Jesus Was a Buddhist Monk?

[Friend of Bill W]

What do you reckon? The OT is full of 'an eye for an eye', and then Jesus turns up full of new ideas, stuff like 'love your enemy' which is more Buddhist than OT.

Three wise men? Buddhists looking for a tulku or incarnation of a bodhisattva (which still happens today; it's how HH Dalai Lama was found; wise Buddhist monks found him).

And some of Jesus's teachings, "The Kingdom of God is within you", sound Buddhist; salvation found within, rather than some external deity.

And here's a good BBC documentary on the subject:

[youtube]-YbUEZfJJaQ[/youtube]
Jesus was a Buddhist Monk BBC Documentary - YouTube

What's your thoughts?

 

[Heathen Hammer]

Yep, I am inclined to agree, especially in light of the huge gap in his history between youth and ministry. He had the opportunity to study at any number of Buddhist-like enclaves around the area [esp. in Egypt iirc], or along the trade roads all the way East.

 

[Bob Dixon]

For a Buddhist monk, he sure advocates the concept of a personal God a lot.
Though, if you replace "Father" with "Dharmakaya" or something of that sort... you get some interesting results.

I'm not sure whether to believe it or not, but... I mean, wouldn't Hindu be more likely?

 

[Caladan]

What do you reckon? The OT is full of 'an eye for an eye', and then Jesus turns up full of new ideas, stuff like 'love your enemy' which is more Buddhist than OT.

Three wise men? Buddhists looking for a tulku or incarnation of a bodhisattva (which still happens today; it's how HH Dalai Lama was found; wise Buddhist monks found him).

And some of Jesus's teachings, "The Kingdom of God is within you", sound Buddhist; salvation found within, rather than some external deity.

And here's a good BBC documentary on the subject:


What's your thoughts?

No, I don't really view it as plausible as the ordinary history.
people seem to take Jesus completely out of his context. people need to remember that the wisdom of Jesus is not necessarily distinct to him. but a representation of various schools of thought within second temple Judaism.
Just like the Jewish House of Hillel, Jesus seemed to have a more liberal approach to the Law, on other matters he agreed with the perspective of the house of Shammai.
the golden rule wisdom of the New Testament can easily be seen presaged by other Jewish thinkers or by Jewish schools before Jesus or during Jesus' time.
I find it unreasonable to uproot Jesus from his social environment.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Probably not.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

This is a problem of taking minor similarities between two sets of teachings and making way too much of it.

There is more to consider:

1) How common are these teachings with other ancient teachers?

2) If Christ was a Buddhist monk, why isn't Buddha mentioned in any early Christian writer? Surely, if they followed a Buddhist monk, the Buddha and his teachings would have a prominent place in at least some of his followers.

3) Perhaps most importantly, no one lives in a vacuum. That is, where is the Buddhist community in Galilee that produced Jesus? Where is the Buddhist community both before and after Jesus?

Finally, this says absolutely nothing about the lost 12 years of Jesus's life. We can say that he was raising chickens in Barbados on as much evidence as is provided on this thread.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

*yawn*

 

[Jainarayan]

My opinion, fwiw, is that Jesus's teachings are an amalgam of his Jewish upbringing and education, with possible influence from merchants and traders who traveled the Silk Roads between the Middle East and South Asia. Maybe he even traveled with them at times. At any rate, I think he was sent by God to speak to and teach a certain people in a certain time and place. There really is only one message from God, it's the messengers who differ somewhat from each other.

 

[ForeverFaithful]

All you have to do on this forum is put "Jesus (something shocking)" and I feel people will nod and agree,

Edit, the Above documentary tries to skew the event of the Crucifixion by stating no man could die from just 6 hours on a cross, ignore how He was beaten before being crucified and stabbed in the side before being brought down from the cross,

 

[Caladan]

This is a problem of taking minor similarities between two sets of teachings and making way too much of it.

There is more to consider:

1) How common are these teachings with other ancient teachers?

I am especially interested to know why the narrator says that the teachings were distinct to Buddhism but not to Judaism.
When Jesus talks about his golden rule, often he talks about it in light of the Jewish golden rule. for example, 'You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor...'

 

[Father Heathen]

I imagine that compassion and selflessness would lead people to similar conclusions even without them having met one another.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

My opinion, fwiw, is that Jesus's teachings are an amalgam of his Jewish upbringing and education, with possible influence from merchants and traders who traveled the Silk Roads between the Middle East and South Asia. Maybe he even traveled with them at times. At any rate, I think he was sent by God to speak to and teach a certain people in a certain time and place. There really is only one message from God, it's the messengers who differ somewhat from each other.

