Betraying the Son of Man
by Jason GodeskyBut Jesus said unto him, Judas, betrayest thou the Son of man with a kiss?
— Luke 22:48
I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ.
— Mahatma Gandhi
I don’t believe “Judas Iscariot” really existed. His first name, “Judas,” refers to “Judah,” and is the same root from which we have “Judaism” and “Jew.” “Iscariot” probably refers to the sicarii–the most radical of the Zealot sects of the Second Temple period (essentially the terrorists of the early Roman Empire). He’s the only one of the apostles from Judea–everyone else is from Galilee. So, essentially, he is “Jew the Jew from Jew-land.” Christianity began as a Second Temple Jewish sect, and was as embroiled in the sectarian infighting as all the rest. The swipes the early Christian books take at other Jewish sects are precisely the same as we find in the Dead Sea Scrolls. The gospels tell us that Jesus faced his last hours alone–so who was keeping all these notes? John Dominic Crossan calls the account of Jesus’ crucifixion, as we have it, “prophesy historicized.” It’s a “passion play,” a morality tale, a metaphor possibly pregnant with truth–but it’s unlikely to be historical fact. Frankly, the idea that someone could overturn the money changers’ tables in the crowded temple during a pilgrimage feast–a powder-keg of possible rebellious tensions–and walk out of the Temple alive, right past an entire fortress of Roman soldiers, already defies description. So, I hope you’ll forgive me for doubting the historical nature of Jesus’ evil betrayer, “Jew the Jew from Jew-land.” That’s not to say he wasn’t betrayed….
An Essenic Sect
I mentioned that Christianity was a Second Temple Jewish sect. Particularly, I believe it was an Essene sect. I made this argument in my 2002 paper, “Subversion Incarnate: Asceticism as Political Resistance in Roman Judea, 6 - 66 CE” (PDF; also available in the Vault), where I wrote:
Scholars have puzzled over the contradictions between the male, celibate community found at Qumran, and the descriptions given by Josephus and Philo of thousands of Essenes, living in cities and towns, marrying only for procreation. Boccaccini suggests that the less rigorous, dispersed group was the mainstream Essene movement (1998), and that its beliefs are reflected in the Enochic literature, while the group at Qumran was a more radical off-shoot of the larger Essene movement. We may be looking at other sub-groups of the Essene movement in the Theraputae described by Philo (Vermes & Goodman 1989), possibly even in the Zealots and sicarii (Jones 1985), and perhaps in the Baptist (Crossan 1991) and Jesus movements that grew into Christianity.
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The Enochic literature makes clear a world view where the material world is ruled by fallen angels; those who are in power, obtain their power from the forces of evil. The power of these fallen angels is too great to be overcome by human means; it will be broken by God, or God’s messiah, at the eschaton. Until then, the Essenes lived a life of withdrawal, while in the midst of the material world. The mainstream Essene sect lived “not in one town only, but in every town several of them form a colony.� (Josephus, BJ 2.124) They restricted sexual activity to procreation only; thus, sex during menstruation or pregnancy was punishable. Enjoyment of sex was not permitted. All property was held in common by the group. Josephus records that they bathed in cold water every morning, that they viewed slavery as unnatural, that their meals are sufficient only for subsistence and no more, and that they refuse to swear oaths. The Essenes would not engage in the production of any weapons of war, or tools that could be used for war, because, in 1 Enoch, the art of creating these implements was given by the fallen angel Azazel (Boccaccini 1998). The rejection of oaths also is found in the Enochic literature—the fallen angels begin their enterprise with an oath. Oaths were what kept the ancient world together; oaths bound the client to his patron, and it was this patronage system which governed all of the ancient world’s social relationships. One who refused to swear an oath in the ancient world was making a very clear rejection of the entire socio-political structure of ancient civilization in general.
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The Gospels’ description of John the Baptist fits well with Josephus’ description of Essenes expelled from their community (Crossan 1991). The Jesus movement, also, shares many things in common with the Essenes. The dualistic view of heaven and hell, angels and demons, fits well with Enochic and Qumranite literature. The positions the gospels assign to Jesus on marriage (Matthew 19:12), the Temple (Mark 13:2), the rejection of oaths (Matthew 5:33-37), and the importance of the Mosaic Law (Matthew 5:17-20) accord perfectly with mainstream Essenic thought. If, however, this is an Essenic movement, it must have been an offshoot from its earliest days, given the attitudes on fasting (the Jesus Seminar concluded that the gospels’ reticent allowance of fasting was an attempt to mitigate the historical Jesus’ forbidding fasting altogether), and the general lack of the strict hierarchy found in the Essene community. While all sources agree on the strictness of Essene hierarchy, the presence of any such hierarchy in early Christianity can only be assumed. While wandering charismatics may have held some authority out of respect (Thiessen 1977), even this was mitigated early on (Crossan 1989).
The links are as clear as they are strong. The Essene movement was a very widespread, but fractured movement. The sectarians at Qumran were the most radically ascetic group, but the Theraputae in Egypt and even the Zealots themselves can be seen as offshoots of Essenism. More importantly, their largest numbers came from a group of mainstream ascetics who somaticized a complete rejection of worldly authority.
The Jesus Movement took this to an entirely new level.
Cynic Influence
Galilee was an especially fertile region of the Levant, situated north of Judea and Samaria. It had attracted a great deal of Greek settlement under the Ptolemies and Seleucids, particularly in the Decapolis. By the first century, the Decapolis had become one of the most significant hotbeds of activity that Cynic philosophy would ever know.
The Cynics held to a philosophy that put a radical emphasis on total freedom. Freedom from desire, but also political freedom. Cynics did not advocate violent revolution or even active opposition; instead, they told people to, in Daniel Quinn’s words, “walk away.” If you do no accept government’s authority, then their power over you is gone. They embodied this radical rejection of all forms of control in their dress and demeanor, often somaticizing their rebellion in disruptive ways–imagine a “shock jock” like our own Howard Stern, only with a philosophical point to make.
Naturally, this made the aristocracy take a dim view of Cynicism. The name comes from the Greek for “dog,” because of this smear campaign. Our modern usage of the word also comes from this propaganda campaign, as the aristocracy managed to convince everyone that such a rejection of their temporal authority was a misanthropic rejection of human society itself. Lucian made merciless fun of the Cynics in his satirical Sale of Creeds, where he gives Diogenes of Sinope the following lines:
Above all, be bold, be impudent; distribute your abuse impartially to king and commoner. They will admire your spirit. You will talk the Cynic jargon with the true Cynic snarl, scowling as you walk, and walking as one should who scowls; an epitome of brutality. Away with modesty, good-nature, and forbearance. Wipe the blush from your cheek for ever. Your hunting-ground will be the crowded city. You will live alone in its midst, holding communion with none, admitting neither friend nor guest; for such would undermine your power. Scruple not to perform the deeds of darkness in broad daylight: select your love-adventures with a view to the public entertainment: and finally, when the fancy takes you, swallow a raw cuttle-fish, and die. Such are the delights of Cynicism.
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But look you, it is all so easy; it is within every man’s reach. No education is necessary, no nonsensical argumentation. I offer you a short cut to Glory. You may be the merest clown–cobbler, fishmonger, carpenter, money-changer; yet there is nothing to prevent your becoming famous. Given brass and boldness, you have only to learn to wag your tongue with dexterity.
Plutarch’s famous account illustrates the kind of boldness Lucian is so afraid of:
Soon after, the Grecians, being assembled at the Isthmus, declared their resolution of joining with Alexander in the war against the Persians, and proclaimed him their general. While he stayed here, many public ministers and philosophers came from all parts to visit him and congratulated him on his election, but contrary to his expectation, Diogenes of Sinope, who then was living at Corinth, thought so little of him, that instead of coming to compliment him, he never so much as stirred out of the suburb called the Cranium, where Alexander found him lying along in the sun. When he saw so much company near him, he raised himself a little, and vouchsafed to look upon Alexander; and when he kindly asked him whether he wanted anything, “Yes,” said he, “I would have you stand from between me and the sun.” Alexander was so struck at this answer, and surprised at the greatness of the man, who had taken so little notice of him, that as he went away he told his followers, who were laughing at the moroseness of the philosopher, that if he were not Alexander, he would choose to be Diogenes.
Other Classical authors expressed their fear that the popularity of Cynicism among the lower classes would spell the end of civilization itself, as the “cobbler, fishmonger, carpenter, money-changer” all abandoned their abusive lords to join “the army of the dog.”
And nowhere was their influence greater than in the Galilean Decapolis, during the first century.
One of those cities, Sepphoris, was destroyed during Judas the Galilean’s rebellion in 6 CE. Herod Antipas, the Tetrarch of Galilee, rebuilt Sepphois as his capital, attracting a flock of skilled laborers–including carpenters. An outlying village–Nazareth–was home to many of these peasants during the years that followed, as they worked to rebuild one of the great centers of Cynic philosophy.
Should we be surprised, then, that Cynic philosophy seems to play such a major influential role in Jesus’ teachings? When Jesus sends out the disciples in Matthew 6:7-11, he leaves instructions as to what they are to take with them: “And commanded them that they should take nothing for their journey, save a staff only; no scrip, no bread, no money in their purse: But be shod with sandals; and not put on two coats.” (Matthew 6:8-9). This would have been immediately recognizable in ancient Galilee as the standard “uniform” of the Cynics. F. Gerald Downing writes:
Yet if the first Christian missionaries obeyed instructions of the kind recorded in Matthew 9:35-10.16, Mark 6:6-11, Luke. 9:1-5, and Luke 10:1-12, they would have looked like a kind of Cynic, displaying a very obvious poverty. Not all Cynics wore exactly the same dress; not all of them even carried the staff that for some was symbolic. But a raggedly cloaked and outspoken figure with no luggage and no money would not just have looked Cynic, he would obviousiy have wanted to.
