Sanatan Dharma / Chapter 75

Chapter 75: A Connected Eurasia: India, Iran, Central Asia and Europe and the Search for a Common Religious Past

What can—and cannot—be inferred from shared Indo-Iranian names, rituals, trade routes and religious forms from South Asia to Central Asia and Europe.

1. The question of a common past

Sanatan Dharma cannot be studied in isolation from the wider history of Eurasia. Languages, technologies, crops, animals, merchants, armies and religious ideas crossed the Hindu Kush, Iranian plateau, Central Asian corridors and maritime routes. Yet “shared past” must be defined carefully. A common Indo-Iranian linguistic inheritance is not the same thing as a direct transmission of a later Sanatan Dharma ritual to Europe.

2. Indo-Iranian religious inheritance

Comparative scholarship identifies striking correspondences between Vedic India and ancient Iranian religion. The deity Mitra in Vedic Sanskrit and Miθra in Iranian sources share a name derived from the concept of contract or agreement and preserve related characteristics. Encyclopaedia Iranica, “Mithra i. Mitra in Old Indian and Mithra in Old Iranian”. Other comparative correspondences include Yama/Yima and Soma/Haoma. These are best understood as evidence for an earlier Indo-Iranian cultural inheritance, not as proof that later Sanatan Dharma was copied from Iran or vice versa.

3. The Hindu Kush as a bridge

Research on the Kushan period shows increasing interaction among northwestern India, Central Asia and Inner Asia from around the second century BCE onward. Political networks, merchants and religious movements reinforced one another. Oxford Research Encyclopedia, “Trade, Buddhism, and the Kushan Connection”.

4. Buddhism as a major transmitter

When discussing “Indian influence” in Central Asia, Buddhism must be given its full importance. Many of the best-documented transregional transmissions from northwestern India into Central Asia were Buddhist rather than specifically Brahmanical. Archaeological and textual evidence from Gandhāra, the upper Indus and the Tarim Basin demonstrates extensive movement of monks, manuscripts, artistic styles and institutions. JSTOR Open Access, Early Buddhist Transmission and Trade Networks.

5. Brahmanical traditions also travelled

R. S. Sharma's overview of ancient Indian cultural interaction notes contacts with Central Asia, West Asia, China, Southeast Asia and the Roman world, and emphasizes the roles of both trade and religious movements. Oxford, “Cultural Interaction with Asian Countries”. Later evidence from Gandhāra and the Śāhi period confirms Brahmanical temple institutions in the northwest.

6. The Mitra/Mithra problem

Mitra/Mithra is an especially useful case study because it demonstrates both genuine connection and the danger of exaggeration. The Indo-Iranian relationship is secure at the linguistic and comparative-religious level. The later Roman cult of Mithras is more complicated. Encyclopaedia Iranica notes a continuing scholarly debate over whether Roman Mithraism was transmitted from Iran or substantially reinvented within the Roman world. Encyclopaedia Iranica, “Mithraism”. Therefore one should not claim that Roman Mithraism was simply “Vedic religion exported to Europe.”

7. Indo-Roman trade

Archaeological and economic research documents substantial trade between the Mediterranean and Indian Ocean worlds during the first centuries CE. Evers describes economically significant exchange from the first to sixth centuries CE that changed consumption and production patterns in India, South Arabia and the Roman Empire. Evers, Worlds Apart Trading Together. Trade created opportunities for religious contact, but a trade route alone does not prove that a specific ritual travelled along it.

8. Common rituals: what they can and cannot show

Across Indo-Iranian and wider Eurasian traditions one can find fire rituals, offerings, sacred waters, oath-taking, solar symbolism, ancestor remembrance, pilgrimage-like movement, sacred meals and ritual purity. Some correspondences are inherited from deep linguistic-cultural history; others emerged independently. Ritual similarity becomes strong evidence of historical connection only when combined with linguistic, textual, archaeological or documented contact evidence.

