300 BCE–700 CE: (Trade Routes as Conduits of Religion — How Buddhism Christianity and Later Islam Grew from Regional into World Religions, Buddhism Spreading…

300 BCE–700 CE: (Trade Routes as Conduits of Religion — How Buddhism Christianity and Later Islam Grew from Regional into World Religions, Buddhism Spreading Across Southern and East Asia Paralleling Expanding Trade Networks, Manicheism Spreading Along Trade Routes Westward to Rome and Eastward to China, Judaism Established in Southern Arabia via Land and Sea Routes, Christianity Reaching the Horn of Africa and India Before the Fourth Century CE Spread Along the Same Trade Routes and Often Introduced by Merchants Themselves, King Ezana of Aksum Converting in the Fourth Century CE — Centuries Before Similar Conversions in Most of Europe — and Coptic Christianity Becoming the Religion of Millions of Ethiopians and Eritreans to the Present Day): How were these systems — notably Buddhism, Christianity, and later Islam — able to grow from regional into world religions? Buddhism spread across southern Asia and to East Asia, with its routes of spread paralleling those of the expanding networks of trade. Manicheism, proclaimed by the prophet Mani in the Sassanian Empire of Persia in the mid-third century, spread similarly — not just westward to the Roman Empire but also eastward through interior Asia as far as China. Judaism became established in southern Arabia in the early first millennium CE, carried by people following the land and sea routes of the Arabian Peninsula. Christianity reached the Horn of Africa and India before the fourth century CE, spreading along the same trade routes and often introduced by merchants themselves. The Empire of Aksum became a particularly notable early area of the spread of Christianity in Africa, with its king Ezana converting in the fourth century CE — centuries before similar conversions took place in most of Europe — and with Coptic Christianity becoming the religion of millions of Ethiopians and Eritreans down to the present day. Hinduism spread in the first millennium CE along the trade links of the Indian subcontinent into today’s Indonesia. And Islam, some centuries later, spread to West Africa along the trans-Saharan routes and around the Indian Ocean routes to Indonesia, more often than not through the agency of merchant believers. The mechanism is universal: religions traveled along trade routes, carried by merchants who were simultaneously commercial agents and evangelists. The merchant who arrived in a foreign port with goods for sale also arrived with a faith to share, and the trust relationships that commerce required — the need for reliable partners, shared ethical codes, and enforceable contracts — made religious conversion a commercial advantage as well as a spiritual transformation. Africa was not a passive recipient in this process. Aksum’s conversion to Christianity predated the conversion of most European kingdoms by centuries. Ethiopian Christianity is older than English Christianity, older than French Christianity, older than German Christianity. When Augustine of Canterbury arrived in Kent in 597 CE to begin the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons, Ethiopian Christians had already been reading scripture and celebrating the Eucharist for more than two hundred years.