Abstract: During the period of the Republic of China, the great strides of the library cause and the self-needs of the development of Buddhism promoted the rise of the Buddhist library. Up to 1949, a total of 14 provinces across the country had established Buddhist libraries, mainly located in the present-day Yangtze River Delta region.The 1930s were the golden period for its development.Compared with traditional monastery libraries, Buddhist libraries exhibit the characteristics of being public, academic and pioneering. By arranging and analyzing the activities carried out by various Buddhist libraries, the paper identifies their major contributions to be promoting Buddhism, advocating Buddhism and innovating the classification of Buddhist scriptures. In sum, the Buddhist libraries in the period of the Republic of China were Buddhist undertakings, cultural undertakings and public welfare
undertakings.