... and we appreciate the difference between "possible influence" and "being a monk."

 

[ForeverFaithful]

... and we appreciate the difference between "possible influence" and "being a monk."

(Sarcastic) What do you mean possible! The Bible says no and there the slimiest possibility that Jesus was actually a Buddhist monk (from outerspace by the way)
So the Bible most be wrong and this theory must be right! Now let me tell you about all the scholars who believe this, unless you're a crazy traditionalist who thinks the apostles record with semi-accuracy the teachings of their rabbi,

John 3:13 clearly saying Jesus descended from Heaven so clearly He came from the Planet Mars and the apostles tried to cover it up, however even though this theory is dependant on a Bible verse it is clear the Bible is completely unreliable on anything Jesus ever said or did, even if it wasn't miraculous

 

[Father Heathen]

(Sarcastic) What do you mean possible! The Bible says no and there the slimiest possibility that Jesus was actually a Buddhist monk (from outerspace by the way)
So the Bible most be wrong and this theory must be right! Now let me tell you about all the scholars who believe this, unless you're a crazy traditionalist who thinks the apostles record with semi-accuracy the teachings of their rabbi,

John 3:13 clearly saying Jesus descended from Heaven so clearly He came from the Planet Mars and the apostles tried to cover it up, however even though this theory is dependant on a Bible verse it is clear the Bible is completely unreliable on anything Jesus ever said or did, even if it wasn't miraculous

To be fair, Jesus being a space alien is no more preposterous than Jesus zombifying and levitating up into the stratosphere.

 

[Friend of Bill W]

For a Buddhist monk, he sure advocates the concept of a personal God a lot.
Though, if you replace "Father" with "Dharmakaya" or something of that sort... you get some interesting results.

I'm not sure whether to believe it or not, but... I mean, wouldn't Hindu be more likely?

Maybe Jesus believed in a God? Maybe he was using the Buddhist 'skilful speech', given that he knew he was taking some pretty radical teachings into Jewish culture.

I think there's some other pointers too. What was he doing in the desert for 40 days and nights? A bit of meditation maybe?

 

[Gjallarhorn]

Jesus was actually the virgin-born son of Athena, who carved the Jewish and Christian religions out and subsequently destroyed the Greek pantheon by causing the Trojan War which led to the founding of Rome and the rise of the Holy Roman Empire.

Just throwing out more unfounded ideas.

 

[outhouse]

This is a problem of taking minor similarities between two sets of teachings and making way too much of it.

There is more to consider:

1) How common are these teachings with other ancient teachers?

2) If Christ was a Buddhist monk, why isn't Buddha mentioned in any early Christian writer? Surely, if they followed a Buddhist monk, the Buddha and his teachings would have a prominent place in at least some of his followers.

3) Perhaps most importantly, no one lives in a vacuum. That is, where is the Buddhist community in Galilee that produced Jesus? Where is the Buddhist community both before and after Jesus?

Finally, this says absolutely nothing about the lost 12 years of Jesus's life. We can say that he was raising chickens in Barbados on as much evidence as is provided on this thread.

I agree

there is no tie what so ever

 

[Caladan]

Maybe Jesus believed in a God? Maybe he was using the Buddhist 'skilful speech', given that he knew he was taking some pretty radical teachings into Jewish culture.

You started a debate. please debate the strong points that some of us posed.
one of which, is that Jesus was not taking radical teachings into Jewish culture.
he was doing what many other Jewish thinkers were doing during the same time: giving a more liberal interpretation to Jewish Law. Jesus had a humane approach within Judaism, and indeed we can see that his followers were still kept in the boundaries of Judaism. not Buddhism, nor Christianity which became a religion unto itself after non Jews eventually outnumbered the Jewish believers in Jesus.

furthermore. I watched all 50 minutes of the video. some of the things were of course interesting. it discusses the Knight Templars, Southern France, etc.
and much of this material would make for good fiction and books. which might be one of the issues with the claim in this video, which is Jesus in Tibet or Kashmir for example, as far as I know it is known that Nicolas Notovitch' work about the unknown life of Jesus is a fraud, it claims for the extraordinary such as ancient documents in Tibet about Jesus, but who substantiates this as facts?

 

[outhouse]

exactly, you have one fraudulent source for your connection and a handful of imagination combined with later teachings cherry picked that preached somewhat to a roman audience

 

[ForeverFaithful]

To be fair, Jesus being a space alien is no more preposterous than Jesus zombifying and levitating up into the stratosphere.

Though the idea the obscure bible verses can be used to build up an "historical" Jesus better then the Teachings recorded by his Disciplines is frankly the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard