Buddhism, Christianity, and what Jesus
taught
by
Frank Walmsley
Get
up and prove things otherwise!
All
ecclesiastical history
Is
a mishmash of error and coercion.
Introduction:
Christianity is what is called a “hitching post
religion,” to illustrate: When the horse was the main means of
transportation you would find hitching posts everywhere. This is where horses
were tied up when their riders would dismount. However with the advent of the
automobile the horse slowly became an obsolete means of transportation but for a
while the hitching posts remained. Hence the case with mainstream Christianity;
the churches remain but they are rapidly loosing their followers as people
gravitate to “new religions.” Unfortunately the “new religion”
of
Buddhism is noted for its ability to embrace or incorporate other theologies and cosmologies. Shakyamuni incorporated Hindu cosmology into Buddhism. Nichiren adopted Hachiman (a Japanese deity) and inscribed it on the Gohonzon. Why do we have to slag Christianity by calling it "depraved" when most people really don't have a clue what it really is all about? Why can't we draw parallels between the two and plant the seed of doubt about what people have come to believe? Is this not a more skillful means? I've seen many cases of culturally embracing someone while doctrinally refuting with great respect for the person, if not for his/her delusions.
Although I don’t have a complete version of all the
Goshos, from my reading I don’t recall the Daishonin trashing Shinto. If
anything he treated it with skillful means……… benign neglect.
It is imperative that you understand that I am not
supporting any form of the Christian dogma in this paper. I share many other
people’s belief that Jesus was at best a Bodhisattva of the provisional
doctrines. I will amply prove in the
following pages that there is a very good argument for this hypothesis
Research
Modality:
Three Proofs: Theoretical, Documentary and Actual
Several years ago I began working on a rebuttal of Christianity and
recently decided to revisit it with the goal of producing some thoughts on how
we could better promote growth in our membership in Canada. Perhaps these thoughts could also pertain to our neighbours to the south as we
share many similarities in culture and language.
The irony is that modern Christians are about as close to the truth
about their religion as the Pure Land Sect is to True Buddhism. In researching
this paper I have done considerable investigation into the theoretical and
documentary aspects of Christianity. The sad fact is that with the possible
exception of the Christian Mystics, and some elements of Gnosticism, Christians
don't understand what Jesus really taught. Jesus represents a very real
archetype in the western psyche and that fact cannot be denied even if you have
the most rudimentary understanding of psychology.
There is an old saying in Physics that provides the
most “elegant” explanation of the historical rise of the Christian Church
that states, “If you keep
your data base short enough, it will fit your theory.”
What is the significance of this statement?
Now by database we mean the facts i.e. Documentary and
Actual Proof. The theory we are addressing is that promulgated by the mainstream
Christian churches. Their problem is that their database is very short, as this
paper will amply show.
It is imperative to expose some of the many myths
surrounding the Christian Religion and through this process perhaps plant a
“seed of doubt” in the minds of our Christian majority in the hope that they
will consider our
The significance is twofold:
1) It
compromises the credibility of the mainstream
Christian Church.
2) It is a more inclusive approach to interest people in
Buddhism.
Historical
Evidence: Theoretical and Documentary Proof
"The Search for the Authentic Words of Jesus -
The Five Gospels" was written by The Fellows of the Jesus Seminar, a
group of 74 mostly Ph.D. scholars and theologians headed by Robert W. Funk, a
Guggenheim Fellow and Senior Fullbright Scholar.
Roy W. Hoover a Weyerhauser Professor of Biblical Literature and
professor of religion at Whitman College is the co-author.
After examining the Gospels extensively they concluded, "no
more than 20 percent of the sayings attributed to Jesus were uttered by him."
So as you can see the “data base”
for the Christian Church is very short at best.
It is important to note that the study indicates “Five Gospels”.
For those familiar with the King James Version of the Bible, there are only 4
four Gospels; Mathew, Mark, Luke and John. The study by the Fellows of the
Jesus Seminar uses an additional gospel by Thomas that has shed light on the
true teachings of Jesus and will become increasingly important as this paper
progresses.
