Your eye is the lamp of your body. When your eyes are healthy, your whole body also is full of light. But when they are unhealthy, your body also is full of darkness. See to it, then, that the light within you is not darkness.
—Jesus, Luke 11:34-5
Like a man, who, having eyes and who bearing also a lamp, sees all objects is he who has heard the law of vice and of virtue; he will become perfectly wise … The fool who is held in bondage by his body is wrapped in darkness; they who covert worldly goods consider all other things in this same (sinful) way.
—Buddha, Udanavarga 22.5, 27.5
Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.
—Jesus, Matthew 7:15
Why your ascetic’s hair, fool? Why your animal-hide clothes? Your interior is a jungle, though you clean the outside!
—Buddha, Dharmapada1
And the King will answer them, “Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.
—Jesus, Matthew 25:40
Whosoever, O monks, would wait upon me, let him wait on the sick.
—Buddha, Mahavagga 8.262
Do you not see that whatever goes into the mouth passes into the stomach, and so passes on? But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a man. For out of the heart comes evil thoughts, murder, adultery, fornication, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defiles a man; but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile a man.
—Jesus, Matthew 15:17-20
One does not become pure by washing … he who casts away every sin both great and small, he, because he casts away sins is a holy man.
—Buddha, Udanavarga 33.133
Destroying life, killing, cutting, binding, stealing, speaking lies, fraud and deceptions, worthless reading, intercourse with another’s wife – this is defilement, but not the eating of flesh.
—Buddha, Sutta-nipata 2424
Among the Abrahamic faiths—Judaism, Islam, and Christianity—Christianity has always been the odd man out. Islam and Judaism much more resemble one another with their dualistic ethics, legalistic theology, and strict monotheism than they do the Christian religion. Two of Christianity’s most essential features are its belief in the incarnation of God in the person of Jesus and the doctrine of the Trinity (the three persons or aspects of God in one). Both features are so seemingly antithetical to Semitic thought that Islam and Judaism completely reject them. At the same time, Christianity espouses a universal ethics that does not admit treating persons outside the faith according to a different code (both Judaic and Islamic ethics allow this).
We believe there is a non-Semitic element in Christian thought that gives it the character of being a rose between two thorns among the Abrahamic faiths. There is evidence that this non-Semitic element may well have been supplied by Buddhist thought. This chapter will make the case for Buddhist influence on Jesus himself as well as on early Christian thinking. This influence, we believe, is the primary origin of Christianity’s uniquely non- Semitic qualities and brings it closer to the Indic religious tradition.
BUDDHA AND JESUS: PARALLEL LIVES
Both Siddhartha Gautama (later known as the Buddha, lived c. 500 BC) and Jesus of Nazareth (c. 1st century AD) were obviously remarkable men in their time. Yet the stories told about Jesus often sound very familiar to those that built up around the Buddha five centuries before. These similarities have tempted generations of scholars to speculate about possible influence from India on the eastern Mediterranean region where the historical Jesus lived his life.
The similarities begin with their births. In both cases there are claims of divine incarnation. John the Evangelist says of Jesus: “and the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us.”5 In the Hindu Puranic texts, the Buddha is named as one of the avatars of the god Vishnu. Similarly, the births of both men are described in various texts as prophesied and accomplished by an immaculate conception. Singing angels attended the births of both, and both infants were said to be visited by wise men bearing gifts.
Both Buddha and Jesus gave early evidence of astounding gifts in their childhood, dazzling adult teachers with their knowledge. Both men set out on an itinerant ministry in their 30s, attracting followers who travel along with them. In both cases, one of these disciples turns out to be treacherous—Buddha had his Devadatta, a former monk who fell to envy and tried to murder him, and Jesus had Judas, an original disciple who betrayed him to the Jewish leadership (and ultimately to his death).
