[Buddha-l] Pure Land

[Franz Metcalf]

Gang,

Gary wondered about something it seems many of us find intriguing,

> ... there may never be archeological evidence of such
> Christian-Buddhist contact at the inception of Pure Land, (context) — 
> but
> still, one wonders, don't one.  (Similarly, one never knows if any of 
> the
> Silk Route travellers had made their way to Galilee ... and influenced 
> Jesus
> / his followers ... )

I'm out of town and don't have my books or notes at hand, but I recall 
that Paul Mus wrote about this subject in his magnum opus _Barabudur_ 
(in the avant propos). My recollection is that Mus does subscribe to 
the theory of influence via the Silk Route. I think he also ties this 
to the rise of figurative depictions of the Buddha in what is now 
Afghanistan (again, I'm recalling things I read 15 years ago, so I make 
no guarantees of accuracy). As for influence in the opposite direction, 
that's more threatening to the self-regard of Western civilization and 
thus a notion more likely to be banished from the scholarly literature.

Franz