Bible Myths and their Parallels in other Religions Part 77

e._, that _Crishna_ is the very name corrupted of Christ the Saviour."[285:2] Many others have since made a similar statement, but unfortunately for them, the name _Crishna_ has nothing whatever to do with "Christ the Saviour." It is a purely Sanscrit word, and means "_the dark G.o.d_" or "_the black G.o.d_."[285:3] The word _Christ_ (which is not a name, but a t.i.tle), as we have already seen, is a Greek word, and means "the Anointed," or "the Messiah." The fact is, the history of Christ Crishna is older than that of Christ Jesus.

Statues of Crishna are to be found in the very oldest cave temples throughout India, and it has been satisfactorily proved, on the authority of a pa.s.sage of _Arrian_, that the _worship_ of Crishna was practiced in the time of Alexander the Great at what still remains one of the most famous temples of India, the temple of Mathura, on the Jumna river,[285:4] which shows that he was considered a _G.o.d_ at that time.[286:1] We have already seen that, according to Prof. Monier Williams, he was _deified_ about the fourth century B. C.

Rev. J. P. Lundy says:

"If we may believe so good an authority as Edward Moor (author of Moor's "Hindu Pantheon," and "Oriental Fragments"), both the name of Crishna, and the general outline of his history, were long anterior to the birth of our Saviour, _as very certain things_, and probably extended to the time of Homer, nearly nine hundred years before Christ, or more than a hundred years before Isaiah lived and prophesied."[286:2]

In the Sanscrit Dictionary, compiled more than two thousand years ago, we have the whole story of Crishna, the incarnate deity, born of a virgin, and miraculously escaping in his infancy from Kansa, the reigning monarch of the country.[286:3]

The Rev. J. B. S. Carwithen, known as one of the "Brampton Lecturers,"

says:

"Both the name of Crishna and the general outline of his story are long anterior to the birth of our Saviour; and this we know, _not on the presumed antiquity of the Hindoo records alone_. Both Arrian and Strabo a.s.sert that the G.o.d Crishna was anciently worshiped at Mathura, on the river Jumna, where he is worshiped at this day. But the emblems and attributes essential to this deity are also transplanted into the mythology of the West."[286:4]

On the walls of the most ancient Hindoo temples, are sculptured representations of the flight of Vasudeva and the infant Saviour Crishna, from King Kansa, who sought to destroy him. The story of the slaughtered infants is also the subject of an immense sculpture in the cave temple of Elephanta. A person with a drawn sword is represented surrounded by slaughtered infant boys, while men and women are supplicating for their children. The date of this sculpture is lost in the most remote antiquity.[286:5]

The _flat roof_ of this cavern-temple, and that of Ellora, and every other circ.u.mstance connected with them, prove that their origin must be referred to a very remote epoch. The _ancient_ temples can easily be distinguished from the more modern ones--such as those of Solsette--by the shape of the roof. The ancient are flat, while the more modern are arched.[286:6]

The _Bhagavad gita_, which contains so many sentiments akin to Christianity, and which was not written until about the first or second century,[287:1] has led many _Christian_ scholars to believe, and attempt to prove, that they have been borrowed from the New Testament, but unfortunately for them, their premises are untenable. Prof. Monier Williams, _the_ accepted authority on Hindooism, and a thorough Christian, writing for the "Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge,"

knowing that he could not very well overlook this subject in speaking of the _Bhagavad-gita_, says:

"To any one who has followed me in tracing the outline of this remarkable philosophical dialogue, and has noted the numerous parallels it offers to pa.s.sages in _our_ Sacred Scriptures, it may seem strange that I hesitate to concur to any theory which explains these coincidences by supposing that the author had access to the New Testament, or that he derived some of his ideas from the first propagaters of Christianity. Surely it will be conceded that the probability of contact and interaction between Gentile systems and the Christian religion of the first two centuries of our era must have been greater in Italy than in India. Yet, if we take the writings and sayings of those great Roman philosophers, Seneca, Epictetus, and Marcus Aurelius, we shall find them full of resemblances to pa.s.sages in our Scriptures, while their appears to be no ground whatever for supposing that these eminent Pagan writers and thinkers derived any of their ideas from either Jewish or Christian sources. In fact, the Rev. F. W. Farrar, in his interesting and valuable work 'Seekers after G.o.d,' has clearly shown that 'to say that Pagan morality kindled its faded taper at the Gospel light, whether furtively or unconsciously, that it dissembled the obligation and made a boast of the splendor, as if it were originally her own, is to make an a.s.sertion wholly untenable.' He points out that the attempts of the Christian Fathers to make out Pythagoras a debtor to Hebraic wisdom, Plato an 'Atticizing Moses,' Aristotle a picker-up of ethics from a Jew, Seneca a correspondent of St. Paul, were due 'in some cases to ignorance, in some to a want of perfect honesty in controversial dealing.'[287:2]

"_His arguments would be even more conclusive if applied to the Bhagavad-gita_, the author of which was probably contemporaneous with Seneca.[287:3] It must, indeed, be admitted that the flames of true light which emerge from the mists of pantheism in the writings of Indian philosophers, must spring from the same source of light as the Gospel itself; but it may reasonably be questioned whether there could have been any actual contact of the Hindoo systems with Christianity without a more satisfactory result in the modification of pantheistic and anti-Christian ideas."[288:1]

Again he says:

"It should not be forgotten that although the nations of Europe have changed their religions during the past eighteen centuries, _the Hindu has not done so, except very partially_.

