The Christian faith is based on the belief that the Bible is indeed the word of god. If the Bible cannot be shown to be inspired, then the Christian faith could be said to be false and no more than a farce. If the Bible cannot be shown to be inspired, then Christianity can be said to be the same as any other religion that has been devised and practiced by man.

The Bible story of Jesus is a contradictory and confusing account. The Bible shows that this Jesus fellow spoke and taught many absurd and foolish things, and often believed he was having a conversation with devils. If one will read the entire Bible, one will find tales of ignorance, murder, sexual perversions, mass insanity, idiotic laws, and even cannibalism and human sacrifice. It staggers the imagination how anyone in his right mind could read the Bible and believe that it was written by a wise, just, and loving god. Christians have found biblical scriptures telling them to burn people at the stake, to justify slavery, to oppress and persecute others, and to kill and commit war in the name of their god. Unfortunately, there are some even today who would have us return to the teachings and laws found in the Bible.

We are taught in our culture that Jesus is the divine hero, but other cultures have different saviors. Religious beliefs are a function of the culture in which one lives. If we had been reared in a different culture, we would have heard the story of a different savior, instead of the Jesus story. Upon comparing the stories of the different saviors, one finds that the similarities are so striking, it is beyond a doubt that they are more than just a coincidence.
Now, let's take a look at the facts.
Jesus is called the lamb of god that takes away the sins of the world. Talk about an old concept.  Vitually all the ancient religions in the world had a lamb of god that takes away the sins of the world. The buddists today, an ancient priesthood far in access to christianity,  have a religions leader called the Dali Lama...whos names translates to god's lamb.  
Some examples of past religious leaders such as jesus being represented with a lamb, dating far before chrisitianity,
as depicted by ancient statues and artifacts include the ancient turkish god and the lamb, the ancient greek god and the lamb, and the ancient roman god and the lamb.  (Sorry I have left the photographs out)

Amen Ra is the egytian god who represented the sun. He had an adversary, named Set.  Sound familiar, such as Jesus and his adversary Satan?  The resemblances between Jesus and Ra, and all of the other saviors of mankind, are just too many. Let's compare these famous "sons of god."  Well compare Jesus,  Horus of egypt, Chrishna of Entia, and Buddha of the Orient.  Just keep in mind that Horus, Chrishna, and Buddha were created far before the story of Jesus was.

***Horus was baptised by water by anup:::Jesus baptised by water by John
***Annab the baptiser:::John the baptist
***Horus born in Annu, the place of bread:::Jesus born in Bethlehem, the house of bread
***Horus the good shepherd with the crook upon his shoulders:::Jesus the good shepherd the with lamb or kid upon his shoulders
***The seven on board the bark with Horus:::The seven fishers on board the bark with Jesus
***Horus as the lamb::: Jesus as the lamb
***Horus as the lion::: Jesus as the lion
***Horus as the black child:::Jesus as the little black bambino
***Horus identified with the tat or cross:::Jesus identified with the cross
***Horus 30 yrs old at his baptism:::Jesus 30 yrs old at his baptism
***Horus the krst:::Jesus the christ
***Horus the manifesting son of god::: Jesus the manifesting son of god
***Two mothers of child Horus who were sisters:::Two mothers of child Jesus who were sisters
***Horus the sower and Set the destroyer in the harvest field:::Jesus the sower of the good seed and satan the sower of tares
***Set and Horus contending on the mount::: Jesus and satan contending on the mount
***The star, as announcer of the child Horus:::The star in the east that indicated the birthplace of Jesus
***Horus the afflicted one:::Jesus the afflicted one
***Horus as the type of life eternal:::Jesus as the type of eternal life
***Horus who comes to fulfill the law::: Jesus who comes to fulfill the law
***Horus who came by the blood, the water, and the spirit::: Jesus who came by the blood, the water, and the spirit
***Horus of the two horizons::: Jesus of the two lands
***Horus walking on the water::: Jesus walking on the water
***Horus entering the mount at sunset to hold conversation with his father::: Jesus entering the mount at sunset to hold conversation with his father
***12 followers of Horus as har-khutti:::12 followers of Jesus as the 12 disciples
***The secret of the mysteries revealed by taht-aan:::The secret of the mysteries made known by john
***Anup and Aan the two witnesses for Horus::: John and John as witnesses for Jesus
***Horus the morning star:::Jesus the morning star

***Buddha was born of the virgin Maya who concieved him without intercourse::: Jesus was born of the virgin Mary who concieved him without intercourse
***The incarnation of Buddha was brought about by the desent of the divine power called the holy ghost, upon the virgin Maya::: The incarnation of Jesus was brought about by the desent of the divine power called the holy ghost, upon the virgin Mary  
***Buddha was visited by wise men who recognized in this marvelous infant all the characcters of the divinity::: Jesus was visited by wise men who recognized in this marvelous infant all the characcters of the divinity
***When Buddha was an infant, he spoke to his mother and said, i am the greatest among men::: When Jesus was an infant, he spoke to his mother and said, i am Jesus, the son of god
***When Buddha died and was buried, the coverings of the body unrolled themselves and the lid of his coffin was opened:::When Jesus died and was buried, the coverings of the body unrolled themselves and his tomb was opened
***Buddha ascended bodily to the celestial regions, when his mission on earth was fullfilled:::Jesus ascended bodily to the celestial regions, when his mission on earth was fullfilled
***Buddha is alpha and omega, without beginning or end, the supreme being, the eternal one:::Jesus is alpha and omega, without beginning or end, the supreme being, the eternal one
***Buddha is to come upon the earth again in the latter days, his mission being to restore the world order and happiness:::Jesus is to come upon the earth again in the latter days, his mission being to restore the world order and happiness


***Crishna was born of a chaste virgin:::Jesus was born of a chaste virgin
***The moment Chrishna was born, the whole cave was splendidly illuminated::: The moment Jesus was born, there was a great light in the cave
***Chrishna was adored by cowherds who prostrated themselves before the heaven-born child:::Jesus was adored by shepherds who prostrated themselves before the heaven-born child
***Chrishna was born when Nanda, his foster father, was away from home, having come to the city to pay his tax or tribute to the king::: Jesus was born when joseph, his foster father, was away from home, having come to the city to pay his tax or tribute to the governor
***Chrishna's father was warned by a 'heavenly voice" to fly with the child to gacool, across the river jumna, as the reigning monarch sought his life::: Jesus' father was warned in a dream to take the young child and his mother, and flee into egypt, as the reigning monarch sought his life
***The ruler of the country in which Chrishna was born ordered the massacre of all the children of the male sex born during the night of the birth of Chrishna::: The ruler of the country in which Jesus was born ordered all children in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, to be slain
***One of Chrishna's first miracles was the curing of a leper::: One of Jesus'  first miracles was the curing of a leper
***Chrishna was crucified, represented with arms extended hanging on a cross, Jesus was crucified, represented with arms extended hanging on a cross
***Chrishna after being put to death, rose from the dead::: Jesus after being put to death, rose from the dead
***Chrishna, although born in a state the most abject and humiliating, was of royal descent::: Jesus although born in a state the most abject and humiliating, was of royal descent

Is this a coincidence? There is a lot of similarity and syncronicity going on for it to just be a coincidence.

Lets go back 10 thousand years before Jesus and look at the 16 other men who claimed to be the son of god, who were born of a virgin mother, whose mother had the name of Mary, or a dirivative of the word Mary, who were in the temple teaching/scoulding their elders by the age of 12, whose ruler of land tried to put them to death,  who were asked by someone greater than they to move from the land they were born in, who began their ministry at the age of 30, and ended it at 33, and were killed on the cross.  These events happend in 16 different events prior to jesus.  Here is a list of these men who led the same exact lives:
Chrishna of India, 1200 BC
Hindoo Sakia 600 BC
Thammuz  of Seria 1160 BC
Wittoba 552 BC
Iao of Napal 422 BC
Hesus 834 BC
Quexalcote of Mexico 587 BC
Quirinus of Rome 506 BC
Prometheus 547 BC
Thulis of Egypt 1700 BC
Indra of Tibet 725 BC
Alcestos 600 BC
Atys 1170 BC
Crite of Caldia 1200 BC
Bali 725 BC
Mithra of Persia 600 BC

Time and time again, we have to look at these simliarities. You can look up any of these men up, and will find their lives are full of syncronicity and similarity.  We're not dealing with myth, belief systems, or faith.  We're dealing with facts, historical data. It is there, you cannot set it aside.  Jesus had the same life, and did the same things, as Chrishna, Buddha, and the above 16 other men.

So this leads to the question... who have we been worshiping? Or what?
What or who have we been living for?
And most importantly, what or who has man been killing man for?
Remember, religion has killed more human beings than any other force on earth.

The answer gets plane and obvious upon taking a close look at the new testament.

I'm going to make a statement that many people in denial will not want to hear, but i will prove the point soon enough.  The bible is nothing more than a retelling of the most ancient story ever told, which is why the bible is called the greatest story ever told.  This story is the story of the zodiac. Astrology. The bible is nothing more than the greatest astrological story ever told. It is pure astrology, based on the zodiac. It is astrotheology, the worsihp of the gods heaven.

