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   ³Q. What was the first of the world's major religions to reach Australia ? ³
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      Probably Buddhism, although the evidence is circumstantial. There is a
suggestion that  the most likely  arrival of the first  Buddhists  in this
continent  may have been with the armada of Cheng Ho in the 15th century. The
Ming dynasty emporers took a keen interest in exploration and several of their
ships are known to have been in the vicinity of Arnhem land around the early
1400's. In 1879, a statuette of a soapstone image was unearthed one metre
beneath a Banyan tree near Darwin. Professor Geoffrey Blainey claims, however,
that soapstone would not have survived 400 years and so, must be more recent.
But if this is so, why was it buried so deeply?  Professor A.P.Elkin seems
convinced that certain Koorie practices such as the belief in reincarnation,
psychic phenomena and mental cultivation can only be explained in the light of
early contacts with the Orient. Unfortunately, no hard evidence exists to
support his hypothesis.