The Coptic text of the Gospel of Thomas
was discovered in December of 1945 in a sealed jar that was found in the desert
in Egypt near the modern city of Nag Hammadi. In it were found many Gnostic
teachings and the Gospel of Thomas, which is found as the second tractate, or
document of Codex II. These teachings had been banned by the Christian church
and declared heretical ("to be damned in the inextricable shackles of
anathema forever"). This condemnation was certainly effective, because
no other complete copy of this Gospel has survived. This is consistent with the
Christian Church’s revisionist efforts throughout the last 2,000 years.
“It
was in 367 AD that Archbishop Athanasius of Alexandria sent out an edict to
establish the canonical books of the New Testament, and to condemn all heretical
teachings and apocryphal books.” Thirty Essays on the Gospel of Thomas by
H.R. Ross
Because of this particular edict the volumes containing the Gospel of
Thomas were hidden in the desert thus escaping subsequent revisions by the
Christian Church that followed for literally hundreds of years.
1)
The Gospel of Thomas, login 77 states: “Cleave the wood, I am there; lift
up a stone, and you shall see me there.”
2) The Oxyrhncus Greek version of he Gospel of Thomas
reads: “There is nothing buried
that will not rise up again.”
3)
The Gospel of Thomas “does not refer to belief or faith; (in the Christian
Church sense) it does not describe any miracles; there is no attribution of
greatness to God, nor of his acting in judgment; neither does Jesus have any
judgmental role nor forgive sins; Jesus makes no claim to be the son of God
…….there is no mention of the passion of Jesus and the resurrection of
Christ……..free of apocalyptic concepts…. Or a last judgment……..it
leaves no place for a mediating priesthood and would divest them of their power.”
Hugh MacGregor Ross; Thirty Essays on the Gospel of Thomas.
“Some
scholars have suggested that if the names were changed, the ‘living Buddha’
appropriately could say what the Gospel of Thomas attributes to the
living Jesus” American Religious Scholar Elaine Pagels
“When the Catholic Jesuits came to Japan in the 16th century to convert “heathens” to Christianity, they were horrified to discover that other Christians had obviously been there already and won over the population. They thought that the Amitabha cult was a variant of Protestantism that they so hated.” The Original Jesus by Dr. Elmar Gruber.
The
Gnostics:
Gnosticism has generally been discounted and downright persecuted by the
Christian Church despite the fact that the true teachings of Jesus are much
closer to Gnosticism than to mainstream Christianity. There are many parallels
between aspects of Gnosticism and Buddhism that indicate an earlier Buddhist
influence.
The
Gnostics, although dualists, did believe that the attainment of knowledge or
Logos was the key to “salvation that emphasized the mystical awakening of the
self, the God within… Everything we seek is already in our presence, and not
outside our self.” And “ Unlike the canonical gospels, that of Thomas spares
us the crucifixion, makes the resurrection unnecessary, and does not
present us with a God named Jesus. No dogma could be founded upon this sequence
of apothegms.” Professor Harold Bloom from The Gospel of Thomas: The Hidden
Sayings of Jesus.
“What
begins to make us free is the gnosis of who we were, when we were “in
the light.” When we were in the light, then we stood at the beginning,
immovable, fully human, and so also divine. To know who we were, is to be known
as we now wish to be known. We came in to being before coming into being; we
already were, and so were never created.” Professor Harold Bloom commenting on
the Gospel of Thomas.
Compare that to a quote from the Gosho Collation of
the Layers of the Various Teachings of All the Buddhas: “mind just as
it is, is light.” The Buddha Writing of Nichiren Daishonin
translated by Martin Bradley
There is a growing body of evidence by certain scholars that the basis of the true teachings of Jesus is indeed based on Buddhism. This is what Jesus taught. Consider the following quote from the Gospel of Thomas:
Jesus said, “If your leaders say… ‘ Look the kingdom is in heaven,’ then the birds of heaven will precede you. If they say ‘It is in the sea,’ then the fish will precede you. Rather, the kingdom is inside you and it is outside you.”
Again this is very Buddhist in its
thought.