During their ministries we find further parallels. There are miracles attributed to both such as curing blindness. Both men renounced worldly goods and required the same of their followers. Namely, Buddhist monks and some of Jesus’ early disciples were both given a strict discipline to follow (although lay followers of Buddhism and Christianity are not held to this same strict standard). Buddha and Jesus are both depicted as ministering to persons cast out of ordinary society and using parables in the course of their teaching. Both men advocated a universal doctrine of peace and love.
When the Buddha delivered his first sermon to his disciples he revealed the existence of a “middle path” between the extremes of hedonist pleasure and painful mortification. The path is known as the Eightfold Path and stems from Buddha’s realization of Four Noble Truths about human existence.6 Jesus’ famous Sermon on the Mount begins with the eight Beatitudes. Although there is not a perfect match with Buddha’s speech, on five points the teachings are distinctly in harmony. The blessings upon the meek, those who hunger for righteousness, the merciful, the pure of heart, and the peacemakers compare favorably with the Buddha’s path of Right Aspiration, Right Conduct, Right Livelihood, and Right Endeavor.
The opposition to both men is also strikingly similar. The Buddha was opposed by the dominant religious elite of his day, the brahmanas. Jesus faced the same sort of opposition from the Pharisees. Their deaths are attended with various supernatural tales. Buddha told his followers he would enter Parinirvana, the final deathless state, after abandoning his earthly body. There are various tales told of his cremation relics that were divided among eight royal families and disciples and became associated with various legends and even political legitimacy. With Jesus, his followers believed he was resurrected after death and spoken to them again before ascending to heaven.
The parallels between the two even extend to the various collections of their sayings and teachings. There are innumerable collections of such parallels available on the internet and in various publications. However, these parallels cannot possibly be word for word because of the many different languages in which the sayings of Buddha and Jesus are recorded.
We know that both men were asked directly “Are you the Promised One?” In their lives, each consorted with supposed sinners while promoting a life of freedom from worldly attachments and worldly corruption. There are similar miracles associated with them, and both spoke of such miracles as becoming possible to those with great faith or concentration. Each of the two established a line of succession for their followers (although Protestants believe Jesus did not do this), yet at the same time they each live on by means of their word (“Logos” in the New Testament; “Dharma” in Buddhist scriptures). Both warn of the karmic wages of sin and of future degeneration setting in due to misguided leaders and false prophets.7
POSSIBLE SOURCES OF BUDDHIST INFLUENCE
The question is, if there is Buddhist influence on the historical Jesus and the early Christians, where did it come from? To begin with, the Buddha predated Jesus by more than five centuries. During that time, we know his teachings became widely diffused throughout the Middle East and had reached Judea and Palestine through traders and missionaries. Zoroastrian ideas had reached Palestine two centuries before Jesus’ lifetime and, as the scholar Roy Amore argues, “the same cultural connections that continued to bring Zoroastrian ideas … could have brought Buddhist ideas” as well.8
A major point of overland contact would have been the Silk Road, which passed from Egypt through Palestine and Mesopotamia through Persia and Central Asia all the way to northern China. A branch of this major trade route also went into northwest India. There is “ample evidence that many of the caravan cities along the silk route were predominantly Buddhist in the first Christian century and following.”9 We also have evidence that goods from India were sold in Jerusalem in Jesus’ lifetime.10 There was also a sea route connecting India to the eastern Mediterranean. Through archaeological discoveries we know there were Indian merchants in Egypt, and there is evidence of the presence of Roman traders in the Indian province of Andhra at an ancient city that boasted a large Buddhist temple.11
Jesus himself is known to have spoken Hebrew and Aramaic and possibly knew Greek as well, since it was the common lingua franca spoken in the near eastern regions during his lifetime and the Septuagint (a Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures) had been made in Egypt two centuries before and was in wide circulation among Jewish populations in Palestine. If Jesus had known Greek, which is speculative but not unreasonable, he could have received some knowledge of Buddhism and India through that route.
