Talk:Christianity and Buddhism/Old version

Buddhist-Christian Parallels have been noted across the ages by scholars but are now being more widely appreciated as individuals search accessible Buddhist scriptures in ancient and modern languages. The field takes three forms:

1. parallel teachings of Buddhism and Christianity in words that appear similar and in some cases appear to share a common origin
2. parallel sayings of the Buddha and Jesus
3. general parallels between the spiritual intent and practices of Buddhism and Christianity

The three categories overlap and are seldom presented separately, although one approach has used the theologically derived Q document of the, possibly, original words of Jesus as a basis of comparison with the supposed earliest words of the Buddha. The process is useful insofar as it highlights direct parallels in words, albeit in modern languages as neither the original words of Jesus or the Buddha were written down at the time nor were the first scriptures in the languages they probably spoke. Other studies of parallels include learned analyses, most of them recent although some date back to the time of the early Church, which seems to have suppressed historical linkages between the ancient Middle-East/Greece and India.

Historical Interactions

Further information: History of Buddhism

More archeological findings and discovery of early Christian and Gnostic writings indicate Buddhist missionary presence and influence in spiritual traditions of the middle east in all Greek lands as early as 260 BCE, during the reign of Emperor Ashoka all the way to the founding and spreading of Manicheism around 200 AD. Buddhist presence and influence in the region can no longer be denied.

India has been open to the outside world from ancient times and a vigorous commercial activity went on between India and the Mediterranean world even before the Christian era. This is testified by both the western and Indian classical writers. Knowledge of Indian geography and India’s trade with the Mediterranean world is abundantly testified by western classical writers on India such as Strabo (63 BC-24 AD), Pliny (AD 23-79), Ptolemy (AD 100-160) and the author of Periplus of the Erythrean Sea. They give detailed information about the people, climate, trade routes, ports, cargoes and the economic condition of India.

Establishment of Diplomatic Relations

After the death of Alexander the Great, much of his empire was divided and eventually ruled by Greek generals from Alexander's army. Part of it was retained by Alexander's General, Seleucus I Nicator. This was also the beginning of India's first historical empire, under the guidance of Chandragupta Maurya.

"Always lying in wait for the neighboring nations, strong in arms and persuasive in council, he [Seleucus] acquired Mesopotamia, Armenia, 'Seleucid' Cappadocia, Persis, Parthia, Bactria, Arabia, Tapouria, Sogdia, Arachosia, Hyrcania, and other adjacent peoples that had been subdued by Alexander, as far as the river Indus, so that the boundaries of his empire were the most extensive in Asia after that of Alexander. The whole region from Phrygia to the Indus was subject to Seleucus. He crossed the Indus and waged war with Sandrocottus [Maurya], king of the Indians, who dwelt on the banks of that stream, until they came to an understanding with each other and contracted a marriage relationship." Appian, History of Rome, The Syrian Wars 55

The two men eventually reached an agreement and through a treaty sealed in 303 BC, established diplomatic relations which involved both marriage and ceding of Indian territory to the Mauryan Emperor in return for 500 elephants.

"The Indians occupy [in part] some of the countries situated along the Indus, which formerly belonged to the Persians: Alexander deprived the Ariani of them, and established there settlements of his own. But Seleucus Nicator gave them to Sandrocottus in consequence of a marriage contract, and received in return five hundred elephants." Strabo 15.2.1(9)

The first Greek ambassador sent by Seleucid Nicator to the Indian Empire was Megasthenes. It was Seleucid Nicator who eventually founded the city of Antioch on the Orontes, which eventually became one of the earliest centers of Christianity.

The main Greek cities of the Middle-East happen to have played a key role in the development of Christianity, such as Antioch and especially Alexandria, and “it was later in this very place that some of the most active centers of Christianity were established” (Robert Linssen, “Zen living”). These Greek cities were also major centers of trade with India and the east.

There were three main routes which connected India with the western world. First, there was an overland route which linked India with the silk route from Antioch to Central Asia and to China. In normal circumstances the Himalayan range in the north was no serious obstacle to India’s trade with Central Asia along the silk route. Secondly, there was a route through the Persian Gulf. It connected the mouth of Indus to the mouth of the Euphrates and thence up the river to the point where roads branched off to Antioch and the Laventine ports. The third route was from India to the Red Sea and from there by road to the Nile and to Alexandria.

Mauryan Proselytizing

See also: Greco-Buddhist monasticism

Some of the Edicts of Ashoka inscriptions describe the efforts made by Ashoka to propagate the Buddhist faith throughout the major Seleucid kingdoms found throughout the middle east and Egypt. The Edicts identify the names and location of the main Greek monarchs of the time, and they are claimed as recipients of Buddhist proselytism: Antiochus II Theos of the Seleucid Kingdom (261–246 BCE), Ptolemy II Philadelphos of Egypt (285–247 BCE), Antigonus Gonatas of Macedonia (276–239 BCE), Magas of Cyrene (288–258 BCE), and Alexander II of Epirus (272–255 BCE).

