Jesus and Krishna--Two Peas In A Pod

[SeekingAllTruth]

In my opinion, there are certain similarities: both are worshipped in groups devoted to them and both are believed to be God incarnate, but past that, I think the similarities are kind of overblown.

Do you think the gospels present ANY details of Jesus' life that were borrowed from other dying/rising gods?

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

Yes.

Nah. I've said more than enough nasty stuff about Him to be a frozen icicle in the Devil's mouth (Divine Comedy reference). I'm just interested in truth and logic here.

What is a "dying/rising god"? Define it.

You said enough nasty stuff about Jesus BEFORE you were a Christian, I"m willing to bet. I'm also willing to bet you haven't said anything nasty about him since and are incapable of saying anything nasty about him now even if it were true. Am I right?

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

You said enough nasty stuff about Jesus BEFORE you were a Christian, I"m willing to bet. I'm also willing to bet you haven't said anything nasty about him since and are incapable of saying anything nasty about him now even if it were true. Am I right?

Nope.

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

So does Krishna have a human father and human mother?

According to what I've read, both were human. But Krishna was supposed to be the 8th reincarnation of Vishnu.

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

Nope.

Say something mean about Jesus now.

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

Say something mean about Jesus now.

You're not taking this seriously.

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

You're not taking this seriously.

I knew it, I knew it!

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

Today millions are celebrating the resurrection of Christ, yet there were many gods before him with similar stories.

Easter Sunday: A history of dying-and-rising gods

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

I knew it, I knew it!

I notice you never actually addressed anything I said. You never responded to what I said about the stories having no similarities other than general ones. I'm not here to joke with you.

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

I notice you never actually addressed anything I said. You never responded to what I said about the stories having no similarities other than general ones. I'm not here to joke with you.

Then let's start with a question I asked you earlier: do you deny a king wanted to kill Krishna?

 

[Fallen Prophet]

The similarities between Krishna's life and Jesus' life are so startling that it's often difficult to tell where one begins and the other leaves off. That's why it's important to remember that the Krishna legend was around a full 1000 years before the gospels emerged. The only conclusion a rational person can reach given the often exact same matching details of each is that the gospel writers borrowed heavily from the Krishna legend and other dying/rising gods as they constructed their own legend of Jesus. Here is but a few in a laundry list of similarities

Yeshua and Krishna were called both a God and the Son of God.

Both were called Savior, and the second person of the Trinity.

Both had adoptive human fathers who were carpenters.

Jesus was conceived by a god. Krishna was the reincarnation of a god.

Both were killed by piercing--Jesus by nails and a spear, Krishna by an arrow

Both resurrected.

This list is not exhaustive. It would take up too much space to list Jesus' similarities with all the dying/rising gods before him--Zalmoxis, Dionysus, Horus, Mithra, Romulus--who inspired the gospel writers to copy them.

Instead I want to mention a few details of Krishna's birth that convince me Jesus is an amalgamation of many other earlier stories.

Kamsa, the evil king ruling the land hears a voice from the sky predicting that a child will be born and will kill him. The king is terrified. He orders all the children born to his sister, who is the one who will give birth to the child, to be killed. But with the help of an angel the parents of the future child escape and flee to a faraway land. There they give the baby Krishna to a carpenter and his wife to raise.

Anyone who cannot see the parallels between this and the Jesus legend involving the prophecy of Jesus, Herod and the flight to Egypt for safety has to have blinders one. It's too exact to be coincidental. One can only conclude Matthew borrowed Krishna's story as a model for his own account.

It becomes clear that the Jesus story is just another legend based on many earlier legends that were floating around the area at that time.

Or - it is my belief - that the details of the life, ministry, death and Resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ had been revealed to Man from the beginning and were passed down by revelation throughout all the generations of the world.

This is how the Magi knew that the new star was a sign of His birth and how the elders informed Herod that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem.

These - and many other - details had been recorded at a previous time and passed down.

 

[SeekingAllTruth]

Or - it is my belief - that the details of the life, ministry, death and Resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ had been revealed to Man from the beginning and were passed down by revelation throughout all the generations of the world.

