9. The Christian miraculous conception has a parallel in Hinduism which is much older
According to the Immaculate Conception of the Christian New Testament, Mary was visited by an angel who told her that she was with child, who would be the Son of God. The Immaculate Conception is a miracle of the Bible believed by most Christian faiths. The debate over whether Mary remained a Virgin following the birth of Jesus centers for many on whether Jesus had siblings and whether Mary was in fact their mother, or if they had been fathered by Joseph in an earlier marriage. In Hinduism, a birth similar to that described in the New Testament takes place, and is part of the Hindu tradition dating more than one thousand years before the advent of the Common Era. Contacts between the ancient cultures were common through trade and through the conquests of the Persians, Mesopotamians, Greeks, and others throughout antiquity.
In the Hindu variation, Vishnu, who was divine and who felt great sympathy for the inhabitants of the earth, entered the womb of Devaki, who had previously given birth to six sons, all dead as a result of an earthly feud. The fruit of Vishnu’s entry was Krishna, born of Devaki and by right of fatherhood by Vishnu, a divine being. Krishna is both a name in and of itself and one of the names of Vishnu, (the 57th). Krishna was thus not born of a virgin, as his mother had borne many children before him, but he was born of an immaculate conception. Following his birth his mother was forced to flee with him into exile to protect him from being murdered by an earthly rival jealous of his power. Like Jesus of Nazareth, with whom there are other similarities in teaching and history, Krishna returned to heaven, from whence he is to come again.