File:AshokaMap2.gif

Buddhist proselytism at the time of king Ashoka (260–218 BCE).

"The conquest by Dharma has been won here, on the borders, and even six hundred yojanas (5,400-9,600 km) away, where the Greek king Antiochos rules, beyond there where the four kings named Ptolemy, Antigonos, Magas and Alexander rule, likewise in the south among the Cholas, the Pandyas, and as far as Tamraparni (Sri Lanka)." (Edicts of Ashoka, 13th Rock Edict, S. Dhammika).

Although the philosophical systems of Buddhism and Christianity have evolved in rather different ways, the moral precepts advocated by Buddhism from the time of Ashoka through his edicts as well as the Pali Canon do have some similarities with the Christian moral precepts developed more than two centuries later:

• respect for life
• respect for the weak and disenfranchised
• rejection of violence
• confession
• emphasis on charity and good deeds.

Kersten contrasts the "bloodthirsty and vengeful deity" of the Old Testament's Semitic tribes with the "totally different God" who has illuminated "the philosophy behind Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, as relayed by Matthew's Gospel":

"Where did Jesus learn the precepts he proclaimed in the Sermon on the Mount?" ... "No other religion of the eastern Mediterranean area lays claim to the magnanimously loving Grace preached by Jesus".

Ashoka's pillars give us some of the earliest Buddhist ideas written in stone:

"Dhamma is good, but what constitutes Dhamma? (It includes) little evil, much good, kindness, generosity, truthfulness and purity." Pilar Edict Nb2 (S. Dhammika)

"And noble deeds of Dhamma and the practice of Dhamma consist of having kindness, generosity, truthfulness, purity, gentleness and goodness increase among the people." Rock Pilar Nb7 (S. Dhammika)

The administrative structures formed by Buddhists are also very similar:

• monasticism and communal living for spiritual adherents which adhered to principals of practicing poverty and chastity.
• early Christian Councils reminiscent in organization to the Buddhist councils.
• missionaries and missions which were first organized and established by Buddhists, all predate the early Christian organizations in the same areas where Christianity was first established (Antioch, etc.).

One theory is that these similarities may indicate the propagation of Buddhist ideals into the Western World, with the Greeks acting as intermediaries and religious syncretists.

"Scholars have often considered the possibility that Buddhism influenced the early development of Christianity. They have drawn attention to many parallels concerning the births, lives, doctrines, and deaths of the Buddha and Jesus" (Bentley, "Old World Encounters").

Early Christianity, Manichaeism and Buddhism

See also: Greco-Buddhism and Buddhism and the Roman world

The story of the birth of the Buddha was well known in the West, and possibly influenced the story of the birth of Jesus: Saint Jerome (4th century CE) mentions the birth of the Buddha, who he says "was born from the side of a virgin". Also a fragment of Archelaos of Carrha (278 CE) mentions the Buddha's virgin-birth.

Early 3rd-4th century Christian writers such as Hippolytus and Epiphanius write about a Scythianus, who visited India around 50 AD from where he brought "the doctrine of the Two Principles". According to these writers, Scythianus' pupil Terebinthus presented himself as a “Buddha” ("he called himself Buddas" Cyril of Jerusalem). Terebinthus went to Palestine and Judaea where he met the Apostles ("becoming known and condemned" Isaia), and ultimately settled in Babylon, where he transmitted his teachings to Mani, thereby creating the foundation of what could be called Persian syncretic Buddhism, Manicheism. We find evidence that Buddhist thought had major influence on the teachings of Mani:

In the story of the Death of Mani :

It was a day of pain

and a time of sorrow

when the messenger of light

entered death

when he entered complete Nirvana"

Following Mani's travels to the Kushan Empire (several religious paintings in Bamiyan are attributed to him) at the beginning of his proselytizing career, various Buddhist influences seem to have permeated Manichaeism:

Buddhist influences were significant in the formation of Mani's religious thought. The transmigration of souls became a Manichaean belief, and the quadripartite structure of the Manichaean community, divided between male and female monks (the "elect") and lay followers (the "hearers") who supported them, appears to be based on that of the Buddhist sangha. (Richard Foltz, "Religions of the Silk Road")

The spread of Manichaeism (300– AD 500). Map reference: World History Atlas, Dorling Kindersly.

Manichaeism spread with extraordinary rapidity throughout both the east and west. It reached Rome through the apostle Psattiq by AD 280, who was also in Egypt in 244 and 251. The faith was flourishing in the Fayum area of Egypt in 290. Manichaean monasteries existed in Rome in 312 during the time of the Christian Pope Miltiades. By 354, Hilary of Poitiers wrote that the Manichaean faith was a significant force in southern France.

