Buddhist scripture translations are among the greatest dramas that have happened in the entire history of Chinese translation. During the space of over one thousand years, Buddhist translators have delved into or touched upon numerous aspects and problems of translation, leaving us an invaluable treasure-house which present-day translation theoreticians can tap into. This paper is an investigation of a peculiar approach employed by early Buddhist translators called ge-yi, or 'concept matching'. Through examples from some Chinese translations of Buddhist sutras, it can be seen that the method of ge-yi is quite frequently used by early Buddhist translators. An analysis is then made with regard to the underlying causes of ge-yi, with the conclusion that although this phenomenon is partly related to the linguistic competence of the translators, seen from a cultural perspective it is caused inevitably by certain laws inherent in translation activities during the process of cultural exchange, especially during the nascent phase.