The original teachings of Jesus Christ were an outcome of Buddhism, says Holger Kersten, a German theology teacher. Hence one of the titles of the chapters in his book, "The Original Jesus" (sub-titled 'Buddhist sources of Christianity') is 'Jesus the Buddhist'!

1. The original teachings of Jesus Christ were an outcome of
Buddhism, says Holger Kersten, a German theology teacher.
Hence one of the titles of the chapters in his book, "The
Original Jesus" (sub-titled 'Buddhist sources of Christianity')
is 'Jesus the Buddhist'!
Holger Kersten
The innate curiosity of humans (that the learned ones label as the propelling factor of human progress)
curiously has no limits and has spawned the phenomena of the biped mass trodding the earth get-ting
'curioser and curioser' about various curious things. Holger Kersten following the tendency of his fold
got curious about a very curious thing ie. as to the total disappearance of Jesus, the adolescent boy and
the fact that he again emerged in his native land by the Galilee seas as a man of 30 years.
Where was Jesus in the intervening years and what was he doing all these years? That no records of
that long segment of this great religious mentor's life did he ever encounter in his perusals of the
aligned literature, struck Kersten as very curious. And of course, his readings were exhaustive for he was
a student of theology and pedagogics at Frieberg University in Germany.
Maybe Holger Kersten who was in Colombo recently for the launch of the Sinhala translation of his
book 'Jesus lived in India' deserves a more intimate introduction to the reader. Physically he is almost
an enigma, endowed with the debonair looks of a film star, quaintly mixed with the holy and serene
demeanour of the early saints of Christendom. In fact, a friend seated near the writer remarked that the
man looks a twin of Jesus Christ, which remark 1 hope is not sacrilegious.
Kersten may or may not look like that noble savant of Nazareth but he has taken the liberty of writing
a number of very controversial books on the life of Jesus Christ that include works like 'The original
Jesus' or 'The Buddhist sources of Christianity", "The Jesus conspiracy" and "Jesus lived in India".
From where did he get the matter for his books? His curiosity on the subject just overwhelming him,
he finally gave up his permanent career of a teacher of theology and took to wandering and
researching. From Germany he travelled to the historical lands of Israel, Middle East, Afghanistan and
India tracing all the places that Jesus had lived in, preached and wandered himself.
His work on the theme are highly likely to fan the flames of controversy among scholars and
theologians about the origin of Christianity. Anyway the first book on the theme had aroused such
worldwide interest and made him receive a very fat fan mail that it led to the formation of the Nazarene
Institute of Frieberg, Kersten told the writer to whom he gave an interview in the aftermath of the book
launch. The objective of the Institute is to activate future research on the historical Jesus and his
Buddhist influenced teachings and to make the findings available to those interested. Actually the welter
of facts presented in his book are a generous testimony to the theory he has tried to present. The book
reveals the startling discovery that while in Egypt as a child (where Jesus's family was in hiding along
with baby Jesus to escape persecution by Herod 37-4BC) that he was academically and spiritually guided
by the Therapateues who belonged to the Buddhist missionary sect who had gone over to Egypt on the

2. initiative of king Asoka (3rd century BC). It is relevant to mention here that according to Rock Edict 13
set up by this great Indian king, Buddhist missionaries had been sent by him to Ptolemy II Philadelphus
of Egypt. The word therapy used for spiritual ministrations according to Kersten is derived from the
salutary behaviour of these Therapateues aligned to Theravada Buddhism). The Essences and the
Mendeaus in Egypt were two religious sects who had already fallen under thg spell of Buddhist
teachings flourishing at this time and the spiritual guidance of this brilliant boy from a fugitive family of
Israel had naturally fallen into their hands.
Kersten's books also lay bare the amazing spread of Indian culture and thought in Biblical lands at this
time. He details the close parallels between the matter in the early Buddhist texts and Jesus's pithy
aphorisms recorded in the Gospels of Mattew and Luke that are said to contain the original teachings of
Jesus (example given, Buddha: "Who soever sees the Dhamma sees me" Christ in the Gospel according
to John says, "He that seeth me seeth him that sent me" - John 12.45). Here the author gushes, "Our
exciting voyage of discovery through the labyrinth of intellectual history reveals that Buddhist
elements in the new Testament are not the result of chance. They were first disseminated by Jesus
himself so that it can be provocatively stated, Jesus was not a Christian. He was a Buddhist."
Meticulously analysed are also the aspects of exchange of trade, myths, fables, philosophical systems
and religious ideas between the Biblical countries and the great Indian subcontinent in this time context
that make plausible such a percolation of religious ideas too..
Other than the above controversial ideas expounded the author has highlighted the following ideas
too that may seem almost heretical to the average Christian and highly speculative to the
nonbelieving.That Christianity as practised today is a far cry from the original teachings of Jesus and is
more a veering towards Paulinism.
"What we know as Christianity today is not the teachings contained in the authentic sayings of Jesus.
It is the theory disseminated by Paul and the doctorers of his Epistles."
That the theory of reincarnation had been accepted in early Christianity (examples are provided as the
spectacle of a blind child that leads to a controversy as to why he is blind? Who has sinned? His parents
or the infant? It is clear that the infant could not have sinned in this birth so he has sinned in his past
birth implying the acceptance of the reincarnation theory)" The early Christian communities still
remembered Jesus's teachings. In 553 AD the theory of reincarnation had been declared a heretical
belief at the Fifth Ecumenical Council in Constantinople and since remains banned.
That Jesus did not die on the cross but after surviving a coma that lasted for days wandered secretly to
Kashmiree India where he lived to a ripe old age. (much evidence is given to substantiate Hebrew
connections in Kashmir along with Jewish connections in Cochin and the role played by St. Thomas in
India. Christianity had existed in India prior to the arrival of the Portuguese.)
"That Jesus's greatness was not acknowledged or publicly proclaimed for two or three centuries after his
demise and that he was not mentioned in historical annals for quite some time. Even in the writings of a
contemporary of Jesus, historian Phillo Judaes, jesus is not mentioned. The
first historical mention of this great figure by whose birth the world's calendar is set today is said to be
in the writings of Tacitus, a non-Chris-tian Roman historian of 2nd Century AD who writes of a 'a
superstitious sect' deriving their name from a certain Christ executed by Pontius.
But after Jesus Christ's teachings zoomed to a world religion (probably on the mediation of king
Constantine who was to Christianity what king Asoka was to Buddhism) a sheer whorl of myths grew
around his life.including the myth of His role as son of God. In this context Kersten states in his preface
to The original Jesus.'

3. "The Jesus mediated to us by the Church is not the true Jesus. That is an artificial construction,
assembled from true and false fragments of his biography from authentic and invalid statements and
based on a great deal of inventiveness on the part of Christian writers...the real historical Jesus and his
concerns are hidden like a portrait beneath layers of varnish added by 2000 years of church history. If
we remove that varnish carefully like a restorer, without destroying the precious original, the primary
colours become apparent."
Artistic depictions of the Buddha & Jesus Christ in the medieval period reflecting the quaint intermix
between Buddhism & Christianity made feasible by a constant exchange of ideas & culture in the
period between 6th century BC & 1st century AD. Courtesy : “The Original Jesus” by Elmar Gruber &
Holger Kersten

4. Sunday Observer 2001.05.27Featurespage24 written by Padma Edirisinghe
Scanned OCRed & finalized by Yapa Wijeratne
E-mail: hellasyapa@gmail.com