[bestworkother]

Thanks, Element. You call it "pruden survival" - for me it is a finely sutable explanation, and this is quite common thing not for mahayana only, but mahayana especially.

Extrapolating it to our times, I can imagine a datsan somewhere in eastern Europe whit an image of St.Mary next to Buddhas, and the monks beeing asked about it say "well, this was st.Mary, but now this is Pratiharya Bodhisattva"