In ancient times the air was divided into 12 equal parts, just as it is today by the 12 months. Each part is called a zodiac, or a house. The sun travels through each house of the zodiac, which is why the son of god had 12 helpers in the Egyptian myth, and 12 disciples in the Christian myth.  The zodiac is then broken into 4 equal parts, forming the shape of a cross.(hmm where have i seen this before?)

In the book of John in the New Testiment 14*2 , Jesus said... "in my fathers house there are many masions."  This was not correctly translated, as were many other scriptures in the king james. This translation makes no sense.  It is actually, "in my fathers abode, there are many dwelling places."  Well of course, there are 12 houses(dwelling places) in the heavens that we know of, which are in "my fathers abode."

In Jobe, chapter 38*31, god says to Jobe.... "canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion?  
Canst thou bring forth Mazzaroth in his season?"  What are we talking about here?  Pleiades and Orion are two astrological symbols of the zodiac.  But wait.. I thought astrology is the devil?  It's that "new age" stuff?  Yet it is right here, in the bible.  From the King James bible, the word mazzaroth means the 12 signs of the zodiac. Therefore god is saying, "can thou bring forth the zodiac in his season?"  Were talking astrology here.

Lets take a look at the "end times" of the bible.  From Mathew 14*17, Jesus fed his followers two fishes.  These two fishes are the symbol of pisces.  Therefore gods son, that comes up in the morning, feeds his people of two fishes.  This is why fish are such a symbolic theme of chrisitanity. You will find this symbol on mostly all churches.  The "birth of Jesus" was the begining of the age of pisces, and Rome ruled the world for 2 thousand years under the age of pisces, and of course we all know Rome is where chiristianity was born.  When gods son leaves the age of pisces, he goes into the age of aquarious. This age is symoblized by the man with the water pitcher.  From Luke 22*10,  when Jesus is asked where he will begin his new kingdom, he says, "when ye are entered into the city, there shall be a man meet you, bearing a pitcher of water, follow him into the house where he entereth in."  A man with a pitcher of water? OHHH you mean aqurarious? Symbolized by the man holding a pitcher of water.  Gotcha.

Mathew 28*20.. and surely i am with you always, until the very end of the age
Mathew 12*32.. the holy spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come
Mathew 13*39.. the harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are the angels. as the weeds are pulled up and burned in the first, so it will be at the end of the age
Yes, the end of the age.  That is what were talking about here.  The end of the pisces age. The last days, of the pisces age.

Mark 10*29.. and in the age to come, eternal life
Luke 18*30.. the kingdom of god will fail to receieve many times as much in this age and, in the age to come, eternal life.
Corithians 6.. we speak a message of the wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age.
Revalations 15*3.. god almighty, king of the ages.
What were talking about here is ages.  The old age of pisces, and what were looking forward to is the kingdom to come, his will to be done on earth, and that kingdom is the kingdom of the man with the pitcher of water(luke22*10), the new age of aquarious.  when you hear Christians talking about the end of days, the end times, what it really means is the end of the age of pisces, and the begining of the age of aquarious.

So where does Jesus, Chrishna, Horus, or any of the other 16 "saviors" fit into this? They represent the sun, the sun in the sky that comes up every morning and sets every evening(hmm perhaps that is why Amen Ra's enemy was Set).  The ancient Egyptians believed that as long as the sun came up every day, there would always be life on earth. Therefore the sun represented eternal life. so quite logically, all religions feeature the sun as its principle and most important feature.  Or as the religions say, the "son" of god.  

The Egyptians saw that on their sun dials, in winter(winter represented the coldness of death) as the dial moved south,  it reached a point in its movement at the time of sunset, and did not move further for 3 days.  Therefore the ancients said the sun of god dies for three days.  It was said that the son of god dies for 3 days, and is ressurected after those 3 days, once the sun begins its anual journey back to the northern hemisphere.  This anual date is December 25.  Therefore, it is said that the son of god is born on this date.  These ancients believed that the sun was everlasting life, for it supported life on earth. As long as the son had risen, there will always be light and life.  All earth life systems require the sun for life, use the suns energy, and therefore they said the sun was giving up its life for us.  Of course, not in the literal sense, but sure enough it was translated that way.  Do you ever wonder why the sun is in so many religious pictures, espeically those of Jesus?

In revalations 1*7, it says "behold he cometh with clouds, and every eye should see him."  Well of course. There is only one light of the world that every eye can see. The sun.
Jesus walked on water. Well have you ever seen the sunset on a body of water?  Seems like it is "walking" on it, doesn't it?
Jesus died with a crown of thorns. These thorns actually represent the sun's rays.
Christ will rise. Christ has risen. Christ will rise again.  We all hear that in church.  But how strange, isn't that what the sun does?

The sun orbits throughout all of the constilations.  When the sun enters a constilation, it enters it at the 30th degree.  When the sun leaves that constilation, it leaves at the 33rd degree.  This is just simple science.  But doesn't it sound familiar?  How about, god's son begins his ministry at 30 years old, and dies at 33?  

Lets discuss the cross.  Many crosses are displayed having a circle in the center. The circle is on the cross of the zodiac, and represents the sun, the sun that comes up every day.  Over the ages man referred to this as the sun of god, and then it became the son of god.  

The ancient cultures of the world started their calanders in virgo, which is symbolized by the virgin.  Therefore, they said the son of god was born of a virgin.  Which simply means, born in virgo.  

We are told by Chrisitianity that Astrology is evil, and of the devil.  Any institution of authority that does not want you to look at somthing, whether it be a set of facts, or a book, must have somthing to hide.  They know the intillectual mind of the human cannot grow if it is not allowed to look at all of the facts.  It is quite obvious here that they in fact did have somthing to hide.

The simple fact is, no matter the true history of the Christian faith, that the people that believe usually experience a great deal of spiritual love. I know that from my own past Christian experience, I also know that I experience a great deal of spiritual love practicing the energys from the hindu chants.
Peace and love bro, thats what it all comes down too.
It hurts no person to believe in it the way that they do. It would hurt me to for reasons I cann't explain.
A funny thing happened to me yesterday after posting some of my future revelations.
I started reading into the eygption book of the dead a little. And this is what I found.
On plate 11

verse? 12 13 14 15

I am strong upon the earth and before the divine father Oser who affects the transformation of the soul
These celestial beings fly with me in the fellowship of the master of limits in his ordained transformation
I acheived spiritual height I aquired physical perfection
I advance in eternity like the rays of the sun

I like reading this stuff because it does coincide with so many other religions.

I agree that you should believe in what feels true to you, and have faith in what you feel brings love and spirituality into your life.  I put together this article simply at the request of Berserk.

Hi outofbodydude I read this true story about this professional doctor,whos nine yr old daughter died and was ressucitated back to life.

Afterwards his daughter told him of her NDE,she said that she had seen God and her father asked her what he looked like and she said God was blue and also that Jesus spoke to her and walked with her through a meadow towards a gate,which he then opened and said to this little girl that she had to go through this gate to return home as it was not her time to stay and when she walked through this gate she was back in her body.

After that conversation with her father,she painted pictures of the spirit world where she had gone and they were beautiful,there were rivers and trees,flowers and birds.

This was a little girls account of her experience with God and Jesus and children are so honest of what they experience and they dont lie,they say as they see and hear,so God and Jesus do exist,which i will always believe no matter what.

I am a practising medium and every medium at the spiritualist church and when i am in circle,we always ask Gods protection and permission to commune with  spirit.

Love and God Bless        Love Juditha

I am sure she did have an experience with Jesus.  Just as I could have just as easily had an experience with the Cat in the Hat if that is what I believed.  We all know our experiences can be distored by multiple factors while in the afterlife.  The point is, no experience can denounce the facts I have presented.

Hi outofbodydude I have a catholic nun spirit guide and she was in my bedroom one night with Jesus and Jesus layed his hand on my head and blessed me.

I love God and Jesus very much and as a practising medium i have recieved words from Jesus many times which i have written down and i have seen him when i have been in circle sometimes as well.

That little girl did not imagine that experience she had.I know that through my own experience as a practising medium.

Love and God bless        Love Juditha

If those experiences have brought love, joy, and strength into your life, than I am happy for you.  Once I saw the television and movie character Borat while out of my body.  This was quite humorous.  However, it allowed me to see that what we beleive or think about is able to project and manifest in higher realms.  Upon examining the data I have presented, it is quite obvious what is going on.  But as long as it proves as a positive influence in your life, I am happy for you and wish you to keep having faith.

Dude,

As I anticipated from your absurd caricature of ES, you have not grappled with any primary ancient texts and instead choose to rely on googled material from those who have no standing even among skeptics in the academic community that studies religion.   I can refute not only your premise that your mythical comparisons are valid and that Krishna and Horus mythology were konwn to first century Palestinian Jews who helped articulate the Christian faith, but also the nature of the comparisons themselves.  Obviously, you know nothing about comparative religion.  But before I dismantle this dreadful potpourri of New Age myopia point  by point, let me ask you a basic question.  You claim that Jesus never existed, that He is 100% a myth.   It is one thing to claim that the historical Jesus was subjected to mythical embellishment; it is quite another to ignore the evidence of his historicity and claim that He never existed.  Can it be that even this obvious distinction eludes you?

Don

P.S. I notice your refusal to acknowledge your source. Afraid to have me read yhour source?  

I believe there were probably some people through the ages that could have witnessed the crucifixion through remote veiwing.
Also at that period of time they did crucify people.
My enduring hope is that it will never happen again.