Also, in the Great Song of Mani (13th-14th century) Mani is many times referred to as Buddha Mani.

One of the founding fathers of western Christianity, Augustine of Hippo was originally a Manichean.

In the 2nd century CE, the Christian dogmatist Clement of Alexandria recognized Bactrian Buddhists (Sramanas) and Indian Gymnosophists for their influence on Greek thought:

"Thus philosophy, a thing of the highest utility, flourished in antiquity among the barbarians, shedding its light over the nations. And afterwards it came to Greece. First in its ranks were the prophets of the Egyptians; and the Chaldeans among the Assyrians; and the Druids among the Gauls; and the Sramanas among the Bactrians ("Σαρμαναίοι Βάκτρων"); and the philosophers of the Celts; and the Magi of the Persians, who foretold the Saviour's birth, and came into the land of Judaea guided by a star. The Indian gymnosophists are also in the number, and the other barbarian philosophers. And of these there are two classes, some of them called Sramanas ("Σαρμάναι"), and others Brahmins (Βραφμαναι)." Clement of Alexandria "The Stromata, or Miscellanies" Book I, Chapter XV[21]

The Greek legend of "Barlaam and Ioasaph", sometimes mistakenly attributed to the 7th century John of Damascus but actually written by the Georgian monk Euthymios in the 11th century, was ultimately derived, through a variety of intermediate versions (Arabic and Georgian) from the life story of the Buddha. The king-turned-monk Ioasaph (Georgian Iodasaph, Arabic Yūdhasaf or Būdhasaf) ultimately derives his name from the Sanskrit Bodhisattva, the name used in Buddhist accounts for Gautama before he became a Buddha. Barlaam and Ioasaph were placed in the Greek calendar of saints on 26 August, and in the West they were canonized (as "Barlaam and Josaphat") in the Roman Martyrology on the date of 27 November.

The story was translated into Hebrew in the Middle Ages as "Ben-Hamelekh Vehanazir" ("The Prince and the Nazirite"), and is widely read by Jews to this day.

The Sanskrit word bodhisattva is translated as nazir and in Hebrew means: ("One who abstains"); and is generally a word used for monks. Jesus too is referred throughout the Greek New Testament as a Nazarene who talks about a life of poverty and celibacy, something different than the vows of the original vow of Nazirs in Numbers 6:1-21.