This is how the Magi knew that the new star was a sign of His birth and how the elders informed Herod that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem.

These - and many other - details had been recorded at a previous time and passed down.

I cannot comment on that except to say I don't believe it.

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

Then let's start with a question I asked you earlier: do you deny a king wanted to kill Krishna?

It seems the myths regarding Krishna include that story. To be honest, I never cared about Krishna and actually actively dislike him. When it comes to Hindu deities, it is Kali that I liked the most and studied the most, with Shiva being second. So Krishna is not a deity that I cared to study beyond generalities. So I don't know all the myths about Krishna for myself.

That said, the same claims are made about a number of other pagan deities, like Dionysius, who is a wine/fertility deity. Pagan dying/rising deities are mostly an explanation of agricultural cycles. Jesus' death and resurrection has nothing to do with agricultural cycles. His drama is very human, as opposed to the other examples.

 

[Fallen Prophet]

I cannot comment on that except to say I don't believe it.

We all have our biases - but considering that both revelation and prophecy exist in the Bible - it is an explanation just as reasonable as the one you presented.

 

[SomeRandom]

Yes, that's pretty close to what I read. I didn't have room for all that so I took out the salient details that most closely matched the story of Jesus, Mary, Joseph and Herod. I think it's too identical to be a coincidence, but I agree the gospel writers kept the framework of the Krishna legend and added their own minor details to try to hide their plagiarism.

Well I mean maybe. Maybe not. The two cultures have wildly differing opinions on what constitutes the “divine”
East vs West. Indian thought seems to have more in common with the ancient Greeks and Romans (albeit more “friendly”) than the Abrahamics. Which is kind of interesting given how the West tends to think of the Ancient Greek/Romans as our predecessors.

(I know they are all distinct and different. I’m just saying, culturally speaking.)

 

[RestlessSoul]

The similarities between Krishna's life and Jesus' life are so startling that it's often difficult to tell where one begins and the other leaves off. That's why it's important to remember that the Krishna legend was around a full 1000 years before the gospels emerged. The only conclusion a rational person can reach given the often exact same matching details of each is that the gospel writers borrowed heavily from the Krishna legend and other dying/rising gods as they constructed their own legend of Jesus. Here is but a few in a laundry list of similarities

Yeshua and Krishna were called both a God and the Son of God.

Both were called Savior, and the second person of the Trinity.

Both had adoptive human fathers who were carpenters.

Jesus was conceived by a god. Krishna was the reincarnation of a god.

Both were killed by piercing--Jesus by nails and a spear, Krishna by an arrow

Both resurrected.

This list is not exhaustive. It would take up too much space to list Jesus' similarities with all the dying/rising gods before him--Zalmoxis, Dionysus, Horus, Mithra, Romulus--who inspired the gospel writers to copy them.

Instead I want to mention a few details of Krishna's birth that convince me Jesus is an amalgamation of many other earlier stories.

Kamsa, the evil king ruling the land hears a voice from the sky predicting that a child will be born and will kill him. The king is terrified. He orders all the children born to his sister, who is the one who will give birth to the child, to be killed. But with the help of an angel the parents of the future child escape and flee to a faraway land. There they give the baby Krishna to a carpenter and his wife to raise.

Anyone who cannot see the parallels between this and the Jesus legend involving the prophecy of Jesus, Herod and the flight to Egypt for safety has to have blinders one. It's too exact to be coincidental. One can only conclude Matthew borrowed Krishna's story as a model for his own account.

It becomes clear that the Jesus story is just another legend based on many earlier legends that were floating around the area at that time.

I too have been struck by these similarities. I draw different conclusions though; to me what we are witnessing is an example of the universality of spiritual experience, across cultures and across centuries.

Far from invalidating the 'Jesus story', common elements within Hindu, Taoist, Buddhist, Christian, Islaamic etc philosophy, serve to illustrate a universal truth - that all life is an expression of divine love, that we are all children of a singular creative consciousness experiencing life subjectively, and that there are those who have gone before us who have experienced profound spiritual awakenings, which they were driven to share with their fellows. If their fellows would but listen.

