:Buddhism and the Roman world

{{Short description|Interaction between Buddhism and the Roman world}}

Several instances of interaction between Buddhism and the Roman world are documented by Classical and early Christian writers.

Textual sources in the Tamil language, moreover, suggest the presence of Buddhism among some Roman citizens in the 2nd century AD.{{Cite web|url=http://www.superzeko.net/dharma_di_aliberth_da_rivedere/testimonianzealtrefonti66.htm|title = Testimonianze - Buddismo nell'antica Roma?|work=SuperZeko}}

Pandion embassy

File:Statuetta indiana di Lakshmi, avorio, da pompei, 1-50 dc ca., 149425, 02.JPG ivory statuette, found in 1938 in the ruins of Pompeii (destroyed in 79 CE), is thought to have originated in Bhokardan, Satavahana Empire. It testifies to the intensity of Indo-Roman trade relations at the time.[https://books.google.com/books?id=t7f0JEWk6HMC&pg=PA46 State Intervention and Popular Response: Western India in the Nineteenth Century], Mariam Dossal, Ruby Maloni, Popular Prakashan, 1999, p. 46]]

Roman historical accounts describe an embassy sent by the "Indian king Porus" (perhaps Pandion, Pandya, or Pandita{{Citation needed|date=November 2018}}) to Caesar Augustus sometime between 22 BC and 13 AD. The embassy was travelling with a diplomatic letter on a skin in Greek, and one of its members was a sramana who burned himself alive in Athens to demonstrate his faith. The event made a sensation and was described by Nicolaus of Damascus, who met the embassy at Antioch (near present day Antakya in Turkey) and related by Strabo (XV, 1,73[https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0239&layout=&loc=15.1.73 Strabo on the immolation of the Sramana in Athens, Paragraph 73]) and Dio Cassius (liv, 9). A tomb was made to the sramana, still visible in the time of Plutarch, which bore the mention:

{{blockquote|"ΖΑΡΜΑΝΟΧΗΓΑΣ ΙΝΔΟΣ ΑΠΟ ΒΑΡΓΟΣΗΣ"

("Zarmanochegas from Barygaza in India")}}

Strabo also states that Nicolaus of Damascus in giving the details of his tomb inscription specified his name was "Zarmanochegas" and he "immortalized himself according to the custom of his country." Cassius Dio (Hist 54.9) and Plutarch cite the same storyElledge CD. Life After Death in Early Judaism. Mohr Siebeck Tilbringen 2006 {{ISBN|3-16-148875-X}} pp. 122-125 Charles Eliot in his Hinduism and Buddhism: An Historical Sketch (1921) considers that the name Zarmanochegas "perhaps contains the two words Sramana and Acarya."Charles Eliot. Hinduism and Buddhism: An Historical Sketch vol 1. Curzon Press, Richmond 1990. {{ISBN|0-7007-0679-8}} p. 431 fn 4. HL Jones' translation of the inscription as mentioned by Strabo reads it as "The Sramana master, an Indian, a native of Bargosa, having immortalized himself according to the custom of his country, lies here."Elledge CD. Life After Death in Early Judaism. Mohr Siebeck Tilbringen 2006 {{ISBN|3-16-148875-X}} p. 125

These accounts at least indicate that Indian religious men (Sramanas, to which the Buddhists belonged, as opposed to Hindu Brahmanas) were circulating in the Levant during the time of Jesus.

Buddhism in the Hellenic era

{{Further|History of Buddhism|Greco-Buddhism|Hellenic Empire|Graeco-Bactrians}}

File:Gandhara Buddha (tnm).jpeg, present-day Pakistan]]

By the time of Jesus, the teachings of the Buddha had already spread through much of India and penetrated into Sri Lanka, Central Asia and China.{{cite book |first=Kenneth Scott |last=Latourette |title=A History of Christianity |url=https://archive.org/details/historyofchristi01lato |url-access=registration |year=1975|page=274}}

Will Durant, noting that the Emperor Ashoka sent missionaries, not only to elsewhere in India and to Sri Lanka, but to Syria, Egypt and Greece, speculated in the 1930s that they may have helped prepare the ground for Christian teaching.Will Durant, The Story of Civilization: Our Oriental Heritage, Part One (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1935), vol. 1, p. 449.

