The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors Part 33

11. All the facts above enumerated would impel us to the conclusion that the Jews would--and every page of history touching the matter proves they did--make important changes in their religion by this contact with the oriental systems, as they had repeatedly done before. Some of this proof we will here present, to show how they originated Christianity.

12. "The schools of Alexandria" says Mr. Enfield, a Christian writer, "by pretending to teach sublime doctrines concerning G.o.d and divine things, enticed men of different countries and religions, and among the rest the Jews, to study its mysteries, and incorporate them with their own.... The Jewish faith mixed with the Pythagorean, and afterward with the Egyptian oriental theology" (that is, they became Essenes in the Grecian school of Pythagoras, who taught the doctrines of that religious order, then Bud-hists in the Egyptian schools of Alexandria). And finally, with Christ as their leader, who taught the doctrines of both schools (they being essentially alike), they a.s.sumed the name of Christian in honor of him, and thus is Christianity from Essene Budhism.

13. Beers in his "History of the Jews," sustains the above statement by the declaration that the Essenian Jews "fled to Egypt at the time of the Babylonian captivity, and there became acquainted with the Pythagorean philosophy, and ingrafted it upon the religion of Moses," which would make them Essenian Budhists--for Cunningham a.s.sures us that "the doctrine of Pythagoras were intensely Budhistic." (Philsa. Topus, chap.

x.)

14. We will condense a few more historical testimonies relative to the entire change of the Jewish faith, while in Alexandria, as well as on other occasions, to show how easy and natural it was for that portion of the Jews who afterward became the founders of Christianity to slide into and adopt Essenian Budhism, whose doctrines they took to const.i.tute the Christian religion.

15. Mr. Gibbon (chap. xxi.) declares that the theological opinions of the Jews underwent great changes by their contact with the various foreigners they found in Alexandria. Mr. Tytler likewise, in his "Universal History," a.s.sures us that the Jewish religion "became _totally changed by the intermixture of heathen doctrines_." Dr.

Campbell also testifies that "their views came pretty much to coincide with those of the pagans." (See his Dissertation, vi.) And the author of "_The Expositor_ for 1854" complains that the pagan "theology stole upon them from every quarter, and mingled in all the views of the then known tribes, so that by the year 150 b. c., it had wrought visible changes in their notions and habits of thought." (P. 423.) Here we have the proof that the whole Jewish religion underwent a change in Alexandria.

16. Now, most, certainly a nation or sect professing a religion so easily changed, and possessing a character so fickle, or so irrepressible as to yield on every slight occasion, and embrace every opportunity to imbibe new religious ideas and doctrines, would easily, if not naturally, slide into the adoption of the religious system then promulgated in Alexandria under the name of Budhism, and afterward remodeled or transformed, and called Christianity.

17. The Jews of the Essenian order, as we have in part shown in a previous chapter, set forth in their creed all the leading doctrines now comprised in the Christian religion hundreds of years before the advent of Christ, not excepting the doctrine of the divine incarnation and its adjuncts, as these concomitants of the present popular faith, we will now prove, were not unknown to the Jewish theology, but const.i.tuted a part of the religion of some of the princ.i.p.al Jewish sects. That standard Christian author, Mr. Milman, in his "History of Christianity,"

tells us that "the doctrine of the incarnation ('G.o.d manifest in the flesh') was the doctrine from the Ganges, and even the sh.o.r.es of the Yellow Sea to the Ilissus. It was the fundamental principle of the Indian Budhist religion and philosophy. It was the basis of Zoroasterism. It was pure Platonism. It was Platonic Judaism in the Alexandrian school." Here it is positively declared, by a popular Christian writer, whose work is a part of nearly every popular library in Christiandom as a standard authority, that the appearance of G.o.d amongst men in the human form, by human birth, was a doctrine of the Jewish religion in some of its branches, especially the Essenian branch--further proof that Christianity originated nothing, and gave utterance to no new doctrine or precepts, and performed no new miracles.

Where, then, is the claim for its originality? On what ground is it predicated? Please answer us, good Christian brother.

18. It is a question of no importance, if it could be settled, whether Christianity is a direct outgrowth from one of the new-fangled sects of Judaism, or whether it derived a portion of its doctrines from this source and the balance from ascetic Budhism. Yet we regard it as an incontrovertible proposition that it all grew out of Budhism originally, either directly or indirectly.

19. Christ may have received his doctrines secondhanded, all or a portion from the Essenian Jews; for that sect held all the leading doctrines of Budhism (as we have shown in a previous chapter), which now goes under the name of the religion of Jesus Christ.

