Twelve Disciples—Love one another—Buddhist Beatitudes—The Sower—Blind Guides—Early Buddhism a religion of joy—Buddhist Baptismal Rites—Other Coincidences. I HAVE shown certain curious points of contact between the Buddhist and the Christian scriptures. Here are a few more:— "THEN WAS JESUS LED UP BY THE SPIRIT INTO THE WILDERNESS, TO BE TEMPTED OF THE DEVIL." Comfortable dowagers driving to church three times on Sunday would be astonished to learn that the essence of Christianity is in this passage. Its meaning has quite passed away from Protestantism, almost from Christendom. The "Lalita Vistara" fully shows what that meaning is. Without Buddhism it would be lost. Jesus was an Essene, and the Essene, like the Indian Yogi, sought to obtain divine union and the "gifts of the Spirit" by solitary reverie in retired spots. In what is called the "Monastery of our Lord" on the Quarantania, a cell is shown with rude frescoes of Jesus and Satan. There, according to tradition, the demoniac hauntings that all mystics speak of occurred. "I HAVE NEED TO BE BAPTISED OF THEE." A novice in Yoga has a guru, or teacher. Buddha, in riding away from the palace, by-and-by reached THIRTY YEARS OF AGE. M. Ernest de Bunsen, in his work, "The Angel Messiah," says that Buddha, like Christ, commenced preaching at thirty years of age. He certainly must have preached at Vaisâlî, for five young men became his disciples there, and exhorted him to go on with his teaching. † He was twenty-nine when he left the palace, therefore he might well have preached at thirty. He did not turn the wheel of the law until after a six years’ meditation under the Tree of Knowledge. "AND WHEN HE HAD FASTED FORTY DAYS AND FORTY NIGHTS." Buddha, immediately previous to his great encounter with Mâra, the tempter, fasted forty-nine days and nights. ‡ "COMMAND THAT THESE STONES BE MADE BREAD." The first temptation of Buddha, when Mâra assailed him, appealed to his hunger, as we have seen. THE TWELVE GREAT DISCIPLES. "Except in my religion, the twelve great disciples are not to be found." § Speech by Buddha.
One disciple was called Upatishya (the beloved disciple). In a former existence he and Maudgalyâyana had prayed that they might sit, the one on the right hand and the other on the left. Buddha granted this prayer. The other disciples murmured much. * "GO YE INTO ALL THE WORLD." From Benares Buddha sent forth the sixty-one disciples. "Go ye forth," he said, "and preach Dharma, no two disciples going the same way." † "THE SAME CAME TO JESUS BY NIGHT." Professor Rhys Davids points out that Yâsas, a young rich man, came to Buddha by night, for fear of his rich relations. PAX VOBISCUM. On one point I have been a little puzzled. The password of the Buddhist Wanderers was "Sadhu!" which does not seem to correspond with the "Pax Vobiscum!" (Matt. x. 13) of Christ's disciples. But I have just come across a passage in Renan, ‡ which shows that the Hebrew word was "Schalom!" (bonheur!) This is almost a literal translation of "Sadhu!" "A NEW COMMANDMENT GIVE I YOU, THAT YE LOVE ONE ANOTHER." "By love alone can we conquer wrath. By good alone can we conquer evil. The whole world dreads violence. All men tremble to the presence of death. Do to others that which ye would have them do to you. Kill not. Cause no death." §
The Buddhists, like the Christians, have got their Beatitudes. They are plainly arranged for chant and response in the temples. It is to be noted that the Christian Beatitudes were a portion of the early Christian ritual. The "long suffering and meek," those "who follow a peaceful calling," those who are not "weary in well-doing," are included in the catalogue. Here is one verse:—MORE COINCIDENCES
10 Self-restraint and purity,
The knowledge of noble truths,
The attainment of Nirvâna—
This is the greatest blessing.
THE ONE THING NEEDFUL.