The work of the Indian emperor Asoka, who ruled in the third century BC, also provides a point of contact between Buddhism and the West. Asoka was a Buddhist convert and a zealous exponent of his adopted religion. He set up large stone inscriptions called rock edicts in places where his forces or his missionaries were active. Asoka sent Buddhist missionaries to the Greek kingdoms near India. Tellingly, one of Asoka’s rock edicts has been found with inscriptions in both Aramaic and Greek.12
DOCTRINAL CONNECTIONS
There is even more evidence of Buddhist influence at work as Christian doctrine developed in the centuries after Jesus. These doctrinal connections come in various forms, and have been noticed both in the teachings of Jesus and in late developments within the Christian church.
One of the central connections involves the emphasis in both Buddhist and Christian ethical thought upon the need not only to act properly but to overcome improper states of mind.13 Jesus famously declared that whoever looks upon a woman with lust has already committed adultery in his heart. The Buddha made a strikingly similar comment as part of his ethical teaching: “commit no adultery; the law is broken by even looking at the wife of another man with lust in the mind.” A similar parallel can be seen in what the two men say about inspecting one’s own conscience before daring to pronounce upon the failings of others. Buddha says, “Do not look at the faults of others or what others have done or not done; observe what you yourself have done or not done.” Likewise, Jesus says, “Let anyone among you who is without sin cast the first stone” to a group eager to condemn a woman to death by stoning for adultery.
There are a number of connections in the ethical teachings of Jesus and Buddha that can be seen simply by putting their words side by side. Buddha says to “consider others as yourself.”14 Jesus says, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”15 Buddha teaches that it is an eternal law that hatreds do not cease by hatred but through love, encouraging people to “Overcome anger by love, overcome evil by good.” In similar fashion, Jesus says: “Love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.” Both men taught the importance of self-control, such that Jesus tells his followers, “If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also.”16 The Buddha’s version of this reads, “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.”17
Both men taught an ethics that insists on the moral value of the unfortunate, even using their own example to illustrate the importance of caring for such persons. Jesus tells his followers, “just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.”18 Buddha tells his monks, “Whoever would tend me, he should tend the sick.”19 Buddhist ethical thought places a premium on nonviolence. Thus Buddha says, “Abandoning the taking of life, the ascetic Gautama dwells refraining from taking life, without stick or sword.”20 In like fashion, Jesus tells his followers to “Put your sword back into its place; for all those who take the sword will perish by the sword.”21 But Jesus’ teaching about violence is a little more nuanced, since we also see him advising his disciples to carry swords with them.22
Another critical early connection involves the stricter ethics enjoined upon the priesthood. Neither Islam nor post-temple Judaism follows a set priesthood. Christianity follows a practice far more similar to the practice of Indic religions, including shave the heads of monks and enjoining celibacy among the priestly orders. The practice of tonsuring monks was introduced to Christian practice around the 4th or 5th century and may have been directly prompted by a similar Buddhist practice of shaving all hair from the head of novitiate monks and nuns prior to their ordination.