Perhaps a wandering Christian preacher repeated the approach ascribed to Jesus in the tradition, “How’s your health today? Feeling well, are you? I’m only here for the ones who are ready to admit they’re a bit sickly, and need the doctor,” But that was a standard Cynic gambit, from the earliest days (even if they weren’t the only ones to use it). “You’re sick with worry about your house when you’re away from it and about your job when you’re at home,” he might have continued; “and about whether the fleet will bring a decent catch in tomorrow, and about the winter clothes you put away last month. One day’s worry at a time is enough. Take a lesson from the wild birds and beasts and flowers. They live very well without grain stores. God cares. Believe me.”
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Many early Christians, and others, were aware - and happily aware - of the similarities between strands of Jesus’ preaching, and the much older Cynic tradition. In the mid-second century a satirist called Lucian tells us of a man he’s sure is a charlatan, a man called Proteus Peregrinus, whom followers of Jesus called “the Christian Socrates,” and Cynics hailed as the greatest man since the original Diogenes, accepting his Christian sufferings as part of his Cynic credentials. There’s a story from even later of a man going to be consecrated as bishop of Constantinople still wearing his Cynic cloak; and there’s much more besides.
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It seems to me that it will appear that Christians who shared publicly the teaching and stories that go to build up our first three gospels must have been entirely happy to sound as well as look like Cynics, content to find themselves saying a great many things of the kind that the Cynics were saying. They focussed on the same topics, very often pressing the same conclusions, and that frequently in very similar language.
There were differences. But then there were considerable differences among pagan Cynics themselves. Some talked about God and prayer and life to come; others were more skeptical and “humanist.” All were opposed to cant and hypocrisy, opposed to letting public opinion live your life for you, opposed to finding your reality in property or expensive enjoyment. They wanted to be free of all that, free to live their own lives - and free of the great men who liked throwing their weight around and expected everyone else to see them as benefactors. Cynics do not look very “political” to many of us today. They didn’t organise political parties, they didn’t (for the most part; there were some exceptions) have political programs. But they certainly got up the noses of people in authority, and were likely to find themselves in exile. They seem to have appeared political (and subversive) in their own day. But they weren’t exactly anarchists, either. They expected that if everyone lived more simply we could do without most of the rules and regulations; but the result would be more peaceful and more orderly - as well as more enjoyable. They were against what we might call a “consumerist” society. They favoured passive resistance. And the authorities often saw this as a very real political threat, and took it very seriously indeed.
The Cynics’ philosophy of simply “walking away” from hierarchical mechanisms of control found a clean join-point in the Essenic idea of withdrawing from a society dominated by evil governments, the legacy of fallen angels. The combination of the two philosophies, though, seems to have created an amalgam where the deficiencies of both were filled by the other, creating a whole greater than the sum of its parts.
Jesus’ Radical Anarchism
As John Dominic Crossan shows in pain-staking detail in the first half of his book, The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant, Rome was a brokered society. This was typical of “ancient states,” and is usually referred to as “patronage.” Everyone but the emperor had a patron. Even the gods participated in this system: an individual worshipper could not simply approach the gods anymore than they could approach the emperor. They must approach the gods through the proper channels–the ordained priestly hierarchy.
This was the nature of hierarchy and control in the world Jesus inhabited. Cynics embraced a life of radical simplicity and solitary itinerancy; Essenes sought to escape an evil hierarchical world established by demons within their own, strict, religious hierarchies. Jesus seems to have combined these in a radical way, rejecting all forms of control.
Take, for example, the following passage, from Matthew 23:9, “And call no man your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven.” In the patriarchal, Roman world, this statement does not just reject the family, it rejects the very basis of all authority. Pietas was the Roman virtue. It was the sense of duty to one’s family, and to the state. The two were inextricably bound in the Roman mind. The Pater familias was an emperor in miniature; the emperor founded his power on the perception of himself as father of all the Roman people. To call no man on earth “father,” in Jesus’ world, was to deny any kind of authority from any source. It denied the authority of the Pater familias, and it denied the authority of the emperor himself. To follow this command, every disciple of Jesus must emulate Diogenes, and tell Alexander merely, “stand from between me and the sun.”
Very often, Matthew 22:21 is cited as Jesus’ acceptance of government. It reads, in reference to paying taxes to Rome: “Then he said to them, ‘Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.’” The Jesus Seminar highlights this phrase as one of the most undeniably historically accurate things Jesus ever said, but this statement can hardly be divorced from Jesus’ numerous earlier pronouncements about the illusory nature of material wealth. Jesus talks about wealth fading, being eaten by moths (Matthew 6:19), being stolen (Matthew 6:20), and generally drives home the point that material wealth is transient (Luke 12:15-21), illusory (Mark 4:19), and unimportant (Luke 16:11). Taken in that context, “render unto Caesar” is a statement Diogenes himself might have made: the State pretends to have authority and power. Let it pretend. The real reality has nothing to do with gold, coins, taxes, or anything else of the State. The State has exactly as much authority over you as you allow it to have; so don’t allow it to have any, and it won’t. Don’t fight against it, simply abandon it. Just “walk away.”
Crossan also raises the points of free healing and open commensality as crucial to Jesus’ career. The healing stories of Jesus are too numerous to simply ignore, and even if we do not accept them as miracles per se, there is a sufficient record of faith-healers and shamans to accept that Jesus may certainly have had an impact on those who came to him to be healed. This remains significant because, as Crossan points out, the healing stories of the Old Testament always involve the Temple. This underlines the brokered nature of the world. Healing comes from G-d through the Temple, and through no other source. Jesus refers to G-d with the familiar Aramaic Abba–roughly equivalent to “daddy”–and refuses to accept any other “father” or authority on earth. Judas the Galilean’s battle-cry–”No Lord buy G-d!”–takes on a less violent, but more radical tone in the mouth of Galilee’s even more famous son. In the healings, Jesus is taking this from a mere ideal into the realm of action. He eliminates the “middle man” of the Temple, and thus, radically negates the most fundamental nature of religious power in his world.
Open commensality was a similarly radical rejection of class and status. The gospels reveal the horror Jesus’ contemporaries felt, seeing Jesus eating with the poor. He commanded his followers to do the same (Luke 14:12). The meal was the single most important theater for Romans to assert the realities of class and status. Mingling persons of differing classes at the same table for a meal was a radical rejection of the very notion of class and status the likes of which has no clear modern analog.
Crossan’s conclusion from The Historical Jesus is:
The historical Jesus was, then, a peasant Jewish Cynic. His peasant village was close enough to a Greco-Roman city like Sepphoris that sight and knowledge of Sepphoris are neither inexplicable nor unlikely. But his work was among the farms and villages of Lower Galilee. His strategy, implicitly for himself and explicitly for his followers, was the combination of free healing and common eating, a religious and economic egalitarianism that negated alike and at once the hierarchical and patronal normalcies of Jewish religion and Roman power.
At the same time, Jesus came equally from the Essenic tradition–and other scholars have rightly referred to him as “apocalyptic.” Jesus’ plan is radical, and he is fully aware of this. Its pursuit will mean the end of civilization itself, by abandonment: the end that other Roman authors feared, as the lower classes abandoned civilization for the “army of the dog.”
Jesus obviously expects the world to end in his own lifetime, and for most of it to come from the wrath of a vengeful G-d. The radical society he builds is meant to inherit the world that G-d will leave them with. So, what manner of apocalypse does Jesus envision? And what kind of post-apocalyptic utopia does he envision his followers inheriting? Can we tell from the kind of society he tries to build?
Jesus does not advocate solitary wandering, like the Cynics. Even when he temporarily sends his apostles through the countryside, he sends them “two by two.” He doesn’t just recast the Cynic message in a Jewish context, he also introduces the idea of “walking away” as a community. Jesus and his followers walk from town to town, gathering food (foraging) from planted fields (Matthew 12:1), and engage in reciprocal relationships with friends who give him food and shelter. Acts 4:32-35 describes the nature of the early Jesus Movement’s community as something akin to a hippie commune:
And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that ought of the things which he possessed was his own; but they had all things common. And with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus: and great grace was upon them all. Neither was there any among them that lacked: for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold, And laid them down at the apostles’ feet: and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need.
As such, Jesus execution is hardly remarkable. His movement represented a clear and present danger not only to Roman hegemony, but to civilization itself. In the film The Last Temptation of Christ, the trial before Pilate is depicted in the kind of dismissive tone the cruel procurator likely had. Yet he is also given a line which sums up Jesus’ threat very nicely:
PILATE: Do you want to know something? You’re more dangerous than the Zealots. Do you know that? Say something. You had better say something. All right. Tell me what you tell people on the streets.
CHRIST: Yes?
PILATE: Yes.
CHRIST: The prophet Daniel had a vision: A tall statue that had a gold head and silver shoulders. The stomach was bronze,
the legs were iron, the feet were clay. A stone was thrown. The clay feet broke and the statue collapsed. You see, God threw the stone.
The stone is me. And Rome…PILATE: And Rome is the statue, yes. So your kingdom, or your world, will replace Rome. Where is it?
CHRIST: My kingdom? It’s not here. Not on earth….
PILATE: It wouldn’t be, would it? It’s one thing to want to change the way that people live … but you want to change how they think, how they feel.
CHRIST: All I’m saying is that change will happen with love, not with killing.
PILATE: Either way, it’s dangerous. It’s against Rome. It’s against the way the world is. And killing or loving, it’s all the same. It simply doesn’t matter how you want to change things. We don’t want them changed.
