The Borrowing Theory
The era of the "Borrowing Theory," as it was known, first began when Antonio Giorgi published his book Alphabetum Tibetanum [Roma 1762]. The materials for Giorgi's writings were gathered from manuscripts of Capucine missionaries [1741] led by Horacio de la Penna [a particularly zealous missionary] who traveled in India and Tibet for several years. Giorgi undertook the task to prove by comparative philology the opinion entertained by the missionaries, that Vaishnavism and Buddhism were a corrupted form of Christianity.

Giorgi wrote that "Krishna is only a corruption of the name of the Saviour [Christ]; the deeds correspond wonderfully with the name, though they have been impiously and cunningly polluted by most wicked imposters."

Indeed, the parallels between Christ and Krishna are many. Just to name a few: The births of Christ and Krishna were heralded by divine beings [angels]. King Harod of Judea planned to kill the Christ child and King Kamsa of Mathura planned to kill the child Krishna. Christ and Krishna both dispelled demons, cured the sick, performed miracles, taught the truth, and both Christ and Krishna were destined to be Kings.

In his monograph Uber die Krishnajanmasthami, Albrecht Weber [1825-1901] pointed out the many and striking similarities between the birth stories of Krishna and Jesus. The following quote from his work notes many of these similarities:

"Take, for example the statement of the Vishnu Purana that Nanda, the foster-father of Krishna, at the time of the latter's birth, went with his pregnant wife Yasoda to Mathura to pay taxes (cf. Luke II, 4, 5) or the pictorial representation of the birth of Krishna in the cow stall or shepherds hut, that corresponds to the manger, and of the shepherds, shepherdesses, the ox and the ass that stand round the woman as she sleeps peacefully on her couch without fear of danger. Then the stories of the persecutions of Kamsa, of the massacre of the innocents, of the passage across the river (Christophorus), of the wonderful deeds of the child, of the healing-virtue of the water in which he was washed, etc., etc. Whether the accounts given in the Jaimini Bharata of the raising to life by Krishna of the dead son of Duhsala, of the cure of Kubja, of her pouring a vessel of ointment over him, of the power of his look to take away sin, and other subjects of the kind came to India in the same connection with the birth-day festival may remain an open question."

Weber even contended that the whole Vedic system of avatars, or incarnations of God, was "borrowed" from the "Incarnation of Jesus Christ."

Dr. F. Lorinser [1869] translated the Bhagavad-gita and compared it scrupulously to the New Testament. He concluded, that the author of the Bhagavad-gita knew and used the Gospels and Christian Fathers. According to Lorinser the similarities were not single and obscure, but numerous and clear. There was no doubt in Lorinser's mind that the Bhagavat-gita had been largely "borrowed" from the New Testament.

Other Western scholars gradually came in contact with the borrowing theory but disputed its validity. One such scholar, Sir William Jones, [philologer] found Vishnu to be one of the more ancient Gods of India, who Vaishnavas asserted was distinct from all the other Avatars [incarnations], who had only a portion of Krishna's divinity. In his fascinating and provocative work, "On the Gods Of Greece, Italy and India" Sir William Jones writes [1786] that "In the principal Sanskrit dictionary, compiled about two thousand years ago, Krishna, Vasudeva, Govinda, and other names of the Shepherd God, are intermixed with epithets of Narayana, or the Divine Spirit."

Sir William Jones's is best known today for making and propagating the observation that Sanskrit [the ancient language of India] bore a certain resemblance to classical Greek and Latin. In "The Sanskrit Language" (1786) he suggested that all three languages had a common root.

Following in the direction of Sir Jones's research, the English philosopher Edward Moore [1873-1958] later went so far as to say that the popular Greek myths had some basis in real life and could be traced ultimately to India.

However, conclusive proof of a borrowing theory for either side of the argument did not surface for some time, thus the debate continued. And in more than one instance it was the religious Christian fervor that won the day in favor of all theological thought in India being borrowed from Christianity. Any literary evidence provided from the ancient Sanskrit literatures which proved that Vaishnavism predated Christianity was never considered as verifiable evidence and was simply brushed aside. The only creditable literary evidence would have to be, in the biased minds of the Christian dominated debate, of Western origin - the "Holy Bible" of course being wholly admissible as evidence - otherwise to question its validity was an act of heresy.

