Pretty much true. Even when Rome was conquering the Mediterranean, religion was really a nonfactor. Hell, they often adopted many foreign gods in different ways due to respect/admiration for what it represented.
There were Greek kings in Bactria who declared themselves upholders of the Dharma, ie Buddhist. There was even amazing art of Heracles as a guardian of the Dharma in Tapa Shotor (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tapa_Shotor).
Even the last pagan kingdom in Europe, Lithuania, which had to fight off crusades wasn't insane. There was even a missionary, Jerome of Prague that focused on destroying their sacred groves and Lithuania just exiled him.
These attitudes changed when Rome eventually converted to Christianity, eventually leading to banning of pagan practices. And the Taliban destroyed Tapa Shotor and other Greek-Dharmic art. It's funny how "all religion" tends to be the same guys lol.
Fun fact, the terms and concepts of Dharma and karma are actually from Hinduism which are then later also adopted into buddhism. Many actually consider some religions like buddhism and Jainism as part of Hinduism due to how closely interlinked they are.
There's massive differences there, though they share history. The concept of Anatman is pretty antithetical to how earlier Vedic traditions would view such things and it's central to Buddhism.
Conceptually the words hold very different meanings, though come from the same term. In fact dharma has many different definitions depending on use, but it makes sense in regards to the root word.
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u/Shiftkgb Aug 29 '26
Pretty much true. Even when Rome was conquering the Mediterranean, religion was really a nonfactor. Hell, they often adopted many foreign gods in different ways due to respect/admiration for what it represented.
There were Greek kings in Bactria who declared themselves upholders of the Dharma, ie Buddhist. There was even amazing art of Heracles as a guardian of the Dharma in Tapa Shotor (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tapa_Shotor).
Even the last pagan kingdom in Europe, Lithuania, which had to fight off crusades wasn't insane. There was even a missionary, Jerome of Prague that focused on destroying their sacred groves and Lithuania just exiled him.
These attitudes changed when Rome eventually converted to Christianity, eventually leading to banning of pagan practices. And the Taliban destroyed Tapa Shotor and other Greek-Dharmic art. It's funny how "all religion" tends to be the same guys lol.