Did Zoroastrianism evolve into Judaism and Christianity?
Some historians say that Zoroastrianism evolved into Judaism, Christianity. Now history is a permanently disputed territory. If you go to Pakistan they don't say don't go to Pakistan.
But if you go to Pakistan the Pakistanis don't say that Pakistan was formed on Hindu rule in 1947. Pakistan was formed in 11th, 12th century and they say after that these infidel Hindus they conquered Pakistan and Pakistan was liberated from Hindu rule in 1947. They have their own version of history.
So once you go into history it becomes very difficult to pin down specifics and there can be some reasonable historical claims can be made. For example say between the similarities in the thoughts of Plato and Socrates and the thoughts of the Ophiuchus. Similarly some parallels can be drawn between some of the depictions that are there in Egypt and some of the depictions that are there in the bhakti tradition.
But beyond that to specifically talk about historical origin of one tradition from another it often becomes exercise in historical self-congratulation. Our tradition is the source of everything. Now if somebody can do rigorous enough research to establish that, that is fine.
It can be done. It's good. But usually this sort of research it is often done from a perspective where one person wants to go and prove this to the nation.
And then it just ends up alienating serious people. The people who are not very discerning they will say oh this came from this this came from this. But otherwise serious people they don't even need to say Australia it's… okay fine.
But what does it mean? Is it that the Pandavas kept their astras in Australia? How will they get it back from there? It just doesn't make much sense. So there are some correlations which are brought about about historical…but if they are not really very well reasoned then they just make us appear very self-serving. They are trying to reinterpret history to support our own wisdom.
So at the time when Prabhupada was there on the planet Suhotra Maharaj he asked Prabhupada that time that book had come about called The Fingerprint of the Gods which said that actually there are signs of ancient intelligence or there are signs of advanced intelligence in various parts of the world. And that was because he said that some godly race had come from some other place. Something like that his theory was.
So when Prabhupada he asked what is Vedic technology? So Prabhupada replied Vedic technology means Guru-Shishya. Now that does not mean there is no Vedic technology but Prabhupada's focus was on getting involved in these things. If somebody is a specialist who has interest they can get involved in these things.
But just trying to study history and interpret it in a way to try to prove everything good came from our culture that just alienates hot people. It is best to focus on universal principles and present them in a way that makes sense to people and it transforms them. So if somebody can do rigorous enough research then they can do it and till now to actually withstand the criticism from competing historians and establish a theory as really respectable that has not been done.
So rather than getting into that zone focus on universal principles because who came from where in the past ultimately how much difference does it make? If I can become a better human being if I can make my life meaningful, perfect, joyful that is what matters to people. So if you focus on that then you won't get too distracted in RSM getting too caught in esoteric historical research or we won't alienate people by such theories which don't persuade them. If somebody has a specialist interest then they can connect with other devotees who have interest in historical research and they can do some specialized research which is sustainable against which can sustain serious.