No, iirc the religion was constructed pretty much wholesale during the opium wars to convince people that the Chinese were an intelligent people with a rich cultural history who we shouldn&#x27;t be genociding. There are a bunch of books about it, this blog post gives an overview of the situation and links to a bunch of the books: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;meaningness.wordpress.com&#x2F;2011&#x2F;06&#x2F;28&#x2F;a-new-world-religion&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;meaningness.wordpress.com&#x2F;2011&#x2F;06&#x2F;28&#x2F;a-new-world-rel...</a><p>I haven&#x27;t really spent any time reading up on it, but they talk about it all the time on the Buddhist Geeks podcast, and presumably they&#x27;d be in the know since they are&#x2F;were students at Naropa.