Certain subtle questions were proposed to Buddha, such as:—"What will best conquer the evil passions of men?" "What is the most savoury gift for the alms-bowl of the mendicant?" "Where is true happiness to be found?" Buddha replied to them all with one word "Dharma" (the heavenly life). *
"WHOSOEVER SHALL SMITE THEE ON THY RIGHT CHEEK, OFFER HIM THE OTHER ALSO."
A merchant from Sûnaparanta having joined Buddha's society, was desirous of preaching to his relations, and is said to have asked the permission of the master so to do.
"The people of Sûnaparanta," said Buddha, "are exceedingly violent; if they revile you what will you do?"
"I will make no reply," said the mendicant.
"And if they strike you?"
"I will not strike in return," said the mendicant.
"And if they kill you?"
BUDDHA'S THIRD COMMANDMENT.
"Commit no adultery." Commentary by Buddha: "This law is broken by even looking at the wife of another with a lustful mind." †
THE SOWER.
It is recorded that Buddha once stood beside the ploughman Kasibhâradvaja, who reproved him for his idleness. Buddha answered thus: "I, too, plough and sow, and from my ploughing and sowing I reap immortal fruit. My field is religion. The weeds that I pluck up are the passions of cleaving to this life. My plough is wisdom, my seed purity." ‡
On another occasion he described almsgiving as being like "good seed sown on a good soil that yields an abundance of fruits. But alms given to those who are yet under the tyrannical yoke of the passions are like a seed deposited in a bad soil. The passions of the receiver of the alms choke, as it were, the growth of merits." §
"NOT THAT WHICH GOETH INTO THE MOUTH DEFILETH A MAN."
In the "Sûtta Nipâta" (chap. 11.) is a discourse on the food that defiles a man (Âmaghanda). Therein it is explained at some length that the food that is eaten cannot defile a man, but "destroying living beings, killing, cutting, binding, stealing, falsehood, adultery, evil thoughts, murder"—this defiles a man, not the eating of flesh.
"A man," says Buddha, "buries a treasure in a deep pit, which lying concealed therein day after day profits him nothing, but there is a treasure of charity, piety, temperance, soberness, a treasure secure, impregnable, that cannot pass away, a treasure that no thief can steal. Let the wise man practice Dharma. This is a treasure that follows him after death." *
THE HOUSE ON THE SAND.
"It (the seen world) is like a city of sand. Its foundation cannot endure." †
BLIND GUIDES.
"Who is not freed cannot free others. The blind cannot guide in the way." ‡
"AS YE SOW, SO SHALL YE REAP."
"As men sow, thus shall they reap." §
"A CUP OF COLD WATER TO ONE OF THESE LITTLE ONES."
"Whosoever piously bestows a little water shall receive an ocean in return." +
"BE NOT WEARY IN WELL-DOING."
"Not to be weary in well-doing." **
"GIVE TO HIM THAT ASKETH."
"Give to him that asketh, even though it be but a little." ††
"With pure thoughts and fulness of love I will do towards others what I do for myself." *
"PREPARE YE THE WAY OF THE LORD!"
Buddha's triumphant entry into Rajâgriha (the "City of the King") has been compared to Christ's entry into Jerusalem. Both, probably, never occurred, and only symbolise the advent of a Divine Being to earth. It is recorded in the Buddhist scriptures that on these occasions a "Precursor of Buddha" always appears. †
"WHO DID SIN, THIS MAN OR HIS PARENTS, THAT HE WAS BORN BLIND?"
(John ix. 3).
Professor Kellogg, in his work entitled "The Light of Asia and the Light of the World," condemns Buddhism in nearly all its tenets. But he is especially emphatic in the matter of the metempsychosis. The poor and helpless Buddhist has to begin again and again "the weary round of birth and death," whilst the righteous Christians go at once into life eternal.
