Quid est Veritas?

In Memoriam to CS Lewis
Feb 27, 2016
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For centuries Western and Eastern Christians revered the two saints Barlaam and Yosaphat. They had feast days in both eastern and western Christianity, were entered in the Roman martyrology, had Christian tracts written about them, Churches named after them.

Yet they are false. In fact this was basically the Life of the Buddha retold and transformed into a Christian tale. It all started with a Mahayana buddhist text, which then was adapted to Manichaeanism, then to Islam, before being picked up and Christianised in the High Middle Ages.
Hence Bodhisattva became Budasaf, then Yudasaf then Yozasaf and finally Yosaphat.

Essentially it says an Indian king kept his son isolated from the world's ills as a prophecy said he would then convert to Christianity. The Prince then escapes his father and meets the hermit Barlaam and becomes an ascetic monk. The traditional story of Gautama Buddha is very evident.

The Georgians wrote an epic on the tale called the Balavariani which the Greeks adopted in the 11th century before diffusing to Western Christianity. It became part of the Golden Legend, had High German versions written, was retold as late as the 18th century as a lesson on free will. It even made its way into Shakespeare, influencing The Merchant of Venice, from where the casket scene in Portia's house originated.

Egg on our face when Orientalist scholars showed the whole thing to be about Buddha in the late 18th. Very strange indeed.

There is a even stranger postscript to this fiasco. Confusion between the Indian placename Kushinara and Kashmir and the false connection of Yozaphat as Yuz Asaf (ie Jesus) led to the weird belief that Jesus visited India during the 'lost decade' of His 20s before the start of His ministry. The Ahmaddiya muslims adapted this even further into saying Jesus lived out his days in Kashmir (they hold to a docetic crucifixion narrative). Eastern Syncreticist groups (basically hippie and New Age culture) then ran with it, transforming Jesus in their minds into a strange guru that very much does not resemble Jesus or even the Buddha.

Weird how easily people can be led astray, even though I am sure the tale of Barlaam and Yosaphat was probably very edifying to many Christians for centuries. Thoughts?