Here is something that happened to me years ago at church, though it has nothing to do with this thread. But seriously this happened!

I was leaving out of the church doors and a man ran up to me and said "You know why people in church are so against sex?"
I giggled and said "Why?"
He goes "They can't do it!"
I said what?
He said "I punished them, I took there parts away they can't do it!" He laughed!
Then he ran off.
I swear this happened ;D
I walked away and said OK
Anyone know who that could of been? Because I wasn't sure he was from here. :o

Everything I have written, aside from my personal comments, can be found in texts of the religions that I write of.  This was not a term paper, therefore I did not list any sources for my information.  The point is that there is no explanation for the striking similarities and almost mirror images between all of the world's religions "sons of god".  Like I said before, anyone in denial will simply refuse the facts.  Could it be that your "historical evidence" was created by the same people who created the Christian religion?  Surely they would not invent somthing with nothing to go along with it to give people the idea that there is validity to it.  Anyone with an open mind will plainly see just how fake this religion is. Hell, they werent even original!  The story of Jesus, they just copied from past religions! Geez, anyone who isn't in denial can see this.  Obviously, someone who waisted so many years of their life learning about these lies will not come to terms with reality.  But that is expected.  

You were taught and given your education by people who strongly believed in the bible, and deeply wanted to legend of the bible to continue.  The ones who created the religions based around the bible obviously knew about these facts which display the religions for what they really are(fiction), for they were the ones who stole the story from past religions in the first place.  Therefore, does it not make sense that they create a way to falsify these facts in order to preserve the religions?  Of course it does.  Bible junkies, whether they are the original creaters and followers, or ones of the present age, will do anything and twist any set of facts to conform to their beliefs.  And obviously, they were taught how to do so by the ones of highest authority of the religions in order to keep people in the dark, in order to hide the truth.  You are simply their pawn, doing their work for them, working against us who are trying to awaken to the truth.  Because that is exactly what they do not want to happen.

Dude,

Not unexpectedly, you ducked my question.  but i will hold you to your claim that you can identify precise sources for your claims in texts from other religions.  You also pretend to know the religious and philosophical horizons of first century Palestine.  I will challenge you to document your claim from specific ancient texts.   Are you even familiar with the non-Christian first centiury sources about Jesus' life (Josephus, contemporary rabbinic Judaism, Roman historians, and Palestinian archaeology)?  If so, why don't you explain why their claims about Jesus can be discounted?  If not, you are providing yet another issue that proves that you pontificate on matters you know nothing about.  Which is it?  Please explain before I launch my point by point reply.

Don  

Quote:

Are you even familiar with the non-Christian first centiury sources about Jesus' life (Josephus, contemporary rabbinic Judaism, Roman historians, and Palestinian archaeology)?  If so, why don't you explain why their claims about Jesus can be discounted?

These manipulators constructed religions based upon a book they claimed to be the word of god, when in reality it was nothing more than a compilation of ancient beliefs and stories, perhaps with a few new inserts.  I don't see how you can overlook the remarkable mirror image of the bible to past religions.  This just shows the capability of religious authority figures to brainwash the population, as they have most likely done with you.  I sympathise with you, for you are so deep in this stuff that backing out now and looking at it at a different perspective will most likely shatter your belief systems and reality.  

Anyway, to answer your question... anyone who is capable of pulling off such a mass-scaled hoax is no doubt capable of creating a multitude of different sources in history in order to make the bible more believable.  Like I stated before, they are not just going to write a book and cross their fingers while hoping everyone will buy into it.  They are also going to create outside sources and point them out to people so it will futher their beliefs in this nonsense.  They fed you garbage for so long that it would be impossible for you to think differently about the subject, no matter how apparent the true facts are.  This is their goal, and we need to understand this in order to break free from the stronghold they have on society.  

You are always knee deep and hell bent on sources and verifications, yet you fail to realise that the very sources you have been consumed with in no way prove anything, and are all part of the mass deception.

Source: Jordan Maxwell

It is indeed noteworthy that the Egyptian sun god's name is Amen Ra and that in the Christian tradition, amen is said after prayer.  Moreover, it is also very apparent that the many common elements in the stories of various religions are perhaps a re-telling of one common story, that may have occurred in human history.  Possibly, the Jesus of Christianity was based on a real person that did exist, but not in the era of Christianity.  Of course, many things in today's religions have been convoluted, mistranslated, infused intentionally with elements of deception meant to distort the truth.  The truth, as it were does still exist in the religious texts, it is there, but admittedly most of it has been distorted.  

Dude,

So are you saying that even the first-century non-Christian sources that vouch for Jesus' life are part of the mass deception?   Why do I get the feeling that you don't even know what these sources and Palestinian archaeology relevant to Jesus' life have to say?   Also, you confuse Old Testiment traditions which precede Jesus' life by several centuries with the historicity of Jesus.  Where's the relevance?   And how do you explain our ability to connect Jesus' life with eyewitness testimony?   Or are you even aware of how this can be done?   If so, give me some reason to believe you are capable of reasoned skepticism.
Outline the case for these eyewitness coneections and then challenge them.  I don't mind that you are ignorant of the case for Jesus.   What I object to is your pontification about issues about which you are clueless.   One last chance to inject some sanity into your thread before I reply in detail.

Don  

From what I have seen of your non-christian sources, many of them are not even believe to be authentic.  For example, your man Josephus.  He describes 3 different jesus! What is that about?  His ownly document directly concerning Jesus is the Testimonium Flavianum. But it is said to be unauthentic, ever since the 17 century!  The testimonium declairs Jesus to be Christ, yet he did not even believe that Jesus was Christ!  Causing scholars to believe he did not even mention Jesus in the first place.  Many passages of his writings were in fact interpolations.  Josephus' account is too good to be true, too confessional to be impartial, too Christian to be Jewish.  Three passages show this:  "if it be lawful to call him a man … He was [the] Christ … for he appeared to them alive again the third day; as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him." These seem directly to address Christological debates of the early 4th century. Consequently, most secular historians, and even many Christian scholars, dismiss the Testimonium as an interpolation.  

To sum things up, this in an uncredible source. Ill get to other sources in future posts.

HOW CAN THE SAME PERSON EXIST ON EARTH 16 DIFFERENT TIMES, IN 16 DIFFERENT PLACES, THROUGHOUT AN EXTREMELY LARGE TIME SPAN.  WHAT MAKES THIS VERSION OF THE "SON OF GOD" REAL, AND NOT ALL OF THE OTHER ONES.  DO YOU THINK THEY DON'T CLAIM TO HAVE EVIDENCE THAT THEIR VERSON OF "JESUS" WAS REALLY ALIVE? YOU BET THEY DO.

Dude,

As I anticipated from your absurd caricature of ES, you have not grappled with any primary ancient texts and instead choose to rely on googled material from those who have no standing even among skeptics in the academic community that studies religion.   I can refute not only your premise that your mythical comparisons are valid and that Krishna and Horus mythology were konwn to first century Palestinian Jews who helped articulate the Christian faith, but also the nature of the comparisons themselves.  Obviously, you know nothing about comparative religion.  But before I dismantle this dreadful potpourri of New Age myopia point  by point, let me ask you a basic question.  You claim that Jesus never existed, that He is 100% a myth.   It is one thing to claim that the historical Jesus was subjected to mythical embellishment; it is quite another to ignore the evidence of his historicity and claim that He never existed.  Can it be that even this obvious distinction eludes you?

Don

P.S. I notice your refusal to acknowledge your source. Afraid to have me read yhour source?
*****************
I'll keep this short and sweet...
Where are the Roman records of Jesus, from the time
he was in Jerusalem?
Pontius Pilate, Herod Antipas, ect. are all well-documented
characters. But Jesus?
-Surely a man who very nearly caused a Jewish insurrection...
-Who was followed by throngs of common folk (surely this would
have caused consternation to the Roman provincial authorities?)
-Who was proclaiming a NEW KINGDOM...
Would have merited at least a passing reference in the Roman
records. (Romans were INVERTERATE record-keepers, BTW...)
But we see NOTHING! Why is that?
While we're at it, we might wonder about why the "slaughter of
the innocents" by King Herod has no records pertaining to it, or
what about that horde of saintly zombies who supposedly burst from
their graves following Jesus' resurrection and "appeared to many" in Matthew 27:52-53???
SURELY THIS would have caused a big enough flap for the Roman administrators to record. Think about it: "The bodies of those who not-so-recently died are returning to life and committing acts of preaching!!!" (from the local Jerusalem town-crier news service, or whatever was the equivalent of news back in those days..!) But as it is, it merits only a glancing, in-passing mention in ONE book of the New Testament (Matthew.)
What's up here, Don???

B-man

Lets discuss some of the Palestinian Archaeology that you mentioned.  For example, the Dead Sea Scrolls.

Those who have control over the dead sea scrolls do not want anyone else to have access to them, because they are afraid that if any outside authority are able to examine the scrolls, it will possibly cause questions about the authenticity of both judaism and christianity. of course, the powers to be would not be very happy about that.  Why else would Israel not want anyone to see the scrolls?  They claim that they have copyright over the scrolls, but if the scrolls were written by god, then there should be no copyright, for the words belong to everyone.