Parallel Sayings

Buddha	Jesus
"Consider others as yourself." (Dhammapada 10:1)	"Do to others as you would have them do to you." (Gospel of Luke 6:31)
"If anyone should give you a blow with his hand, with a stick, or with a knife, you should abandon any desires and utter no evil words." (Majjhima Nikaya 21:6)	"If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also." (Luke 6:29)
"Hatreds do not ever cease in this world by hating, but by love: this is an eternal truth. Overcome anger by love, overcome evil by good ... Overcome the miser by giving, overcome the liar by truth." (Dhammapada 1.5 & 17.3)	"Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. From anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. Give to everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them back." (Luke 6:27-30)
"If you do not tend one another, then who is there to tend to you? Whoever would tend me, he should tend the sick." (Vinaya, Mahavagga 8:26:3)	"Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me." (Gospel of Matthew 25:45)
"Abandoning the taking of life, the ascetic Gautama dwells refraining from taking life, without stick or sword." (Digha Nikaya 1:1:8)	"Put your sword back into its place; for all those who take the sword shall perish by the sword." (Matt. 26:52)
... all these do not equal a sixteenth part of the liberation of mind by loving kindness. The liberation of mind by loving kindness surpasses them all and shines forth, bright and brilliant. (Itivuttaka 27;19-2) Just as a mother would protect her only child at the risk of her own life, even so, cultivate a boundless heart towards all beings. Let your thoughts of boundless love pervade the whole world." (Metta Sutta)	"This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friend." (John 15:12-13)
Just as rain penetrates a badly-covered house, so passion enters a dispersed mind. Just as rain does not penetrate a well-covered house, so too does passion not enter a well-developed mind (Dh 1:13-14).	Everyone who hears my words and does them is like a man who built a house on rock. The rain fell, a torrent broke against the house, and it did not fall, for it had a rock foundation. But everyone who hears my words and does not do them is like a man who built a house on sand. The rain came, the torrent broke against it, and it collapsed. The ruin of that house was great (QS 14).
It's easy to see the errors of others, but hard to see your own. You winnow like chaff the errors of others,but conceal your own — like a cheat, an unlucky throw. If you focus on the errors of others, constantly finding fault, your effluents flourish.You're far from their ending. (Dhammapada Mahavagga 252-253)	"Why do you see the speck in your neighbor's eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? Or how can you say to your neighbor, "Friend, let me take the speck out of your eye," when you yourself do not see the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor's eye." (Luke 6:41-42)
"Do not look at the faults of others, or what others have done or not done; observe what you yourself have done and have not done." (Dhammapada 4:7)	He said to them, "Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her." (John 8:4-7)
But these three things, monks, shine openly, not in secret. What three? The moon, the sun, and the Dhamma and Discipline...(Anguttara Nikaya 3:129) "That great cloud rains down on all whether their nature is superior or inferior. The light of the sun and the moon illuminates the whole world, both him who does well and him who does ill, both him who stands high and him who stands low." (Sadharmapundarika Sutra 5)	"Your father in heaven makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous." (Matt. 5:45)
"Let us live most happily, possessing nothing; let us feed on joy, like the radiant gods." (Dhammapada 15:4))	"Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God." (Luke 6:20)
"The avaricious do not go to heaven, the foolish do not extol charity. The wise one, however, rejoicing in charity, becomes thereby happy in the beyond." (Dhammapada 13:11)	"If you wish to be perfect, go sell your possessions, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven." (Matt.19:21)
...when a tathagatha arises in the world,.. then there is the manifestation of great light and radiance: then no blinding darkness prevails. (Samyutta Nikaya 56:38; V442)	Jesus is the light of the world - John 8:12 Those who do the truth come to the light - John 3:17-21
Plucking out her lovely eye, with mind unattached she felt no regret. 'Here, take this eye. It's yours.' Straightaway she gave it to him. Straightaway his passion faded right there,and he begged her forgiveness.(Therigata 14.1 Subha and the Libertine)	"And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. (Matt. 5:29–30).
Buddha the new born prince is adored and predicted by seer Asita and gods celebrate his birth.([2]SN 3.11 Nalaka Sutta)	Jesus the new born prince is adored and predicted by seers "from the east" who celebrate his birth.(Matthew 2)
Buddha holds nothing back: there is nothing, Ananda, with regard to the teachings that the Tathagata holds to the last with the closed fist of a teacher who keeps some things back. (Digha Nikaya, Mahaparinibbana Sutta,32)	Jesus holds nothing back: because a slave doesn't know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything I have heard from My Father.(John 15:15)
Chosen ones of Buddha the Blessed One saw beings with little dust in their eyes (Samyutta Nikaya 6.1 Ayacana Sutta) He has long had little dust in his eyes. What if I were to teach him the Dhamma first?(MN 26 Ariyapariyesana Sutta)	Chosen ones of Jesus You did not choose Me, but I chose you. (John 15:16)(Matthew 9: 35 - 10: 8, Mark 3: 13 - 19, Luke 6: 12 - 18)
MARA AND BUDDHA Then Mara, the Evil One, knowing with his awareness the train of thought in the Blessed One's awareness, went to him and on arrival said to him: "Exercise rulership, Blessed One! Exercise rulership, O One Well-gone! Mara leaves Then Mara the Evil One — sad & dejected at realizing, "The Blessed One knows me; the One Well-gone knows me" — vanished right there.(Samyutta Nikaya 4.20 Rajja Sutta)	SATAN AND JESUS: And the devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, 6 and said to him, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. 7 If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” 8 Satan leaves 13 And when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time. (Luke 4:1)