Betraying the Son of Man
It would take a peculiar kind of historical blindness to neglect the role that Christianity has traditionally played as one of the most hierarchical, dominating forces the world has ever seen. How did the horrors of Christendom emerge from the radical, apocalyptic egalitarianism of Christ?
It begins with Jesus’ own family. The families of holy men formed an important part of the “brokered world” of Rome. Jesus was acutely aware of this, and so, spent a good deal of his time repudiating his family (Matthew 12:48-49, Matthew 23:9, Luke 14:26). His family tried to have him taken away as insane when his campaign became embarrassing for them, but after the crucifixion, all of them were quick to join the other disciples (Acts 1:14). Relying on the very forms of brokerage that Jesus had spent his life trying to undermine, his brother James came to be head of the movement. Already, the radical dream of Jesus was beginning to fade.
However, the process of turning that radical vision into an actual defense of everything Jesus had sought to tear down would require another–Paul. Paul cites his conversion often, but almost never makes any reference to what Jesus actually said or did. For Paul, only the crucifixion, resurrection, and the divinity of Christ matters. Jesus told his disciples that his was a Jewish movement, and not to proselytize beyond the limits of Judaism (Matthew 10:5, Matthew 15:24, John 4:22), and for all his treachery otherwise, James and the apostles did confine themselves to Judaism. When Paul converts, he is not trusted by the other Christians–and with good reason, he used to be persecuting them. He did not have much success in converting Jews, and so, turned his sights to the Gentile world. Dr. Adel Elsaie writes in History of Truth: The Truth about God and Religions:
In the early stages of Christianity, there were two versions of Christianity: one presented by James, a relative of Jesus, and the rest of the apostles as a mission to the Jews. Paul introduced the second version as a religion for Gentiles. Barnabas introduced Paul, to the other apostles in Jerusalem. But the disciples “were all afraid of Paul and believed not that he was a disciple, but Barnabas took him and brought him to the Apostles”, (Act 9:26-27). The apostles had doubtful feelings that Paul was not what he seemed to claim. Paul tried first to preach to the Jews, but he was unsuccessful as some of the Apostles. They understood that the Jesus’ message was for “the black sheep of Israel”, and Jesus came not to “destroy but to fulfill.” And here was someone, that they did not trust, pushing to steal the show and expand the religion beyond its original boundaries. The apostles were trying to conserve the Jewish law, while Paul was exempting the Gentiles from this law.
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It is important to know these facts to understand the struggle between communities that ended up by shaping Christianity. The Gospels began to appear around 70 AD, the time where the two rival groups were engaged in a fierce struggle, with the Judeo-Christians winning this battle. Then the Jews revolted against Rome in 66 AD, and after the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD the Pauline version won the victory after his death. From 70 AD to about 140 AD, the Gospels of Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John appeared. They did not constitute the first Christian documents: the letters of Paul dated well before them.
Paul is the most controversial person in Christianity. He was considered to be a traitor to Jesus’ teachings by the family and apostles of Jesus. Paul created Christianity at the expense of those whom Jesus had gathered around him to spread his Gospel. He proved the authority of his mission by declaring Jesus, raised from the dead, had appeared to him on the road to Damascus. It is reasonable to state that Christianity would not be the same without Paul. It is almost certain that if this atmosphere of struggle between Christians had not existed, we would not have had the Bible that we know today.
The Jewish camp led by James objected primarily to Paul’s rejection of Mosaic Law, but many other concessions were also made in order to attract a wider, Gentile audience. Paul’s contradictions of Jesus’ commands regarding the Mosaic Law and the Jewish nature of his campaign are only the most insignificant of Paul’s betrayals. In order to “sell” Christianity to the Roman world, it needed to be stripped of its purpose. In places of Jesus’ radical rejection of pietas, Paul talks about the necessity for social order–for women to obey their husbands, for slaves to obey their masters, etc. In a juxtaposition that would be harder to make more clear, Jesus’ command to call no man on earth “father” (Matthew 23:9) is set against Paul’s declaration in 1 Corinthians 11:3: “Now I want you to realize that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is man, and the head of Christ is God.”
The most essential core of Jesus’ teaching was to reject all forms of earthly authority and live free. In order to “sell” Christianity, Paul makes the message how important it is to be a respectable member of society and do as you’re told. It’s significant that Paul emphasizes Jesus’ divinity, but never makes reference to Jesus’ own teachings. He uses the name of Christ like a weapon to bludgeon those who oppose him; he turns Jesus into a sterile godhead to be invoked, rather than heeded. By emphasizing Christ himself, Paul succeeded in pushing his teachings to the side–and thus, betraying everything Jesus ever stood for.
The sayings gospel, Q, shows that this was not always the case. It shows that Jesus’ teachings once held primacy, before Paul discarded those teachings and instead invoked Jesus as a mythic figure. With Paul, the Jesus Movement became the religion, Christianity. Christianity as we know it has nothing to do with Christ, and everything to do with Christ’s betrayer–Paul. In short, Christianity is the ultimate betrayal of everything Jesus ever stood for.
By the time Constantine came to the fore, the transformation was nearly complete. The intolerant, monolithic edifice of Christianity was the perfect complement to the terror and domination of the empire. As above, so below; as a single G-d rules in heaven, so must all the earth capitulate before a single throne. The imperial nightmare of despotic oppression could now pursue their subjects even into their prayers. Christianity became “the spiritual arm of the empire,” and a tool of domination and terror for the single most successful military regime in history–a regime that ruled through secret police, internal spy networks, paranoia and the absolute monopoly of violence. Paul’s Christianity was a perfect fit.
Today’s Christian fundamentalists revel in this grand tradition. Bible Doctrines for Today is a textbook published by A Beka, a favorite publishing company for those fundamentalists whose faith is so incredibly weak that they cannot face the possibility of their children encountering others who might think differently than they. Compare their dystopian vision of Jesus’ reign to the radically egalitarian future Jesus himself expected:
Christ will rule with a rod of iron. Those few earth dwellers who dare to sin outwardly will die. Evidently Christ will allow individuals to rebel inwardly, but not outwardly without suffering the immediate consequences.
The Last Temptation of Christ includes a fictionalized encounter between Jesus and Paul. For me, the exchange epitomizes the relationship between Christ and Christianity:
PAUL: Look around you. Look at all these people. Look at their faces. Do you see how unhappy they are? Do you see how they’re suffering? Their only hope is the resurrected Jesus. I don’t care whether you’re Jesus or not. The resurrected Jesus will save the world and that’s what matters.
CHRIST: Those are lies. You can’t save the world by lying.
PAUL: I created the truth out of what people needed and what they believed. If I have to crucify you to save the world, then I’ll crucify you. And if I have to resurrect you, then I’ll do that, too.
CHRIST: I won’t let you. I’ll tell everyone the truth.
PAUL: Go ahead. Go on. Tell them now. Who’s going to believe you? You started all this, now you can’t stop it. All those people who believe me will kill you.
CHRIST: No. That wouldn’t happen.
PAUL: How do you know? You see, you don’t know how much people need God. You don’t know how happy he can make them. Happy to do anything. He can make them happy to die and they’ll die. All for the sake of Christ. Jesus Christ. Jesus of Nazareth. The Son of God. The Messiah. Not you. Not for your sake. You know, I’m glad I met you. Because now I can forget all about you. My Jesus is much more important and much more powerful. Thank you. It’s a good thing I met you.
Bibliography
- Boccaccini, G.
- 1998. Beyond the Essene Hypothesis: The Parting of the Ways between Qumran and Enochic Judaism. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.
- Crossan, J.
- 1989. The Birth of Christianity: Discovering What Happened in the Years Immediately After the Execution of Jesus . San Francisco: Harper Collins.
- 1991. The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant. San Francisco: Harper Collins.
- Jones, A.
- 1985. Essenes: The Elect of Israel and the Priests of Artemis. Lanham: University Press of America.
- Schiffman, L.
- 1991. From Text to Tradition: A History of Second Temple and Rabbinic Judaism. Hoboken: KTAV Publishing House.
- 1991. Texts and Traditions: A Source Reader for the Study of Second Temple and Rabbinic Judaism. Hoboken: KTAV Publishing House.
- Theissen, G.
- 1992. Social Reality and the Early Christians. Philadelphia: Fortress Press.
- Vermes, G. and Goodman, M..
- 1989. The Essenes according to the Classical Sources. Sheffield: JSOT Press.
> I don’t believe “Judas Iscariot” really existed.
What about Jesus?
Here’s the funny thing. No contemporary record of Jesus exists outside of the bible. Isn’t that strange considering he’s supposed to be the son of God? You’d think that dad could have at least hired a publicist to help him out with his mission. There is a brief footnote sized reference to some “rebel leader” with that name in the writings of contemporary historian Josephus, but no one has been able to verify that it’s the biblical Jesus.
This complete lack of corroborating evidence always puzzled me. You’d think that the Romans, who recorded everything, would have jotted down somewhere, “This Jesus dude claims to be the son of god and is walking the earth performing minor miracles.”
But there’s nothing. I dismiss the recent flurry of faux history and science books from the Fundie propaganda machines. They are bald-faced liars who will say and do anything to advance their agenda.
Comment by Peter — 19 October 2005 @ 8:36 PM
Not strange for a Jewish peasant, anyway. But in fact, we have more reliable, historical attestation that someone named Jesus was crucified and started a movement than, well, pretty much anything else in the ancient world. Paul’s letters are written very shortly after his death, as is Q. I think Mark is probably written in something like 60 CE, just 30 years after Jesus’ death. This is multiple attestation; it’s not as if the Bible was written as a single volume. It was compiled at a much later date.
