 The dominant religious beliefs during the Ming dynasty were the various forms of Chinese folk religion and the Three Teachings – Confucianism , Taoism , and Buddhism . The Yuan @-@ supported Tibetan lamas fell from favor , and the early Ming emperors particularly favored Taoism , granting its practitioners many positions in the state 's ritual offices . The Hongwu Emperor curtailed the cosmopolitan culture of the Mongol Yuan dynasty , and the prolific Prince of Ning Zhu Quan even composed one encyclopedia attacking Buddhism as a foreign " mourning cult " , deleterious to the state , and another encyclopedia that subsequently joined the Taoist canon . 