Buddha is the Truth and the Law: "He who sees the Dhamma, he sees me; he who sees me, sees the Dhamma."Kindred Sayings (III, Khandhaa-vagga, Middle Fifty, Ch 4, 87, Vakkali Sutta)	Jesus is the Truth and the Law:Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way? Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth and the life: no man cometh to the Father, but by me. (John 14:6)
Buddha tells us to "come and see" the Dhamma or truth, which is the Buddha...In the Six Characteristics of the Dharma or the "law", the fourth one is "Ehipashyaka" or, "Come and See".	Jesus tells us "come and see" his true dwelling, Jesus is the truth: "They said unto him, Rabbi, (which is to say, being interpreted, Master,) where dwellest thou? 39 He saith unto them, Come and see. They came and saw where he dwelt, and abode with him that day: for it was about the tenth hour."John 1:35-39,John 1:43-46.
Buddha lectures priest on bloodless sacrifice: "But, Reverend Gotama, is there any sacrifice that is more profitable than these four?" "There is, Brahmin." "What is it, Reverend Gotama?" "Brahmin, if anyone with a pure heart undertakes the precepts - to refrain from taking life, from taking what is not given, from sexual immorality, from lying speech and from taking strong drink and sloth-producing drugs - that constitutes a sacrifice more profitable than any of these four."(Kutadanta Sutta)	Jesus lectures priest (Sadducees) on bloodless sacrifice: 33And to love Him with all the heart, with all the understanding, with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbor as himself, is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices." (Mark 12:33)
Buddha calls priests blind O Vasettha, those brahmins who know the three Vedas are just like a line of blind men tied together where the first sees nothing, the middle man nothing, and the last sees nothing (Tevijja-Sutta, Dighanikaya, 13:15).	Jesus calls priests (Pharisees) blind Can the blind lead the blind? Won't they both fall into a pit? (Matthew 15:14).
Buddha says eating meat isn't bad, bad morals is:"[t]aking life, beating, wounding, binding, stealing, lying, deceiving, worthless knowledge, adultery; this is stench. Not the eating of meat." (Book 02 Kulavagga : Chapter 2 Amagandha Sutta)	Jesus says eating meat isn't bad, bad morals is: 19because it entereth not into his heart, but into the belly and goeth out into the drain, thereby purging all meats?" 21For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, 22thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: (Mark 7)
Buddha sends missionaries"Go forth, o bhikkhus, for the good of the many, for the happiness of the many, out of compassion for the world, for the benefit, for the good, for the happiness of gods and men. Let not two go by one way. Preach the doctrine that is beautiful in its beginning, beautiful in its middle, and beautiful in its ending. Declare the holy life in its purity, completely both in the spirit and the letter.[Mahavagga Ch 5, Vinaya Pitaka]"	Jesus sends missionariesTherefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in[a] the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. (Matthew 28:19).
Buddha helps outcastes (Thag 12.2), lepers(Ud 5.3) and the courtesan like Ambapali (Digha Nikaya 16: Maha-parinibbana Sutta)	Jesus helps outcaste lepers (Luke 17:11-19) and "sinful women" like Mary Magdalene or Mary of Bethany (Luke 7:36-50)
God appoints Buddha:God the creator: "Throw open the door to the Deathless! Let them hear the Dhamma realized by the Stainless One![Ariyapariyesana Sutta]	Christ says he has been anointed by God: 18He hath anointed Me to preach the Gospel to the poor. He hath sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised,21And He began to say unto them, "This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your ears." (Luke 4:21)
Buddha declares: Open are the doors to the Deathless to those with ears. Let them show their conviction.[Ariyapariyesana Sutta]	Christ declares after defeating Satan: Repent! for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. —Matthew 4:17 Anyone who has ears to hear ought to hear."(Mark 4:23)
Buddha can walk on water and walk through walls: He goes unimpeded through walls, ramparts, and mountains as if through space. He walks on water without sinking as if it were dry land.(Digha Nikaya 11:Kevatta Sutta)	Jesus can walk on water and walk through walls: And in the fourth watch of the night Jesus went unto them, walking on the sea.Mat 14:25 "Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them." (John 20:26)
Buddha and the Cross: "This, monks, is called a monk whose cross-bar is thrown off, 10 whose moat is filled in, whose pillar is pulled out, whose bolt is withdrawn, a noble one with banner lowered, burden placed down, unfettered.(Majjhima Nikaya 22:Alagaddupama Sutta I 139-140)	Jesus and the Cross: And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple. (Luke 14:27)
Buddha and the Sacrifice: This Purusa is all that yet hath been and all that is to be; (Rig Veda Purusha Sukta) Buddha is known as the MAHA PURUSHA. This Purusha is a human sacrifice or Purushamedha, from which all creation comes forth. "Maha -Purusha" in the Pali canon, the Digha Nikaya, in the discourse titled "Sutra of the Marks" (Pali: Lakkhana Sutta).Griffith (1899) :"man, the noblest victim, being actually or symbolically sacrificed ... and men and women of various tribes, figures, complexions, characters, and professions being attached to the sacrificial stakes in place of the tame and wild animals enumerated in Book XXIV [VS 24]. These nominal victims were afterwards released uninjured, and, so far as the text of the White Yajurveda goes, the whole ceremony was merely emblematical." The ceremony evokes the mythical sacrifice of Purusha, the "Cosmic Man", and the officiating Brahman recites the Purusha sukta to the assembled human victims (RV 10.90 = AVS 5.19.6 = VS 31.1–16). From the body of the Purusha all things come forth. In this human sacrifice, the Purusha is tied to a stake and symbolically killed.	Jesus and the Sacrifice: 3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. (John 1) “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! (John 1) 12For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ.(1cor 12:12)