And if we expand the circle to near-contemporary, the number of sources jumps up very high. This is why you won’t find any serious historian who doubts the historicity of Jesus, and why everyone selling it is, well, a crackpot, frankly. It’s the “aquatic ape theory” of Roman history: the only people who believe it are people who don’t know what they’re talking about. There’s a bigger historical question as to whether or not Alexander the Great existed than Jesus.
Now, whether or not a single other thing in the gospels is true, now there’s a good debate.
I’d think you’re referring to the Testimonium Flavium, except that that passage in no way references any kind of rebel leader. Most scholars doubt the historicity of the Testimonium, and believe it was added by later Christian monks. I don’t think so. Wilson makes a very good argument; it’s precisely the kind of back-handed compliment Josephus does best, “Christ” would be how his Roman audience would know him, and how else do you make sense of that story that comes next?
We actually have exceedingly few records like this from the Romans–and such people were a dime a dozen in the Second Temple period, so, no, I would actually be shocked to find that any Roman cared enough to jot any of it down.
Actually, we have a lot. More than, well, for any other figure in the ancient world. Furthermore, your expectations are based on a very flawed idea of Roman record-keeping. You seem to think that we have access to Roman records comparable to what you’d find at your local county courthouse. Nothing could be further from the truth. You could fit all the contemporary primary sources from Jesus’ day on a single bookshelf with room to spare–and none of them really cared about the dozens of Jewish peasants who were going around performing miracles and claiming to be the Messiah.
Well, yes, but what does that have to do with historical Jesus studies?
Comment by Jason Godesky — 19 October 2005 @ 8:51 PM
Looks like you have different sources from the ones that were available prior to the 1990s, when I conducted my search. I should add that my search was part of a sincere desire to find some corroborating documentation that would enable me to believe what I was taught in a private school run by Jesuits.
It’s interesting to see all this new “contemporary” evidence which has recently decided to make itself available. Where was it all just a decade ago?
I think you are down playing the fact that all the stuff about Jesus was first written long after a his death. (Ever play that telephone game as a kid where a message is passed along one person at a time?)
As to how all this relates to Jesus studies? I don’t know. How does it relate to Buddha studies? While not a Buddhist, I’d say that his teachings are far more profound and enlightening than most of the vague and ambiguous parables of the alleged Jesus.
Comment by Peter — 19 October 2005 @ 9:16 PM
I’ll add this point. I have never been able to divine what bible-thumpers find so profound in the bible. Believe me, I have tried. Much of the advice is pure nonsense. One example. Think about it for a moment. You are walking down the street minding your own business thinking happy thoughts. Some thug steps in front of you and slaps you. Do you really turn the other cheek? Should the USA have turned the other cheek after the 9-11 attacks?
Basically, all the supposed “good stuff” in the bible can be found in earlier works from different cultures. Some “laws” are universal whether you are Catholic, atheist, Buddhist, Jew, Jain, Hindu or Bon: don’t kill, don’t steal, do your best to get along with others.
The bible certainly has no monopoly on any of these. As an anthroplogy major, you can undersatnd the reasons why these universal “laws” evolved over time.
Comment by Peter — 19 October 2005 @ 9:28 PM
No, not that such corroborating evidence exists, just that you need to understand the nature of primary historical sources in this particular period. Most figures in the ancient world are first mentioned by sources that were written a century after their death. More sources the more important someone is, less if it goes the other way. Jesus was a peasant that no one really cared about, until his cult happened to complement Constantine’s ambition three centuries later (they did get a little spike in interest when Nero decided they’d make a good scapegoat when his little land-clearing project to make room for his new palace got a wee bit out of hand). So really, it’s amazing we have as many sources as we do.
There are some things that are susceptible to being made up, replaced, etc. Others are not. Pithy, Aramaic-style sayings are more likely to be authentic than long, rambling, philosophical, Greek speeches. Remembering that you once knew a guy named “Jesus” is not very susceptible to being made up.
“Telephone” nicely illustrates one principle at play, but it’s hardly the only one. The lesson there is not to trust literal transcriptions. But most of us can remember “the gist” of something that happened to us a few years ago–especially if it’s a formative event for us.
(Also, we’re not talking about long after Jesus’ death for the first references in Paul’s letters–unless you would consider something I might write today about Monica Lewinsky to be long after the fact. Jesus is executed c. 30 CE; Paul’s writing his epistles 10 years later, c. 40 CE. Q is being written about the same time. Even Mark is written by c. 60 CE, the same as me writing about the Nixon administration.)
I do like Buddha, though I find the central idea of “existence is suffering” to be, well, profoundly Taker. That said, I don’t see why these need to be mutually exclusive. If we find Buddha’s teachings meaningful, we can’t find Jesus’ meaningful?
And if we point out that Buddhism has often been a tool for control, oppression, and terror (which it has), does that leave us with two options that either Buddhism is unvarnished truth, or Buddha never existed?
How does Jesus’ teachings not being meaningful impact his historicity? Why would his teachings being meaningless mean he wasn’t real? Isn’t it more reasonable to think that there was a Jesus, just like there was a Buddha, whose teachings were manipulated to serve a power-hungry hierarchy? Seeing as how they’ve done such things many times before….
Am I really being included as a Bible-thumper here? That’d be quite the first in quite some time.
Anyway, I do find the Bible profound. I believe the Bible is a stinging condemnation of civilization. For example, the Torah puts severe limits on power. Doesn’t mean I expect others to find it profound, but it is something I do find profound.
Would’ve helped, actually. “Fighting” terrorism has executed al-Qa’ida’s plan flawlessly. If we’d be interested in actually stopping terrorism, we would have answered their attacks with kindness. We would’ve spent that money on donations, food, medical aid. We would have withdrawn our forces from the Middle East. So, “turning the other cheek” would’ve made for a far more effective strategy.
Sure. I don’t hear anyone claiming otherwise.
…and that proves Jesus didn’t exist?
Comment by Jason Godesky — 19 October 2005 @ 11:02 PM
Don’t forget that part of the Judas and the 12 postles story is being told through the filter of Astrology.
When creting the myth of the birth of Christianity, Constantine needed a religion that would unite the pagans.
The 12 apostles in their personality and deeds all each reflect a sign.
So what is Judas sign?
Pisces.
Comment by Tonyz — 20 October 2005 @ 12:20 AM
The 12 apostles owe much more to the 12 tribes of Israel–as a ploy to convince Jews of Jesus’ particular brand of Judaism, not to convince Gentiles of Paul’s new religion. The 12 apostles are referenced centuries before Constantine.
and
I’m sorry, Peter; there’s no log of it in the system. Were you trying to do something “funky”? If you’d like to try writing it in an email to me, I can make sure it gets up.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 20 October 2005 @ 9:30 AM
Several things:
First, the “Telephone Game” argument is pretty poor because the rules of the game(whispering so that your face cannot be seen) practically force misunderstanding of the words. If you played the game by rotating people into a sound proof room and allowed them to speak normally you would end up with a version very close to the original.
Jason,
As for you writing about Nixon. Unless you are quite a bit older than I think you are, you were not socially aware for Nixon. So, you would be writing about something that someone else told you. To make that equivalent to writings 30 years after Jesus you would have to make do without recordings and newspaper archives. That leaves you with word of mouth and your own judgement and the possibility that you are furthering your own agenda.
I don’t know enough to argue either way about the historiocity of Jesus. But I do wonder if, 2000 years from now, archaeologists unearth The Lord of the Rings if they’ll think we believed it as a historical account.
Comment by JimFive — 20 October 2005 @ 10:30 AM
Quite right. And I could probably write a fairly good summary of Nixon’s presidency based solely on a thorough questioning of my parents on the matter.
Don’t mistake my meaning; the Virgin Birth, the crucifixion and resurrection, and much else of the Jesus story is pure myth. But that doesn’t mean that Jesus himself never existed. A legend is a historical figure, to whom a mythology is attached. King Arthur was a legend–there is a whole cottage industry on “the historical Arthur,” and, having once been very active in it, I’m quite convinced there was some kind of historical figure at the center of it all. Charlemange in the Matter of France is another legend, one whose historicity has never been doubted (even though there’s much less evidence for it than Jesus’). So, that myths were attached to Jesus is undeniable. That this means Jesus was made up, though, is patently absurd.
This is a false dichotomy. We needn’t choose our positions between, “Jesus Christ is the only begotten Son of G-d” and “Jesus was a myth invented by a Roman conspiracy!” The reasonable conclusion, based on an actual evaluation of the evidence, is much more tempered: that Jesus was a radical social revolutionary, whose message appealed to the abused peasants of his day. That appeal made it attractive to certain unsavory elements, who twisted Jesus’ original message in order to create a source of power for themselves.
The Nacirema are a great exploration of that possibility, but we do have things that are written from that time that are clearly fiction–and others that are clearly not.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 20 October 2005 @ 10:44 AM
The difference being that fiction [i]not[/i] written by Tolkien tends to be interesting enough to be recognized as fiction. ::rimshot::
Comment by Giulianna Lamanna — 20 October 2005 @ 12:01 PM
Dug up some pertinent passages from the XTalk archives. Mind you, these are some of the top scholars in the field, here.
On Jesus & Mythology
— Rikki Watts, 2 October 2000
On Mark
— Robert Brenchley, 30 September 2000
On the Testimonium Flavium
— Jack Kilmon, 1 October 2000
— Antonio Jerez, 30 September 2000
Comment by Jason Godesky — 20 October 2005 @ 12:05 PM
Besides, fiction didn’t really become much of genre until much later, with the exception of plays. Not enough people could read to make writing fiction sensible, but everyone loves a good play. But, the format that plays are in is well established enough that it is unmistakable, and has been that way since at least the Ancient Greeks. And, even before that there are significant commonalities. For instance, “The Descent of Inanna,” which is a Babylonian myth that is kind of fun to compare to the Greek myth of Persephone and Hades, is not formated as a play as we know. But, the writing and phrasing of the words themselves lend one to believe that at least part of it was acted out.