Following Indic tradition, Buddhists draw a distinction between the life of the householder and the life of a monk. The householder’s ethic involves supporting a family, whereas the monk is meant to give up all such ties.23 Jesus lays down similar rules for his first disciples. We also find parallels such as his injunction to “Follow me, and leave the dead to bury their own dead.”24 Compare this with the Buddha: “Let the wise men leave the way of darkness and follow the way of light.”25
An interesting link can also be found in the use of the rosary, which came to Christianity late and has a somewhat mysterious origin. Even the name is curious, as it isn’t immediately clear why a string of prayer beads should be called a garland or garden of roses. Yet compare this with the Buddhist term used for prayer beads, which is almost identical to a word meaning a rose garland.26
Even Christian Saints’ lives will show evidence of Buddhist influence. One of the clearest examples of this comes in the medieval story of Barlaam and Josaphat. According to the story, Josaphat was an Indian prince who was heir to the throne of a ruthless idolater who hated Christians. When his father heard omens of his son’s future greatness, he kept him locked up. Eventually, Josaphat was permitted out to see the world. On one journey he happened to see a crippled man, a blind man, and a senile old man. After being raised secluded from such unpleasantness, these three men made a remarkable impression upon the young prince. Later, a monk named Barlaam came to speak with him. Josaphat was converted by this monk. Eventually, he would grow up to rule in his father’s place, but he abdicated his throne in favor of seeking out his former teacher. Finding him, the two lived as hermits until their deaths.27
This story is almost entirely cribbed from the life of the Buddha and given a Christian covering. The Buddha was also of noble family, raised in a secluded manner. He likewise had a series of experiences, the “four sights,” through which he came to understand the nature of human life, decay, and suffering. In the Christianized version, the four sights become the three different men plus the monk Barlaam. Even the name “Josaphat” is itself a corruption of the original word “Bodhisattva,” the title used by the Buddha prior to the time of his enlightenment.28
One of Christianity’s most evident non-Semitic elements is the doctrine of the Trinity. This doctrine has an interesting parallel in Buddhism as well. According to Mahayana Buddhism, the Buddha continues to manifest in the world of form and appearances (that is, in what we think of as the “real world”) in order to work for the liberation of all other beings. This is made possible by the existence of three “bodies” (named dharmakaya, sambhogakaya, and nirmanakaya; collectively called the Trikaya).29 The idea of a three-in- one divine or supernatural agent working for the salvation of all beings is a striking parallel.
The other definitively non-Semitic element of Christianity is its doctrine of the incarnation of God in the person of Jesus. Yet this doctrine is perfectly at home in the Indic tradition. In the words of Swami Akhilananda:
Christianity and Hinduism are the two great religions which maintain that God incarnates Himself as a human being to establish the spirit of religion in the world. But for the advent of divine incarnations, Man would grope blindly for the experience of God. They are connecting links between God and man.30
In Hinduism, the Buddha himself is understood as an incarnation in Akhilananda’s sense. He is sometimes pictured as an avatar of Vishnu. Ironically, while the fellow Abrahamic faiths of Judaism and Islam find the Christian doctrine abhorrent and intolerable, the Indic tradition has no trouble accepting it on its own terms.31 The key difference, as Akhilananda says, is that the Hindus say there have been many such incarnations of God, while the Christians say there has been only one.32
It is telling that many of the most significant sectarian differences in Christianity have arisen due to efforts to integrate the non-Semitic elements of the religion with its roots in Semitic monotheism. The doctrines of Jesus’ nature (as incarnation of God) and the nature of the Trinity have been the central points of conflict in these sectarian divisions. Even as these elements have produced difficulty, however, they also provided early Christianity with a competitive edge over other religious cults in the Roman Empire. Perhaps it was grafting the Indic concept of Jesus as avatar onto the Jewish concept of the messiah as savior figure which allowed the gentiles to understand and absorb a religion which might otherwise have been completely foreign to them.33
The late professor T.W. Rhys Davids goes so far as to argue,
Almost the whole of the moral teaching of the Gospels, as distinct from the dogmatic teaching, will be found in Buddhist writings, several centuries older than the Gospels; that, for instance, all the moral doctrines collected together in the so-called Sermon on the Mount, all those which can be separated from the theistic dogmas there maintained are found again in the Pitakas.34
The connections between Christianity and Buddhism, in Rhys Davids’ view, extends beyond the content to the very form in which the doctrines are presented. Both Jesus and Buddha teach in parables, using ordinary and even homely figures of speech.35
CHRISTIANITY AND UNIVERSALISM
Christianity’s non-Semitic qualities, which it may well have absorbed from Buddhism, provide it with an element of universalism more in harmony with the Indic tradition than with Judaism or Islam.36 Swami Akhilananda has explored this element in detail in his Hindu View of Christ. Akhilananda describes human civilization as following one of two distinct ideals: the good or the pleasant. The pleasant was the ideal followed by Greco-Roman civilization (its great philosophers notwithstanding), and he believes it is also followed by modern European civilization to its detriment. By contrast, the good is “the path of religion which emphasize[s] the attainment of knowledge or realization of God or feeling the presence and grace of God.”37 This path is the one followed by people such as the Hindus, the Chinese, and the (true) Christians.