Mauryan proselytizing

Ashoka ascended the throne of the Mauryan Empire around 270 BC. After his conversion to Buddhism he dispatched missionaries to the four points of the compass. Archeological finds indicate these missions had been "favorably received" in lands to the West.{{Citation needed|date=July 2008}}

Ptolemy II Philadelphus, one of the monarchs Ashoka mentions in his edicts, is recorded by Pliny the Elder as having sent an ambassador named Dionysius to the Mauryan court at Pataliputra: "India has been treated of by several other Greek writers who resided at the courts of Indian kings, such, for instance, as Megasthenes, and by Dionysius, who was sent thither by Philadelphus, expressly for the purpose: all of whom have enlarged upon the power and vast resources of these nations."[http://perseus.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Plin.+Nat.+6.21 Pliny the Elder, "The Natural History", Chap. 21] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130728023626/http://perseus.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Plin.+Nat.+6.21 |date=2013-07-28 }}

Records from Alexandria, long a crossroads of commerce and ideas, indicate that itinerant monks from the Indian subcontinent may have influenced philosophical currents of the time.{{Citation needed|date=July 2008}} Roman accounts centuries later speak of monks traveling to the Middle East, and there is mention of an embassy sent by the Indian king Pandion, or Porus (possibly Pandya), to Caesar Augustus around 13 AD (see Pandion Embassy section above).

Expansion of Buddhist culture westward

Meanwhile, the Buddha's teachings had spread north-west, into Parthian territory. Buddhist stupa remains have been identified as distant as the Silk Road city of Merv."The Silk Road city of Marv (Grk. Margiana), situated in the eastern part of the Parthian Empire, became a major Buddhist center" Foltz, "Religions of the Silk Road", p. 47 Soviet archeological teams in Giaur Kala, near Merv, have uncovered a Buddhist monastery, complete with huge buddharupa. Parthian nobles such as An Shih Kao are known to have adopted Buddhism and were among those responsible for its further spread towards Han China.

Western knowledge of Buddhism

File:SiddhartaBirth.jpg, Gandhara, 2nd–3rd century AD.]]

Some knowledge of Buddhism existed quite early in the West. In the 2nd century AD Clement of Alexandria wrote about the Buddha:{{Cite web|url=http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/clement-stromata-book1.html|title=Clement of Alexandria: Stromata, Book 1|website=www.earlychristianwritings.com|accessdate=11 April 2024}}

{{blockquote|{{lang|grc|εἰσὶ δὲ τῶν Ἰνδῶν οἱ τοῖς Βούττα πειθόμενοι παραγγέλμασιν. ὃν δι’ ὑπερβολὴν σεμνότητος ὡς θεὸν τετιμήκασι.}} [Among the Indians are those philosophers also who follow the precepts of Boutta, whom they honour as a god on account of his extraordinary sanctity.]| Clement of Alexandria|Stromata (Miscellanies), Book I, Chapter XV}}

He also recognized Bactrian Buddhists (Sramanas) and Indian Gymnosophists for their influence on Greek thought:

{{blockquote|"Thus philosophy, a thing of the highest utility, flourished in antiquity among the barbarians, shedding its light over the nations. And afterwards it came to Greece. First in its ranks were the prophets of the Egyptians; and the Chaldeans among the Assyrians;{{cite journal |last1=Viglas |first1=Katelis |title=Chaldean and Neo-Platonic Theology |journal=Philosophia e-Journal of Philosophy and Culture |date=2016 |issue=14 |pages=171–189 |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/311924083|quote=The name “Chaldeans” refers generally to the Chaldean people who lived in the land of Babylonia, and especially to the Chaldean “magi” of Babylon......The “Chaldeans” were the guardians of the sacred science: the astrological knowledge and the divination mixed with religion and magic. They were considered the last representatives of the Babylonian sages......In Classical Antiquity, the name “Chaldeans” primarily stood for the priests of the Babylonian temples. In Hellenistic times, the term “Chaldeos” was synonymous with the words “mathematician” and “astrologer”......The Neo-Platonists connected the Chaldean Oracles with the ancient Chaldeans, obtaining a prestige coming from the East and legitimizing their existence as bearers and successors of an ancient tradition.}} and the Druids among the Gauls; and the Sramanas among the Bactrians ("Σαρμαναίοι Βάκτρων"); and the philosophers of the Celts; and the Magi of the Persians, who foretold the Saviour's birth, and came into the land of Judaea guided by a star. The Indian gymnosophists are also in the number, and the other barbarian philosophers. And of these there are two classes, some of them called Sramanas ("Σαρμάναι"), and others Brahmins ("Βραχμάναι")." | Clement of Alexandria|Stromata (Miscellanies)}}

File:Berenike Buddha (drawing).jpg, discovered in Berenice, Egypt, in 2022.]]

The story of the birth of the Buddha was also known: a fragment of Archelaos of Carrha (278 AD) mentions the Buddha's virgin-birth, and Saint Jerome (4th century) mentions the birth of the Buddha, who he says "was born from the side of a virgin". Queen Maya came to bear the Buddha after receiving a prophetic dream in which she foresaw the descent of the Bodhisattva (Buddha-to-be) from the Tuṣita heaven into her womb. This story has some parallels with the story of Jesus being conceived in connection with the visitation of the Holy Spirit to the Virgin Mary.

