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Julie VognarThey co-opt and absorb native customs into Buddhism. And as for Hindus--ask your Hindu friend if he knows where the Shiva linga came from: it's just an old-fashioned fertility symbol, like the Buddhist Yakshi.
In the Southeast Asian countries, there is an origin myth--in about 4 of them--that a Brahmen priest, guided by a dream, landed on the shores of (fill in the blank), and married the daughter of the snake king, who, to celebrate the nuptuals, drank the flood waters off the land, thus saving the kingdom and allowing farmers to cultivate the land.
From India came a holy story of the Buddha, meditating in the garden at Sarnath, before or just after his Englightenment, when a huge storm arose. The Buddha was so deep in mediation, he didn't notice, but the cobra king saw him, and to save him from drowning, coiled three coils beneath him and curved his eight-headed hood over him. In India, there are almost no statues of "Buddha on Mucalinda," though the story came from there. But South East Asia, especially Cambodia, is FULL of "Buddha on Mucalinda" statues. because of their origin myth.
Scuse me. The Asian Art Museum opens again on March 20. I just get a little impatient sometimes.
Anyway, it's not just the Christians who do it!