The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c12.s13.10

c12.s13.10

In India the deification of Śākya the moralist as Buddha the god as well as the initiation of *avatāras* like Rāma and Kriṣṇa were almost synchronous with the transformation of Jesus the Jew into Jesus the Christ.⁴⁰ Here Aśvaghoṣa and Vālmīki, there Seneca and St. Paul were consummating the profoundest remaking of mankind. While the Hīnayāna *Vinaya Piṭaka* would remind one of the contemporary Roman jurists and constitutionmakers, the Mahāyāna *Buddha-Charita*, *Saddharma-puṇḍarīka* and other treatises of selfless social services, love of humanity and so forth would appear to have their natural cognates in the Mark, Matthew, Luke, Paul and Peter chapters of the *New Testament*. Readers of the *Gītā* and the *Kurāl*, the *Rāmāyaṇa* and the *Viṣṇu Purāna* could have easily joined the Romans in listening to such messages as the following from St. Paul (Gal. III, 28, 1 Cor. XII, 13). "There can be neither Jew nor Greek," said he, "there can be neither bond nor free, there can be no male and female, for ye all are one man in Christ Jesus."