Jesus Was a Buddhist Monk?

[Twilight Hue]

Was Jesus a Buddhist monk?

No.

 

[More In Common]

Not to be dismissive of the original question, but I think we often get distracted and even adversarial by focusing on the man rather than the message.

This is not just true of Jesus, but of all religious figures - rather than concentrating (or in some cases fixating) on the bibliographic, miraculous or historical nature of the icons, I think humanity may be better served if we focused on the positive, compassionate aspects of their messages.

 

[Nakosis]

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.

What's your thoughts?

There were numerous religious groups in the area. I tend to think Jesus was a Therapute an order of monks/healers that came out of Egypt. The people of Judea had a number of different religious influences. The Pharisee, which is said to be the precursors of Rabbinic Judaism it only one of the groups back then. Kind of obvious the Jesus was at odds with the Pharisee. many of the other groups are no longer around so one can only guess at their influence. The Pharisee and Christians(Hellenized Judeans) emerged. A lot of the Christian thinking was likely influenced by the Greeks. Not quite sure how you'd trace any of it back to Buddhism.

 

[Nakosis]

I wouldn´t say he was a buddhist monk, but I am sure he had some buddhist and/or hinduist influences. It would have been very easy for him to travel to India as for the commercial routes that went there.

As pointed out, he didn´t speak about buddha or was a carbon copy teacher of buddhism, this is why I would say he was influenced (maybe even deeply so) but not 100% buddhist. At least I wouldn´t say buddhism was his central message.

I mean when you can argue with your locals about the local spirituality at your 12 and be deemed insightful, chances are you need some new spiritual inspirations if you wanna keep growing spiritualy. It´s just how it is.

Maybe Jesus was fascinated with religious idealism. I don't think it was necessary that he step outside of Judea to find this influence. Or maybe just accept he was influenced by God. Or thought he was. He certainly seem to accept being considered the Son of God.

 

[Friend of Bill W]

A lot of the Christian thinking was likely influenced by the Greeks. Not quite sure how you'd trace any of it back to Buddhism.

There must've been some cultural exchange between Buddhists and Greeks because the Buddha image we have today is a plagiarisation of the Greek God Apollo. If you doubt this, Google for it; it's true.

I believe there's also similarities between some Greek philosophy and Buddhist philosophy, but I've not looked into this and maybe this is pure coincidence?

 

[Friend of Bill W]

Maybe Jesus was fascinated with religious idealism. I don't think it was necessary that he step outside of Judea to find this influence. Or maybe just accept he was influenced by God. Or thought he was. He certainly seem to accept being considered the Son of God.

Aren't we all God's children? And Jesus also refers to himself on quite a few occasions as 'son of man'; and there's various explanations why he did this. One explanation is that Jesus is an archetypal figure showing us how to achieve the death and resurrection of the human spirit.

I quite like this idea; being a member of A.A. I regularly witness newcomers to A.A., bent and mangled, their spirits broken (by drinking too much spirits funnily enough), watch them get sober and come back to life - to grow spiritually via the 12 Step program - I see their spirits resurrect. It's beautiful to watch a damaged individual grow spiritually and really have a change of heart; helping other alkies recover.

 

[Friend of Bill W]

Not to be dismissive of the original question, but I think we often get distracted and even adversarial by focusing on the man rather than the message.

This is not just true of Jesus, but of all religious figures - rather than concentrating (or in some cases fixating) on the bibliographic, miraculous or historical nature of the icons, I think humanity may be better served if we focused on the positive, compassionate aspects of their messages.

I've heard in Buddhism that if the historical Buddha never existed, that he was no more than a mere literary device to make the Dharma (the truth) more interesting, then it wouldn't change the Dharma one bit.

I reckon that's fairly true and not many educated Buddhists would disagree. Buddhism seems to be a confident religion in this way.

 

[Nakosis]

There must've been some cultural exchange between Buddhists and Greeks because the Buddha image we have today is a plagiarisation of the Greek God Apollo. If you doubt this, Google for it; it's true.

I believe there's also similarities between some Greek philosophy and Buddhist philosophy, but I've not looked into this and maybe this is pure coincidence?

I'm curious too...

 

[Nakosis]

Aren't we all God's children? And Jesus also refers to himself on quite a few occasions as 'son of man'; and there's various explanations why he did this. One explanation is that Jesus is an archetypal figure showing us how to achieve the death and resurrection of the human spirit.