Joseph Campbell, the American scholar and historian, is perhaps best known as the inspiration for George Lucas's "Star Wars." This series of movies has elements of provisional Buddhism contained in it. In commenting on Saint Thomas:
"His followers said to him 'When will the kingdom come?' It will
not come by watching for it. It will not be said, ‘Look here it is,' or 'Look,
there it is.' Rather, the father's kingdom is spread out upon the earth, and
people do not see it."
Joseph
Campbell comments "Sheer Buddhism."
Campbell brought up a Roman Catholic, has very little
use for standard Christian dogma. In his video series Transformations of Myth
Through Time (Program #8-9) he examines many parallels between what he calls
"true Christianity" and Buddhism. This series is an excellent
provisional Buddhist primer and can be rented at some specialty video outlets
that specialize in educational videos. I highly recommend it.
The series traces the historical roots of Buddhism from the Ayrans who entered India from the North West between 1500 and 1000BCE introducing the Hindu caste system, and the earliest Hindu scriptures such as the Rig Vedas, which comprises hymns to the deities (devas) of their pantheon.
In the video he recounts an amusing encounter between Alexander the
Great and Indian Holy men (siddhas) as early as 327 BCE.
He also emphasizes that the well-known Buddhist King Ashoka sent missionaries to
Egypt, Cyprus and Macedonia (Greece) in 350 BCE.
It is a well-known historical fact that two centuries
after Pythagorus Alexander the Great reached India. Alexander was very liberal
for his time having been a student of Aristotle he was interested in local
customs and religious thought.
Perhaps the best example of this spread of the Buddhist Dharma to the West is a group of two books written by Dr. Elmar Gruber and Holger Kersten.
Kersten's book Jesus Lived in India offers
ample food for thought that Jesus’ teachings were heavily influenced by
Buddhism and offers a well documented “data base” that Jesus did survive the
crucifixion and escaped to India where he is buried. If you examine the
Christian Church’s story of the resurrection from a Buddhist perspective the only
way that Jesus could have appeared to his disciples after the crucifixion
was to have survived his ordeal on the cross.
As you may recall Jesus did not appear as a ghost, vision or mass
hallucination but in his corporeal human form (in the flesh.) This where Thomas
got his name “Doubting Thomas” because be skeptic he wanted actual proof
that it was indeed Jesus and not a ghost. The book does much to debunk standard
Christian dogma and presents ample documentary proof to support his case.
The Original Jesus, The Buddhist Sources of Christianity, by Dr. Gruber flatly states in the preface, "Jesus was not a Christian. He was a Buddhist."
I would recommend these books. "The Original Jesus, The Buddhist Sources of Christianity" and Kersten's book “Jesus Lived in India” if you are interested in the story of Jesus that is not found in standard Christian Church dogma you may be able to find these books in the library.
“In the Acts of Thomas one of the first episodes is that Jesus, it is implied having survived his crucifixion and wanted Thomas to take the message to the East. Thomas protested, so Jesus sold him as a slave to a trader” Thirty Essays on the Gospel of Thomas by H.R. Ross
“We can find some
similarities between Christianity and some sects of provisional Buddhism. The
Jodo sect, founded by Honen, and the Jodo Shin sect, founded by Shinran teach
that it is impossible for humans to extinguish their earthly desires and to
achieve the happiness they yearn for……………These faiths rely solely upon
others for salvation.”:
April,
2002 - Lecture in Praise of Nichiren Daishonin
Jodo is provisional Buddhism at its worst and also
reflects elements of mainstream Church Christianity. This is not what Jesus
taught.
Consider
the following quote from the Gospel of Thomas: Jesus said, “If your
leaders say ‘
Look the kingdom is in heaven,’ then the birds of heaven will precede you. If
they say ‘It is in the sea,’ then the fish will precede you. Rather, the
kingdom is inside you and it is outside you.” This is very Buddhist in
its thought.
Allan Watts a former Christian Minister and Zen adept perhaps put it
best when he states:
“…..