20. Or we may indulge the not unreasonable hypothesis that the founders of Christianity, who republished the doctrines of Budhism and adopted them as their own, received them all direct from the disciples of that religious order; for "they were everywhere," as one writer (Mr. Taylor) declares, speaking of their extensive travels to propagate their doctrines through the world. And it was about that period, as Mr.

Goodrich informs us, they sent out nine hundred missionaries, who made six millions of converts,--a small fraction of their present number (three hundred and eighty millions, as given by some of our geographies),--one third more than the entire census of Christendom, and six times the number of believers in the Christian religion, if we omit Greeks and Catholics. "It is." as a writer remarks, "the oldest and most widely spread religion in the world." And, whatever hypothesis may be adduced to account for the fact, Christianity is now all Budhism.

21. It is impossible, with the historic darkness which at present environs and beclouds our pathway, to determine at what period or in what manner Christ became an Essene,--whether he was born of Essenian parents, or became a convert to the faith,--because the whole period of his life, with the exception of about three years, is a total blank in history. There is but one incident related of his movements by his bible biographers prior to his twenty-seventh year, leaving more than a quarter of a century of his probably active life unreported--a period that may have witnessed several important changes in his religion. We have not even his ancestry reported in his scriptural biography, in either parental line, unless we a.s.sume Joseph to have been his father.

The parental lineage of his mother is entirely omitted Had we his line of ancestry, or could we trace him back to his national or family origin, we doubt not but we should there find a clue to the origin of his religion. We should find his ancestors were Essenian Jews.

22. Nor can we fix the date when Essenian Budhism among the Jews received the name of Christianity for a similar reason. There is a link--a chain of events of four hundred years left out of the bible between Judaism and Christianity--thus lacking four hundred years of connecting the two religions together, or of showing how the latter grew out of the former. Malachi, the last book of the Old Testament, antedates the first events of Christian history four centuries, or twelve generations, thus leaving a wide and dark gap between them. And besides, we cannot find the name of Christ or Christianity mentioned in any of the contemporary histories of that era till one hundred and four years after the time fixed for Christ's birth by Christendom; Tacitus being the first writer who names either, and this was at that date.

23. These facts disclose the whole secret with respect to the mystery and darkness thrown around the origin of the Christian religion--the how, the when, and the where of its origin. That chapter of Christian history is left out of the record. The bible account itself is but fragmentary, as it leaves nine tenths of Christ's history a blank,--twenty-seven years out of the thirty,--and omits all mention of his ancestors beyond his grandmother, and leaves even the time of his birth a blank. "The researches of the learned," says Mr. Mosheim (a standard Christian author), "though long and ably conducted, have been unable to fix the time of Christ's birth with certainty." (Eccl. Hist.

p. 23.) Wonderful admission, truly, as it is an evidence that nothing else can be fixed "with certainty," with respect to the history of "the man Christ Jesus," only that his doctrines and precepts were all borrowed perhaps during the twenty-seven dark and mysteries years of his life, if not an Essene by birth.

24. There is no escaping the conclusion that Christianity is a _borrowed system_--an outgrowth and remodeling of Budhism, with a change of name only. A thousand facts of history prove and proclaim it, and the verdict of posterity will be unanimous in affirming it.

25. From the almost endless chain of a.n.a.logies, exhibiting a striking resemblance even in their minute details of Christianity and Budhism, we are compelled to conclude that one furnished the materials for the other; that one is the offspring--the legitimate child--of the other.

And as it is a settled historical fact that Budhism is much the older system, there is hence no difficulty in determining which is the parent and which is the child.

26. In the Hindoo story of the creation of the human race, we find Adimo and Heva given as the names of the first man and woman answering to our Adam and Eve. And our Shem, Ham, and j.a.pheth are traceable to their Sherma, Hama, and Jiapheta; the difference in the mode of spelling is probably owing to the difference in the languages. And under the new era we have Christ Jesus answering to their Chrishna Zeus, as some writers give the name of the eighth Avatar. And for Maia, a G.o.dmother, we have Mary. And other similar a.n.a.logies might be pointed out besides the long string of strikingly similar events previously presented in the history of the two Saviors (Christ and Chrishna), amounting to hundreds.

27. Such an almost countless list of similar and nearly identical incidents bids defiance, and absolutely sets at naught all attempts to account for it as a mere fortuitous accident. There is no other explanation possible but that Christianity is a re-vamp or re-establishment of Budhism.