Mr. Strutinel, the cheif editor of the Dead Sea scrolls appointed by Israel, has declaired... "Judaism is a horrible religion with racist origins, which in principle should not exist at all."  The whole story of the old testiment is the worship of the heaves, an incoded story that only those on in "inside" know.  The story for the outside, the ill informed(us), get a different story.  But the writers of the story, and those well versed in hebrew theology, know that there is a second story interwoven into the bible.  This is proven in the above article, for the syncronicities tieing the new testament to astrology occur just as much in the old testament as well.

Dude,

As usual you are clueless.  First, I was one of Strugnell's students.  He and another Harvard professor, Frank Cross, collated the scrolls and their fragments with the help of their students.  The scrolls have been published and  thoroghly studied.  There is no problem with access to these texts.  In any case, the Dead Sea scrolls never allude to Jesus and are inrrelevant to the point at issue, whether Jesus existed.  

Sadly, Strugnell became an alcoholic and made the comments to which you allude in a drunken stupor.  His intemperate comments caused him to lose his jurisdiction over the scrolls.  It was a Mel Gibson type of moment.  In fact, John had great respect for Judaism and was the Harvard specialist on intertestamental Judaism.  In any case, once again you duck my questions: What do Old Testament texts composed many centuries prior to Christ have to do with Jesus' historical existence?   Since your are ignorant of both (1) the various ways Jesus' life can be connected with eyewitness testimony and (2) the first-century NON-CHRISTIAN allusions to His exisitence,  how are you even entittled on rational grounds to an opinion about His existence?  I'll give you a day to mull all this over and then reply in detail.   But i've already exposed the sad truth about your baseless assertions.

Don

Old Testament texts do not have to do with Jesus' existance.  However, they do allow us to see how fictional they are.  There are many, many connections throughout the entire testiment that are simply tales of astrology and the zodiac.  Can you explain why noone is allowed to physically see the scrolls? Perhaps because if they are examined, it will be found that they are unauthentic to the original story.  

The fact that there are claims that people are eyewitnesses to jesus, or that people have alluded to his existance mean absolutely nothing when you see the facts I have presented above.  Hearsay does not lessen in any way the facts.  The facts that Jesus is the same in every way as 15 other "god's sons" of other religions and cultures, far prior to his "existance."  Facts that it is so obvious to see how Jesus and the rest of the bible are pure personifications of the zodiac and astrology.  

Why would all kings in eastern and wester europe, and much of the rest of the world, accepted the new calendar dating time from the birth of "our lord" Jesus, when they did not even believe in him? Why would kings from all different creeds, different races, different religions accept this?  Because this date was simply the begining of age the of pisces.  The fish.  The pope's hat is the shape of a fishhead. Jesus was the great fisherman. Joshua was called Joshua the sone of nun.  Well nun translates to fish.  Jesus is nothing more than the sun ruling the world in the age of pisces for 2 thousand years, which is the length of each zodiac age.  Jesus says the new kingdom will begin with the man bearing a pitcher of water.  Well hello, this is the symbol for the age of aquarious.  
Open your eyes man! The truth is right in front of you.  

It is clear that Josephus's "validation of christ" is totally bogus.  Well duh, because He did not exist.  If they are going to fake one source, they are going to fake them all.  I mean, what makes you think these "eyewitnesses" are telling the truth, or that they even ever existed! It was over 2000 years ago! These are not facts.  The facts are what I have presented.  As I said before, an alleged "eyewitness" to Jesus does not disprove the fact that a carbon copy of the Christian "son of god" "existed" in 15 other religions and cultures, it does not disprove the fact that there is clear talk of astrology in the bible that anyone with an open mind can easily decode, and only proves the fact that you are in denial.

Perhaps your boy Toaster Strutnell finally woke up to the truth about this religion.  Maybe he was finally able to see past all the crap he was being fed throughout his life.  A person involved in religion does not just totally freak out and denounce his life passion for no reason.  It is obvious that he discovered the truth.  Hopefully you, and everyone else will one day do the same.

Here is a compilation of very important quotes from several Proffessionals and Scholars in the subject of Religion:

"What Taylor [Robert Taylor 1784 - 1844] thinks of the testimony brought forward by the Church historians can be seen in the following passage:--'The historians of the first three centuries of Christianity have taken so great a license in this way (inventing incidents and names, etc.), as that no one alleged fact standing on their testimony can be said to have even a probable degree of evidence. The most candid and learned even of Christian inquirers have admitted that antiquity is most deficient just exactly where it is most important; that there is absolutely nothing known of the church history in those times on which a rational man can place any reliance; and that the epoch when Christian truth first dawned upon the world is appropriately designated as the Age of Fable.'"

"The determination of the dates of the various books of the N.T. is beset with difficulties and uncertainties. In the first place, none of these works is explicitly and definitely dated by its author. Nor does any writing contain unmistakable references by which it might be accurately dated. Further, it is highly probable that most of the authors are unknown to us, save for Paul, for apart from his letters the books in the New Testament are almost without exception either anonymous, or, what is worse, pseudonymous. Finally, the external attestation to their authorship and date is meager and as a rule unreliable. " ["save for Paul"? No! Another pseudonym!]. "

"What possible reason could there have been for Paul and James and the other writers to ignore practically the whole earthly career of Jesus? Does it not raise a presumption that there was no such earthly career? What other possible reason could there have been?"

"It is odd that the Jews have always [Not in my researches. Much fear, collusion, etc.] classified Jesus as a myth, yet his crucifixion allegedly took place in Jerusalem....Apart from the Gospels which cannot be regarded as either historical or objective since they were written for the sole purpose of fostering the faith of Christians--what other documentary evidence exists to prove that Jesus ever existed at all?"

"apart from the gospels, not a single work belonging to the early Christian period gives us any intimate detail about the life of this personage? Examine Paul's Epistles! As we shall show in the next chapter, they do not tell a single special fact about the life of Jesus. Read the other Epistles of the New Testament--Peter, John, James, Jude, and the Epistle to the Hebrews--and the letter of Clement to the Corinthians, the letter of Barnabas, the Pastor of Hermas, the Acts of the Apostles, etc. Nowhere in any single one of these early Christian documents do we find even the slenderest reference to the mere man Jesus [see 388.], or to the historical personality of Jesus as such, from which we might infer that the author had a close acquaintance with it. His life, as it is described in the gospels, in all its human detail, seems to have been entirely unknown to these authors."

"["THE NON-CHRISTIAN WITNESSES"] 'As early as the first few centuries of the present era pious Christians searched the Jewish and pagan writers for references to Jesus, convinced that such references ought to be found in them; they regarded with great concern the undeniable defects of tradition, and, in the interest of their faith, endeavoured to supply the want by more or less astute "pious frauds," such as the Acts of Pilate, the letter of Jesus to King Abgar Ukkama of Edessa,1 the letter of Pilate to Tiberius, and similar forgeries. Greater still was the reliance on the few passages in profane literature which seemed to afford some confirmation of the historical truth of the things described in the gospels.' "

"Just as there is a Christ myth, there is a Jesuit legend. Just as the Christ did not exist, the biblical Jesus did not exist. There is absolutely nothing contemporary with the Jesus of the Gospel that confirms the validity of his being. No sculptures, no drawings, no markings in stone, nothing written in his own hand; and no letters, no commentaries, indeed no authentic documents written by his Jewish and Gentile contemporaries, Justice of Tiberius, Philo, Josephus, Seneca, Petronius Arbiter, Pliny the Elder, et al., to lend credence to his historicity. "

"Historical investigations have revealed to us the origin and growth of the Bible; we know that by this name we designate a collection of writings, as radically unlike in origin, character and contents, as if the Nibelungen Lied, Mirabeau's speeches, Heine's love poems and a manual of zoology, had been printed and mixed up promiscuously, and then bound into one volume. We find collected in this book the superstitious beliefs of the ancient inhabitants of Palestine, with indistinct echoes of Indian and Persian fables, mistaken imitations of Egyptian theories and customs, historical chronicles as dry as they are unreliable, and miscellaneous poems, amatory, human and Jewish--national, which are rarely distinguished by beauties of the highest order, but frequently by superfluity of expression, coarseness, bad taste and genuine Oriental sensuality. As a literary monument the Bible is of much later origin than the Vedas; as a work of literary va lue it is surpassed by everything written in the last two thousand years by authors even of the second rank, and to compare it seriously with the productions of Homer, Sophocles, Dante, Shakespeare or Goethe, would require a fanaticized mind that had entirely lost its power of judgment; its conception of the universe is childish, and its morality revolting....And yet men, cultivated and capable of forming a just estimate, pretend to reverence this ancient work, they refuse to allow it to be discussed and criticized like any other production of the human intellect, they found societies and place enormous sums at their disposal to print millions of copies of it, which they distribute all over the world, and they pretend to be edified and inspired when they read in it. "

And finally, this quote is for Berserk:

"they see what they wish to see, what is useful to them, what is agreeable. The second is the tendency toward inhibition; they do not see what they do not wish to see, what is useless to them, or disagreeable.

Hi outofbodydude   Jesus was cruxified and people have the stigmata,as St Francis of Assiss had the stigmata ,he had the wounds of  Jesus which bled,so how do you explain that, as your trying to say Jesus did not exist,i love Jesus and God,i beleive and always will beleive they exist.