As for the number 12. And the numbers 7, 3, 5, and 11. Are all reoccuring in many cultures, some of which had tenuous contact at best. Hmmm, maybe the human mind simply likes some numbers. Any way, 12 moons every cycle. Not hard to see where that came from.
Comment by Benjamin Shender — 20 October 2005 @ 12:53 PM
That’s a first, I must admit. You score high for originality. Over the decades, I have had countless people share with me their personal opinion of what the bible is really about. I’ve lost track of most these diverse and contradictory view points. It’s like the 12 blind man arguing over what an elephant is. People can find something in the bible to support anything they wish to believe. Literally anything. It’s a book full of errors, contradictions, and platitudes. That’s why I can’t see much point in reading it anymore.
Now, you present your interpretation of the bible as a “stinging condemnation of civilization”.
Is that a coincidence or what considering that this site eagerly anticipates a quick collapse of civilization and return to tribal hunter-gatherer life?
What’s that old Chinese saying about everyone viewing the world through their own key-hole?
I do give you 9 out of 10 for originality though.
[EDITOR’S NOTE: Peter experienced some difficulty getting this posted, so if it seems to disrupt the flow of conversation, it’s entirely due to technical issues — J.G.]
Comment by Peter — 20 October 2005 @ 1:07 PM
there’s 13 moons in every cycle.
actually, numbers regardless of cultural context have inherent meaning. But that is because there are numberical repetitions found all over the planet.
But I don’t think it’s pure coincidence that Jesus only had 12 loyal followers, and the reigning pagan religious tradition that was converted into Christianity just so happened to be astrology fanatics.
but hey, maybe it’s jsut what I allow to congeal in my brain…
Comment by Tonyz — 20 October 2005 @ 1:11 PM
Not entirely so. We do know of a number of Roman novels. Actually, Luke, stylistically, is very much like a Roman novel. But they are very easily identifiable as novels. Luke would likely have also been classified as one, had we not also found so many other, contemporary works referring to the same events, which were very clearly not novels. (Interesting fact: Acts is Luke’s sequel).
Very true. The Talmud is quite the exercise in creative interpretation. One of the reasons I find so much strength in my own exegesis, though, is that while others must rely on specific passages and then tease them endlessly, my interpretations simply relies on the broad outline of the story itself.
It seems to me that, if we were able to read the Bible in its own words and divorced from everything we’ve been told about it our whole lives, it would seem quite the radical document. It seems to me that it’s the “traditionalists” who have teased out a “creative” interpretation–such as the interpretation of Matthew 6:25-30, “And by that, he meant to assert the importance of the Protestant work ethic.” I mean, these are the same people who think that G-d somehow cared about homosexuality–when a surface reading shows very clearly that he was far more concerned about bacon cheeseburgers and the cotton-nylon shirt.
As to “errors, contradictions, and platitudes,” no more than what I’d expect of any anthology by different writers. I read it as the expression of a given community’s beliefs, and insofar as it is the expression of a community, an echo of the Pantheos. I don’t read it as a historical document, or as a science textbook. Really, the thematic consistency in its harsh damnation of civilization across both time and space is something I find astounding. Really, it all seems to lend a good deal of support to Daniel Quinn’s suggestion that the Bible is a Taker attempt to codify Leaver mythology.
Naturally, we all bring something to it. So yes, maybe I am coloring it with my own perception. But unlike the fundies, I didn’t have to twist it very hard to make it match up. I reject anything that I have to twist too far to fit with my own views. Catholic doctrine, for example. Buddhism. Sure, if I really wanted to, I could reconcile Catholic doctrine and my own beliefs, and my what an exercise it would be! But I don’t care enough to try to make a forced fit like that. If the Bible had presented similar troubles, I would’ve rejected it. And, while fundamentalist interpretations of the Bible are completely irreconcilable with my own views, the Bible itself locks neatly into place.
I’m not espousing any new idea. It’s the same idea the Cynics were talking about in ancient Greece, after all. As long as there’s been a civilization, there’s been people opposed to it. Why should we be too terribly surprised, if we find those beliefs reflected in the stories of a marginal tribe of nomads who had a certain history of being abused by civilization?
Coincidence? No. But correlation is not causality. The 12 tribes of Israel may have come from astrology in the distant past, and there you’d have your chain. But the 12 apostles were very clearly from the 12 tribes of Israel. Jews, as a rule, didn’t care much about astrology, and the 12 apostles appear at a time when most Christians were still Jewish, and there was a raging debate as to whether Gentiles were even permissable as Christians.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 20 October 2005 @ 1:53 PM
“Much of the advice is pure nonsense. One example. Think about it for a moment. You are walking down the street minding your own business thinking happy thoughts. Some thug steps in front of you and slaps you. Do you really turn the other cheek? Should the USA have turned the other cheek after the 9-11 attacks?”
The meaning of the three “be a bitch” teachings of Jesus (that is, turn the other cheek, go the extra mile, and give your cloak as well as your coat) are much more interesting when you examine them in the historical context of the Roman era.
I would go into here, but another guy has already written it much better than I ever could. Jason, I think that these interpretations would support your theory that Christ was teaching egalitarianism, equality, and radical indifference to the power structure. Everyone should check this out.
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1216-30.htm
- Chuck
Comment by Chuck — 20 October 2005 @ 2:34 PM
Excellent article, Chuck. Reminds me of Gandhi’s own “non-violence,” so often taken now to justify fearfully obeying your oppressors while going through the motions of “opposition.” No, Gandhi’s “non-violence” took even more bravery than violent opposition. Gandhi’s tactics forced the British into a situation where either they needed to back down, or kill everyone. And the British blinked.
But today, we’ve turned it into platitudes, and what was once incredibly radical opposition is, today, nothing but a cop-out. Just like Jesus….
I am reminded again of a discussion in an anthropology seminar back at Pitt, that the very act of revolt solidifies the oppressors’ claim. By revolting, you automatically assert yourself as being opposed to the legitimate authority–and thus, bolster your enemy’s legitimacy. The tactics of Jesus and Gandhi managed to challenge the oppressor, and still strip them of their legitimacy all the same.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 20 October 2005 @ 2:42 PM
One of the things I have noticed about religion is that it too changes to conform to passing political fashion, just like everything else. Back in the early sixties, when I started school, there was definitely a heaven and a hell. For new borns who died before baptism there was limbo. The only way a sinner’s soul could escape limbo was if the people back on earth prayed long and hard enough for it. Then maybe, after 500 years or so, St Peter would let it slip in through the back door of heaven. (Gotta love a god who metes out infinite punishment for finite crimes.)
Now we have Catholic Lite since Vatican II. If I understand correctly, there is no longer a hell, heaven, or limbo.
When I tell younger Catholics about the 60s version, they recoil in horror. They can’t comprehend anything so vile once having been part of the official church dogma.
I thought the law of god was something steadfast that we could lean on for moral support.
Then there’s the current Christian (non-Catholic)obsession with being rewarded by god with abundance. (see http://www.landoverbaptist.org)God must be rolling over in his grave over this hijacking of his religion. Kunstler nails the state of today’s American evangelical movement when he describes it as a “Wal-mart of the spirit”.
So why are we wasting time on this again?
Comment by Peter — 20 October 2005 @ 6:02 PM
But of course. Religion is part of culture, and culture is a reflexive, organic system. Change one part of that system, and everything else will adapt, as well.
Not so. All three are alive and well. Though, limbo was a part of hell that wasn’t exactly punishment. More like the gloomy shades of Sheol. You’re thinking of Purgatory, which was the intermediate stage between heaven and hell, and the indulgences that got Martin Luther so worked up. Worked on a kind of “man-hour” system, so 500 monks praying for you for one day was as good as one monk for 500 days. Led to kings paying off a whole monastery for a few weeks at a time. Eventually they got a whole time-share system rolling….
You should hear Bede’s version from the 800s!
Maybe it is. The problem is no human knows what “the law of god” might be.
I think it has mostly to do with cotton-nylon shirts, though….
You do know that Landover is a parody, right? They’re a classic up there with the Onion.
That’s kind of my whole point in this essay….
Amen! Sing it brutha!
You don’t have to, if you think it’s wasting time. I think it’s important to recognize the history of people who’ve thought like us, what they did well, and why they obviously failed. Learn from their mistakes. I think Jesus presents us with a very nearly flawless case of exactly what we’re trying to do. So where did he go wrong?
My hypothesis: Durden’s Folly. Jesus didn’t make peers; he made space monkeys. So when James and Paul came along to hijack the religion, it’s not like Simon “Rock (thick as a)” Peter exactly had the kind of mental agility to match a master rhetorician like Paul. Besides the fact that the gospels seem to agree that Peter (and most of the apostles) was garden-variety retarded, he was a disciple. They followed. It’s what they did. They never really understood what Jesus was doing on a very deep level, so they could only go through the motions. That meant they were very suceptible to being taken over by a smooth, car-salesman type like Paul.
“His name was
Robert PaulsonJesus Christ.”Comment by Jason Godesky — 20 October 2005 @ 8:47 PM
Oh, that and, if you’re still stuck on “changing minds,” convincing 1/3 of the world’s population that the LORD their G-d died trying to start the New Tribal Revolution would probably be a good start.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 20 October 2005 @ 8:51 PM
“You do know that Landover is a parody, right? They’re a classic up there with the Onion.”
Yes, I do in this instance. But often it’s next to impossible to tell what’s parody and what’s not in the evangelical world.
Comment by Peter — 20 October 2005 @ 8:53 PM
Very true. They parody themselves as effectively as the Bush administration….