Now, it seems to me that this is an example of the danger of contrasting two historical characters when we have a strong sympathy for the one and a strong prejudice against the other. Professor Kellogg has conjured up a Jesus with nineteenth century ideas, and a Buddha who is made responsible for all the fancies that were in the world B.C. 500. Professor Kellogg is a professor of an American university, and as such must know that the doctrine of the gilgal (the Jewish name for the metempsychosis) was as widely spread in Palestine A.D. 30, as it was in Râjâgriha
The author of the article in the "Church Quarterly Review" in proof of its existence adduces the question put by the disciples of Christ in reference to the man that was born blind. And if it was considered that a man could be born blind as a punishment for sin, that sin must have been plainly committed before his birth. Oddly enough, in the "White Lotus of Dharma," there is an account of the healing of a blind man. "Because of the sinful conduct of the man (in a former birth) this malady has risen." But a still more striking instance is given in the case of the man sick with the palsy (Luke v. is). The Jews believed, with modern Orientals, that grave diseases like paralysis were due, not to physical causes in this life, but to moral causes in previous lives. And if the account of the cure of the paralytic is to be considered historical, it is quite clear that this was Christ's idea when He cured the man, for He distinctly announced that the cure was effected not by any physical processes, but by annulling the "sins" which were the cause of his malady. Traces of the metempsychosis idea still exist in Catholic Christianity. The doctrine of original sin is said by some writers to be a modification of it. Certainly the fancy that the works of supererogation of their saints can be transferred to others is the Buddhist idea of good karma, which is transferable in a similar manner. "As when a string of blind men are clinging one to the other neither can the foremost see, nor the middle one see, nor the hindmost see. Just so, methinks, Vâsettha is the talk of the Brahmins, versed in the Three Vedas." * "EUNUCHS FOR THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN'S SAKE." In the days of St. Thomas à Kempis the worshipper was modelled on the Christ. In our days the Christ seems modelled on the worshipper. The Bodleian professor of Sanskrit writes thus:—"Christianity teaches that in the highest form of life love is intensified; Buddhism teaches that in the highest state of existence all love is extinguished. According to Christianity, Go and earn your own bread, and support yourself and your family. Marriage, it says, is honourable, and undefiled, and married life a field where holiness can grow." But history is history; and a French writer has recently attacked Christ for attempting to bring into Europe the celibacy and pessimism of Buddhism. This author in his work, "Jésus Bouddha," cites Luke xiv. 26:— "If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple." He adduces also:— "Let the dead bury their dead. "Think not that I have come to send peace on earth: I come not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man's foes shall be they of his own household" (Matt. x. 34-36).
"So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple" (Luke xiv. 33). The author says that all this is pure nihilism, and Essene communism. "The most sacred family ties are to be renounced, and man to lose his individuality, and become a unit in a vast scheme to overturn the institutions of his country." "Qu’importe au fanatisme la ruine de la societé humaine." Here also is a remarkable passage from an American writer:— "The anticosmic tendency of the Christian doctrine," says Mr. Felix Oswald, * distinguishes it from all religions except Buddhism. In the language of the New Testament the 'world' is everywhere a synonym of evil and sin, the flesh everywhere the enemy of the spirit. . . . The gospel of Buddha though pernicious, is, however, a perfectly consistent doctrine. Birth, life, and re-birth is an eternal round of sorrow and disappointment. The present and the future are but the upper and lower tyre of an ever-rolling wheel of woe. The only salvation from the wheel of life is an escape to the peace of Nirvâna. The attempt to graft this doctrine upon the optimistic theism of Palestine has made the Christian ethics inconsistent and contradictory. A paternal Jehovah, who yet eternally and horribly tortures a vast plurality of his children. An earth the perfect work of a benevolent God; yet a vale of tears not made to be enjoyed, but only to be despised and renounced. An omnipotent heaven, and yet unable to prevent the intrigues
A propos of this "pessimism," is it certain that early Buddhism and S’iva Buddhism were quite in harmony? Asoka certainly believed that Buddhism was an optimism. "On my subjects I confer happiness both in this world and the next." Buddha called his message "Subhashita" (the glad tidings), and declared that the man who was spiritually awakened had joy for his accompanying shadow. The Burmese are the happiest of God's creatures. "THEN ALL HIS DISCIPLES FORSOOK HIM AND FLED." It is recorded that on one occasion when a "must" elephant charged furiously, "all the disciples deserted Buddha. Ânanda alone remained." * "IF THE RIGHT EYE OFFEND THEE." Mr. Felix Oswald † announces, without, however, giving a more detailed reference, that according to Max Müller's translation of the "Ocean of Worlds," a young monk meets a rich woman, who pities his hard lot. "Blessed is the woman who looks into thy lovely eyes!" "Lovely!" replied the monk. "Look here!" And plucking out one of his eyes he held it up, bleeding and ghastly, and asked her to correct her opinion.