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Dating of Texts

One of the sources of controversy in the parallel teachings has been the dating of the texts, both Buddhist and Christian. Buddhist teachings and missionaries are obviously older, however, Buddhism began with a long tradition of oral teachings which were finally put down in writing in Sri Lanka during the reign of King Vaṭṭagamiṇi (70 B.C.E.)The Ti-pitaka rendered into writing for first time at Aloka-vihara, Matale, Sri Lanka: The Fourth Buddhist Council according to Theravada tradition held in Sri Lanka. Before the scriptures were put into writing, several Buddhist councils were held in order to reach an agreement on what constituted the official canon:

"There is every reason to believe that the Pitakas [sacred books containing the legends of Buddha] now present in Ceylon are substantially identical with the books of the Southern Canon, as settled at the Council of Patna about the year 250 B.C. As no works would have been received into the Canon which were not then believed to be very old, the Pitakas may be approximately placed in the fourth century B.C., and parts of them possibly reach back very nearly, if not quite, to the time of Gautama (Buddha) himself." (Rhys Davids, Buddhism: Being a Sketch of the Life and Teachings of Gautama, the Buddha (London, 1894), p. 10)

The oral teachings were important as the poorest and disenfranchised were not literate, in fact, most of ancient society was illiterate and the most effective way for the teachings to be proclaimed was orally or through preaching, and so the preacher tradition begins with Buddha and the missions. The exortation "Open are the doors to the Deathless to those with ears [Ariyapariyesana Sutta] is literal, and is similarly expressed in the Jesus story, "This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your ears." (Luke 4:21) The life story of the Buddha was already being translated into Chinese around 70 A.D.:

"We know that the Fo-pen-hing [legends of Buddha] was translated into Chinese from Sanskrit (the ancient language of Hinduism) as early as the eleventh year of the reign of - Wing-ping (Ming-ti) of the Hans Dynasty, i.e., 69 or 70 A.D. We may, therefore, safely suppose that the original work was in circulation in India for some time before this date." (Samuel Beal, The Romantic Legends of Sakya Buddha from the Chinese Sanskrit (London, 1875), p. vi.)

A similar problem occurs in dating the Christian Gospels. The Gospels for a while, circulated in oral traditions:

All early gospels have a common background. They come from an age when traditions about Jesus had not yet been fixed. Most these traditions, in fact, were still being circulated orally. In the “unwritten tradition,” various narratives about Jesus were being recounted along with parables and teachings attributed to him (Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.9.11). The oral traditions were so abundant that, as one ancient writer put it, “if every one of them were written down, I suppose the world itself could not contain the books that would be written” (John 21:25).(Andrew Bernhard)

However, a general consensus as to the timeline of putting those scriptures down in writing has been reached by most scholars trying to date the Gospels:

All parts of all early gospels were likely written after the death of Jesus (ca. 30 C.E.), but before Irenaeus created a broad consensus that only four[41] individual[42] gospels could be regarded as authoritative scripture (ca. 180 C.E.). The period for the writing of the early gospels might reasonably be narrowed to something like 60-150 C.E...(Ibid)

We can safely assume that Buddhist teachings, in particular the Pali Canon, were circulating around the world, both orally, from the time of Emperor Ashoka's missions around the world (Second Century B.C.), and written (from the time of King Vattagamini), earlier than their Christian counterparts.

Aramaic and Greek Missions

Bilingual inscription (Greek and Aramaic) by king Ashoka, from Kandahar (Shar-i-kuna). Kabul Museum. Click image for translation

We might also assume that many Buddhist teachings were circulating in both Greek and Aramaic languages. In the western most part of Ashoka's empire, Edict 13, was in both Greek and Aramaic Many of the kings after Ashoka in the northwest of India were of Greek descent and strongly Buddhist, such as Menander or King Milinda.

Many scholars debate as to what language Jesus and the apostles spoke in. Many have so far concluded that Jesus spoke Aramaic and knew Hebrew.

Moreover, Jesus’ disciples were all Aramaic-speaking Jews, and the tradition as they and others handed it down was doubtless in that tongue -- as we have noted, the various surviving tags of Aramaic, such as Abba, effathá, talithá kumi, clearly indicate this.(ibid, Frederick C. Grant)

Nazir for Buddha?

The word Buddha or Bodhisatva is not once used in the New Testament. This point is not missed altogether by scholars of comparative religions.

The followers of the Buddha in Alexandria during the decades either side of Jesus' birth, if there were any, certainly did not call themselves Buddhists. Instead, they probably would have used the name adopted by their brothers in India: the followers of the Dharma (the Universal Law and the teaching of Buddha). In Greek, the word Dharma may be translated as Logos...The most sacred authority in Buddhism is the trinity represented by Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Christian theology has the Holy Trinity of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, of whom the Son, the second Person, is equated with the Logos (that is to say the Dharma), and the third Person, the Holy Spirit, is active in the community of the faithful (the Sangha).

Another possible explanation for this might be found in the more well known history of the spread of Buddhism in China. In China, early Buddhist missionaries explained Buddhist ideas using Taoist terminology. Many Chinese held Buddhism to be a kind of Taoism of the foreigner and so not in conflict as they shared many of the same ideas.

