part0008

Section Five of Buddhism’s Relation to Christianity discusses parables found in Buddhist traditions for which we currently possess only a literary record, without dateable sculptural depictions. Lockwood indicates he is interested in establishing Buddhist priority with these examples. The inference throughout the book is not only that the Buddhist doctrines and motifs preceded the emergence within Christianity of their counterparts but also that Christianity derived these parallels significantly from Buddhism.

Here too Lockwood (65) makes such mythicist views clear:

…Jesus and his disciples are allegorical, non-historical characters mixed together with historical characters (such as Pilate and some Temple priests)… Even the story of the “Outcaste Woman at the Well” is a fictitious meta-narrative, though involving the, perhaps, historical persons of the Buddha and his “beloved” disciple Ananda—if indeed they are historical!

Thus, Lockwood also calls into question the existence of “the Buddha” as a single, historical figure. As it does with the figure of “Jesus Christ” of the New Testament, the evidence points to “the Buddha” as a fictional compilation of characters and motifs, some historical and some mythical. In this regard, Lockwood notes later (77) that there is a “Buddha” perceived as a “historical” figure, named “Gautama,” and that there is also a Buddha who is transcendent, divine and unearthly, i.e., God:

The “Buddha” here should not be confused with the historical Gautama Buddha, but rather understood as the transcendent Being of the Mahāyānists, whose counterpart, in Jewish minds, might be represented by the four-lettered (tetra-grammaton ) YHWH (in Sanskrit…YHVH ), with whom mystics experience an inexpressible union.

The confused or conflated figure of “the Buddha” with many Buddhas both mystical and literal cannot be deemed scientifically to represent a single, historical character.

Included in the Buddhist parables discussed by Lockwood are those of the Prodigal Son, the Woman at the Well, and the Good Samaritan. Lockwood (71) provides here a discussion of the famous Mahayana Buddhist text the “Lotus Sutra” or Saddharma-Pundarika-Sutra , also rendered the “Good News of the Lotus-Like Virtuous Path” and deemed the “New Testament of Asia.”

The composition of the Lotus Sutra was evidently begun around 100 BCE and comprises 28 chapters by different anonymous authors, redacted possibly up to the end of the second century AD/CE . The sutra contains moralistic and missionary ideas, and preaches universal salvation and eternal life. This universality included women, which irked the sexist Buddhist community. Nevertheless, the text has proved highly popular since antiquity, a fact that argues for it being known to early Christians—and possibly serving as a significant influence upon Christianity.

Another motif Lockwood (77) raises in relation to the parables and the Buddhist tactic of “skillful leading by misleading” (upaya-kaushalya ) is the appearance in Paul’s First Epistle to the Corinthians (15:6-7) of 500 “brethren” who supposedly witnessed the resurrected Christ. This motif has been used by Christians as “proof” that Christ was a historical figure, about whom Paul and these hundreds of others clearly knew. However, according to Buddhist scholar Dr. Christian Lindtner, this “historical” episode represents yet another example of “pious fraud” and propaganda:

…The “more than 500 brethren,” “most of whom are still alive,” who are among those cited as eyewitnesses to Christ as raised from the dead, were originally the 500 Buddhist monks present at the death of the Buddha, as related in the MPS [Mahā-Parinirvāna-Sūtra ] (part of the MSV [Mūla-Sarvāstivāda-Vinaya ]. So, here Paul reveals himself, if we know the original source, as being guilty of a pious fraud, indeed. (Lockwood, 77)

Also according to Lindtner, this text, the MPS, part of the MSV, discussed throughout BRC, serves as a source for the gospels, specifically hypothesized as part of the “Q” or Quelle text.