Comment by Jason Godesky — 20 October 2005 @ 9:53 PM
very interesting. i may print this and leave it for my mother–a Presbygelical asst. preacher–to ponder.
you almost make me want to become a Jesusologist, to take the good parts of the philosophy BACK from the evil damn Paulists! what a horrible fate, to have your words so twisted, and used for such terrible purposes.
Comment by Librarian — 20 October 2005 @ 9:58 PM
I sometimes have nightmares of that, too.
Peter–that’s why I’m “wasting time” on this. For things like this. With luck, this can be used to reach some people who might be otherwise “unreachable.” I’ve used this to convert Jehovah’s Witnesses at my door. So, I don’t think it’s “wasting time.” It’s worthwhile because people believe in it–and as any shaman will tell you, that gives it a reality all its own.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 20 October 2005 @ 10:24 PM
I’m still not convinced about the tribes of Israel.
Comment by Tonyz — 20 October 2005 @ 11:46 PM
It’s all about the audience. The apostles are mentioned by Paul, and in all of the early gospels. Those are all written by 100 CE. At that point, Christianity is still a Jewish sect. Judaism forbids astrology, but Second Temple sectarian literature is full of references to the 12 tribes of Israel. It’s all through the Dead Sea Scrolls–produced by the Essenes at Qumran, being another Essenic sect from Christianity. The Essenes were apocalyptic, and everything in their apocalypse comes in 12’s. Take a look at Christianity’s own apocalypse–everything comes in 12’s, and every single time, it references the 12 tribes of Israel. Just like the Qumranite literature.
Meanwhile, the syncretic movement of Christianity gets started around 300, with the ascent of Constantine. You see a lot of moves here to make Christianity more palateable to pagans–i.e., Christmas.
So, a timeline here….
1 CE: Essenes are obsessing about the apocalypse, and put everything into 12’s for the 12 tribes of Israel.
c. 30 CE: An Essene (Jesus), convinced the end of the world is coming, gathers up 12 people and starts a radical campaign aimed at the very core of civilization itself.
c. 100 CE: Documents are written by Jews, for Jews, about Jesus and his 12 apostles. Jews who are also very into the 12 tribes of Israel–but are forbidden on pain of death to have anything to do with astrology.
c. 300 CE: Two hundred years later (a space in which you could fit nearly the whole of U.S. history), Constantine starts adapting Christianity for use by pagans, many of whom hold the 12-figure zodiac in high regard.
Seems pretty clear to me.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 21 October 2005 @ 12:07 AM
So what is twelve to the Jews?
How they define their birth.
So what is twelve to pagans?
How they define their birth.
How does is each apostle labelled? One of each tribe? A greater embodiment? A symbolic move from tribes to individuals?
I found this neat Web page of 12 as archetypes:
http://www.jonathonart.com/retu-l2.html
I’m not looking this as right and wrong, I’m just seeing how wide a scope I need to look through.
Comment by TonyZ — 21 October 2005 @ 4:49 AM
(They’re actually labelled very explicitly for the 12 tribes…)
Well, if it’s a matter of personal symbolism, have fun with it.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 21 October 2005 @ 8:04 AM
I tried doing a google search and couldn’t find shit. Could you jsut help me out with this one, Jason?
Didn’t you think that link was informative? there was some crazy stuff towards the end, but I like crazy.
12 is the number of completion in the world over. Seems like describng any diaspora would make sense to do so in twelves.
I get the feeling that you’re thinking that I’m thinking that you’re wrong, and I have to say that’s just wrong.
This whole inquiry has made me wonder why there are 12 tribes of Israel.
What REALLY gets me is how the Atlantic isn’t a divide when it comes to using 12 and the number of completion.
Comment by Tonyz — 21 October 2005 @ 1:55 PM
Originally, I thought you were saying that, historically, the 12 apostles were an invention meant to align to the 12 signs of the zodiac. Historically, that don’t make no goddamn sense.
Now, metaphorically, absolutely. That’s why Constantine did it.
Why 12? Originally, in the deep and distant past, probably was the zodiac. It has to go at least back to the Babylonian Exile, when most of the Tanakh was composed. Would make sense, too. The Hebrews were sorting out their national identity amidst a major crisis, in a land that was absolutely obsessed with astrology.
So, historically, I could see the claim of 12 signs -> 12 tribes -> 12 apostles, but not 12 signs -> 12 apostles. Given that this was back in the good ol’ days, when a Jewish astrologer got hisself a stonin’
Now, metaphorically … hell, go with whatever you find meaning in. It’s a metaphor.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 21 October 2005 @ 2:20 PM
Hey –
I’ve never really understood the application of Sumerian numbering — but I do know that it was a base-6 system… do you know anything baout this Jason? And might that have any relevance to the 12 tribes?
Janene
Comment by Janene — 22 October 2005 @ 10:28 AM
Dunno a thing about it.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 22 October 2005 @ 11:10 AM
12 is also the size of the human core group.
Comment by Devin — 22 October 2005 @ 11:50 AM
Guys - just keep in mind that if you look for the number 12, you’ll find it everywhere. The same is true for any number.
- Chuck
Comment by Chuck — 22 October 2005 @ 12:29 PM
That’s a mean. Lotta variation about that.
— Sol Robeson in the movie, Pi
Comment by Jason Godesky — 22 October 2005 @ 2:50 PM
Did somebody say pi? (QuickTime, greatest thing I have ever seen/done/eaten)
Comment by Jason Godesky — 22 October 2005 @ 2:52 PM
This is very well-done, but I do have one question: Is there any evidence that any of Jesus’s followers embraced these values?
While not minimizing Paul’s role - without him Christianity as we know it today simply would not exist - it’s worth noting that it seems none of his other follwers was much better. From the only record we have of the days following Jesus’s death (that is, Luke-Acts), none of the Apostles carried forward the values you’re discussing here.
Immediately after Jesus’s death, it appears that the Christian community in Jerusalem turned into an insular and authoritarian sect of messianic Judaism, firmly controlled by Peter. Far from rejecting authority, this community declared itself the only valid source of Christian teaching, and imposed strict conditions on anyone seeking to join or even to practice the new faith. This happened, so far as we can tell, literally within weeks or months of Jesus’s execution.
It’s very hard to say what Jesus actually taught. But such evidence as we have suggests that the disciples who knew him personally didn’t take any anti-authority teachings to heart. If that was Jesus’s true message then it appears that he was betrayed by every follower we know of, in different ways.
Comment by Paul — 25 October 2005 @ 12:58 PM
Some, in Acts. I pointed to it above in reference to the early Christian “hippie commune.” And many of our scattered early Roman references to Christianity refer to them as a more dangerous type of Cynics-with-a-community.
Quite true. As I said, this is why the movement failed. Peter just fulfilled whichever wheel squeeked last–and that was a competition between James and Paul. One of them never met Jesus, and the other tried to have him put away until it was convenient for him.
James, actually. Peter was ineffectual and dense. First he was a figurehead for James, then later he became a figurehead for Paul.
I see a lot of Jesus’ influence very early on, but you’re right. Without any real understanding, it didn’t last long–like wheat that springs up on rocks, it has no roots so it springs up quickly, only to whither in the sun.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 25 October 2005 @ 1:22 PM
Heh, it looks like Jesus built his church on sand.
- Chuck
Comment by Chuck — 25 October 2005 @ 3:11 PM
“Like a monkey, ready to be shot into space. Space monkey! Ready to sacrifice himself for the greater good.”
Tyler Durden — Second Coming?
Comment by Jason Godesky — 25 October 2005 @ 3:15 PM
Did Jesus shave his followers heads and beat the crap out of them and put nasty chemical burns on their hands to make them realize that the flesh is not separate from the self?
… ‘cuz if so, Jesus rules!
- Chuck
Comment by Chuck — 25 October 2005 @ 10:33 PM
“And lo, the LORD said unto them, ‘Thou art not thy job, neither art thou the amount of money thou havest in thy bank; thou art not the chariot thou drivest, nor art thou the contents of thy wallet; neither art thou thy fucking khakis.’”
— The Gospel according to Chuck [Palahniuk]
Though, come to think of it, that’s kind of close to Matthew 6:19, Matthew 6:20, Luke 12:15-21, Mark 4:19 and Luke 16:11.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 25 October 2005 @ 10:39 PM
“Yea, verily, I also say to thee this day: thou art the rejoicing and merrymaking dung of the world.”
And all who heard were amazed (and rather confused) by His knowledge and understanding.
- Chuck
Comment by Chuck — 25 October 2005 @ 11:23 PM
Amen.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 26 October 2005 @ 12:02 AM
It’s possible that Jesus’s disciples deliberately turned their backs on the values he taught. But there is another possibility that’s consistent with the evidence.
If the record suggests that almost none of Jesus’s followers embraced the Cynic model, or turned away from it almost immediately after his death, then it’s possible that those are simply not the values he taught. After all these were the people who were closest to him in his lifetime, and had the most direct access to his thoughts. It’s a little surprising that so little evidence exists to point to the Cynic values as the values they learned from him.
Comment by Paul — 26 October 2005 @ 12:11 AM
That would make sense, except, as I pointed out, the very earliest evidence of the Christian community is consistent with those values. In fact, we can watch quite clearly as it drifts (quickly, yes, but drifts) away from those values under the leadership of James and Paul.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 26 October 2005 @ 7:52 AM
Was Jesus a Roman troll?
http://www.caesarsmessiah.com/summary.html
I haven’t read it yet. Just came across a reference to it.
Comment by Peter — 27 October 2005 @ 5:33 PM
Have you heard of the ‘flavian theory’ which supports the view of the emperors Vespasian,Titus,Domitian and their inner circle of experts to create christianity to satirize the rebel jews.
