First came a book of "sayings" only. Then a gospel was constructed—the Gospel of the Hebrews—of which only a small fragment can be restored. This was the basis of many other gospels. At the date of Irenæus (180 A.D.) they were very numerous. (Hœr i. 19.) As only the Old Testament, at that time, was considered the Bible, the composers of these gospels apparently thought it no great sin to draw on the Alexandrine library of Buddhist books for much of their matter, it being a maxim of both the Essenes and the early Christians that a holy book was more allegory than history.
But before I compare the Buddhist and Christian narratives, I must say a word about the early religion of the Jews.
[CHAPTER I.]
Moses.
Until within the last forty years the Old Testament has been practically a sealed book.
It found interpreters, no doubt—two great groups.
The first group pointed to its useless and arbitrary edicts, and pronounced them the inventions of priests inspired by fraud and greed.
The second group practically admitted the arbitrary and useless nature of most of the edicts, but maintained that they were given by the All-wise, in a book penned by His finger, to miraculously prepare a nation distinct from the other nations of the earth, for a special purpose. They were "types" of a higher revelation, a "better covenant."