Certain villagers, hard of belief, were listening to Buddha on the shore of a mighty river. Suddenly by a miracle the great teacher caused a man to appear walking on the water from the other side, without immersing his feet. * "AND, LO! THERE WAS A GREAT CALM." Pûrna, one of Buddha's disciples, had a brother in danger of shipwreck in a "black storm." But the guardian spirits of Pûrna informed him of this. He at once transported himself through the air from the distant inland town to the deck of the ship. "Immediately the black tempest ceased as if Sumeru had arrested it." † "WHY EATETH YOUR MASTER WITH PUBLICANS AND SINNERS?" The courtesan Amrapalî invited Buddha and his disciples to a banquet in the mango grove at Vaisâli. Buddha accepted. Some rich princes, sparkling in emeralds, came and gave him a similar invitation. He refused. They were very angry to see him sit at meat with Amrapalî. He explained to his disciples that the harlot might enter the kingdom of Dharma more easily than the prince. ‡ THE PENITENT THIEF. Buddha confronts a terrible bandit in his mountain retreat and converts him. § "THERE WAS WAR IN HEAVEN." Professor Beal, in his "Catena of Buddhist Scriptures" (p. 52), tells us that, in the "Saddharma
"THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN IS LIKE UNTO A MERCHANTMAN SEEKING GOODLY PEARLS, WHO, WHEN HE HAD FOUND ONE PEARL OF GREAT PRICE, WENT AND SOLD ALL THAT HE HAD AND BOUGHT IT" The most sacred emblem of Buddhism is called the maṇi (pearl), and in the Chinese biography a merchant seeking goodly pearls finds it, and unfortunately drops it into the sea. Rather than lose it he tries to drain the sea dry. * THE VOICE FROM THE SKY. This sounds often in the Buddhist narratives. † FAITH. "Faith is the first gate of the Law." ‡ "All who have faith in me obtain a mighty joy." § "THOU ART NOT YET FIFTY YEARS OLD, AND HAST THOU SEEN ABRAHAM?" In the "White Lotus of Dharma" (chap. xiv.), Buddha is asked how it is that, having sat under the bo-tree only forty years ago, he had been able, according to his boast, to see many Buddhas and saints who died hundreds of years previously. He answers that he has lived many hundred thousand myriads of Kotis, and that though in the form of a Buddha, he is in reality Swayambhu, the Self-Existent, the Father of the million worlds. In proof of this
"Let us make here three tabernacles—one for Thee, one for Moses, and one for Elias." Why should Peter want to adopt a Buddhist custom and build tabernacles for the dead Moses and the dead Elias? Why, also, should Moses come from the tomb to support a teacher who had torn his covenant with Yahve to shreds? "HE WAS TRANSFIGURED BEFORE THEM." Buddha, leaving Maudgalyâyana and another disciple to represent him, went off through the air to the Devaloka, to the Heaven Tuśita, to preach to the spirits in prison and to convert his mother. When he came down from the mountain (Mienmo), a staircase of glittering diamonds, seen by all, helped his descent. His appearance was blinding. The "six glories" glittered on his person. Mortals and spirits hymned the benign Being who emptied the hells. * In the "Gospel according to the Hebrews" is a curious passage which Baur and Hilgenfeld hold to be the earliest version of the Transfiguration narrative. "Just now my mother, the Holy Spirit, took me, by one of my hairs and bore me up on to the great mountain of Tabor." This is curious. Buddha and Jesus reach the Mount of Transfiguration, each through the influence of his mother. But perhaps the Jewish writer did not like the universalism inculcated in the Buddhist narrative.