9. Fire as a shared ritual language

Vedic agni and Zoroastrian reverence for fire are often compared. The comparison is legitimate at the level of shared Indo-Iranian religious history, but Zoroastrian theology developed its own distinctive doctrines and institutions. It is therefore misleading to say “Zoroastrians copied Sanatan Dharma fire worship.” The better conclusion is that both traditions preserve transformed elements of an older Indo-Iranian ritual world.

10. Water, rivers and sacred geography

River reverence is particularly strong in South Asia, but sacred water is hardly unique to India. What matters historically is the specific symbolism attached to rivers and waters. Varuṇa, Sindhu, Sarasvatī and Iranian water traditions provide material for comparison, but each must be read in its own textual and historical setting.

11. Europe: the limits of the evidence

Claims that European religions directly borrowed Sanatan Dharma rituals are often much weaker than claims about Indo-Iranian linguistic inheritance. The Roman Mithras tradition is connected by name and some cultural history to Iranian Mithra, but its exact relationship remains debated. There is no evidence sufficient to say that Christianity, Greek religion or European paganism as wholes were simply derived from Sanatan Dharma. Responsible history distinguishes shared deep ancestry, cultural contact and independent development.

12. Afghanistan and Central Asia

Afghanistan and Central Asia were not merely transmission routes; they were creative religious environments. Gandhāran Buddhism, Iranian traditions, Brahmanical temples, local cults and later Islamic institutions interacted over centuries. The Kushan world in particular demonstrates how political and commercial integration could generate new religious forms.

13. Common past versus common religion

A connected Eurasian past does not imply that everyone once followed “Sanatan Dharma.” Historical societies had multiple religions and identities. The strongest common-past claims are those supported by comparative linguistics, dated archaeological evidence, inscriptions, manuscripts or documented contact. The weakest are those based only on visual resemblance or a modern ritual that “looks the same.”

14. A verification ladder

Very strong: dated inscription, manuscript, archaeological context or contemporary record showing transmission.
Strong: shared linguistic form plus systematic ritual and mythological correspondences.
Moderate: multiple independent similarities combined with known historical contact.
Weak: isolated similarity in a symbol, festival or ritual.
Unsupported: “these look alike, therefore one copied the other.”

15. The most defensible conclusion

The Eurasian record supports a deeply interconnected ancient world. Indo-Iranian religious inheritance is real; India-Central Asia exchange is abundantly documented; Buddhist transmission from northwestern India is exceptionally well attested; Brahmanical institutions also existed in the northwest; Indian Ocean and Roman trade created sustained contact; and some ritual concepts have very old shared roots. But Europe-wide claims of direct Sanatan Dharma borrowing require much stronger evidence than is usually offered.

Final methodological rule. The most intellectually honest version of the “common past” argument is not that every later Eurasian religion descended from India. It is that Eurasia contained networks of inherited Indo-Iranian culture and sustained exchange in which Indian, Iranian, Central Asian and Mediterranean traditions repeatedly interacted, transformed one another and sometimes independently developed similar practices.

The history of Eurasian religious connections requires especially strict controls against false diffusion claims. A common Indo-Iranian linguistic inheritance can explain related divine names such as Mitra and Mithra without proving later borrowing between historical communities. Trade routes make contact possible, but possibility is not evidence of transmission. Stronger evidence includes dated inscriptions, identifiable loanwords, archaeological objects in secure contexts, translations, or textual passages demonstrably dependent on earlier sources. This hierarchy is essential when comparing Indian, Iranian, Central Asian and European religious traditions.

17. Transmission versus resemblance

18. Transmission versus resemblance

Comparative religion without collapsing distinct traditions

This section strengthens the chapter’s historical method by separating textual evidence, material evidence, later tradition, and modern interpretation. The goal is not to flatten disagreement but to identify what can be established securely, what is plausible, and what remains debated.