God saw his son upon the cross
He felt his suffering that came across
His dear son died to save our sin
So open your heart and let God in.

Love and God bless       Love Juditha

Hi outofbodydude   Jesus was cruxified and people have the stigmata,as St Francis of Assiss had the stigmata ,he had the wounds of  Jesus which bled,so how do you explain that?
******************
Two words...
Collective Unconscious!!!
People in western society have an image of the stigmata you
mention in their minds. Perhaps if we are all connected at the
level of the subconscious, various psycho-somatic symptoms
might manifest as wounds in the hands and feet? (Perhaps in
response to subconscious feelings of martyrdom, or what
have you.)
As I understand it, stigmata are a WESTERN phenomenon,
and very seldom (if ever) seen among non-Christian peoples.
(This would be easy to explain, if you consider that non-
Christian nations, tribes, ect. don't have the crucifixion motif as part
of their culture!)

B-man

I have to say honestly., although I do not believe in Christianity the same way anymore for I can't. But as a young girl when I recieved Christ into my my life I did experience a spiritual hieght. I did feel his presence, I do believe he is a being. But I fight the idea of this same life occuring all over again. Which truly what I believe some members of the church hope for.

You guys are all claiming that these experiences disprove the facts that I have presented.  However, they do not!!!  Every experience you claim has proven Jesus as real can be easily explained in several different ways.  Even in Bruce Moens articles, he says he was with a guide who, in order to trick some people out of their Hollow Christian Heaven where they were trapt, the guide took upon the image of Jesus to get these silly worshipers out of their eternal damnation of constant church going!  Like I have said, I have seen Borat in the nonphysical!  If I worshiped him as you worship Jesus, then perhaps I too would have felt much love and inspiration.  However, we are talking about projections of the mind here.

About stigmata... first of all, there have been historical stigmatics that were known to have faked wounds, such as Magdalena de la Cruz (1487–1560), who admitted the fraud!  Similarly self-inflicted wounds can be associated with certain mental illnesses. Some people who fake stigmata suffer from Munchausen syndrome which is characterised by an intense desire for attention.  I also point out that stigmata have appeared on hands in some cases, wrists in others, and the lance wound has appeared on different sides of the body. This suggests some form of internally generated phenomena, based on the victim's own imagination and subjective in character, rather than something of external divine origin. It is unknown, either through the gospels or other historical accounts, whether crucifixion involved nails being driven through the hands, or wrists, or what side the lance pierced Christs body, and this would appear to be reflected in the inconsistent placement of stigmatists' wounds.  Similarly, no case of stigmata is known to have occurred before the thirteenth century, when the crucified Jesus became a standard icon of Christianity in the west.  This shows just how strong the power of the mind is.  There have been claims that non-religious people under deep hypnosis, when told that they had a crown of thorns on their heads cutting into their flesh (in the manner similar to Christ), have had bleeding welts appear on their foreheads even when nothing had come into contact with the skin!  Its all in the mind!  Stigmatas result from exceptional poignancy of religious faith and desire to associate oneself with the suffering Messiah.  However, this in noooo way proves the authenticity of Jesus' life OR Christianity.

Here is a link to a website showing that the "non-Christian sources" pointed out by Berserk, in fact, do not prove the existance of Jesus at all.  Instead, the sources are warped by the minds of Christians and others hell bent on finding evidence for Jesus in order to percieve that they prove Jesus as real.  However, an unbiased mind finds that these sources do not prove a thing.

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/jeff_lowder/jury/chap5.html

and another

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/robert_price/fiction.html

Hi outofbodydude I just want to ask you this one question,how do you know that Jesus did not exist,if you was not around when he walked the earth.

I ask because you think that what you print on here about Jesus not existing is the truth and nothing but the truth.

But you cant say that its the truth he did not exist because you dont know that.

Love and God bless      Love Juditha

You are correct.  I was not around when he walked the earth despite the fact that I believe I know for sure that he did not exist.  However, you are just as strong and confident in your claims that he did in fact exist.  But you were not around either, so you are in the same boat as me with your assertions. Therefore your point looses much validity.  The difference between my claims and yours, is I am laying out hardcore facts supporting my claims (which cannot be overlooked and are only overlooked by those in denial), while you are just stating... well I know he existed because he loves me, because I believe in him, because I "saw" him.  Like I said before, I do not wish to strip you of your beliefs if these beliefs prove to be a positive influence in your life.  The only reason I made this thread was to satisfy Berserkers' curiosity.  However, at the same time I believe we are at a stage in human evolution where it is no longer neccessary to have blind faith in ancient characters posing as God-like figures, when all we have to do is look within ourselves to find god and the truth.

Don't worry about it Juditha. I know that there is an ancient highest conciuosness and always has been. What ever name he has many many people in this world have experienced Him. There is no reason to believe anyone that claims anything against it.
Because I believe firmly that war did break out in heaven and I believe that the war will end. I do not believe that we are ever going to be lost back in time in this crisis of this world again. Its not going to happen again. We are moving forward and continue to do so.
I believe that there are those that want to continue to keep what is rightfully his here, while they continued on. So it will reverse they can have that place. We will start another. Thats what I believe and no one can take what I have seen take place in my life from me.
I have so much more to share but do not believe in the writings of Mr. Moen from what I have read on this board. You have no need to travel out of the body, when heaven can reach you itself. The very thought of a being trying to trick others to believe he is Christ is absurd. ;D I'm sorry but I truly know better. I have encountered things you would never imagine and I never had to leave my body or well perhaps I did a few times but I came back.
Good luck to you all hope you find your true selfs.
Om nahma shiva ya. ;)

War in Heaven, Shwar in Shmeaven.  Thats all baloney.  A war in "heaven", (which I am assuming you are reffering to the Christian version of heaven, but any version of heaven will prove the point just as well), goes against the very concept of heaven in the first place.  Who would this "war in heaven" be against?  Demons?  Satan?  Negative beings cannot even REACH heaven.  In order for you to reach a certain level of consiousness or plane of frequency, your vibrations have to be in tune with that area.  The higher levels of the "afterlife" have high vibrations, the lower "hellish" levels have low vibrations.  In order for someone to ascend to a higher level, their vibrations must increase, and this is done by spiritual growth, a better understanding and feeling and expressing of love, and other positive measures.  Therefore, it is impossible for a negative being to go to any higher, heavenly plane, unless they transform themselves into a being of light and love.  Believing in a war in heaven not only does not make sense, but only brings about negativity, for War is a truely negative energy.

I Am Dude wrote on Jan 7^th, 2007 at 5:45pm:

You are correct.  I was not around when he walked the earth despite the fact that I believe I know for sure that he did not exist.  However, you are just as strong and confident in your claims that he did in fact exist.  But you were not around either, so you are in the same boat as me with your assertions. Therefore your point looses much validity.  The difference between my claims and yours, is I am laying out hardcore facts supporting my claims (which cannot be overlooked and are only overlooked by those in denial), while you are just stating... well I know he existed because he loves me, because I believe in him, because I "saw" him.  Like I said before, I do not wish to strip you of your beliefs if these beliefs prove to be a positive influence in your life.  The only reason I made this thread was to satisfy Berserkers' curiosity.  However, at the same time I believe we are at a stage in human evolution where it is no longer neccessary to have blind faith in ancient characters posing as God-like figures, when all we have to do is look within ourselves to find god and the truth.

 Personally, i don't think the existence or non existence of Jesus can be totally and completely objectively proved beyond a shadow of a doubt on either side.

 Yet personally, i do believe he existed, and even did many of the things attributed to him in the N.T.   I am not, nor have ever been involved in a religion, and haven't ever limited myself to one major spiritual belief system.   Belief systems weren't pushed at all in my home and childhood environment.  I started studying metaphysical subjects, and really leaned to Eastern concepts and philosophies since age 13.  

  I do find it rather interesting that some of the most verified, studied, and prominent psychics in our history, have supported the reality of Jesus and his unusual life.    

  The likes of Edgar Cayce, Emmanuel Swedenborg, Rudolf Steiner, Rosiland McKnight's Guides (or specifically Ah So?), and Eileen Garret all talked about Jesus and indicated that he indeed was murdered without just cause, and resurrected his physical body.  

  With this in mind, let's briefly examine Robert Monroe's info, specifically his last book, Ultimate Journey.   In this book, Bob relates asking his Inspec friend if he could get some info on the most mature (spiritually evolved) human living in his then time/space.   He was told, yeah ok, but indicated that Bob would probably be quite surprised by the truth.  

  Then we meet "He/She", someone around 1800 years old or so, who has not incarnated in that time period, but has continuously stayed in the body and kept it young and healthy.  He/She does not need to eat, does not need to sleep, and works many various jobs during its physical linear time.   Essentially He/She spends self in complete service to others.

 If you read this account very carefully, you will see clues that Monroe eventually learns the real identity of this person, and is one 1. quite surprised by this just like Inspec said he would be, and 2. subtly but certainly seems to indicate that other people know about this person in some kind of way, and that He/She is "occidental" i.e. western in origin, not asian.  

 Now keep in mind that Edgar Cayce, Rudolf Steiner, Rosiland's McKnight's psychically relayed info, etc. all say that Jesus lived as a man, died, and resurrected his physical vehicle.   When we compare Monroe's experience with a some 1800 year old living immortal, is it simply just coincidence?

