Helpful Devadatta?

[Tenma]

What do y'all think of this:
https://devdutt.com/articles/indian-myt ... dhism.html

[Sentient Light]

That's a pretty weird conclusion, but the bit about Christians being confused for worshippers of Devadatta is a common legend. To my knowledge, it is untrue. The king of Thailand actually ordered a Roman Catholic monastery built for the first Christian missionaries in the 16th century, mostly serving a substantial Portuguese trading community that resided in Siam. When the Protestant missionaries arrived in the 19th century though, it was decreed that Christian teachings could not be propagated in Thai or Pali. If there's any truth to the Devadatta story, it would likely be around this time period, but Christianity had already existed in Siam for 300 years at this point.

Even if there were truth to it, I'm not sure if I'd say that because of it, Devadatta "saved" Buddhism (there's no real indication that Buddhism was ever really threatened by Christian missionaries).

[Tenma]

That's a pretty weird conclusion, but the bit about Christians being confused for worshippers of Devadatta is a common legend. To my knowledge, it is untrue. The king of Thailand actually ordered a Roman Catholic monastery built for the first Christian missionaries in the 16th century, mostly serving a substantial Portuguese trading community that resided in Siam. When the Protestant missionaries arrived in the 19th century though, it was decreed that Christian teachings could not be propagated in Thai or Pali. If there's any truth to the Devadatta story, it would likely be around this time period, but Christianity had already existed in Siam for 300 years at this point.

Even if there were truth to it, I'm not sure if I'd say that because of it, Devadatta "saved" Buddhism (there's no real indication that Buddhism was ever really threatened by Christian missionaries).

Meh. Well, looks like he'll have to be prayed as he has not earned merit.
Still, it's better than one source I once found in a Christian university. Unfortunately, my Samsung phone pictures are too big for Dharmawheel, but in this world religion book, it claimed that Devadatta was reborn in the Middle East as Muhammad. I am not kidding about this statement(but then again, it just said that's what the sutras say without citing the sutra).

[Tenma]

One more thing, do actual Devadatta followers still exist today?

[Aemilius]

Nichiren talks about Devadatta https://www.nichirenlibrary.org/en/ott/PART-1/12

[Wayfarer]

Hey I really like devdutt's website, regardless of the merits of that particular article. He seems a really interesting dude.