In a vihâra at Gândhâra was a monk so loathsome and stinking, on account of his maladies, that none of his brother disciples dare go near him. The great Teacher came and tended him lovingly and washed his feet. * THE GREAT BANQUET OF BUDDHA. In the "Lalita Vistara" (p. 51) it is stated that those who have faith will become "sons of Buddha," and partake of the "food of the kingdom." Four things draw disciples to his banquet—gifts, soft words, production of benefits, conformity of benefits. BAPTISM. In a Chinese life of Buddha by Wung Puh, † it is announced that Buddha at Vaisâlî delivered a Sûtra entitled "The Baptism that Rescues from Life and Death and confers Salvation." "AND NONE OF THEM IS LOST BUT THE SON OF PERDITION." Buddha like Christ had a treacherous disciple, Devadatta. He schemed with a wicked prince, who sent men armed with bows and swords to slaughter Buddha. Devadatta tried other infamous stratagems. His end was appalling. Coming in a palanquin to arrest Buddha, he got out to stretch himself. Suddenly fierce flames burst out, and he was carried down to the hell Avîchi (the Rayless Place). There, in a red-hot cauldron, impaled by one red bar and pierced by two others, he will stay for a whole Kalpa. Then he will be forgiven." ‡
Buddha had his last supper or repast with his disciples. A treacherous disciple changed his alms-bowl, and apparently he was poisoned. * Fierce pains seized him as he journeyed afterwards. He was forced to rest. He sent a message to his host, Kunda, the son of the jeweller, to feel no remorse although the feast had been his death. Under two trees he now died. It will be remembered that during the last supper of Jesus a treacherous disciple "dipped into his dish," but as Jesus was not poisoned, the event had no sequence. "NOW FROM THE SIXTH HOUR THERE WAS DARKNESS OVER ALL THE LAND UNTIL ABOUT THE NINTH HOUR." The critical school base much of their contention that the Gospels do not record real history on this particular passage. They argue that such an astounding event could not have escaped Josephus and Tacitus. When Buddha died, the "sun and moon withdrew their shining," and dust and ashes fell like rain. "The great earth quaked throughout. The crash of the thunder shook the heavens and the earth, rolling along the mountains and valleys." † The Buddhist account is certainly not impossible, for the chronicler takes advantage of the phenomena of an Indian dust-storm to produce his dark picture. At Lucknow, before the siege, I remember a storm so dense at midday that some ladies with my regiment thought the Day of Judgment had arrived. "AND MANY BODIES OF THE SAINTS WHICH SLEPT AROSE." When Buddha died at Kusinâgara, Ânanda and another disciple saw many denizens of the unseen world in the city, by the river Yigdan. ‡
"TO ANOINT MY BODY TO THE BURYING" The newly-discovered fragments of the Gospel of Peter give us a curious fact. They record that Mary Magdalene, "taking with her her friends," went to the sepulchre of Jesus to "place themselves beside him and perform the rites" of wailing, beating breasts, etc. Amrapalî and other courtesans did the same rites to Buddha, and the disciples were afterwards indignant that impure women should have "washed his dead body with their tears." * In the Christian records are three passages, all due, I think, to the Buddhist narrative. In one, "a woman" anoints Jesus; in John (xii. 7), "Mary" anoints him; in Luke, a "sinner," who kisses and washes His feet with her hair. Plainly these last passages are quite irrational. No woman could have performed the washing and other burial rites on a man alive and in health.