In Berenice, Egypt, in March 2022 an American-Polish archaeological mission excavating the main early Roman period temple dedicated to the Goddess Isis uncovered in the forecourt of the temple a marble statue of a Buddha, the Berenike Buddha, suggesting the presence of Buddhist merchants from India in Egypt at that time.{{cite magazine |date=20 April 2023 |title=Garum Masala;Dramatic archaeological discoveries have led scholars to radically reassess the size and importance of the trade between ancient Rome and India. |magazine=New York Review |url=https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2023/04/20/garum-masala-indian-ocean-trade-in-antiquity-cobb/}}{{cite web |last1=Magazine |first1=Smithsonian |last2=Parker |first2=Christopher |title=Archaeologists Unearth Buddha Statue in Ancient Egyptian Port City |url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/buddha-statue-found-berenike-egypt-180982075/ |website=Smithsonian Magazine |language=en}}

The latest impact upon Christian and Greek literature is the Christianized version of the legend of the life of the Buddha found in the Buddhist texts of the 3rd century CE and the epic Barlaam and Josaphat. The latter is traditionally attributed to Saint John of Damascus (d.c.750 CE), but it seems that he took it from the Arabic Kitab Bilawhar wa Yudasaf, which in its turn had also been taken from India via the Manichaeans.{{cite book|author=Vassiliades, Demetrios Th.|title=Greeks and Buddhism: An Intercultural Encounter |year=2016|url=https://elinepa.org/greeksandbuddhism/|isbn=978-618-82624-0-9|page=116}}

Buddhism and Gnosticism

Early 3rd century–4th century Christian writers such as Hippolytus and Epiphanius write about a Scythianus, who visited India around 50 AD from where he brought "the doctrine of the Two Principles". According to Cyril of Jerusalem, Scythianus' pupil Terebinthus presented himself as a "Buddha" ("He called himself Buddas"{{Cite web|url=https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/310106.htm|title=CHURCH FATHERS: Catechetical Lecture 6 (Cyril of Jerusalem)|website=www.newadvent.org|accessdate=11 April 2024}}). Terebinthus went to Palestine and Judaea ("becoming known and condemned"), and ultimately settled in Babylon, where he transmitted his teachings to Mani, thereby creating the foundation of Manichaeism:

{{blockquote|"But Terebinthus, his disciple in this wicked error, inherited his money and books and heresy, and came to Palestine, and becoming known and condemned in Judæa he resolved to pass into Persia: but lest he should be recognised there also by his name he changed it and called himself Buddas."|Cyril of Jerusalem, [http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/310106.htm "Catechetical lecture 6"]}}

Buddhism and Pyrrhonism

Because of the high degree of similarity between Madhyamaka and Pyrrhonism, particularly the surviving works of Sextus Empiricus,Adrian Kuzminski, Pyrrhonism: How the Ancient Greeks Reinvented Buddhism 2008 Thomas McEvilleyThomas McEvilley, The Shape of Ancient Thought 2002 pp. 499-505 and Matthew Neale[https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:347ed882-f7ac-4098-908f-5bb391462a6c/download_file?file_format=pdf&safe_filename=THESIS01&type_of_work=Thesis Madhyamaka and Pyrrhonism] ox.ac.ukArchived at [https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211205/NMZwyPdY7eg Ghostarchive]{{cbignore}} and the [https://web.archive.org/web/20200307220101/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMZwyPdY7eg&gl=US&hl=en Wayback Machine]{{cbignore}}: {{cite web| url = https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMZwyPdY7eg&t=52s| title = Sextus Empiricus and Madhyamaka at Oxford's Oriental Institute | website=YouTube| date = 10 May 2015 }}{{cbignore}} suspect that Nāgārjuna was influenced by Greek Pyrrhonist texts imported into India during the era of Roman trade with India.

According to legend, Nagarjuna said he was influenced by books inaccessible to other people. He was approached by Nāgas (semi-divine serpents) in human form. They invited him to their kingdom to see some texts they thought would be of great interest to him. Nagarjuna studied those texts and brought them back to India.Lex Hixon Mother of the Buddhas: Meditations on the Prajnaparamita Sutra {{ISBN|0835606899}} 1993 p. xii{{cite book|author=Thomas E. Donaldson|title=Iconography of the Buddhist Sculpture of Orissa: Text|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DbxE8zOuRbUC&pg=PA276|year=2001|publisher=Abhinav Publications|isbn=978-81-7017-406-6|page=276}}{{cite book|author=Tāranātha (Jo-nang-pa)|title=Taranatha's History of Buddhism in India|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4yXn-lVdqGgC&pg=PA384|year=1990|publisher=Motilal Banarsidass|isbn=978-81-208-0696-2|page=384}} According to Matthew Neale, "Nāgārjuna was a skillful diplomat concealing novel doctrines in acceptably Buddhist discourse... to conceal their doctrines’ derivation from foreign wisdom traditions."Matthew Neale Madhyamaka and Pyrrhonism 2014 p. vi