As destiny would have it there finally surfaced a Western literary account of ancient India that was in fact much older than the Bible. This record of ancient India was found in the book, Indica, written by Megasthenes [3rd century BCE, Greek] and authoritatively referred to by his commentators in their writings.

Strabo
Sometime in the third century BCE, Meghasthenes journeyed to India. The King of Taxila had appointed Meghasthenes ambassador to the royal court of the great Vaishnava monarch, Chandragupta. Evidently while there, Megasthenes wrote extensively on what he heard and saw. Unfortunately, none of Megasthenes original writings survived the ages. However, through early Greek historians like Arrian, Diodorus, and Strabo, fragments of Megasthenes's writings were available and remain so today.

German orientalist Christian Lassen [1800-1876] was the first scholar to bring Megasthenes into the debate on the borrowing theory. He noted that Megasthenes wrote of Krishna under the pseudonym of Heracles and that Heracles, or Krishna, was worshipped as God in the area through which the Yamuna River flows.

A respected German Indologist, Richard Garbe [journeyed to India 1885-1886], agreed with Lassens analysis and called the testimony of Megasthenes indisputable. Soon, other scholars who had formerly supported the borrowing theory changed their minds and admitted, that the evidence of Megasthenes had exploded the borrowing theory once and for all.

The life of Krishna and the religion of Vaishnavism had not been influenced by Christianity, but had appeared autonomously on Indian soil and was already well-established by at least the third century BCE. Indeed, according to numerous accounts in the ancient Sanskrit literature [that began to appear more creditable to Western scholars] Krishna and the worship of Krishna as God appeared in India close to 3,000 BCE.

Following close behind the evidence of Magasthenes were several archaeological discoveries that also verified the Vaishnava faith as independently existing in India several centuries before the advent of Jesus and the doctrine of Christianity.

By far, the most important archaeological discovery made was by the indefatigable General Sir Alexander Cunningham in 1877. During an archeological survey of Beshnagar in central India [near present day Bhopal], he noted a curious ornamental column. The shape of the column caused Cunningham to attribute it erroneously to the period of the Gupta Dynasty (CE 300-550). Thirty-two years later, however, two gentleman, Mr. Lake and Dr. J. H. Marshall saw some lettering on the lower part of the column in an area where pilgrims customarily smeared it with red paint. When the thick red paint was removed an inscription dating the curious pillar to 113 BCE was revealed.

In the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society in 1909, Dr. J. H. Marshall described his conclusions. Cunningham had dated the column far too late and could little have dreamt of the value of the record which he just missed discovering. A glance at the few letters exposed was all that was needed to show that the column was many centuries earlier than the Gupta era. This was, indeed, a surprise to Dr. Marshall, but a far greater surprise was in store when the opening lines of the inscription were read.

The following translation of this ancient Brahmi inscription was published in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society [London: JRAS, Pub, 1909, pp 1053-54].

"This Garuda-column of Vasudeva (Visnu), the God of Gods, was erected here by Heliodorus, a worshipper of Visnu, the son of Dion, and an inhabitant of Taxila, who came as Greek ambassador from the Great King Antialkidas to King Kasiputra Bhagabhadra, the Savior, then reigning prosperously in the fourteenth year of his kingship."

The column had been erected in BCE 113 by Heliodorus, a Greek ambassador to India. He, like Megasthenes, hailed from Taxila in the Bactrian region of northwest India, which had been conquered by Alexander the Great in BCE 325. By the time of Heliodorus, Taxila then covered much of present-day Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the Punjab.

After the publishing of the findings on the Heliodorus pillar in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society in 1909 little more was said amongst scholars about the borrowing theory.

Indians did not take much interest in the debate of this theory, as they did not realize its relevancy in their times. The early Christian missionaries and scholars had indeed found a significant number of very interesting similarities between Vaishnavism and Christianity which in their own words were, "Not single and obscure, but numerous and clear." So it was only logical to any trained mind that this idea should arise. However, since it was concluded long ago that the worship of Krishna existed long before Christianity - could it then be reasonable to assume or at least to question that possibly it was Christianity that borrowed from Vaishnavism?

The Editors

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