The Abbé Huc tells us * that on the death of the Bokté Lama, his garments are cut into little strips and prized immensely. "HE APPEARED UNTO MANY." "Buddha prophesied that he would appear after his death." † In a Chinese version quoted by Eitel, ‡ Buddha, to soothe his mother, who had come down weeping from the skies, opens his coffin lid and appears to her. In the temple sculptures he is constantly depicted coming down to the altar during worship. THE "GREAT WHITE THRONE." Mr. Upham, in his "History of Buddhism," (pp. 56, 57), gives a description of the Buddhist heaven. There is a "high mountain," and a city "four square" with gates of gold and silver, adorned with precious stones. Seven moats surround the city. Beyond the last one is a row of marble pillars studded with jewels. The great throne of the god stands in the centre of a great hall, and is surmounted by a white canopy. Round the great throne are seated heavenly ministers, who record men's actions in a "golden book." A mighty tree is conspicuous in the garden. In the Chinese heaven is the "Gem Lake," by which stands the peach-tree, whose fruit gives immortality. § THE ATONEMENT. The idea of transferred good Karma, the merits of the former lives of an individual being passed on to another individual, is, of course, quite foreign to the lower Judaism, which believed in no after life at all. In the view of the higher Buddhism, Sâkya
St. Paul is very contradictory about the atonement. This passage seems pure Buddhism. "As by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation, even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life." (Rom. v. 18). Contrast this with another passage:— "Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins" (Rom. iii. 25).
201:* Foucaux, "Lalita Vistara," p. 228. 201:† Foucaux, "Lalita Vistara," p. 236. 201:‡ Chinese Life," by Wung Puh. 201:§ "Bigandet," p. 301. 202:* Bigandet, p. 153. 202:† Ibid, p. 126. 202:‡ "Les Apôtres," p. 22. 202:§ "Sûtra of Forty-two Sections," v. 129. 203:* "Bigandet," p. 225. 204:* "Bigandet," p. 216. 204:† Buddhaghosa's "Parables," by Max Müller and Rodgers, p. 153. 204:‡ "Hardy "Manual," p. 215. 204:§ "Bigandet," p. 211. 205:* "Khuddaka Pâtha," p. 13. 205:† "Lalita Vistara," p. 172. 205:‡ Ibid, p. 199. 205:§ "Ta-chwang-yan-king-lun," serm. 57. 205:+ Ibid, serm. 20. 205:** "Mahâmangala Sutta," ver. 7. 205:†† "Udânavarga," chap. xx., ver. 15. 206:* "Lalita Vistara." Chap. v. 206:† "Bigandet," p. 147. 208:* Buddha, in the "Tevigga Sutta," I., 15. 209:* "Secret of the East," p. 27. 210:* "Fo-sho-hing-tsan-king, IV., 21. 210:† "Chinese Dhammapada," p. 51. 211:* "The Secret of the East," p. 134. 211:† Burnouf, "Introduction," p. 229. 211:‡ "Bigandet," p. 251. 211:§ "Chinese Dhammapada," p. 98. 212:* "Rom. Hist., p. 228. 212:† See Beal, "Rom. Hist.," p. 105. 212:‡ "Lalita Vistara," p. 39. 212:§ Ibid, p. 188. 213:* "Bigandet," p. 209. 214:* "Chinese Dhammapada, p. 94. 214:† See Beal, "Journ. As. Soc.," Vol. XX., p. 172. 214:‡ "Bigandet," p. 244. 215:* See Rockhill's, "Buddha," p. 133 215:† "Fo-sho-hing-tsan-king," v. 26. 215:‡ Rockhill's "Life of the Buddha," p. 133. 216:* Rockhill, "Thibetan Life," p. 153. 217:* "Voyages," II., p. 278. 217:† "Lotus," p. 144. 217:‡ "Three Lectures," p. 57. 217:§ See illustrations to my "Buddhism in Christendom." 218:* Chinese version, p. 225.
(Matt. xv. 14).
(Matt. ix. 11).
(Matt. xiii. 45).
(John xiii. 5).
(Mark xiv. 8).
Footnotes