28. Here let it be noted that Christianity was not the only religion which was rehabilitated in the Alexandrian schools. On the contrary, all the popular oriental systems then in active being had long previously pa.s.sed through the same representative theological schools and creed-making inst.i.tutions of that royal and commercial city. All were remodeled in its theological workshops--a fact which accounts most conclusively for the same train of religions ideas and historical incidents being found in the later sacred books of each. And besides, Sir William Jones says, "The disciples of these various systems of religion had intercourse with each other long before the time of Christ, which would necessarily bring about a uniformity in the doctrines and general character of each system."

29. The disciples of all the religious systems cited their initiatory miracles as a proof of being on familiar terms with G.o.d Almighty. They all (as is claimed) healed the sick; all restored the deaf, the dumb, and the blind; all cast out devils, and all raised the dead. (See chapter on Parallels.) In fact, all their miracles and legendary marvels run in parallel lines, because all were recast in the same creed-mold in Alexandria. A coincidence is thus beautifully explained, which would otherwise be hard to account for.

30. Mr. Gibbon says, "It was in the school of Alexandria that the Christian theology appears to have a.s.sumed a regular and scientific form" (Decline, &c., chap. xv.); that is, the regular and scientific form of Budhism or Essenism.

31. Pregnant with meaning is the text, "It was in the city of Antioch the disciples were first called Christians." (Acts xi. 36.) Here is conclusive proof that the disciples of the Christian faith were not always known by the same name, and were not at first called Christians.

Then what were they called during the earlier years of their history?

Here is a great and important query, and one involving a momentous problem. Couple the two facts together, that the disciples were first known as Christians at Antioch, and that the Essenian order of believers expired and went out of history about that period, and the question is at once and forever satisfactorily settled. It was not an infrequent act on making important changes in a religion, and adopting some new items of faith to change the t.i.tle of the system, and give it a new name.

After Alexander Campbell had made some modifications in his previous religious faith, and started a new church, his followers were popularly called Campbellites. Elias Hicks ingrafted some reform ideas into the Quaker faith, and inst.i.tuted a new society of that order. Hence, and henceforth, his disciples were known as Hicksites. In like manner Jesus Christ having made some innovations in his inherited Jewish faith (which was of the Essene stamp) by ingrafting more of the Budhist doctrine into it, his followers were henceforth called Christians. How complete the a.n.a.logy! Here let it be borne in mind, as powerfully confirmatory of this conclusion, that the first Christians were (as history affirms) "merely reformatory Jews." The twelve chosen were all Jews, probably of the Essene order. According to the Rev. Mr. Prideaux (Jewish History), the Jews of this order were first called Israelites, in common with the other tribes; then Cha.s.sidim; and thirdly Essenes. And finally, after the Essenian Jesus Christ, with some new radical ideas, proclaimed, "Ye have heard it hath been said by them of old time" thus and so, "but I say unto you" differently. The t.i.tle was again changed, and they adopted or received the name of Christians--the Essenes going out of history at the very date Christians first appear in history. Put this and that together, and the chain is welded. Thus we can as easily trace the origin of Christianity as we can trace the origin of a root running beneath the soil in the direction of a certain tree. History, then, proclaims that to the honest, pious, deeply-devout, self-denying, yet ignorant, slothful, and filthy Budhistic Essenes must be awarded the honor or dishonor of giving birth to that system of religion now known as Christianity.

CHRISHNA AS A G.o.d--ADDITIONAL FACTS.

The following additional facts relative to the history, character, life, and teachings of Zeus Chrishna, or Jeseus Christna (as styled by one writer) are drawn mostly from the Vedas, Baghavat, Gita (Bible in India).

1. _His Virgin Mother, her Character_.--The holy book declares, that "through her the designs of G.o.d were accomplished. She was pure and chaste; no animal food ever touched her lips; honey and milk were her sustenance; her time was spent in solitude, lost in the contemplation of G.o.d who showered upon her innumerable blessings; she looked upon death as the birth to a new and better life; when she traveled, a column of fire in the heavens went before her to guide her. One evening, as she was praying, she heard celestial music, and fell into a profound ecstasy, and being overshadowed by the spirit of G.o.d, she conceived the G.o.d Chrishna." (Baghavat, Gita).

