What if Buddhism had gained a foothold in Greece through means of the Silk Road? And what would it's chances be of surviving to Medieval or even modern history as a major religion?
Why?Buddhism predates both Christianity and Islam for LONG,LONG,TIME.I think you'd need an alternate world without Christianity or Islam to allow Buddhism to spread into Southeastern Europe.
If the POD is early enough you can just Butterfly those away.I think you'd need an alternate world without Christianity or Islam to allow Buddhism to spread into Southeastern Europe.
Why?Buddhism predates both Christianity and Islam for LONG,LONG,TIME.
I think you'd need an alternate world without Christianity or Islam to allow Buddhism to spread into Southeastern Europe.
What I meant to say earlier was that, even if Buddhism gets a significant following in Greece of all places, how do you make the region stay Buddhist? I think you would need to remove Christianity and Islam from the picture (or at least stunt their growth), because of the effect they had on destroying most of the old pagan religions in western Eurasia.
Also, I've read somewhere that when Alexander reached present-day India, the Greek culture and religion mixed with that of the native Hinduism/Buddhism. So basically, this thread is proposing a similar situation happening, but in the opposite direction?
Even when Europe was pagan, Buddhism never reached that far west. And even if it did, I'm not sure if it would survive the expansion of Abrahamic faiths (Afghanistan was once Buddhist long ago, now it's not).
Not quite, Ashoka sent Buddhist missionaries as far as Alexandria and Athens, there were also Buddhists present in the various Persian Empires until Genghis Khan's invasion, and it's speculated that Gnosticism was partly influenced by Buddhist ideas, not to mention those who think that Buddhism had influence on Christianity and Jesus Christ himself.
So... I think it's perfectly possible for Buddhism to gain a major following in Greece, not to mention the Roman Empire.
I can’t see it. Why would they convert from their traditional religion? Buddhism isn’t really monotheistic.
I think you'd need an alternate world without Christianity or Islam to allow Buddhism to spread into Southeastern Europe.
I can’t see it. Why would they convert from their traditional religion? Buddhism isn’t really monotheistic.
I can’t see it. Why would they convert from their traditional religion? Buddhism isn’t really monotheistic.
Plenty of people who aren’t monotheistic have converted to Buddhism. Generally,Buddhism is compatible with the local polytheistic religion.Can only monotheistic religious beliefs spread?