An early circular ichthys symbol, created by combining the Greek letters ΙΧΘΥΣ, forming an eight-spoked wheel also known as the Dharmachakra in Buddhism

A similar integration or intermingling of Buddhist teachings generally happened in many of the different lands where missionaries were sent, including Tibet with the Bon traditions and in Japan with Shinto traditions.

In the middle eastern regions where Christianity began such as Antioch, many of the kingdoms were ruled by a small minority of Greco-Seleucid rulers with subjects of a Jewish majority. Jewish terminology and myths to explain Buddhist metaphysical ideas might have been utilized by Buddhist missionaries.

According to Epiphanius of Constantia (Salamis), the Essenes were also called Nazarene – Nazarenos or Nazoraios

Evidence of such a possibility presents itself in the Greek legend of "Barlaam and Ioasaph". The Hebrew translation of this text in the middle ages, is called "Ben-Hamelekh Vehanazir" ("The Prince and the Nazirite") or the "Prince and the Nazirite". The Sanskrit word bodhisatva is completely replaced with the word "Nazir" and in Hebrew means: ("One who abstains"); and generally became a word used for monks by the middle ages. Jesus too is referred throughout the Greek New Testament as a Nazarene and a celibate who tells his disciples to leave all material things behind if they want to be his disciple in several places in the New Testament. This was something entirely different from the Judaic tradition mentioned in Numbers 6:1-21.

Gerber and Kersten have made a valiant effort to prove that the historical Jesus lived the life of a Buddhist and taught Buddhist ideals to his disciples; their work follows in the footsteps of the Oxford New Testament scholar' Barnett Hillman Streeter, who established as early as the 1930s that the ,moral teaching of the Buddha has four remarkable resemblance to the Sermon on the Mount."

Later influences

The Baptism of Christ, by Piero della Francesca, 1449

Praying Hands by Albrecht Dürer showing the hand position of a medieval commendation ceremony.

The use of rosaries spread from India to Europe during the Crusades through the Islamic versions.

When the Catholic missionary Francis Xavier started preaching to the Japanese, he used the word Dainichi to inculturate the notion of the Christian God. However, when he learnt that the Japanese used Dainichi for the Buddha Vairocana, he changed to use Deusu from Portuguese and Latin Deus, avoiding confusion of Christianity and Shingon Buddhism.

Prayer postures are also quite generally associated with a particular religious tradition. Prayer with both the palms touching one another is called the "Anjali Mudra" in Indian spiritual traditions, and is a common greeting and prayer posture in all Indian spiritual traditions, including Buddhism, but is absent in Jewish traditions, whose scriptures mention raised or clasped hands. However, we find this prayer position found in Christian art from the middle ages, considered a common prayer posture of Christianity

In literature

H.G. Wells in his Outline of History draws strong parallels between the essential message of both Buddha and Jesus main:love thy neignbor, and how that message was distorted by followers and the priesthood. Durant in his The Story of Philosophy suggests that Jesus-Buddha is the feminine idealogy, Nietzsche the masculine and Plato-Socrates somewhere in between. Paul Carus' 1894 The Gospel of Buddha was modeled on the New Testament and told the story of Buddha through parables.

Scholars on the Parallels

"With the remarkable exception of the death of Jesus on the cross, and of the doctrine of atonement by vicarious suffering, which is absolutely excluded by Buddhism, the most ancient of the Buddhistic records known to us contain statements about the life and the doctrines of Gautama Buddha which correspond in a remarkable manner, and impossibly by mere chance, with the traditions recorded in the Gospels about the life and doctrines of Jesus Christ...." (Ernest De Bunsen, The Angel Messiah of Buddhists, Essenes and Christians (London, 1880), p. 50.)

"Lamaism with its shaven priests, its bells and rosaries, its images and holy water, its popes and bishops, its abbots and monks of many grades, its processions and feast days, its confessional and purgatory, and its worship of the double Virgin, so strongly resembles Romanism that the first Catholic missionaries thought it must be an imitation by the devil of the religion of Christ." The Encyclopedia Britannica.

"These points of agreement with the Gospel narrative arouse curiosity and require explanation. If we could prove that they [the legends of Buddha] were unknown in the East for some centuries after Christ, the explanation would be easy. But all the evidence we have gone to prove the contrary...." (Samuel Beal, pp. viii-ix.)

"Between the language of The Buddha and his disciples, and the language of Christ and his apostles, there are strange coincidences. Even some Buddhist legends and parables sound as if taken from the New Testament, though we know that many of them existed before the beginning of the Christian era." (Max Muller, Introduction to the Science of Religion (London, 1873), p. 243)

"Approximately five centuries older than Christianity, by the time of the birth of Christ, Buddhism had already spread through much of India and Ceylon and had penetrated into Central Asia and China." (Kenneth Scott Latourette, A History of Christianity (New York, 1975), p. 274.)