Islam converted a certain number by force of arms in the eighth and following centuries, and Christian truth is at last slowly creeping onwards and winning its way by its own inherent energy in the nineteenth; _but the religious creeds, rites, customs, and habits of thought of the Hindus generally, have altered little since the days of Manu, five hundred years B. C._"[288:2]

These words are conclusive; comments, therefore, are unnecessary.

Geo. W. c.o.x, in his "Aryan Mythology," speaking on this subject says:

"It is true that these myths have been crystallized around the name of Crishna in ages subsequent to the period during which the earliest _vedic_ literature came into existence; _but the myths themselves are found in this older literature a.s.sociated with other G.o.ds_, and not always only in germ. _There is no more room for inferring foreign influence in the growth of any of these myths than, as Bunsen rightly insists, there is room for tracing Christian influence in the earlier epical literature of the Teutonic tribes._ Practically the myths of Crishna seems to have been fully developed in the days of Megasthenes (fourth century B. C.) who identifies him with the Greek Hercules."[288:3]

It should be remembered, in connection with this, that Dr. Parkhurst and others have considered _Hercules_ a type of Christ Jesus.

In the ancient epics Crishna is made to say:

"I am Vishnu, Brahma, Indra, and the source as well as the destruction of things, the creator and the annihilator of the whole aggregate of existences. While all men live in unrighteousness, I, the unfailing, build up the bulwark of righteousness, as the ages pa.s.s away."[288:4]

These words are almost identical with what we find in the _Bhagavad-gita_. In the _Maha-bharata_, Vishnu is a.s.sociated or identified with Crishna, just as he is in the _Bhagavad-gita_ and _Vishnu Purana_, showing, in the words of Prof. Williams, that: the _Puranas_, although of a comparatively modern date, are nevertheless composed of matter to be found in the two great epic poems the _Ramayana_ and the _Maha-bharata_.[288:5]

FOOTNOTES:

[278:1] It is also very evident that the history of Crishna--or that part of it at least which has a _religious aspect_--is taken from that of Buddha. Crishna, in the ancient epic poems, is simply a great hero, and it is not until about the fourth century B. C., that he is _deified_ and declared to be an incarnation of Vishnu, or Vishnu himself in human form. (See Monier Williams' Hinduism, pp. 102, 103.)

"If it be urged that the attribution to Crishna of qualities or powers belonging to the other deities is a mere device by which his devotees sought to supersede the more ancient G.o.ds, _the answer must be that nothing is done in his case which has not been done in the case of almost every other member of the great company of the G.o.ds_, and that the systematic adoption of this method is itself conclusive proof of the looseness and flexibility of the materials of which the c.u.mbrous mythology of the Hindu epic poems is composed." (c.o.x: Aryan Mythology, vol. ii. p. 130.) These words apply very forcibly to the history of Christ Jesus. He being attributed with qualities and powers belonging to the deities of the heathen is a mere device by which _his_ devotees sought to supersede the more ancient G.o.ds.

[278:2] See ch. xii.

[278:3] See The Gospel of Mary, _Apoc._, ch. vii.

[278:4] Hist. Hindostan, vol. ii. p. 329.

[278:5] Mary, _Apoc._, vii. Luke, i. 28-30.

[278:6] Hist. Hindostan, vol. ii. pp. 317 and 336.

[278:7] Matt. ii. 2.

[279:1] Vishnu Purana, p. 502.

[279:2] Luke, ii. 13.

[279:3] See ch. xvi.

[279:4] Hist. Hindostan, vol. ii. p. 311. See also, chap. xvi.

[279:5] See ch. xvi.

[279:6] Protevangelion, _Apoc._, chs. xii. and xiii.

[279:7] Hist. Hindostan, vol. ii. 311.

[279:8] Infancy, _Apoc._, ch. i. 2, 3.

[279:9] See ch. xv.

[279:10] Luke, ii. 8-10.

[279:11] See Oriental Religions, p. 500, and Inman's Ancient Faiths, vol. ii. p. 353.

[279:12] Matt. ii. 2.

[279:13] Hist. Hindostan, vol. ii. p. 317.

[279:14] Matt., ii. 1, 2.

[279:15] Vishnu Purana, bk. v. ch. iii.

[279:16] Luke, ii. 1-17.

[280:1] Asiatic Researches, vol. i. p. 259. Hist. Hindostan, vol. ii. p.

310.

[280:2] See the Genealogies in Matt. and Luke.