Why didn't Indian religions spread westward into the middle east and mediterranean?

Just to clarify, neither description well describes the history of Buddhism.

Whilst Buddhism doesn't well fit into usual standards of religion (I've said on here before that the differences between many schools are far more pronounced than the Judaism, Islam, Christianity divide), it was never "just a philosophy" and he was never venerated as a god outside of Hindus doing so ironically.

But from the completion of the Pali Canon, Siddhartha Gautama was treated above a god, as he proves that an Ishvara can also be bound to samsara. Later schools if anything deemphasized him in comparison, focusing largely on the Bodhisattvas and their helper deities.

The problem of using terms like "philosophy" or "religion" to classify completely independent traditions is obvious. Still, it's a very useful tool for explaining concepts to the general public (just as useful as calling the Mesoamerican Ballgame "Mayan soccer"). That being said, one can definitely say that thinkers like the Buddha and Mahavira share more ideas with Socrates in his quest for eudaimonia than, let's say, Moses. As for your observation with regards to the comparison of the Sakyamuni and gods, IMHO it is highly misleading, not only the Pali Canon is filled with metaphors, but also the role of the gods here are completely different from from the Semitic God.

The main thing with Buddhism I feel is that it should require some previous cultural belief in reincarnation. For Europe there is a variety of believes about the dead, but many of the cruelest burial cultures involving killing slaves upon the death of their master. Not all of them, but just enough to keep them company and serve them in the next life/afterlife. It suggests they don't see themselves coming back to Earth. For Porto-Hinduism we have castes were, no matter how well you behave, the only way to rise in society is to die, and your children will never rise in status either. To break the cycle of death and reincarnation would be rather more desirable there.

There was the concept of reincarnation in Ancient Greece, it's called metempsychosis.
 
The problem of using terms like "philosophy" or "religion" to classify completely independent traditions is obvious. Still, it's a very useful tool for explaining concepts to the general public (just as useful as calling the Mesoamerican Ballgame "Mayan soccer"). That being said, one can definitely say that thinkers like the Buddha and Mahavira share more ideas with Socrates in his quest for eudaimonia than, let's say, Moses. As for your observation with regards to the comparison of the Sakyamuni and gods, IMHO it is highly misleading, not only the Pali Canon is filled with metaphors, but also the role of the gods here are completely different from from the Semitic God.
Indeed. I feel that Buddhism may actually take on characteristics of Manicheasism, Judaism, Christianity (though one could say that in fact Judaism had split between Rabbincal Judaism and Messianic Judaism in the form of Christianity, which then sundered in two with the destruction of the temple, which both groups had not nad a necessary need for.), and stuff with Greek philosophers and sages. Buddhism did change a lot when it left India and went to Southeast Asia, Japan, Mongolia, Tibet... So many forms. And so many got a sort of saint thigh going on. Though whereas for Christianity there were supposedly lots of unofficial saints and shrines for old spirits and deities remolded into angels and saints (plus how Buddha was once made a saint) Asians took their own spirits and deities and... well, really far to complex to say. I think that every East, South, and Southeast Asia had traditions so divergent that each should be looked at separately. Probably not space for it here, though.
 
The main thing with Buddhism I feel is that it should require some previous cultural belief in reincarnation. For Europe there is a variety of believes about the dead, but many of the cruelest burial cultures involving killing slaves upon the death of their master. Not all of them, but just enough to keep them company and serve them in the next life/afterlife. It suggests they don't see themselves coming back to Earth. For Porto-Hinduism we have castes were, no matter how well you behave, the only way to rise in society is to die, and your children will never rise in status either. To break the cycle of death and reincarnation would be rather more desirable there.

Gaul has a belief in reincarnation.
 
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