I know I am God (a Buddha) in disguise. That’s is very difficult thing to
say in Western culture, but it’s very easy to say in India, because there
everybody knows it’s true. Jesus knew this but couldn’t possibly say it in
his culture without being accused of blasphemy, which is what happened, and they
killed him for it. Christians never understood him. They said, ‘Sure Jesus is
God (a Buddha) but nobody else is.’ And that strangled his teachings at birth”
Reincarnation in Christian
Thought:
Christians are always startled when asked if they are
aware that reincarnation was once a Christian teaching. This is an undeniable
historical fact. Therefore if you want to really get them thinking this is a
good place to start.
Plato’s
concept of transmigration was stated at the end of his Republic “
namely that souls proceed to Hades or the Isles of the Blessed in accordance
with merits. Once they have either enjoyed the benefits or reaped the
punishments that accrued during earthly life, they return once again to physical
bodies” Quincy Howe Jr. Reincarnation for the Christian.
Alfred Lord Whitehead (1861-1947) Professor of
Philosophy at Harvard once stated, “All Western Philosophy are but footnotes
to Plato.”
This is indeed a very bold statement and hardly to be
taken too seriously. However you must realize that Western philosophical and
religious thought has been greatly influenced by Platonic and Neoplatonic
thought. Plato had adopted reincarnation/transmigration or what the West calls
“Metempsychosis” from Pythagoras.
“Platonic
and other influences had already been at work even in the half-Hellenised
Judaism into which Jesus was born. When it was carried by Paul and others into
the Gentile world and interpreted, as inevitably it had to be, in terms of the
fashionable philosophies of the day, the influence of Platonic and, later, of
Neoplatonic ideas was such as cannot be ignored.” Reincarnation as a
Christian Hope: Hugh MacGregor
Ross
These Platonic influences stretch throughout the
following centuries and are found in later philosophers such as Hegel and
Schopenhauer. Parts of Emanuel Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason are
Buddhist in nature and the culmination of his system “Transcendental Idealism”
which Schopenhaur championed is very close to the “Consciousness Only”
school of Buddhism. In the West this is prevalent in the Idealism schools of
Kant, Hegel, Berkley, and most importantly Schopenhaur. There is no space here
to bring out these similarities but they should at least be noted as they had a
considerable influence on Western thought if not Christian dogma. There are many
other Buddhist influences in Christianity to name a few; The Christian Trinity
and Rosary Beads.
Origon’s
Theology:
You have to understand that the theology behind the four Gospels that
make up the foundation of the Christian church was pretty “thin gruel” at
best. It was left to subsequent leaders to “beef it up” with at least some
semblance of what we would call theoretical proof if it was to stand any chance
of competing with the other religions and philosophies of the day. The following
is more information than you need but I feel it important that we as
knowledgeable Buddhist know our background and facts.
Origon (185-254 AD) was a Greek and a philosopher (a
Christian Platonist) and “he was beyond doubt the greatest biblical scholar as
well as the most original philosophical mind of his age.
Origon
“who was by far the most remarkable genius, with the possible exception of
Augestine, among the Christian Fathers, whose writings have commanded a greater
authority in the Church than any other literature than the Bible itself.” Twenty
Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation: Ian Stevenson, M.D.
Origon
was “filling in the gaps with Platonic philosophy that he knew from his
education in Alexandria. He chose to read the Bible allegorically rather than
literally and this is a very dicey affair to say the least, he was painstakingly
cautious, and it took the most subtle thinkers of the church three hundred years
to find fault with what he had created.” Quincy HoweJr. Reincarnation for
the Christian.
The importance of Origon is that his validation of
reincarnation was widely adopted for over 300 years by the mainstream Christian
Church until the Second Council of Constantinople (the Fifth Ecumenical Council
of the Church) 553 CE where it was stricken as a Christian teaching. There are
several theories why this was implemented. One being that the Church wanted the
heavy punishment of “eternal damnation” to keep the believers in line
another that it was a political struggle between the Roman Emperor Justinian and
Pope Vigilus.
Again, it is always interesting to note the reaction
of Christians when you point out to them that the seemingly Buddhist concept of
reincarnation/transmigration was once part of the churches teachings especially
when you have the historical facts to support it.