The best book available is caesars messiah ,the stories of decius Mundus and Fulvia and Paulina either side of the testimonium passage reveal the real meaning is to show the christian reference was not inserted later but deliberately placed by Flavius Joseph -reading the two stories opposite reveal the names should be switched”I value not this business of names” is the answer to the puzzle,proves the three stories should be combined to reveal the similarities,the two stories have the same storline and the husband has the same name this is because they are parallel stories.
Comment by ANTONY DALLEY — 31 October 2005 @ 11:06 AM
Yes, and while it’s a slightly more coherent formulation than the Eusebius stuff floating about, it still suffers from some serious flaws. Yes, it makes some sense of the TF–except, if it were actually devised by the Flavian emperors, why wouldn’t Josephus spend more time on it? Josephus mentions it, but he doesn’t really care very much. Also, Christianity first comes to the fore for most Romans under Nero–before the Flavian dynasty. So, even a cursory look at the evidence is sufficient to debunk this one.
The TF is generally considered genuine, for precisely the reasons you highlight; but it wasn’t an invention of the Flavian emperors, for the reasons I’ve outlined.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 31 October 2005 @ 11:13 AM
Jesus was a buddhist monk of the order of Essenes from Theraputae of Alexandria.
See
isbuddhismfatherofchristianity.blogspot.com
http://www.essenes.net/bnei4.htm
http://www.answers.com/christianity%20%26%20buddhism
King Ashoka sent buddhist missionaries to Alexandria under Ptolemy, Antioch Greece & Magga
(Ashoka Rock eddict #13)
The buddhist elders are also called THERS. The theraputae of egypt probably came from Buddhist elder monks.
Baby Jesus was carried to egypt (probably alexandria) where he learnt buddhist principals.
CONSPIRACY & POLITICS
Jews Killed Jesus because he was trying to incorporate buddhist principles of love & compassion in Judaism which was opposed by orthodox jews who followed eye for eye & tooth for tooth of Torah.
Later library of Alexandria was burnt (probably by jews) . Later Torah was added to gospels as OT by Jews to make the christians believe that Jesus was basically a Jew & to keep christians loyal to them (as they are today).
But one day truth will speak for itself that JESUS WAS A BUDDHIST and jews not only killed him but hijacked christianity
Comment by Anonymous — 4 May 2007 @ 3:05 AM
The Theraputae had nothing to do with Buddhism. Essene, likely, but Buddhist? This is a silly detour through a lot of confused ignorance about the ancient world.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 4 May 2007 @ 8:44 AM
Those damn filthy heebs! I think we all know what must be done.
Comment by Giulianna Lamanna — 4 May 2007 @ 9:05 AM
Y’know, I actually glossed over the crazy, anti-Semitic rant.
Yeah, ’cause when I think of Orthodox Judaism, St. Jerome is the first name that leaps to my mind.
So, what we have here is (1) a complete ignorance of Second Temple Judaism, (2) a complete ignorance of Buddhism, (3) a complete ignorance of the source material, and (4) all of it hanging on the common use of a basic Indo-European root, “Thera,” which is present in Hindi, Greek, and most other Indo-European languages across Eurasia. Obvious conclusion: despite any evidence whatsoever of any Buddhist influence on Jesus’ teachings (notice, nothing even close to reincarnation, dharma, nirvana, or even meditation), and despite the fact that “Thera” was also a very common Greek word, the Theraputae in Alexandria must’ve been Buddhist monks, and that’s where Jesus learned about Buddhism! And it’s the sneaky Jews who’ve kept it under wraps all this time.
Anonymous, I think it might be time to go read some history books.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 4 May 2007 @ 9:30 AM
Things I’ve learned today:
Jews hate love and compassion.
Jews killed Jesus. (Isn’t this a bit like saying, “Blacks killed Tupac”?)
Jews hate knowledge. (Library of Alexandria was burnt… probably by Jews.)
Jews were the ones who added the Old Testament to the Gospels to make people believe Jesus was a Jew.
Jews want to keep Christians around to do our bidding for us.
Jews cared so much about Christianity that we went to the trouble of hijacking it, just so it wouldn’t have any love or compassion in it. Then nothing would stand in the way of our Grand Zionist Conspiracy to take over the world. Right.
Incidentally, am I the only one who finds the following sentence hilarious? “Later library of Alexandria was burnt (probably by jews).” You know, last week, little Sally’s kitten got caught in a tree. It was probably the work of the Jews.
Oh, anti-Semitism! You’ve got a sweet, sweet taste the world apparently just can’t get enough of.
Comment by Giulianna Lamanna — 4 May 2007 @ 9:39 AM
Plutarch gives an account of a battle in which Julius Caesar burns his own ships in Alexandria’s harbor, which catches the port on fire, and eventually spreads to the library. Of course, Strabo was working there just 25 years later, so if it was damaged, it wasn’t much.
Aurelian removed most of the library’s contents during a revolt. Emperor Theodosius, a Christian Roman Emperor, later ordered the destruction of all pagan temples—an order which included the Serapeum, which housed part of the Library of Alexandria.
Then, of course, there’s several accounts of the library’s final destruction by the Muslim general Amr bin al ‘Ass, who recieved an order from the caliph Umar, “Touching the books you mention, if what is written in them agrees with the Book of God, they are not required; if it disagrees, they are not desired. Destroy them therefore.”
So, to review:
Yup, probably the work of Jews.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 4 May 2007 @ 9:54 AM
Don’t feel bad, Anonymous. On another board, you’d probably just be deleted for being crazy. Or stupid. Or offensive (did you catch on that Giuli’s Jewish yet?). Here, we observe your right to be crazy, stupid and offensive, and simply reserve our right to mock you mercilessly for it.
Of course, if you can actually mount a defense of this insane hypothesis of yours, I’ll be quite impressed. But I don’t really foresee that happening. This is firmly in tinfoil hat territory.
So yeah, that was dumb. I’m pretty sure we’re all a little bit stupider now just for having read it. Bad enough to aggrevate my PTSD. It’s like Dreadmist Peak all over again, man….
Comment by Jason Godesky — 4 May 2007 @ 10:10 AM
/leave 1
Comment by jhereg — 4 May 2007 @ 10:26 AM
Guys , I dont hate Jews. Rather I pity them for their cleverness. Fritz Haber and Einstein were also very clever, look what they have done. They gave Zyklon-B gas and Nuclear Bombs. Their own very clever creations have only being destroying them.
Zyclon-B in Holocaust and Nuclear Bombs in Armegeddon(yet to come from new aryans of Iran ). OT rightly says : those who live by the sword ……
Compare it to what buddhism says that all violence & its tools come forth from the devil(mara).
Read Matthew’s Gospel about what JESUS is saying to Jews (”Woe to you…”).
I dont want to raise any antisemitic slogans rather I hate hate. If you call me anti-semitic then Jesus also was for all his “woe to you..” statements. BUT, all I am trying to say that we must be ready to know the truth even if it is unacceptable to our beliefs , culture and traditions. Buddha says that the greatest impediment for spiritual growth for any man is his staunch belief in traditional dogma. So Buddha says , keep your mind open to truth , for what we believe as true today might become false in future. Else remain in the mass delusion. Its biggest example is the belief in the flat earth theory (but I dont want to go into that controversy..)
King Ashoka is considered as one of the greatest buddhist but he was a murderer who killed more than 100000 people before he became a buddhist. (Thats the type of Truth I am stressing ). And later he became a man of peace and spread Buddhism to the corners of the word which eventually became Christianity originating from Alexandria Theraputae.
Guys , plz read the blog :
isbuddhismfatherofchristianity.blogspot.com
and also
http://www.answers.com/christianity%20%26%20buddhism
Remember King Ashoka had sent buddhist Thers to israel also. Its proof is in his rock eddict of Afghanistan which is written in three languages Aramaic, Greek and Pali(brahmi).
Aramaic is the language Jesus & his disciples spoke.
Now lets understand what religion is.
RELIGION
I categorize religions in two :
(A) Religions which believe in violence & revenge for establishing peace.
(B) Religions which believe in Love for establishing peace.
(Buddhism, Christianity, Jainism etc.)
(a) FAITHS OF VIOLENCE
Scientific (DNA) analysis says that modern man (Homosepians) came from Africa and then spread further to all corners of earth. So they might have also brought with them their primitive beliefs of (1) worshipping spirits , gods, goddesses etc. for solving day to problems such as disasters and diseases. (2)After the discovery of fire , fire might also be considered as an object of worship/ritual. (3)Sacrifice of animals, birds etc. to spiritual entities. This also might have come from African traditions who even sacrificed humans(cannibalism). (4) Consumption of intoxicants during rituals.
The African witch-doctors in interior Africa had all these traditions.
Hinduism has all above 4 characteristics.Here the intoxicant was a liquor called soma. Fire is god Agni and many other gods & goddesses. Sacrifice is used still in some temples.
Judaism had sacrifice of animals & birds and offering them to fire to please Jehovah. Drinking is a ritual.
Ancient Egyptian religion had worship of many gods and goddesses.
Zoroastrianism also had fire rituals & their early people were fighters.
(B) FAITHS OF COMPASSION
Buddha stopped all animal sacrifice and other many rituals were rendered meaningless. Buddha considered that violence is the religion of the devil and all the creation is full of it where one animal eats flesh of another animal. Buddha even declared that a living plant is also not to be damaged as it has life too. Buddhism considers the creation as a struggle between good & evil. Just like the movie MATRIX-1 . In Buddhism 3 things are seen :
(1)Nirvanic realm of Buddhas considered as the state of eternal life and salvation. Gotama Buddha was just one Buddha , Jesus is another one. (Neo of Matrix-1)
(2) Realm of the devil(Mara). Here the bacteria , viruses & germs can be considered as the army of devil at nano scale.