 

[RestlessSoul]

Thank God the Internet is exposing the fraudulent doings of the church hierarchy, laying bare for all to see exactly how the Jesus mythology was stolen from a variety of sources to make the Jesus legend more palpable to pagans. Pagans had no idea when they accepted Jesus that they were in actuality accepting the myths of a half-dozen dying/rising god before him. Many must have recognized the similarities instantly.

A theme of the Gospels is Jesus exposing the hypocrisy of the religious hierarchy in his time and place. Such is the nature of the priestly class.

Is it not possible that pagans had deep reverence for myth, and the truths often contained therein, and were persuaded by the poetic beauty of the Gospels? Some of them anyway. Others, like Danish warlord Guthrum of East Anglia, were defeated in battle and assumed that the Christian God of Alfred of Wessex must be more powerful than the Norse.

Either way, a message doesn't resonate across continents and centuries, unless it has meaning and substance. Good luck trying to 'debunk' stories that have inspired millions of people over thousands of years.

 

[PruePhillip]

The similarities between Krishna's life and Jesus' life are so startling that it's often difficult to tell where one begins and the other leaves off. That's why it's important to remember that the Krishna legend was around a full 1000 years before the gospels emerged. The only conclusion a rational person can reach given the often exact same matching details of each is that the gospel writers borrowed heavily from the Krishna legend and other dying/rising gods as they constructed their own legend of Jesus. Here is but a few in a laundry list of similarities

Yeshua and Krishna were called both a God and the Son of God.

Both were called Savior, and the second person of the Trinity.

Both had adoptive human fathers who were carpenters.

Jesus was conceived by a god. Krishna was the reincarnation of a god.

Both were killed by piercing--Jesus by nails and a spear, Krishna by an arrow

Both resurrected.

This list is not exhaustive. It would take up too much space to list Jesus' similarities with all the dying/rising gods before him--Zalmoxis, Dionysus, Horus, Mithra, Romulus--who inspired the gospel writers to copy them.

Instead I want to mention a few details of Krishna's birth that convince me Jesus is an amalgamation of many other earlier stories.

Kamsa, the evil king ruling the land hears a voice from the sky predicting that a child will be born and will kill him. The king is terrified. He orders all the children born to his sister, who is the one who will give birth to the child, to be killed. But with the help of an angel the parents of the future child escape and flee to a faraway land. There they give the baby Krishna to a carpenter and his wife to raise.

Anyone who cannot see the parallels between this and the Jesus legend involving the prophecy of Jesus, Herod and the flight to Egypt for safety has to have blinders one. It's too exact to be coincidental. One can only conclude Matthew borrowed Krishna's story as a model for his own account.

It becomes clear that the Jesus story is just another legend based on many earlier legends that were floating around the area at that time.

The Jewish scripture speak of the coming Messiah some 1500 years before Jesus.
He would come as a Redeemer, paying the price for our sins. He would be rejected
of his own people. The Jews would lose their nation because they did not know the
time of their visitation. He would be despised, betrayed, tried and pierced. His legacy
would go out unto the Gentiles, until their time was fulfilled - then the Jews could
return to their homeland. And in his second coming the Jews would mourn because
the reigning and conquering king is the same lowly man they crucified.

 

[SomeRandom]

You conveniently left out this part:

Kamsa was the maternal uncle of Lord Krishna who swore to kill Lord Krishna because according to a prophecy, Lord Krishna would kill him otherwise.

Know The Whole Story of Kamsa Vadha By Lord Krishna - Youngisthan | DailyHunt

*Staff Edit*.

So who was Jesus’ maternal uncle who swore to kill him then?
I keep hearing of these supposed similarities between Jesus and Krishna. For years now as a born Hindu
But the most I can find is that they both drew a large crowd and that’s it. The rest is a stretch at best.
Even their deaths is admittedly a bit of a stretch.
Come on man. Shot in the foot by a hunter is not the same as being nailed to a cross. It just isn’t, I’m sorry.
Krishna had his own folklore and you’re gonna have to deal with that.

 

[RestlessSoul]

I'm not going to knock myself out. Look it up yourself. It's there.

Kamsa - Wikipedia

The way you’re swinging that hammer, I suspect there’s every chance you will knock yourself out