BUDDHISM IN RELATION TO CHRISTIANITY.

Dunstan Times, Issue 1156, 25 April 1884, Page 4

BUDDHISM IN RELATION TO CHRISTIANIT Y.

At the last large meeting held in 1 F.-h ruary, by the Victoria (Philosophical 1 ) Institute, 7, Adelphi Terrace, London, a paper was read by the Rev. R C. Codins, M.A., on Buddhism in relation toChristianity Referring to the parade's between the persons and characters of Buddha ami Jesus Christ, he said : —Take, as a prominent instance, the birth stories. I need nt here give details, which are to bo found in any modern on Buddhism, The supposed miraculous conception ; the bringing down of Buddha from the Tusita heaven, the Devas acknowledging his supremacy ; the presentation in the Temple when the images of tndra and oil er gods threw themselves at his feet; the temptation by Mara—which legends are embellished by the modern writer I have already quoted, under such phi ases as “Conceived by the Hoy Ghost” “ Born of the Virgin Maya.” “Bong of the heavenly host,” “ Presentation in the Temple and temptation in the wilderness”—none of these is found in the early Pali texts. The simple story of ancient Buddhism is i hat an ascetic, whose family name was Gautam.i, preached a new doctrine of human suffering, and a new way of deliverance from it. There is no thought in the early Buddhism, of which we read in the Pali lexts, of deliverance at the hands of a god ; but the man Gautama Buddha stands alone in his striving after the true emancipation from sorrow and ignorance. The accounts of his descending from heaven, and being conceived in the world of men, when a preternatural light shone over the worlds, the blind received sight, the dumb sang, the lame danced, the 1 sick were cured, together with | all such embel ishmeuts, are most | certainly added by later hands ; and | if here we recognise some rather re- | markable likenesses in thought or ex jiression to things familiar to us in j our Bibles we need not be astonished, when we rifled, how great must have been the influence, qs I have before hinted, of the Christian story in India in the early centuries of the Christian era, and, perhaps, long subsequently. Tnis is a point which has been much overlooked; but it is abundantly evident from, among other proofs, the story of the god Krishna, which is a manifest parody ol the history of 1 Christ. The Bhayavat Gita, a then-1 sophical poem put in.o the mouth of 1 Krishna, is something unique among the productions of the East, containing many gems of what we should call Christian truth wrested from thenproper setting, to adorn this creation of the Brahman poet and indicating as plainly their origiti as do the stories of Ids life in the Maha Bharaia) so that it has not unreasonably been co - eluded that the siory of Krishna was inserted in the Maha*Bharata to furnish a divine sanction to the B aryavat Gita. If, then, as there is the strongest reason to beluve, the Christian story, somewhere between the tiist and tenth centuries of the Christian era, forced itself into the great Hindu epic, and was at the foundation of the most remarkable poem that ever saw the light in India, can we be surprised if wo tiu,d similarly borrowed and imitated wonders in the later Buddhist stories also Several Home and Colonial applications to join the Institute as guinea subscribers we.e received, and its object being to investigate ad philosophical and scientific questions, especially any said to militate against the truth of the Bible—a discussion ‘ ensued in which Mr Homiuzd Rassam, Protessor Leitner, from Lahore, Mr Coles, an earnest student of the question during 25 years’ residence in Ceylon, Professor Rhys Davids, and others took part. All agi eeing in and confirming tne statements of Mr Colins’ paper. Dr Leitner brought a large number of photog; aphs of early Indian and Tarlar sculptures, showing the first introduction or the Christian story into those monuments between and about the second and tenth centuries, and he pointed out the value of such additional confirmation of Mr Collins’ statements.