I quite like this idea; being a member of A.A. I regularly witness newcomers to A.A., bent and mangled, their spirits broken (by drinking too much spirits funnily enough), watch them get sober and come back to life - to grow spiritually via the 12 Step program - I see their spirits resurrect. It's beautiful to watch a damaged individual grow spiritually and really have a change of heart; helping other alkies recover.

I don't know I think Jesus thought there was something unique about him. The only begotten son. Like he alone had unique authority to speak. Maybe this was how the story was written. By his followers with this kind of bias.

 

[Friend of Bill W]

I'm curious too...

There's a wiki on it:

Greco-Buddhism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hmmmm.

But with regards to the Greeks influencing Jewish thought:

Freke and Gandy wrote:

"Helenized Jews had been synthesizing the Pagan mysteries with their own Jewish mysteries of Moses and Joshua for centuries, so the prototype Jesus story was created way before Jesus's supposed birth"

Remembering there were a number of similarities between Jesus and various other pagan myths of dying and resurrecting son of God who were both God and man.

I mean I don't know what's true and what isn't true regarding Jesus, but it looks like the Greeks influenced both Buddhism and Jewish thought, and maybe this caused the birth of a new religion; Christianity?

 

[angellous_evangellous]

There's a wiki on it:

Greco-Buddhism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hmmmm.

But with regards to the Greeks influencing Jewish thought:

Freke and Gandy wrote:

"Helenized Jews had been synthesizing the Pagan mysteries with their own Jewish mysteries of Moses and Joshua for centuries, so the prototype Jesus story was created way before Jesus's supposed birth"

Remembering there were a number of similarities between Jesus and various other pagan myths of dying and resurrecting son of God who were both God and man.

I mean I don't know what's true and what isn't true regarding Jesus, but it looks like the Greeks influenced both Buddhism and Jewish thought, and maybe this caused the birth of a new religion; Christianity?

The problem is that they are making way too much out of the inter-relation between "pagan myth" (whatever that is) and Judaism.

Let's examine the quote:

""Helenized Jews had been synthesizing the Pagan mysteries with their own Jewish mysteries of Moses and Joshua for centuries, so the prototype Jesus story was created way before Jesus's supposed birth"

Even if this were true to a great extent:

"Helenized Jews had been synthesizing the Pagan mysteries with their own Jewish mysteries of Moses and Joshua for centuries"

It is not by any means evidence that "the prototype Jesus story was created way before Jesus's supposed birth."

And we have to examine which mysteries the Jews liked so much and chose for their "proto-type." What the sam hell is a Jewish mystery anyway?

And finally, and most importantly, two points:

1) The Jews were not particularly fond of the person / god "Jesus" so why on earth would the Jews pick a pagan mystery and pattern a person that they reject?

2) Much of the "prototype" of Jesus comes between 100 and 300 years after he lived, written by Christians who were heavily influenced by Plato and Aristotle.

 

[Nakosis]

There's a wiki on it:

Greco-Buddhism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hmmmm.

But with regards to the Greeks influencing Jewish thought:

Freke and Gandy wrote:

"Helenized Jews had been synthesizing the Pagan mysteries with their own Jewish mysteries of Moses and Joshua for centuries, so the prototype Jesus story was created way before Jesus's supposed birth"

Remembering there were a number of similarities between Jesus and various other pagan myths of dying and resurrecting son of God who were both God and man.

I mean I don't know what's true and what isn't true regarding Jesus, but it looks like the Greeks influenced both Buddhism and Jewish thought, and maybe this caused the birth of a new religion; Christianity?

Something interesting I've found.

Having said that, what rests? Is there no Buddhist influence in the gospels? Since more than hundred years Buddhist influence in the Gospels has been known and acknowledged by scholars from both sides. Just recently, Duncan McDerret published his excellent “The Bible and the Buddhist” (Sardini, Bornato [Italy] 2001). With McDerret, I am convinced that there are many Buddhist narratives in the Gospels.
Jesus is Buddha

 

[Friend of Bill W]

Just a short post; I've got to do a 'taxi run' for my daughter:

But your post was good, but this tripped me up:

1) The Jews were not particularly fond of the person / god "Jesus" so why on earth would the Jews pick a pagan mystery and pattern a person that they reject?

'The Jews' - they (I suspect) were not a single entity with one solid thought; we've discussed this earlier where I found that Jewish beliefs weren't as rigid as I first thought; and it wasn't all 'an eye for an eye'.