 Edgar Cayce, perhas the single most verified and studied psychic on record, not only affirms the basic message of the N.T., but goes farther in connection with Jesus.  His source talks about Jesus's lost years, his other lives in the Earth, and seems to strongly indicate that Jesus's Total Self/Spirit, is literally the Co-Creator with Source of this Universe.   In other words, Christ was the first returned to Source spark, who became the first Creator God out of all the children of Source.  

  Notice in Bruce's 4th book, when he and his partner Denise explore the Planning Intelligence, Denise gets strong connections of the Planning Intelligence to the concept of Christ.  

  Indeed, in some general respects, Bruce's info about the Planning Intelligence parallels Cayce's overview of Creation and of the fact that there was one Spark who returned before any others, and who became a model, a pattern of other Souls, and who became a full Co-Creator with Source before the Earth was ever physically formed.  

  Cayce's source said that Christ incarnated in early Atlantis as a guide, a teacher, and Retreiver and that he wasn't born, but manifested a physical vehicle.  His name then was Amelius, which Cayce said translates to mean, "Light".  

 Interestingly enough, even though you can find elements of all major world religions and belief systems within the bulk of the Cayce material...this very much echoes the claim of the New Testament and specifcally that of the John material which claims that Christ was and is the Logos, the Light and Word of this Universe.  

  Yeshua's Total Self, is pure Light.   What is Light?   Isn't Light the manifestation of Love energy?   What is Love energy?   Fusion.   What did Bruce say about the beginning of Creation?  That one Spark returned completed and when Consciousness the Creator examined this particular Spark, it realized why this particular Spark was able to fulfill its purpose perfectly whereas the other Sparks either disintegrated or went out and never returned...  What was the main "ingredient" in this Spark which came Home and fulfilled its purpose?   Bruce says Love was the ingredient; that this Spark had a base of Love energy within its consciousness which allowed for the bonding of different and sometimes non harmonious parts within a Whole.  Bruce of course gives the analogy of the particles of a dry cake mix which are "separated", and Love is like the water which flows around, through, and bonds all these separate particles together allowing it to exist as both a Whole and as individual parts.  Incidentnally enough, Cayce oft said that this is the great gift of the Creator to us, to be able to become aware of and One with the Whole, yet as a individually aware and freewilled being.

   Sure, don't believe in Jesus or his Total Self, He only just created you and loves you more than any Mother/Father you ever had could ever.  

  All those psychics whose abilities could probably blow your novice abilities and awareness out of the water are just plain wrong, all historical mentions are fabrications and a giant 2000 year old conspiracy, etc.  ::)    ;)

[edit]Sure, don't believe in Jesus or his Total Self, He only just created you and loves you more than any Mother/Father you ever had could ever.   [/edit]

Is this a joke? Jesus created me? Jesus, a character from a book, who was sooooooo obviously copied from past religions and cultures?  There were 15 different "Jesuses" Faaar Prior to Christianity!!! All lived the same exact life!!! All said the same things!!! All were the same person!!!! The similarties are due to the fact that Jesus and the others are nothing more than personifications of the sun! There is only one sun, astrological facts are bascially set in stone, which is why all of these stories are the same!  There is no explanation for these syncronicities except that they were stolen or passed down, whatever you want to call it, from ancient religions to Christianity.  Could it be possible that these psychics and viewers have seen Jesus due to their beliefs?  Of course.  I could leave my body and see Barney the Dinosaur if I wanted to.  Our thoughts manifest, our beliefs manifest as reality to us, but that does not make them historically or universally accurate!  A "great psychic" seeing things which were most likely skewed by their own belief systems, does not disprove the historical facts I have presented, plain and simple.  

 Apparently you completely skipped over the bulk of my synthesized (from many sources) post explaining why and from what non-religious and psychically respected sources i have reasoned this conclusion from.  

 No biggy, your beliefs and your prerogative.   I can't change them, even with logic and synthesis.

 Co-Create a joyful day for yourself OOBD.

 Well for one example, Edgar Cayce talks about many things in his readings which he did not have a conscious belief in.  In fact, there are concepts in there that which any Cayce biographer would tell you that he struggled with for years because they went against his core belief systems which were instilled in him since early childhood growing up in the bible belt and in the poor southern portion of America.

  Really good psychics, can and do get info beyond what they consciously believe in and which contradicts their conscious belief systems.  

 A good psychic is an Universal receiver of information psychic, who has less distortion effect on the info coming through.

 

The pure suggestion that Jesus possibly may have existed is enough thought to enable the process of manifesting that reality.  You do not need to be religious to believe in Jesus, or to think that he probably existed, this I learned from observing some of my closest family members.  I am not denying that these psychics saw Jesus, for I am sure they did.  I am simply saying that the collective thought that he did exist among the Christian and Catholic population(which is extremely large) is enough energy to allow this character Jesus to manifest for those psychicly looking back to pick up on.  Just as it is likely that a psychic looking back to the time of Chrishna, or Buddha, or any of the other 16 "sons of god" would pick up on the energies of these characters.  Not because they existed in reality, but because the mass conscious thought that they did exist allowed that energy to manifest.

I Am Dude wrote on Jan 7^th, 2007 at 8:07pm:

The pure suggestion that Jesus possibly may have existed is enough thought to enable the process of manifesting that reality.  You do not need to be religious to believe in Jesus, or to think that he probably existed, this I learned from observing some of my closest family members.  I am not denying that these psychics saw Jesus, for I am sure they did.  I am simply saying that the collective thought that he did exist among the Christian and Catholic population(which is extremely large) is enough energy to allow this character Jesus to manifest for those psychicly looking back to pick up on.  Just as it is likely that a psychic looking back to the time of Chrishna, or Buddha, or any of the other 16 "sons of god" would pick up on the energies of these characters.  Not because they existed in reality, but because the mass conscious thought that they did exist allowed that energy to manifest.

   Perhaps this is true.  Either way in any case, its a pretty pointless debate since like i said in my first reply on this thread...


Quote:

Personally, i don't think the existence or non existence of Jesus can be totally and completely objectively proved beyond a shadow of a doubt on either side.

 Yet, you seem awfully attached to trying to prove that Jesus did not exist?   Psychologically i find this interesting.  

 Btw, its no "proof" and its still highly controversial in the scientific world, but i would suggest a very deep, objective, and multi-perspective study of the Shroud of Turin.    There are many interesting things about this though it hasn't been completely refuted nor completely proven either.  

  Its a very complex subject and study, and a sunday researcher will be either confused or easily and prematurely persuaded on either side of the issue, if many sources are not consulted and reasoned over.  I still haven't completely made up my mind on this issue, but i find the debate and arguments on both sides quite fascinating.

  Take care, i won't be responding to this thread anymore, i have better things to do than to argue the existance or non existence of Jesus, which cannot be completely proved either way to my knowledge and perception.  It ultimately comes down to what a person "resonates" to within their own expanded Heart.

OOBD, I respectfully think that this subject is pretty much punching a brick wall made of diamond.  The more one argues against Jesus, the more some believe that Satan has returned to destroy the world.  From what I have seen, attacking just loads the belts with ammo for arguements like "persecution", "Satan is trying to destroy the truth", etc.  (Remember, Christian is a fairly broad term today so I don't label all to be like this)

Thats how simple I can explain it.  Stop fighting a phantom battle and focus your energies on what really matters inside your heart (I will not tell you what THAT is because no two persons are the same.)  ;)

Quote:

Yet, you seem awfully attached to trying to prove that Jesus did not exist?   Psychologically i find this interesting.

Understand, this was simply a challenge put forth by Berserk.  Please realise that I have believe in Jesus for my whole life until I discovered the true nature of the subject of Religion, which was only about three months ago.  I am not trying to convince myself of anything, as you seem to be implying in the above statement, for I have been on both sides of the spectrum.  I simply find this a friendly debate that I am semi passionate about, and I am continuing it simply because I am finding that I am learning a lot with every new post and every challenge put in front of me.  It may be a subject that cannot be 100% proven either way, but I find it a fun discussion nevertheless.

Yet, you seem awfully attached to trying to prove that Jesus did not exist?   Psychologically i find this interesting

I don't know Dude's reasons (though Don's question seems to be the immediate one), but my purposes in wanting proof that Jesus at least may not have existed is that his supposedly irrefutable existence is used to strong-arm people.  

Now, I live in a Dutch/Christian reformed area, where taking non-believers out to be shot (but only after they were given a chance to see the one truth, of course) wouldn't upset all that many, so I may be ultra touchy on this subject, but I'd be a lot more comfortable if the people who make the rules around here didn't have what they consider an unimpeachable reason to club me with their religion.  

It's only been the last five or six years that gas stations and other businesses were allowed to stay open on Sundays, pretty much forcing everyone (only town of any size around here) to toe the establishment line.  For the working poor who often only had Sunday off, not being able to get car parts, shop for groceries, etc., was a real hardship.  One of the reasons they got away with this so long is because no one dared propose changing the law...because the establishment had proof that their religion was the right and only one, so they were better and got to make the rules.  Sounds fairly minor, not like ethnic cleansing or anything, but still a very real PITA for a lot of people.  There was a time not many centuries ago that the established Christian religion did feel that they had a right to what would be considered ethnic cleansing now...because the book was irrefutable right and gave them top dog status.  People just don't do well when given that sort of power.  It's a people thing, not the fault of a given religion...Islam gets used that way too, obviously, but lets not give them ammo.

