The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors; Or, Christianity Before Christ

by Kersey Graves

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 assume 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 analogies, 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 Japheth 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 godmother, we have Mary. And other similar analogies 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.