Jesus the Bodhisattva: Christology from a Buddhist Perspective

Abstract

To believe and affirm that God is love and that human beings are not like orphans lost in the vast, meaningless universe but are under the care of a loving God constitutes the core of Christian faith. Yet it is by no means easy to do so, for there seems to be more hatred than love in the world, more injustice and violence than justice and peace, and in the eyes of modern science the world appears to be nothing more than blind congeries of restless particles. Despite this, however, what enables Christians to have the courage to affirm the moral meaning of life is none other than the truth revealed through Jesus Christ concerning human life and the world. Christians believe that, in Jesus Christ, the mystery of the ultimate reality of the world and the ultimate meaning of life was decisively revealed. Rather than relying on abstract philosophical speculation, they base their understanding of the ultimate reality and its relationship with human beings on a concrete historical being, Jesus. It is for this reason that Christology-which is thinking about the mystery of Jesus' person and the significance he has for human salvation-is of decisive importance in Christian theology. What I attempt here is to develop an indigenous Asian Christology by interpreting the meaning of Jesus' message and life from the Buddhist perspective, especially from its doctrine and ideal of bodhisattvahood as developed in Mahayana Buddhist tradition. I try to show that the power that made Jesus what he was and the power that makes a bodhisattva a bodhisattva are ultimately the same and that the only way for humans to be authentic human beings in Buddhism and Christianity is through the power of cosmic love.