The doctrine of purgatory (purging is the root word)
was developed in the Middle Ages that briefly stated that souls have the option
of going to heaven, hell or purgatory where they would purge their sins
(negative Karma.) This is a form of reincarnation.
“On the basis of contemporary Biblical scholarship a plausible case can be made that Jesus and John the Baptist accepted reincarnation, having learned it from the Essences.” Quincy Howe Jr. Reincarnation for the Christian.
The Essenes (Gnosticism)
It is a strange thing that Jesus is given the title
“Jesus of Nathareth” when he was supposedly born in Bethlehem. There is
however an explanation for this that is important to this papers hypothesis.
That it is a mistranslation. The correct translation of Act22:8 should read,
“I am Jesus the Nazarene.”
The significance of this is the fact that the Essenes
were also called Nazarenes. John the
Baptist was also an Essene.
The Essenes are a fascinating Jewish sect founded two centuries before the time of Jesus among the Jews in Alexandria and Palestine. As noted earlier Alexander the Great had conquered India and had later founded the city of Alexandria and a great university at the mouth of the Nile River in Egypt. It had been important to him, as a student of Aristotle, to bring back with him the art and literature of conquered territories including Buddhist monks and Hindu yogis.
According to Aristoxenus, who was writing during the
time of Alexander the Great, the philosopher Socrates (469-399 BC) had met
travelers from Indian in Athens Greece.
Essenes were very much like
a Hinnayana sect of Buddhism in their lifestyle and certain belief structures
indicating they were directly influenced by Buddhist missionaries from India.
Points of similarity are briefly as follows:
1) “Perhaps the greatest positive
quality of Gnosticism was its emphasis
2) This attainment is a path the
seeker follows. He or she starts without that awareness, and comes to a type of
spiritual attainment.
3) The transmission of this Gnosis is
a living experience from one person to another.
4) Gnostics forsake the material world
and lived a life of austerity, celibacy, and asceticism away from the material
world.
This Gnostic Church in the early centuries had a
rather large following and became a real threat to the growing Christian
Churches who branding heretical began a series of persecutions to destroy it and
its teachings.
It is a historical fact that there was a flourishing
trade between Babylon and India as early as 538 BCE
and this trade reached a new dimension as the 5th Century BCE
progressed as Asian goods became available in ancient Greece especially Athens.
This was an exchange not only of goods but also more importantly to our study,
of culture. This is the historic epoch immediately following Shakyamunis' death
and his instructions to spread the Buddhist Dharma.
Indeed it is said that such important Greek
philosophers such as Thales, Empedocles, Anaxagoras, Democritus, Pythagorus and
many others are thought to have visited the East, perhaps a good explanation why
there are elements of the Upanishads found in Plato (427-347 BCE)
Some brief examples would be:
Heraclitus
(550-480 BCE) “Everything is in flux.”
Parmenides
515-445 BCE) declared the whole of the
sensuous or phenomenal world to be an illusion.
Xenophanes
(570-475 BCE) declared that man had the
potential to be above all the gods “who has attained the highest wisdom and
possesses an all-seeing eye.”
Democritus
(460-339 BCE) “From nothing will come nothing.
Nothing that is can be destroyed.”
Pythagorus
(570-480 BCE) “Pythagorus can only have taken
over this teaching (reincarnation)
from the Indians” Leopold von Schroeder.
Polyhistor
(first century AD) wrote of Pythagoras “having
discussions with Indian Brahmins who taught him their insights into the essence
of mind and body.”
It is a well-known historical fact that two centuries
after Pythagorus Alexander the Great reached India. Alexander was very liberal
for his time having been a student of Aristotle he was interested in local
customs and religious thought.
Paul’s Church and its Teachings:
"Christianity
is the religion founded by Paul, which replaces Jesus’ Gospel with a Gospel
about Jesus - a religion that should be called Paulinism. This Paulinism
is a misinterpretation and falsification of Jesus’ real teachings - a fact
that has been recognized by modern theological research: All the beautiful
aspects of Christianity are linked with Jesus, all the unbeautiful with
Paul." Historian W. Nestle.
