Budd''.<ref name="Harvey2013p194">{{cite book|author=Peter Harvey|title=An Introduction to Buddhism: Teachings, History and Practices|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u0sg9LV_rEgC&pg=PA194 |year=2013|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-85942-4|pages=194–195}}</ref> The desecration of idols in cave temples continued through the 17th century, states Geri Malandra, from the offense of "the graphic, anthropomorphic imagery of Hindu and Buddhist shrines".<ref name=malandra1993p13>{{cite book|author=Geri Hockfield Malandra|title=Unfolding A Mandala: The Buddhist Cave Temples at Ellora|url=https://archive.org/details/unfoldingmandala0000mala |url-access=registration|year=1993|publisher=State University of New York Press|isbn=978-0-7914-1355-5|pages=[https://archive.org/details/unfoldingmandala0000mala/page/n22 1]–4}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author1=Trudy Ring|author2=Noelle Watson|author3=Paul Schellinger|title=Asia and Oceania: International Dictionary of Historic Places|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=voerPYsAB5wC&pg=PA256|year=2012|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1-136-63979-1|page=256}}, Quote: "Some had been desecrated by zealous Muslims during their occupation of Maharashtra in the fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth centuries."</ref>

In East Asia and Southeast Asia, worship in Buddhist temples with the aid of icons and sacred objects has been historic.<ref name="Reinders2012p17"/> In Japanese Buddhism, for example, ''Butsugu'' (sacred objects) have been integral to the worship of the Buddha (''kuyo''), and such idolatry considered a part of the process of realizing one's Buddha nature. This process is more than meditation, it has traditionally included devotional rituals (''butsudo'') aided by the Buddhist clergy.<ref name="Reinders2012p17"/> These practices are also found in Korea and China.<ref name=pori153/><ref name="Reinders2012p17">{{cite book|author1=Fabio Rambelli|author2=Eric Reinders|title=Buddhism and Iconoclasm in East Asia: A History|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yVYWmJUPQooC |year=2012|publisher=Bloomsbury Academic|isbn=978-1-4411-8168-8|pages=17–19, 23–24, 89–93}}</ref>