2. _Chrishna, his Life and Mission_.--This sin-atoning G.o.d was about sixteen when he commenced active life. Like Christ, he chose twelve disciples to aid him in propagating his doctrines. "He spent his time working miracles, resuscitating the dead, healing lepers, restoring the deaf and the blind, defending the weak against the strong, and the oppressed against the oppressor, and in proclaiming his divine mission to redeem man from original sin, and banish evil, and restore the reign of good." (Baghavat, Gita.) It is declared that he came to teach peace, charity, love to man, self-respect, the practice of good for its own sake, and faith in the inexhaustible goodness of the Creator; also to preach the immortality of the soul, and the doctrine of future rewards and punishments, and to vanquish the prince of darkness, Rakshas. It is further declared that "Brahma sent his son (Chrishna) upon the earth to die for the salvation of man." "His lofty precepts and the purity of his life spread his fame throughout all India, and finally won for him more than three millions of followers." "He inculcated the sublimest doctrines, and the purest morals, and the grand principles of charity and self-denial." "He forbade revenge, and commanded to return good for evil, and consoled the feeble and the unhappy." "He lived poor, and loved the poor." "He lived chaste, and enjoined chast.i.ty." "Problems the most lofty, and morals the most pure and sublime, and the future destiny of man, were themes which engaged his most profound attention."

"Chrishna, we will venture to say (says the Bible in India) was the greatest of philosophers, not only of India, but of the entire world."

"He was the grandest moral figure of ancient times." (Bible in India.) "Chrishna was a moralist and a philosopher." "We should admire his moral lessons, so sublime and so pure." "He was recognized as the 'Divine Word.'" "He received the t.i.tle of Jeseus, which means pure Essense."

Chrishna signifies the "Promised of G.o.d," the "Messiah." "When he preached, he often spoke from a mount. He also spoke in parables.

'Parable plays a great part in the familiar instructions of this Hindoo Redeemer.'" He relates a very interesting parable of a fisherman who was much persecuted by his neighbors, but who in the time of a severe famine, when the people were suffering and dying for the want of food, being so n.o.ble as to return good for evil, he carried food to these same persecuting enemies, and thus saved them from starvation. "Therefore,"

said he "do good to all, both the evil and the good, even your enemies."

His addresses to the people were simple, but to his disciples they were elevated and philosophical. Such was the wisdom of his sermons and his parables, that the people crowded around him, eager to behold and hear him, "saying, This is indeed the Redeemer promised to our Fathers."

Great mult.i.tudes followed him, exclaiming, "This is he who resuscitates the dead, and heals the lame, and the deaf, and the blind." On one occasion, as he entered Madura (as Christ once entered Jerusalem), "the people came out in flocks to meet him, and strewed branches in his way."

On another occasion two women approached him, anointed him with oil, and worshiped him. When the people murmured at this waste, he replied, "Better is a little given with an humble heart than much given with ostentation." Such was his sense of decorum, that he admonished some girls he once observed playing in a state of nudity on the bank of a river after bathing. They repented, asked his forgiveness, and reformed.

"The followers of Chrishna practiced all the virtues, and observed a complete abnegation of self (self-denial), and lived poor, hoping for a reward in the future life. They occupied all their time in the service of their Divine Master. Pure and majestic was their worship." Chrishna had a favorite disciple _Adjaurna_, who sustained to him the relation of John to Christ, while Angada acted the part of Judas by following him to the Ganges and betraying him.

3. _His last Hours_.--"When Chrishna knew his hour had come, forbidding his disciples to follow him, he repaired to the bank of the River Ganges; and having performed three ablutions, he knelt down, and looking up to heaven, he prayed to Brahma." While nailed to the cross, the tree on which he was suspended became suddenly covered with great red flowers, which diffused their fragrance all around. And it is said he often appeared to his disciples after his death "in all his divine majesty."

4. _The second Advent of Chrishna_.--"There is not a Hindoo or a Brahmin who does not look upon the second coming of Chrishna as an established article of faith." Their holy bibles (the Vedas and Gita) prophesy of him thus: "He shall come crowned with lights; he shall come, and the heavens and the earth shall be joyous; the stars shall pale before his splendor; the earth will be too small to contain him, for he is infinite, he is Almighty, he is Wisdom, he is Beauty, he is all and in all; and all men, all animated beings, beasts, birds, trees, and plants, will chant his praises; he will regenerate all bodies, and purify all souls." "He will be as sweet as honey and ambrosia, and as pure as the lamb without spot, or as the lips of a virgin. All hearts will be transported with joy. From the rising to the setting of the sun it will be a day of joy and exultation, when this G.o.d shall manifest his power and his glory, and reconcile the world unto himself." Such are a few of the prophetic utterances of his devout and prayerful disciples.

