eriod and the tablets of Tel-el-Amarna testify to the antiquity and
intimacy of this intercourse. At a later date Necho invaded Babylonia
but was repulsed. The Jews returned from the Babylonian captivity (538
B.C.) with their religious horizon enlarged and modified. They were
chiefly affected by Zoroastrian ideas but they may have become
acquainted with any views and practices then known in Babylon, and not
necessarily with those identified with the state worship, for the
exiles may have been led to associate with other strangers. After
about 535 B.C. the Persian empire extended from the valley of the
Indus to the valley of the Nile and from Macedonia to Babylon. We hear
that in the army which Xerxes led against Greece there were Indian
soldiers, which is interesting as showing how the Persians transported
subject races from one end of their empire to the other. After the
career of Alexander, Hellenistic kingdoms took the place of this
empire and, apart from inroads on the north-west frontier of India,
maintained friendly relations with her. Seleucus Nicator sent
Megasthenes as envoy about 300 B.C. and Ptolemy Philadelphus (285-247
B.C.) a representative named Dionysius. Bindusara, the father of
Asoka, exchanged missions with Antiochus, and, according to a
well-known anecdote,[1108] expressed a wish to buy a professor
([Greek: sophisthen]). But Antiochus replied that Greek professors
were not for sale.

Egyptologists consider that metempsychosis is not part of the earlier
strata of Egyptian religion but appears first about 500 B.C., and
Flinders Petrie refers to this period the originals of the earliest
Hermetic literature. But other authorities regard these works as being
both in substance and language considerably posterior to the
Christian era and as presenting a jumble of Christianity, Neoplatonism
and Egyptian ideas.

I have neither space nor competence to discuss the date of the
Hermetic writings, but it is of importance for the question which we
are considering. They contain addresses to the deity like I am Thou
and Thou art I [Greek: _ego eimi su kai su ego_]. If such words
could be used in Egypt several centuries before Christ, the
probability of Indian influence seems to me strong, for they would not
grow naturally out of Egyptian or Hellenistic religion. Five hundred
years later they would be less remarkable. Whatever may be the date of
the Hermetic literature, it is certain that the Book of Wisdom and the