"The miraculous births of Buddha, his life and instructions, contain a great number of the moral and dogmatic truths professed in Christianity." (M. L'Abbe Huc, Christianity in China, Tartary, and Thibet (London, 1857), p. 327.)

...nothing now remains for the honest man to do but acknowledge the truth, which is that the history of Jesus of Nazareth[,] as related in the books of the New Testament, is simply a copy of that of Buddha, with a mixture of mythology borrowed from other nations." (T.W. Doane, "Bible Myths" (New York, 1882), p. 286)

"There are many moral precepts equally commanded and enforced in common by both creeds. It will not be rash to assert that most of the moral truths prescribed in the gospel are to be met with in the Buddhistic scriptures." Paul Ambroise Bigandet, the Catholic Bishop of Ramatha

"In reading the particulars of the life of Buddha it is impossible not to feel reminded of many circumstances relating to our Savior's life as sketched by the evangelists. It may be said in favor of Buddhism that no philosophic-religious system has ever upheld to an equal degree the notions of a savior and deliverer, and the necessity of his mission for procuring the salvation of man." Catholic Bishop Bigandet

"He [Buddha] requires humility, disregard of worldly wealth, patience and resignation in adversity, love to enemies ... non-resistance to evil, confession of sins and conversion." Bishop Jean Paul Hilaire

References

Reference: Lindsay Falvey (2002) The Buddha’s Gospel: A Buddhist Interpretation of Jesus’ Words. Institute for International Development Fund, Adelaide. 108pp.http://www.iid/publications/buddhasgospel.pdf

Further reading

• Blavatsky, H. P. Isis Unveiled (1877)
• J. Duncan M. Derrett. The Bible and the Buddhists. Sardini 2000. ISBN 88-7506-174-2 [3] [4]
• Richard Garbe: Indien und das Christentum [5]
• Elmar R. Gruber & Holger Kersten. The Original Jesus: The Buddhist Sources of Christianity.
• Streeter, Burnett H., The Buddha and The Christ, an Exploration of the Meaning of the Universe and of the Purpose of Human Life, Macmillan and Co., London, 1932.
• Allegro, John, The Mystery of the Dead Sea Scrolls Revised, Grammercy Publishing Co., New York, 1981 (first published Penguin Books, 1956).
• Amore, Roy C., Two Masters, One Message, The Lives and the Teachings of Gautama and Jesus, Parthenon Press, Nashville, 1978.
• de Silva, Lynn, A., The Problem of the Self in Buddhism and Christianity, Macmillan Press, London, 1979. -Reincarnation in Buddhist and Christian Thought, 1968.
• Haring, Hermann & Metz, Johann-Baptist, eds., Reincarnation or Resurrection?, SCM Press, Maryknoll, 1993.
• Head, Joseph, & Cranston, S.L., eds., Reincarnation An East-West Anthology (Including quotations from the world's religions & from over 400 western thinkers), Julian Press, New York, 1961.
• Howe, Quincy, Jr., Reincarnation for the Christian, Westminster Press, Philadelphia, 1974.
• Leaney, A.R.C., ed., A Guide to the Scrolls, Nottinham Studies on the Qumran Discoveries, SCM Book Club, Naperville, Ill., 1958.
• Lefebure, Leo D., The Buddha and the Christ, Explorations in Buddhist and Christian Dialogue (Faith Meets Faith Series), Orbis Books, Maryknoll, New York, 1993.
• Lillie, Arthur, Buddhism in Christendom or Jesus, the Essene, Unity Book Service, New Delhi, 1984 (first published in 1887). *India in Primitive Christianity, Kegan House Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co., 1909.
• Lopez, Donald S. & Rockefeller, Steven C., eds., The Christ and the Bodhisattva, State University of New York, 1987. Phan, *Peter, ed., Christianity and the Wider Ecumenism, Paragon House, New York, 1990.
• Pye, Michael & Morgan, Robert, eds., The Cardinal Meaning, Essays in Comparative Hermeneutics: Buddhism and Christianity, *Mouton & Co., Netherlands, 1973.
• Radhakrishnan, S., Eastern Religions in Western Thought, Oxford University Press, 1939.
• Siegmund, Georg, Buddhism and Christianity, A Preface to Dialogue, Sister Mary Frances McCarthy, trans., University of Alabama Press, 1968.
• Smart, Ninian, Buddhism and Christianity: Rivals and Allies, Macmillan, London, 1993.
• Tambyah, Isaac T., A Comparative Study of Hinduism, Buddhism and Christianity, Indian Book Gallery, Delhi, 1983 (first edition 1925).
• Yu, Chai-shin, Early Buddhism and Christianity, A comparative Study of the Founders' Authority, the Community, and the Discipline, Motilal Banarsidass, Delhi, 1981.

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