I'm pagan, and while there are the occasional internecine spats and witch wars, no one is saying anyone else's gods aren't real...and the same for their own...and no one cares if anyone else believes in Jesus.  Just don't try to prove he's more real than ours with bad data, and then use that "fact" to say believers should get to set the rules for society.  If there wasn't the history of power grabs we probably wouldn't even care about that...beleive what you will is pretty much our motto, if they could just be convinced not to care what we believe either.  Sadly, experience has proved that very unlikely.

OOBD, I respectfully think that this subject is pretty much punching a brick wall made of diamond.  The more one argues against Jesus, the more some believe that Satan has returned to destroy the world.  From what I have seen, attacking just loads the belts with ammo for arguements like "persecution", "Satan is trying to destroy the truth", etc.  (Remember, Christian is a fairly broad term today so I don't label all to be like this)
*****************
Such is life today in America...
Isn't it ironic then, that the hulking, hollow-eyed, grinning, lantern-jawed, clad-from-head-to-toe-in-black-body-armor
cop who smashes your head in in the year 2025 A.D. (because you were protesting the new national 6 o'clock curfew, or mandatory monthly colon check for drugs, or whatever) is likely going to be a devout evangelical Christian (who views YOU as a hell-bound heathen to boot..!)

B-man

Here are the real parallels of Horus and Jesus... the first list was just a scrub list, this is the real deal.  Lets see some explanations for these.

Comparison of some life events of Horus and Jesus:

(format= subject: Horus..........Jesus)

Conception: By a virgin.......By a virgin. 8
Father: Only begotten son of the God Osiris............ Only begotten son of Yehovah (in the form of the Holy Spirit).
Mother: Meri.................. Miriam (a.k.a. Mary).
Foster father: Seb, (Jo-Seph).................  Joseph.
Foster father's ancestry: Of royal descent......... Of royal descent.
Birth location: In a cave............. In a cave or stable.
Annunciation: By an angel to Isis, his mother.............. By an angel to Miriam, his mother. 8
Birth heralded by: The star Sirius, the morning star.......... An unidentified "star in the East."
Birth date: Ancient Egyptians paraded a manger and child representing Horus through the streets at the time of the winter solstice (typically DEC-21)  Celebrated on DEC-25............. The date was chosen to occur on the same date as the birth of Mithra, Dionysus and the Sol Invictus (unconquerable Sun), etc.
Birth announcement: By angels............. By angels. 8
Birth witnesses: Shepherds............... Shepherds. 8
Later witnesses to birth: Three solar deities.............. Three wise men. 8
Death threat during infancy: Herut tried to have Horus murdered.............. Herod tried to have Jesus murdered.
Handling the threat: The God That tells Horus' mother "Come, thou goddess Isis, hide thyself with thy child." .................An angel tells Jesus' father to: "Arise and take the young child and his mother and flee into Egypt."
Rite of passage ritual: Horus came of age with a special ritual,  when his eye was restored.................. Taken by parents to the temple for what is today called a bar mitzvah ritual.
Age at the ritual: 12.............. 12
Break in life history: No data between ages of 12 & 30............ No data between ages of 12 & 30.
Baptism location: In the river Eridanus................ In the river Jordan.  
Age at baptism: 30............... 30.
Baptized by: Anup the Baptiser................ John the Baptist.
Subsequent fate of the baptiser: Beheaded................... Beheaded.
Temptation: Taken from the desert of Amenta up a high mountain by his arch-rival Sut. Sut (a.k.a. Set) was a precursor for the Hebrew Satan.............. Taken from the desert in Palestine up a high mountain by his arch-rival Satan.
Result of temptation: Horus resists temptation.............. Jesus resists temptation.
Close followers: Twelve disciples.................. Twelve disciples.
Activities: Walked on water, cast out demons, healed the sick, restored sight to the blind. He "stilled the sea by his power."................ Walked on water, cast out demons, healed the sick, restored sight to the blind. He ordered the sea with a "Peace, be still" command.
Raising of the dead: Horus raised Osirus, his dead father,  from the grave............10 Jesus raised Lazarus from the grave.
Location where the resurrection miracle occurred: Anu, an Egyptian city where the rites of the death, burial and resurrection of Horus were enacted annually............... 10 Hebrews added their prefix for house ('beth") to "Anu" to produce "Beth-Anu" or the "House of Anu." Since "u" and "y" were interchangeable in antiquity, "Bethanu" became "Bethany," the location mentioned in John 11.
Origin of Lazarus' name in the Gospel of John:   Asar was an alternative name for Osirus, Horus' father, who Horus raised from the dead. He was referred to as "the Asar," as a sign of respect. Translated into Hebrew, this is "El-Asar." The Romans added the prefix "us" to indicate a male name, producing "Elasarus." Over time, the "E" was dropped and "s" became "z," producing "Lazarus." 10
Transfigured: On a mountain............ On a high mountain.
Key address(es): Sermon on the Mount............ Sermon on the Mount; Sermon on the Plain.
Method of death By crucifixion.......... By crucifixion.
Accompanied by: Two thieves. ............Two thieves.
Burial In a tomb............. In a tomb.
Fate after death: Descended into Hell; resurrected after three days.......... Descended into Hell; resurrected after about 30 to 38 hours (Friday PM to presumably some time in Sunday AM) covering parts of three days.
Resurrection announced by: Women........... Women.
Future: Reign for 1,000 years in the Millennium.......... Reign for 1,000 years in the Millennium.



Comparison of some characteristics of Horus and Jesus:

Nature" Regarded as a mythical character.......... Regarded as a 1st century CE human man-god.
Main role: Savior of humanity..............  Savior of humanity.  
Status: God-man............. God-man.
Common portrayal: Virgin Isis holding the infant Horus............... Virgin Mary holding the infant Jesus.
Title: KRST, the anointed one............... Christ, the anointed one.
Other names: The good shepherd, the lamb of God, the bread of life, the son of man, the Word, the fisher, the winnower................ The good shepherd, the lamb of God, the bread of life, the son of man, the Word, the fisher, the winnower.
Zodiac sign: Associated with Pisces, the fish................... Associated with Pisces, the fish.
Main symbols: Fish, beetle, the vine, shepherd's crook................ Fish, beetle, the vine, the shepherd's crook.

After reading this, you may change your minds.

Christianity was the ultimate product of religious syncretism in the ancient world. Its emergence owed nothing to a holy carpenter. There were many Jesuses but the fable was a cultural construct. Nazareth did not exist in the 1st century AD – the area was a burial ground of rock-cut tombs. Following a star would lead you in circles. The 12 disciples are as fictitious as their master, invented to legitimise the claims of the early churches. The original Mary was not a virgin. That idea was borrowed from pagan goddesses.

Scholars have known all this for more than 200 years but priestcraft is a highly profitable business and finances an industry of deceit to keep the show on the road. "Jesus better documented than any other ancient figure" ? Don't believe a word of it. Unlike the mythical Jesus, a real historical figure like Julius Caesar has a mass of mutually supporting evidence.

It is intuitively satisfying to think that someone was behind the towering legend. Yet like the worship of Horus or Mithras a human life was neither necessary nor helpful. Nothing in the 'Christian message' was original. Brotherly love and compassion had been taught by the Stoics for centuries. The Christian faith was a vulgarised paganism, set to the theme of the Jewish prophets and debased by religious intolerance. The early Christian sects attacked each other as energetically as they attacked pagans. 1st century Palestine had rabbis, radicals and rebels in abundance. But a 'life' conjured up from mystical fantasy, a mass of borrowed quotations, copied story elements and a corpus of self-serving speculation, does not constitute an historical reality. The final defeat of militant Jewish nationalism and the eradication of the Jewish kingdom gave the incipient Christian churches the final uplift they required.

There never was just one Christianity. Out of the milieu of religiosity that infected the Roman world, dozens of competing and conflicting Jesus/Sun-god/Mystery cults emerged. The first believers in Jesus maintained he was an ethereal spirit, much like other sky/sun-gods. Only later did he acquire a human death, a human life and finally a human birth. The composite 'Jesus Christ' character – god, man, king, carpenter, conqueror, peace-maker, dispenser of justice, advocate of love – was assembled to try and unify a fragmented and fractious messianic religious movement. In the mid-2nd century the Jewishness of the faith was purged but apologists had little to say about a human Jesus. They took comfort in noting similarities between their own ideas and pagan myths. The Christians remained a minority until well after one particular faction formed a political alliance with the Roman State. The orthodox creed remained unpopular for centuries and persecution was necessary to impose its will.

Through the centuries, the Christian godman has been made and remade. Egypt provided many of the themes and much of the detail. From the age of the Ptolemies, Alexandria was the ancient cooking pot of religious fusion. Here, Hellenized Judaism influenced the early Christians. From Egypt, Catholicism copied its rituals and ceremonies, including relics, demonology, and monasticism. The Patriarchs of Alexandria wrote much of Catholic theology and it was probably in Alexandria that a profound and detailed Buddhist influence impressed itself upon the faith. From Persia, too, came a Saviour God and notions of rebirth, a Mithraic dress rehearsal for Christianity, triumphant in Rome but fatally weakened by its exclusion of women. In Judaea itself, hatred for the Roman conquerors bred a genre of apocolyptic curses, anticipating an end of the world.