From an Indic or Oriental point of view, Akhilananda argues, Jesus is a man of the highest spiritual authority. Through his experience on the Cross, Jesus advocates in the firmest possible way the spiritual method, which is the overcoming of evil by good. Regarding Jesus’ prayer for the people who were persecuting him, even as he was dying at their hands, Akhilananda concludes, “Can you find greater manifestation of spiritual power than this?”38
From the same point of view, the supreme goal of human effort appears to be the attainment of eternal life through realization of the nature of God. Other human efforts aim at happiness in this world and the proper training and discipline needed to achieve this. While these efforts have their value, they are not ends in themselves. By emphasizing the supreme goal so strenuously, Akhilananda says, Jesus “appears thoroughly Oriental to the Hindu.”39
The difficulty in accepting Christian teaching, from the point of view of the Indic tradition, lies not in its doctrine of Incarnation or the Trinity but in the exclusivist nature of its claims—a quality which it inherits from its Judaic roots. The Hindu has no objection in principle to the claim that Jesus is God become man. But the claim that Jesus is the sole ‘son of God’ and the one acceptable path to salvation is difficult if not possible for the Hindu to accept.
In her 2008 book Aryan Jesus, Dartmouth professor Susannah Heschel laments that fascination with the connections between Jesus and Indian Buddhism may have been promoted by a romantic but false fascination with India. Because of this fascination, she argues, Christianity came to be seen as derived from India’s Aryan mythology and Jesus himself became “drained” of his “Jewishness.”40
Because of her polemical view, Heschel makes little effort to refute the arguments put forward over the course of more than 150 years by investigators of the study of Buddhist influence on Christianity. The work of scholars such as T.W. Rhys Davids, Otto Pfleiderer , Dr, Wintertmintz, Max Muller, Dr. S. Radhakrishnan, Sir Charles Eliot, Dr, Roy Amore, Dr. Micheal Lockwood, Dr. Zacharias Thundy, and others is largely ignored by Heschel. Yet these studies together present a far different look at the history of first century Palestine and Buddhist and Christian relations.
For example, Pfleiderer makes the case in his Christian Origins that the parallels between Buddhist stories and the childhood stories of Jesus told in Luke are “too striking to be classed as mere chance; some kind of historical connection must be postulated.”41 In Eastern Religions and Western Thought, Dr. Radhakrishnan makes the case that Buddha and Jesus each grew out of a tradition, and the differences in their respective traditions produce “certain deep differences beneath the resemblances” between their two doctrines. Thus, Buddha views the Absolute as a super-personal spirit, while Jesus believes in a personal God. This shows the theistic impulse Jesus picks up from Judaism, which is not present in Buddha’s teachings. The dogmatic Christian belief in the sole salvation of Jesus also has no parallel in Buddhism.42 Nevertheless, although some connections between Buddhism and Christianity may be mere chance parallels, Radhakrishnan argues, like Pfleiderer, that it is unlikely if not impossible that two men could have careers “with the same legends and embellishments” purely by accident.43
By whatever means it came by them, Christianity has roots beyond Judaic monotheism. Those roots place it decidedly at odds with its fellow Abrahamic faiths, but bring it closer to the orbit of other world religions—notably religions of the Indic tradition. The exclusivist monotheism of Islam has left it an odd man out in the world throughout the modern age. Christianity, on the other hand, has considerably moderated its former exclusivist claims.44
Most significantly, the possible Buddhist origins of Christian thought and doctrine also call into question the claim that Christianity (or the other Abrahamic religions for that matter) represents the completely independent revelation of a wholly other monotheistic God. There seems to have been too much borrowing from purely human, preexisting sources to believe that the whole truth of Christian thought was simply revealed to a handful of first century scribes in the eastern Mediterranean. While these borrowings do not enhance Christianity’s reputation as a “divine” faith, they do make it remarkably successful as a tolerant, universal, and humane religion.