Historical method

Comparative history is most useful when similarity is treated as a question rather than a conclusion. Sanskrit and Avestan are closely related Indo-Iranian languages, and Vedic and early Iranian religious traditions preserve important shared vocabulary, ritual concepts, and divine names. Oxford scholarship on the Ṛgveda and Indo-Iranian religion uses these parallels as evidence for a common inherited layer. But linguistic relationship does not mean that later Sanatan Dharma and Zoroastrianism are simply two versions of one religion. The distinction is important because religious traditions are cumulative: later communities frequently preserve older names and stories while giving them new meanings, and modern communities may read ancient texts through categories that did not exist in the same form in antiquity.

Textual and material evidence

The Indo-European comparison becomes especially valuable when its limits are respected. The term Indo-European is fundamentally linguistic, not a biological racial category. Shared vocabulary can support reconstruction of earlier cultural concepts, but it cannot automatically establish that a particular modern ritual descended unchanged from a prehistoric practice. This distinction is essential because nineteenth- and twentieth-century racial theories often transformed linguistic observations into claims about ethnicity and hierarchy that the evidence does not support. The distinction is important because religious traditions are cumulative: later communities frequently preserve older names and stories while giving them new meanings, and modern communities may read ancient texts through categories that did not exist in the same form in antiquity.

Regional and social variation

The Soma/Haoma comparison is a good case study. Vedic Soma and Iranian Haoma share linguistic ancestry and ritual significance, but their historical development diverged. Comparative analysis can illuminate an inherited ritual vocabulary while still recognizing later differences in theology, liturgy, and community identity. Similarly, parallels between Mitra and Mithra are historically meaningful, but the later deities cannot be treated as identical merely because their names share an Indo-Iranian origin. The distinction is important because religious traditions are cumulative: later communities frequently preserve older names and stories while giving them new meanings, and modern communities may read ancient texts through categories that did not exist in the same form in antiquity.

Modern reception

Trade created additional channels of contact. Roman commerce connected South Asia with the Mediterranean world, while Central Asian routes linked India to Iranian, Buddhist, and Chinese spheres. Buddhism became a particularly important transmitter of Indian philosophical and artistic forms across Asia. Brahmanical traditions also travelled, especially through merchants, courts, ritual specialists, and temple networks in Southeast Asia. These processes were multidirectional and often involved local reinterpretation. The distinction is important because religious traditions are cumulative: later communities frequently preserve older names and stories while giving them new meanings, and modern communities may read ancient texts through categories that did not exist in the same form in antiquity.

What the evidence allows us to say

The safest conclusion is therefore a layered one: Eurasia contained real zones of cultural contact and inherited linguistic relationships, but historical comparison should not collapse distinct civilizations into a single ancient religion. Similarity can result from common inheritance, borrowing, parallel development, or later reinterpretation. Each possibility requires separate evidence. The distinction is important because religious traditions are cumulative: later communities frequently preserve older names and stories while giving them new meanings, and modern communities may read ancient texts through categories that did not exist in the same form in antiquity.

Selected scholarly anchors

For further verification, this discussion is anchored in Oxford Academic scholarship and, where relevant, additional Oxford research on Sanatan Dharma history and practice. These sources are used as scholarly reference points rather than as substitutes for primary evidence.

Comparative work must also distinguish inheritance from contact. Shared Indo-Iranian vocabulary can indicate an inherited layer before the separation of linguistic communities, whereas a similarity between later temple rituals in India and Iran requires a different kind of evidence. Trade routes, imperial expansion, migration, and translation can create later contacts, but similarities may also arise independently. Good comparative history therefore specifies the mechanism it proposes instead of treating every resemblance as proof of common origin. This additional layer is important because it prevents a common error in civilizational history: treating continuity of vocabulary or mythology as proof that social institutions and practices remained unchanged. Historical continuity can coexist with major transformations in meaning, authority, and practice.

References cited in this chapter

Clickable scholarly, primary, institutional, and documented traditional sources named or used in this chapter.