"We find," says a writer, "in all the theogonies of different countries the hope of the advent of a G.o.d (either his first or his second coming)--a hope which sprang from a sense of their own imperfections and sufferings, which naturally induced them to look for a divine Redeemer."

5. _Precepts of Chrishna_.--Numerous are the prescriptive admonitions found in the holy books which set forth the religion of "this heathen demiG.o.d" (so called by Christian professors). They appertain to all the duties of life, but are too numerous to be quoted here. Those appertaining to woman enjoin the most sacred regard for her rights, such as "woman should be protected with tenderness, and shielded with fostering solicitude." "There is no crime more odious than to persecute woman, or take advantage of her weakness." "Degrade woman and you degrade man." For other similar precepts, see Chapter x.x.xII. The injunctions to read their holy bible (the Vedas, &c.) are quite numerous, such as, "Let him study the holy Scriptures unceasingly"

"Pray night and morning, and read the holy Scriptures in the att.i.tude of devotion." And many of them read it through upon their knees. (See Chap. XLIV.) We have not s.p.a.ce for a further exposition of this subject here; but it will be found more fully set forth in the pamphlet, "Christ and Chrishna Compared," which will, perhaps, become an Appendix to this work.

It may be objected that there are precepts and stories to be found in the religion of this Hindoo G.o.d (Chrishna), which reflect but little credit or honor upon that religion. This is true. And similar reflections would materially damage the religion of Christianity also.

The story of Christ beating and maltreating the money-changers in the temple, his cursing an innocent, unoffending, and unconscious fig tree, and his indulgence in profane swearing at his enemies,--"O ye fools and blind, ye generation of vipers, how can you escape the d.a.m.nation of h.e.l.l!"--does not reflect any credit upon his religion, viewed as a system. Defects, then, may be found in both systems. In viewing the a.n.a.logies of the two religions, it should be noted that the Hindoos claim, with a forcible show of facts and logic, that the religion of Christianity grew out of theirs. It has not been long since a learned Hindoo maintained this position in a public debate with a missionary.

If all these facts effect nothing in the way of inducing the Christian clergy to confess the falsity of their position in claiming their religion to be a direct emanation from G.o.d, it will be a sad commentary upon either their intelligence or their honesty.

These historical facts, with those set forth in the preceding chapters, prove that the religion called Christianity, instead of being, as Christians claim, "the product of the Divine Mind," is the product of "heathen" minds; i. e., a spontaneous outgrowth of the moral and religious elements of the human mind. And therefore, for G.o.d to have revealed it over again to the founders of Christianity would have been superfluous, and a proof of his ignorance of history.

Note.--The author deems it proper to state here, with respect to the comparison between Christ and Chrishna, that some of the doctrines which he has selected as const.i.tuting a part of the religion of the Hindoo Savior, are not found in the reported teachings of that deified moralist. But as they appear to breathe forth the same spirit, it is presumed he would have indorsed them, had they come under his notice. As Christians a.s.sume the liberty to arrange the doctrines of Paul and Peter under the head of Christianity because claimed to be in consonance with the religion of Christ, though not all taught by him, the author, in like manner, has a.s.sumed, that some doctrines taught by other systems and religious teachers of India accord with those taught by Chrishna, and hence has arranged them with his. The author's purpose is not to set forth the doctrines of any sect, any system, or any religious teacher, but to show that all the doctrines of Christianity are traceable to ancient India. But whether taught by this sect or that sect, it is foreign to our purpose to inquire; and hence, for convenience, he has arranged them all into one system, and designated them Chrishnianity (borrowing a new term). There can be no more impropriety, he presumes, in arranging the doctrines of the various conflicting sects of India into one system (including even Brahminism and Budhism), than to arrange, as Christians do, the doctrines taught by the antagnostic system of Catholicism and Protestantism, and their six hundred conflicting sects, under the head of Christianity. Hence, Christians, of course, will not fault the arrangement. The cla.s.sification above alluded to comprises, in part, the religion of many of the Hindoo sects, but does not set forth all their doctrines, only those a.n.a.logous to Christianity. Chrishna was a Vishnuite, and not a Brahmin, as some writers a.s.sume. He and Christ were both reformers, and departed from the ancient faith. Vishnuism appears to have finally centered in Budhism.

CHAPTER x.x.xIII. APOLLONIUS, OSIRIS, MAGUS, ETC.--G.o.dS

MIRACULOUS ACHIEVEMENTS OF OTHER G.o.dS AND DEMI-G.o.dS OF ANTIQUITY.