Paul’s life is nothing short of amazing, for rarely has someone managed to get so much so wrong in such a short period of time and never before was it possible for so many people to share so many bad ideas all at once that would have repercussions lasting millenium. The best a person can hope for when he is dead wrong is that he runs into a brick wall quickly….. before he has a chance to build up speed. Unfortunatly for Christianity this was not the case when it came to Paul.
As you research the Christian Church the
inconsistancies go on and on. The “data base” gets shorter and shorter until
we come to the writings of Paul’s Epistles that are older than the four
Gospels and form a group of works that are in sheer
number of pages in the Bible almost as large as the four Gospels of
Mathew, Mark, Luke and John together.
Modern
research has concluded that “many of the Epistles (letters from Paul found in
the bible) later attributed to Paul are forgeries or were patched together from
a few genuine fragments. The Epistles to Timothy, Titus and Hebrews are thought
to be entirely spurious. ………….The religious teachings presented in
Paul’s Epistles is fundamentally different from what research has recognized
as being the authentic sayings of Jesus.” Dr. Elmar Gruber
Even Goethe doubted that Jesus
had established the Christian religion and in his opinion it was done by his
diciples such as Paul and modern textual criticism has revealed additions that
“do not accord with an author’s style, period, circumstances or thinking,
thus showing them to be misrepresentations by the Church”. Dr.
Elmar Gruber
It was not until the end of the
second century that the four Gospels that form the foundation of the bible were
“canonized” (officially recognized.) The verification of the authenticity of
these four core Gospels is at the very best very problematic in that they were
composed between 50 and 100 years after the crusifiction of Jesus…..some two
to three generations had passed before the first written accounts of his works.
The Gospel according to John builds on the first three Gospels however its
author was certainly not John as a simple fisherman could not possibly have
authored a work with such a phiosophical rendering
in a language he did not know namely Greek.
It is a well known historical
fact that the oldest writings of the New Testament “took on their final shape,
as we know it today, in the fourth century, after many theologically determined
changes.” The Original Jesus. Dr.
Elmar Gruber
The reason I empasize the
previous quote is the Christian Church, as opposed to the teachings of Jesus is
based on the teachings of Paul and as as others have stated should be called “Paulinism.”
What is the significance of this? If we take a long hard look at who this Paul
really was and what he taught you can see how far the Church has strayed from
what were basically very Provisional Buddhist teachings by the original Jesus.
These strange deviations can be pointed out to “Christians” we come in
contact with to plant the aforementioned “seed of doubt” about what
people really believe to be the truth.
Paul came from a rich family and
acquired Roman his father bought him Roman citizenship. He was brought up in the
Pharisaic tradition and he received his education in the Greek tradition of
philosophy and literature. About the age of twenty he went to Jeruselum to study
theology and became a strict believer, narrow minded and ever faithful to the
laws of Judaism. This can be demonstrated by the fact that he even applied for
permission to persecute the early Christians outside the city of Jerusalem. This
was orchestrated to curry favour with the Jewish religious hierarchy.
The famous “experience”
before the gates of Damascus led him to covert to Christianity. This
hallucination or “vision” of Jesus has been attributed by some scholrs as
either a phychotic episode or an epileptic seizure. An article appearing in the UK
Financial Times reports on the continuing major research which links religious
beliefs and visions with neurological processes. Authored by Dr. Raj Persaud,
consultant psychiatrist to the Maudsley Hospital in London, England, the report
notes "discoveries in modern neurology that establish a link between
religion and particular brain areas," and the possibility that biologists
may have even discovered "the location of god." Scientists, historians
and philosophers have long debated the existence of a "god module" in
the human brain that may account for religious visions, feelings of ecstasy and
related phenomenon. Epilepsy seems to play a role in some of these experiences,
and Persaud notes that a particular form of the illness involving the brain's
temporal lobes seems to be related to "distinctive religious fervor."
Jeffrey Saver and John Rabin from the UCLA
Neurological Research Center argue that substantial numbers of founders of
religions, prophets and other religious figures, display symptoms which suggest
they suffered from epilepsy," observed Dr. Persaud. Mohammad, Joan of Arc
and the Apostle St. Paul are cited.