The deptt. of devil controls rebirth, sexual & other desires, violence & thoughts of violence , disease and death.( The agents in Matix-1)
(3) The creation (Matrix - 3d visualization a virtual world) : like a Ferris wheel in which beings go up & down & take rebirths in various realms & then die & again the devil creates another body for them & tempts them & sees their downfall again & again for its enjoyment.
Buddha wanted people follow his technique of scientific discrimination , non violence & not reacting to desires of the body as a way out of this ferris wheel & this is called salvation by Jesus.
Buddha had declared that in future many buddhas will come for the salvation of many. Next one is called Maitreya Buddha. Jesus is called Messiah which is similar to maitreya. Christ is another word for Messiah.
Jesus always considered rituals as meaningless (Sabbath was made for man , not man for sabbath).
So the conclusion is that modern religions such as Buddhism and Christianity tried to make man civilized by abolishing violence.
BTW the democracy was started by Buddha first as he started the practice of electing elder monks instead of traditional way of priest’s son becoming a priest.
Peace & Happiness to all
Comment by Anonymous — 7 May 2007 @ 5:29 AM
I thank Jason for providing details of destruction of the Alexandrian Library. All I was trying to say that jewish elements who entered christianity tried to eliminate all the material not amenable to their traditions. Council of Nicea did just that.
Comment by Anonymous — 7 May 2007 @ 6:02 AM
Bravo! I haven’t seen such a fine example of a smug, backhanded compliment in a loooooong time! Kudos to you Mr. Nonymous!
Comment by jhereg — 7 May 2007 @ 9:25 AM
You know all those times I called you a stupid Jew? I didn’t mean it, Kyle. You’re not a Jew.
There is so very much in that post that I could snark on, but I think I’ll limit myself to these two:
YES, because the Pharisees represent ALL Jews, everywhere, at all times, and Jesus was DEFINITELY not a Jew, because a Jew living in Judea would just be too damn convenient.
Setting aside the fact that your exegesis is, for lack of a better word, retarded, I think you’ll get really far with us convincing us to be anti-Semitic because Jesus hated Jews. And it’s not just because I’m Jewish and Jason used to hang out with the most respected Historical Jesus scholars of our time, all of whom would laugh you out of the room after about two seconds of your drivel. Everyone knows how we here at Anthropik love to follow the Christian God in every insane, evil, ridiculous thing he tells us to do…
Oh, you poor little child, you really have no idea where you are, do you?
Here, I’ll let you in on a little secret: (whisper) Pst! You’re talking to a bunch of animists! Now that you’ve already outed yourself as an anti-Semite, please tell me more about how our religion is a religion of violence and control, as practiced by those nasty, cannibalistic Africans and their “witch-doctors.”
Comment by Giulianna Lamanna — 7 May 2007 @ 10:00 AM
Oh yeah, I guess we pegged you wrong. I mean, that’s not anti-Semitic at all to say that the Jews deserved the Holocaust and really, didn’t they bring it on themselves with their “cleverness”?
The teaching’s rather similar; but of course, we know that no Buddhist would ever set aside such noble teachings the way those sneaky Jews did, right?
Jesus was a Jew. What you read in Matthew is completely typical Second Temple sectarianism. Take a look at the Dead Sea Scrolls and what they have to say about the “Children of Darkness.” Almost identical, but they were Jews, too. It’s like listening to Catholics talk about Protestants, or vice versa. It’s sectarianism, plain and simple.
The Theraputae were pretty clearly Essenic. There’s nothing Buddhist about them at all—no reincarnation, no nirvana, none of it. They were an ascetic cult (which Buddhism is against, remember the Buddha gave up being a samana?).
Yeah, that was so dumb it made my head hurt. I mean, what kind of incisive theological mind comes up with something as inane as, “Buddhist & christian beliefs & practices are same practically based on compassion, nonviolence & love”?
Nobody’s doubting that it was available, but it also wasn’t particularly common. There were a hundred and one various cults floating about, but where’s the evidence? Where does Jesus ever say that existence is suffering, and we’re bound on a wheel of eternal reincarnation, or that we can escape it into nirvana? Or the importance of proper breathing? Or meditation? Or really, anything distinctly Buddhist?
Yeah, that’s a fairly bogus and arbitrary distinction, the kind you usually get from bigots trying to justify their nonsense.
Uh, yeah, no, that’s bullshit. The Alexandrian Library was burned down by (1) Julius Caesar, (2) Theodosius I, and (3) Caliph Umar. Some of the most prominent gentiles in history. It’d be hard to find a group that’s more goy than that.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 7 May 2007 @ 10:17 AM
Anonymous: You forgot to add that the Christian ritual of drinking alcohol is a result of “Jewish elements who entered Christianity” adding “material amenable to their traditions.” There was just that little bit of your theory that wasn’t explained by circular logic, so I fixed it for you.
Have a nice day
Comment by Vicky — 7 May 2007 @ 10:28 AM
Ha ha !
So I get a crown of thorns just as Jesus did - (dumb,bogus,arbitrary,bullshit,retarded etc.)
Look what Jesus said - the stone builders rejected has become capstone.
I may be a simple man & you guys may be highly educated western ppl but I am sure that you guys are unaware of the history of :
Bactria, Greek King Menander, Mauryan Kingdom, King Chandragupta Maurya, King Ashoka , Buddha & his teachings, Clement of Alexandria, Philo.
Go & get the stuff (its on internet too)
Buddha is available at :
http://www.vipassana.com/canon
What I have said as a simple man can turn the world upside down and thats what everyone is afraid of inspite of ample proof available from Ashoka and Clement of Alexandria. Why to be afraid ? Afraid because major part of US aid goes to Israel and without US support the very existence is in peril (dont shiver )…
What is holocaust - as a simple man I see it as a clash of principles - one that of Jews etc. & another - the insanity of nazism. But both represent the faiths as I mentioned as (A) - fundamentalism. Whether it is muslim , hindu, Jew or nazi , fundamentalism is just insanity as it feeds on human blood.
But I heard that Hitler was illegitimate gradchild of a rich Jew & being poor Hitler somehow developed antipathy towards all jews. And I know about Himmler that he carried with him Gita - the holy book of hindus. For what purpose - to exhort the german workers of the ovens to handle the dirty work as a divine duty which Gita says (and Krishna tells Arjuna - Kill , Kill thats your duty , dont see that they are your relatives or your dear ones , kill anyway because one day eventually they will die).
How indian ideas in theosophical society were taken up by Helena Blavatsky & how these were taken up by nazis , I think u all must know.
Mr. (or Dr.) Jason plz. find out about Clement of Alexandria(20 BC-40AD). Buddhism came to Alexandria more than 200 years before Christ. In 200 years many things happen - Jews can become Theraputae & Essene.
read : http://www.essene.net/bnei4.htm
Regarding whether Jews deserved holocaust all I have to say is that Jesus had already made a prediction about it (”woe to you..”) and also for the destruction of the temple.
But I believe no one deserves a holocaust- not again.
So the bitter memories r still awake - Storm in a tea cup
Comment by Anonymous — 8 May 2007 @ 5:42 AM
….
Or you’re just an idiot.
You know, either/or.
You’d be wrong. I’m quite aware of each of them.
Ample proof? Where do you get Buddhism in Clement? Nobody’s afraid of you, we’re just annoyed by your stupidity, your rampant anti-Semitism, and your grandiose claims without the slightest bit of evidence.
Wow, you’re vile. So them dirty Jews had it coming, huh?
Mister, and I know all about Clement of Alexandria. What does he have to do with this outrageous claim about the Essenes being Buddhist? Sure, it could have happened that way, but if it did, wouldn’t the Essenes have mentioned something vaguely Buddhist along the way? Reincarnation or Nirvana, or the Four Noble Truths, or the Noble Eight-fold Path, or the Three Jewels, or, y’know, anything really Buddhist? Hell, I’ll settle for meditiation in a lotus position. Instead, the Theraputae take their name from Greek, which does share some ultimate Indo-European roots with some Hindi words, but that’s not a causal connection. They and the Essenes fuse Judaic beliefs archaeologically attested to a time well before Hellenism brought Buddhism to the Mediterranean, or indeed before the Buddha’s Bodhi, with Greek philosophy that owes far more to the Socratic and Platonic lines that were contemporary with the Buddha, and almost completely uninfluenced by Buddhism.
But they deserved it the first time, huh? Got to hand it to you, that’s a unique interpretation of Jesus’ words, particularly since that bit about the Temple was already fulfilled in 70 CE. But hey, you should run this past David Duke, I’m sure he’d eat it up.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 8 May 2007 @ 9:46 AM
I’ll tell you what, show me some reference to something vaguely Buddhist in either the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Books of Enoch, or any gospel written before 200 CE, and I’ll consider the possibility that you’re something more than a vile, anti-Semitic nutjob.
Comment by Jason Godesky — 8 May 2007 @ 9:49 AM
But don’t you see, Jason? Buddhists invented the concept of love, so wherever love appears in any Christian writings, that’s the Buddhist influence!
What a genuis Buddha was, to have come up with the ideas of love and peace all by himself. Not like those evil, warmongering Jews, with their eating of babies and whatnot…
I’m getting pretty damn sick of this guy’s Llewellyn-meets-Stormfront nutjobbery. Dude, if you insist on being a pussy and remaining anonymous, at least make up a handle like RacistAsshole584 so we can tell you apart from the anonymous users who aren’t completely batshit insane.
Comment by Giulianna Lamanna — 8 May 2007 @ 10:07 AM
Thanks for all that attention . I am satisfied
Comment by Anonymous — 10 May 2007 @ 7:50 AM