But here, you seem to imply the the Jews were a single entity (as in they didn't disagree with each other) and were rigid in thought.

Is that what you're saying, or would you agree that your point isn't valid?

I'll comment on the rest of the post when I have more time; apologies for the rushed post here. I hope I've made some sense. English isn't my first language.

Angelous is pretty, sexy, etc, etc.

 

[outhouse]

Just a short post; I've got to do a 'taxi run' for my daughter:

But your post was good, but this tripped me up:



'The Jews' - they (I suspect) were not a single entity with one solid thought; we've discussed this earlier where I found that Jewish beliefs weren't as rigid as I first thought; and it wasn't all 'an eye for an eye'.

But here, you seem to imply the the Jews were a single entity (as in they didn't disagree with each other) and were rigid in thought.

Is that what you're saying, or would you agree that your point isn't valid?

I'll comment on the rest of the post when I have more time; apologies for the rushed post here. I hope I've made some sense. English isn't my first language.

Angelous is pretty, sexy, etc, etc.

the whole jesus dogma attached to the real man was played out in the OT long before and pagan myths seated themselves.

Jews had different beliefs but they were a community not that far a part. the distance between pagan and jew was very wide compared to jew -jew

 

[outhouse]

2) Much of the "prototype" of Jesus comes between 100 and 300 years after he lived, written by Christians who were heavily influenced by Plato and Aristotle

agreed with the OT as a guideline or backdrop so to speak

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Just a short post; I've got to do a 'taxi run' for my daughter:

But your post was good, but this tripped me up:



'The Jews' - they (I suspect) were not a single entity with one solid thought; we've discussed this earlier where I found that Jewish beliefs weren't as rigid as I first thought; and it wasn't all 'an eye for an eye'.

But here, you seem to imply the the Jews were a single entity (as in they didn't disagree with each other) and were rigid in thought.

Is that what you're saying, or would you agree that your point isn't valid?

I'll comment on the rest of the post when I have more time; apologies for the rushed post here. I hope I've made some sense. English isn't my first language.

Angelous is pretty, sexy, etc, etc.

No, I don't think that all Jews were a single entity. I was replying to the incorrect generalization of the quote that characterized Jews (one group?) as being influenced by the "pagan mysteries" so much so that they had a proto-type for Jesus long before his supposed birth.

So, tell me, which specific group of Jews were both heavily influenced by the pagan mysteries, had a proto-type of Jesus and chose to form him from that? Again, you must remember that much of the theology of Christ doesn't even come from any Jewish group or even from the first century.

I suggest that you read something else because these guys suck.

 

[Friend of Bill W]

I suggest that you read something else because these guys suck.

I like 'em, but yeh, they seem to write for a 'pop culture' audience! I've read a fair bit of Elaine Pagels work too, what are your views on her?

Also can I ask what authors you would recommend? I do have an interest in this area. I do prefer secular history authors, so preferably something along those lines if possible.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

I like 'em, but yeh, they seem to write for a 'pop culture' audience! I've read a fair bit of Elaine Pagels work too, what are your views on her?

Also can I ask what authors you would recommend? I do have an interest in this area. I do prefer secular history authors, so preferably something along those lines if possible.

Well, on the influence of the mystery religions on the development of Jesus, not that much - mostly because it's so slight that it might get a passing mention in a scholarly work. Nobody writes on it because it's so obviously false.

I read Pagels often as well. I'm not as impressed with her as other people are - but she's very insightful. If you like her, you should take a look at her teacher's work -- Helmut Koester. Some of his work was originally written in German - look for his 2 volume introduction to the New Testament. It's readable. Then there's Karen King on Gnosticism - I believe that she is Pagel's student. Her work is good but it seems like she hates Christianity.

All three of these scholars build on the work of F. C. Bauer's Orthodoxy and Heresy, whose basic argument is that proto-heterodoxy was the original form of Christianity (orthodoxy) and proto-orthodoxy (what later became orthodoxy) was the vocal minority that ate its opponents alive. So Christianity in its earliest form was "Gnosticism" but the "Orthodox" upset the happy beginning and gave us "Christianity."

 

[Friend of Bill W]

Thanks, Angellous, you've given me some stuff to look at and order from Amazon.

Cheers.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Thanks, Angellous, you've given me some stuff to look at and order from Amazon.

Cheers.

You should be able to find Bauer online for free.