156 erik seldeslachts
Another Alexandrian teacher of Origen was called Sakkas Ammonius
(ca. 175–245 AD), whose teachings are very much akin to Gnosticism.^120
Some researchers suspect that the name Sakkas Ammonius refers to an
epithet of the Buddha: Pli Sakkamuni, Sanskrit
kyamuni “sage of the
Sakka or
kya clan”.^121 There is, however, no indication that Ammonius
really was a Buddhist. According to the Church Father Eusebius of
Caesarea, he was a Christian turned pagan.^122 Ammonius was also a
teacher of the Neo-Platonist Plotinus (205–270 AD). As to Plotinus, who
had to cut short a voyage to India halfway,^123 several researchers have
pointed out a number of parallels between his doctrine and Indian,
especially Upaniadic notions. One such idea is that the world with its
soul(s) and matter came into being through successive emanations of
the “one”, and that the human soul can be reunited with that essential
nature of the universe during this or a later life.^124 But direct Indian
in uence is nowhere demonstrable, and Plotinus’ ideas do have Greek
antecedents, although it is interesting to note that the Neo-Platonist
philosopher Porphyry (ca. 233–309 AD) suggests that they are derived
from Sakkas Ammonius.^125
Around 400, another father of the Church, Hieronymus, mentions
the virginal birth of Buddas (Buddha) from the thigh of his mother.^126
The virginity of My and Mary is only one of the many parallels in
Buddhist and Christian themes, teachings, parables and stories.^127 There
are the childhood stories of the apocryphal gospels, like that in which
the statues fall down at the moment Christ and Buddha are carried
inside a temple,^128 or that in which both explain to their teachers the
meaning of the characters of the alphabet.^129 But also in the canoni-
cal gospels the similarities are amazing, with, among other themes, the
glori cation of the newborn saviour by an old man, the parable of the
(^120) Benz 1951, p. 197; Sedlar 1980, pp. 200–207, 292.
(^121) Benz 1951, pp. 197–202, relying on Seeberg 1941; Sedlar 1980, pp. 199–200,
292; and the prudent criticism of Halbfass 1988, p. 17. 122
Sedlar 1980, p. 199.
(^123) Sedlar 1980, pp. 200, 292.
(^124) Benz 1951, pp. 200–201; cf. Halbfass 1988, p. 17.
(^125) Benz 1951, p. 200.
(^126) Hieronymus, Adversus Iovinianum 1.42; cf. Ratramnus Corbeiensis, De nativitate
Christi 127 3.
Cf., a.o., Derrett 1967; 1970; 1978; 1990; 1992; 1999; 2002; Philonenko 1972;
Sedlar 1980, pp. 107–123; Lindtner 2000. 128
Sedlar 1980, p. 114.
(^129) Garbe 1914, p. 74; Jairazbhoy 1963, pp. 145–146.