> why was it ever acceptable to transliterate the Sanskrit into Chinese I'd say it wasn't transliteration, it was just writing. Sanskrit was written with loca

> why was it ever acceptable to transliterate the Sanskrit into Chinese I'd say it wasn't transliteration, it was just writing. Sanskrit was written with local script throughout the world. Unlike some other languages, which have strong affinity for one script, Sanskrit can be written with lots of scripts (e.g. Burmese, Tibetan, etc.). So Chinese characters were probably perceived just as another way of writing, not as some kind of vulgarisation. Sure, in the end the pronunciation drifted in unexpected ways. But I think it's not because people used Chinese characters, but because the knowledge of Sanskrit in China, Japan or Korea was not that widespread.