About The Same Time, Professor F.
Liebrecht Of Liege, In Ebert's Jahrbuch Fuer Romanische Und Englische
Literatur, II.
P. 314 seqq., comparing the Book of Barlaam and Joasaph
with the work of Barthelemy St. Hilaire on Buddha, arrived at the same
conclusion.
In 1880, Professor T.W. Rhys Davids has devoted some pages (xxxvi.-xli.)
in his Buddhist Birth Stories; or, Jataka Tales, to The Barlaam and
Josaphat Literature, and we note from them that: "Pope Sixtus the Fifth
(1585-1590) authorised a particular Martyrologium, drawn up by Cardinal
Baronius, to be used throughout the Western Church.". In that work are
included not only the saints first canonised at Rome, but all those who,
having been already canonised elsewhere, were then acknowledged by the
Pope and the College of Rites to be saints of the Catholic Church of
Christ. Among such, under the date of the 27th of November, are included
"The holy Saints Barlaam and Josaphat, of India, on the borders of Persia,
whose wonderful acts Saint John of Damascus has described. Where and when
they were first canonised, I have been unable, in spite of much
investigation, to ascertain. Petrus de Natalibus, who was Bishop of
Equilium, the modern Jesolo, near Venice, from 1370 to 1400, wrote a
Martyrology called Catalogus Sanctorum; and in it, among the 'Saints,'
he inserts both Barlaam and Josaphat, giving also a short account of them
derived from the old Latin translation of St. John of Damascus. It is from
this work that Baronius, the compiler of the authorised Martyrology now in
use, took over the names of these two saints, Barlaam and Josaphat. But,
so far as I have been able to ascertain, they do not occur in any
martyrologies or lists of saints of the Western Church older than that of
Petrus de Natalibus. In the corresponding manual of worship still used in
the Greek Church, however, we find, under 26th August, the name 'of the
holy Iosaph, son of Abener, King of India.' Barlaam is not mentioned, and
is not therefore recognised as a saint in the Greek Church. No history is
added to the simple statement I have quoted; and I do not know on what
authority it rests. But there is no doubt that it is in the East, and
probably among the records of the ancient church of Syria, that a final
solution of this question should be sought. Some of the more learned of
the numerous writers who translated or composed new works on the basis of
the story of Josaphat, have pointed out in their notes that he had been
canonised; and the hero of the romance is usually called St. Josaphat in
the titles of these works, as will be seen from the Table of the Josaphat
literature below. But Professor Liebrecht, when identifying Josaphat with
the Buddha, took no notice of this; and it was Professor Max Mueller, who
has done so much to infuse the glow of life into the dry bones of Oriental
scholarship, who first pointed out the strange fact - almost incredible,
were it not for the completeness of the proof - that Gotama the Buddha,
under the name of St. Josaphat, is now officially recognised and honoured
and worshipped throughout the whole of Catholic Christendom as a Christian
saint!" Professor T.W. Rhys Davids gives further a Bibliography, pp.
xcv.-xcvii.
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