Theos-Talk Archives (January 2003 Message tt00645)

Sear BAG:

In ISIS Blavatsky asserts that the Essenes, who were the precursors 
of the early Christians, were Buddhists, but she is merely copying 
the opinion of C.W. King from his book THE GNOSTICS and not stating 
an original opinion. In his QUEST OF AN HISTORICAL JESUS, Schweitzer 
surveys scholarly opinion on the subject and gives the consensus as 
being that the similarities between Christianity and Buddhism, while 
striking, are probably coincidence. I am merely quoting here, and 
not arguing, although I suspect that opinion is probably a competent 
one. It seems more likely that Christianity in its primitive form 
was a derivative sect of Egyptian Judaism than that it originated 
further east.

The similarities between specifixally Pure Land Buddhism and Krishna 
worship, though, are likely exactly what you say they are, which is 
extremely interesting. I had not seen that insight anywhere else.