GREAT RELIGIOUS FIGURES
One hears conflicting estimates of Jesus. Christians believe he is incomparable, without a peer, but they are often quite ignorant of the lives of other great spiritual leaders. On the other hand, some people speak of Jesus, Buddha, Socrates and others without acknowledging any differences. Walter Lippmann, for example, remarks, “There is no doubt that in one form or another, Socrates and Buddha, Jesus and St. Paul, Plotinus and Spinoza, taught that the good life is impossible without asceticism….”1 Arnold Toynbee asks: “Now who are the individuals who are the greatest benefactors of the living generation of mankind? I should say: Confucius and Lao-tse; the Buddha; the Prophets of Israel and Judah; Zoroaster, Jesus, and Muhammad; and Socrates.”2 One may cite many syncretistic movements in the United States, Japan and elsewhere, such as Baha’i, which attempt to combine the teachings of various religious leaders.
The purpose of this essay is to highlight Jesus’ life, death and teachings by comparing and contrasting them with Zoroaster, Buddha, Socrates and Muhammad. We have chosen these four because many people today, in their search for meaning, are looking to these men and the traditions they have generated. We will divide the investigation into five categories: (1) the sources available for reconstructing the lives of these teachers, (2) their birth and family, (3) their life and teachings, (4) their death and (5) their relation to deity. After the data become clear, we will be able to see where the uniqueness of Jesus lies.
From a historian’s point of view there are serious disparities in the sources available for reconstructing the lives of Zoroaster, Buddha, Socrates, Muhammad and Jesus. We need to distinguish sharply between first-hand or nearly contemporary sources and later apocryphal and legendary materials.
Zoroaster (628-551 B.C.) We have what appear to be the genuine sayings of Zoroaster in the Gathas of the Avesta. The mass of Zoroastrian texts, however, are in late Pahlavi recensions (ninth century A.D.). Contemporary Old Persian cuneiform inscriptions betray at best only allusions to early Zoroastrianism. Some Greek and Arabic authors also allude to Zoroaster. The Persian national epic, the Shah Namah by Firdausi (c. A.D. 1000), includes traditions of the prophet.
Buddha (563-483 B.C.) Buddha’s teachings, after many centuries of being passed on orally, were written down for the first time in the first century B.C. in Ceylon. The earliest written texts which have been preserved are in Pali, an Indo-Aryan dialect which may be the dialect Buddha himself used. The Pali canon of the Hinayana school (the southern branch of Buddhism, also called the Theravada school) is known as the Tipitaka (Sanskrit Tripitaka), meaning “Three Baskets.” Portions of this collection, such as the Samyutta Nikaya, the Majjhima Nikaya and the Anguttara Nikaya, may have come into existence two centuries after Buddha’s death, but other portions originated much later.
The Sanskrit canon of the Mahayana school, which spread northeastward to Tibet, China, Korea and Japan, dates, at the earliest, to the first and second centuries A.D. According to Christmas Humphreys, “the later Sutras of the Mahayana School, though put into Buddha’s mouth, are clearly the work of minds which lived from five to fifteen hundred years after his passing.”3
In the later sources one notes a conspicuous exaggeration of the supernatural elements in Buddha’s life. But even the earliest traditions, separated as they are by a century or two from Buddha’s time, are not free from amplification. As M. Winternitz observes, “Even what are generally considered to be our oldest documents, the texts of the Pali Tipitaka, speak of Buddha often enough as a superhuman being, and tell us more of the legendary man than of the historical Buddha.”4
Socrates (469-399 B.C.) We are fortunate in having the accounts of two of Socrates’ own disciples, Plato and Xenophon, as well as notices collected by Diogenes Laertius (third century A.D.). We cannot accept these accounts uncritically, of course, because it is difficult to know how much of Plato’s dialogues is really Socratic and how much Platonic. Another problem is that Xenophon’s Memorabilia and other writings were composed to refute the Sophists’ attacks against Socrates.
Muhammad (570-632 A.D.) In the Qur’an (Koran) we have the authentic sayings of Muhammad, which were at first written down on skins, palm leaves, pottery and even the shoulder blades of sheep. Shortly after the prophet’s death the caliph Uthman (644-55) collected these sayings in a canonical edition. In the Hadith we have numerous oral traditions about the words and actions of Muhammad, traditions involving even such details as his regularly brushing his teeth. Some two centuries after the prophet’s death Al-Bukhari sifted through some 600,000 traditions to obtain 7,000 Hadith which he thought were genuine. The first life of Muhammad, based on the Qur’an and the Hadith, is the ninth-century Sirat ar-Rasul by Ibn Hisham.
Jesus (5 B.C.-30 A.D.) Our main sources of information about the life of Jesus are the canonical Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. There is some dispute over the identity of the authors, but it is generally held that Matthew, a converted tax-collector, and John, a fisherman, were two of Jesus’ apostles. Mark was an eyewitness as Jesus and the apostles met in his home, and later he learned more about Jesus from Peter, whom, according to Irenaeus, he served as an interpreter. Luke, a physician who accompanied Paul, made use of eyewitness accounts for his Gospel. Mark, the earliest Gospel, may have been written as early as A.D. 50; Luke was probably written before A.D. 64; and Matthew shortly after A.D. 70. Although it has been customary to date John’s Gospel approximately A.D. 90, some scholars have recently favored a date in the 70’s or 80’s. Jesus spoke in Aramaic, but the Gospels are in Greek.
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