Many factors influence occurrences of rock burst in coal mines, such as mining methods, control methods of the coal roof, lithological characteristics of the roof and floor, tectonic stress, groundwater and so on. Among those factors, lithological characteristics in the roof are the intrinsic controlling factors that affect rock burst during coal mining. Tangshan colliery is one of the coal mines that have suffered seriously from rock bursts in China. In this paper, based on the investigating the lithological characteristics of coal roofs and occurrence of rock bursts in Tangshan colliery, a numerical method is used to study the influence of roof lithological characteristics on rock burst potential. The results show that the lithological characteristics in the roof have an important impact on the distributions of stresses and elastic strain energy in coal seams and their surrounding rocks. Occurrences of rock bursts in this colliery have a close correlation with the thick-bedded, medium- to fine-grained sandstones in the roof. Such strata can easily cause severe stress concentration and accumulate enough energy to trigger rock bursts in the working face during mining operations.