Paul often complained of a “thorn in his side”
that has been attributed to the above or perhaps homophobic tendencies. He
prayed for relief from his afflictions to no avail. So much for actual proof in
his life.
Others feel that “perhaps Paul was simply fascinated
by the possibility of becoming the spiritual leader of the religious mass
movement then coming into existence.” As the saying goes “power corrupts.”
Whatever his motives, underlying and overt, he often refers to “his church and
his teachings.”
The following will give you an idea of what some
well-established religious authorities think of “Paul’s Church”
“No matter how deeply this teaching may have become established among Christian, the real Jesus knew nothing about it” Theologian Eduard Grimm
”Christianity
is the religion founded by Paul, which replaces Jesus’ Gospel with a Gospel
about Jesus” Religious Historian Wilhelm Nestle
“A
religion that rather should be called Paulinism. This Paulinism is a
misinterpretation and falsification of Jesus’ real teaching – a fact that
has been recognized by modern theological research. All the beautiful aspects of
Christianity are linked with Jesus, all the unbeautiful with Paul” The
Original Jesus by Dr. Elmar Gruber
If you really look at the big picture Christianity has
done much more harm than good. The suppression of Gnosticism, the crusades, the
Inquisitions, witch-hunts, religious wars with protestant against Catholics, the
secretarian violence that continues today in the Middle East is an offshoot of
this. The American Economic incursions into the Middle East’s energy reserves
is nothing short of a Holy Crusade by Christian values that now favour
consumption over religion.
Another important paper on the Judeo Christian
religion was written by Carl Jung and it is called “Answer to Job.”
When this important psychological study was published back in the 1950’s it
caused a storm of controversy and no end of trouble for Jung. I consider Jung
the greatest psychologist the west ever produced and his greatness stems from
his introduction of Eastern psychology into Western thought. In this paper Jung
does a psychological profile of “God”
and it isn’t flattering to say the least. A must read for all followers of
Judeo-Christianity. Classical Judeo Christianity is clearly a delusion. It
represents the worst form of dualism and an outright denial of dependent
origination.
Why has Church Christianity been so successful or as
Alex Dolgorukii calls his most excellent treatise Why did Christianity “Win.”
A few quotes below will ask questions and give you some answers.
“Now, we must surely ask ourselves,
if Christianity is really so
terrible, why and how did it supplant and suppress, so easily, the religions
which preceded it? Why did Christianity 'win' over the religions which
preceded it?"
“This was a question which haunted me for years. It is only quite recently and after a really large amount of historical research, both on my own part, and on the part of many others, whose research and conclusions assisted me in finally understanding why such a clearly inferior metaphysical philosophy so easily replaced others which were not simply very much more benign and beneficial to humankind, but which were, clearly and immensely, both intellectually and spiritually superior to it.
“The primary problem was that this was a "war" which was apparent only to the Christians. The pre-Christian inhabitants of the classical world weren't at all aware that their metaphysical and existential philosophies were in a "to the death" conflict with a belief structure which was exactly the opposite of their own. The pre-Christian "Pagans" of the classical world were remarkably open and tolerant of the religious beliefs of others.
“Christianity, was then, and it still is, and it always will be, fiercely, indeed murderously, intolerant of any dissent at all! Except for its manifestation in Judaism, which in fact, had itself, been viewed for centuries by many of the inhabitants of the classical world with great contempt, and with much rueful amusement, for precisely that quality of fierce intolerance, this kind of fierce bigotry was an entirely unusual thing in the classical milieu.”
Mr. Dolgorukii’ calls Christianity “A perfect
religion for an ant hill.” I would encourage you to read Dolgorukii’s
complete dissertation and attach the web link to his complete article:
http://www.parascience.org/BKTWO-10.htm
I hope this would give you at least a thumbnail sketch
of the difference between the Christian Church and the teachings of Jesus and
the overwhelming evidence of Buddhism in these teachings.
This whole dissertation could be easily expanded into
a whole book as many have been written that cover certain aspects of this paper.
I for one don’t have the time or capability and I very much doubt most people
have the interest. If you have made it this far I must commend you for your
tenacity and patience.