The Israelites did not come from Egypt – a palpable myth – but emerged from the local population. There was no ancient 'Jewish Empire': the Jewish priests drew their inspiration from the empire of the Assyrians and "Judaism" was a reaction to the loss of the northern kingdom and an instructive period spent in Babylon. Jerusalem in 10th century BC had been barely a village of huts and cave dwellings. Kings David and Solomon are purely mythical characters – warrior/priest heroes, invented in the 6th century BC. Herod the Great was a real king – but he did not massacre any babies. He was an astute and successful ruler. The Herodians and the Jewish elite became Romanized but religious fanatics led an armed resistance which ended in catastrophies under Titus, Trajan, and Hadrian. In the aftermath, a collaborationist revision of Judaism, later attributed to a 13th apostle "Paul", allegedly of impeccable Pharisaic credentials, competed fiercely with a reconstituted rabbinic Judaism which fused piety with mercantile success.

Eye Witness Reports?  
Human ingenuity and cunning is matched by mankind's equally monumental credulity and wishful thinking.

There are actually some 200 gospels, epistles and other books concerning the life of Jesus Christ. Writing such material was a popular literary form, particularly in the 2nd century. The pious fantasies competed with Greek romantic fiction. Political considerations in the late 2nd century led to the selection of just four approved gospels and the rejection of others. After three centuries of wrangling 23 other books were accepted by the Church as divinely inspired. The rest were declared 'pious frauds'. In truth, the whole lot belongs to a genre of literary FICTION.

Would the Christians lie? They said it themselves – lying for God! And non-Christian testimony? – from the authentic pen of lying Christian scribes! Would the early believers have died for a lie? Consider the evidence for that supposed "persecution": Holy Mother Church invented heroic origins.

Laugh or cry? The pork salesman who became England's patron saint - the fabrication of "Saint George". Shrouded in deceit – Leonardo da Vinci's Last Laugh. How a sacrilegious 'sorcerer' outwitted the priests! Declared fake – Official! The "James Ossuary". How an Israeli entrepreneur outwitted the 'experts'. With multiple authors behind the original gospel story it is no surprise that the figure of "Jesus" is a mess of contradictions. Yet the story is so thinly drawn, that inventing alternative endings and conspiracy theories is a thriving industry

Church organisation, authority and membership preceded rather than followed the justifying doctrine. As the organisation and its needs changed so has the ‘Testament of God’ adapted accordingly.

A triumphant Christianity was the active agent in destroying knowledge and access to learning. An ignorant and impoverished population was more readily subjugated by Princes of the Church. "Mark" – Bringing the Celestial Superjew Down to Earth Switching the Messiah from future hope to "historic past". Copying the Competition – The Mythical "Virgin Mary". Vesta, Diana, Artemis, Isis – the pagan world knew all about virgins getting pregnant by randy gods. The Roman Church Asserts Authority – The Mythical "St Peter". How ambitious bishops in Rome laid claim to a Palestinian fantasy.  "Matthew" – A Gospel for Messianic Jews Belt and braces. Adding a "royal genealogy" and "fulfillment of prophesy". "Luke" – A Gospel for Credulous Pagans. Playing to the gallery. Absolving Rome and embellishing the "birth" and "death" scenes. "Brother James" – Radical Jew Sanitized into Pious Christian Martyr. Throwing some light on the supposed brother in the supposed ossuary. "John" – A Gospel to Silence the Gnostics Mid-2nd century: the Catholic ecclesia write a rebuttal to the rival church of Valentinus.

From religious policeman to grandee of the church, from beast fighter in Ephesus to beheading in Rome, Paul's story has more holes than a swiss cheese. A detailed study of the great missionary that some say "founded Christianity".

The trail-blazing Christian missionary and apostle, St Paul, appears nowhere in the secular histories of his age. Ironically, though supposedly in Jerusalem at the right time, he can give no witness to a historical Jesus. But was Paul himself a genuine historical figure? Viewed without the rose-tinted spectacles of Christian faith, the first voyage of Paul is as fanciful as the first voyage of Sinbad. The later Pauline journeys, including the supposed transportation of the apostle to Rome, are similarly bogus. Characterized by incongruities, contradiction, and the absurd, they are a concocted fantasy. The Pauline epistles, far from being genuine letters, originated in the acrimonious doctrinal battles of the 2nd century – a time when "pseudepigraphy" and forged apostolic writings were weapons in the war of "Christianities".  

Orchestrated by ambitious Christian clerics, a cancer of superstition, fear and brutality was imposed across Europe.

As it waited in the wings of pagan Rome, the Catholic Church was already marked by corruption, violence and sexual scandal. The fanatics of Christ proved useful to an ambitious prince who set his sights on absolute and undivided power. The Church expropriated the resources – both human and material – which might have defended Roman civilization. While an indolent army of clerics lived on the state, the impoverished legions degenerated into a peasant militia. Once a particular Christianity – hierarchical and authoritarian – became wedded to the Roman state, it became a force of brutal repression. Romano-Hellenic culture was transformed by the "Church Fathers" by bigotry, anti-Semitism, censorship and intolerance. This so-called 'orthodoxy' suppressed and persecuted its 'heretical' opposition. The barbarian tribes that overran the weakened Roman Empire were, for the most part, Christianised; the forces that opposed them, pagan.

The Christian Heaven may have been a vain folly but the Christian Hell has been real enough.

The priestly "protection racket" required the criminalizing of the whole of humanity through the doctrine of Sin. In a world run by clerical gangsters, the writ of Holy Mother Church was enforced by sadism and torture. For more than a thousand years, the henchmen of Christ inflicted a cruel barbarism on every community they encountered. Law was replaced by Divine Right, scientific method criminalized, ancient medical knowledge lost for a millennium. Women, fortunate to be domestic slaves, might find themselves in enforced celibacy, joyless marriage or burnt as a witch. Roasting heretics became popular entertainment and a religious duty.  

Raised to the status of State religion the Christian Church reigned over the destruction of civilization. As the centuries passed religious barbarism grew ever more vicious.

In their struggle for power, Christians waged their own "civil war". A Catholic trinitarian nonsense triumphed over Arianism. The intellectual centres of the empire were ruined by murder and prohibition and Europe sank into ignorance and superstition. The civilization that had stretched from the deserts of Arabia to the highlands of Scotland reverted to a primitive village subsistence. By aggressive warfare, Christianisation of the heathen tribes followed. In Spain, the German lands, Britain, and Ireland, the despots of the Church imposed their tyranny.

With a Jewish father (stern patriarch) and a Christian mother (obsession with guilt and heaven) it is not surprising that Islam grew up a bit of a tartar.

Early civilizations arose in many parts of Arabia, long before Judaism, Christianity or Islam. Islam arose as an adaptation of old ideas, not something new. Yet initially, far from imposing a severe theocracy, the early caliphs were tolerant, even urbane. Despite the mutual hostility of kindred monotheisms, Islam endorsed a great deal of Judeo-Christian theology and adopted many of its practices. In its heyday, from the Atlantic to central Asia, Islam produced scholars and refinement. Europe's recovery owed a huge debt to Islamic civilization. Battered by both East and West the enlightenment failed and theology triumphed.

Christian knights brought savagery and racism to a whole new world. When gentle Jesus arrived in England's North American colonies, a motley crew of venture capitalists, criminals and self-righteous fanatics established a precarious existence. But a stolen land, worked by an enslaved labour force, cultivating drug crops, could not fail to enrich the colonial elite. Jesus was there when the American republic built the foundations of its economy on slavery and was re-packaged into a convenience Christianity suited to dreams of vast personal wealth. Today a bunch of crooks and hucksters, womanising egotists and dangerous megalomaniacs choreograph extravaganzas of Jesus frenzy. Alarmingly, they have serious political influence and an agenda for Armageddon.  

[Dude:] "Nazareth did not exist in the 1st century AD – the area was a burial ground of rock-cut tombs."
_________________________

Duh, no!  Jesus' hometown of Nazareth is not only widely attested in the Gospels.  It was a source of ridicule by Jesus' opponents because of its small and rustic character.  If Christians wanted to invent Jesus' hometown, they would have chosen a less embarassing locale.  We have NON-CHRISTIAN Jewish sources for Nazareth's existence in the first cnentury!  For example, the priestly family named Hapizez fled there from Jerusalem after the Roman legions closed in on Jerusalem in 66 AD (Mishmaroth 18).  There are many casual references to trips to Nazareth in the first few Christian centuries.  Archaeologists have even been able to establish the village's approximate area (60 acres) and population (about 480)!   You really don't have a clue, do you?

When I agreed to engage you in this discussion, I initially assumed you had actually read at least the Gospels and the actual ancient sources relevant to its illumination.  But after reading your recent posts, I now realize the extent of your illiterate presumption and regret engaging you in this way.  I intended to playfully expand your horizons, not to humiliate you.   My God, please read any standard New Testament introduction (e. g. Raymond Brown, "An Introduction to the New Testament." It really is unseemly to dogmatically rave on as you do without having read the New Testament or the basic ancient texts that shed light on its historical background.  Do you even pretend to consider yourself  open-minded on these issues?

I have decisively refuted your pagan savior parallels in my thread and will not bother to spend the time to refute your new batch googled without acknowledgement.   You claimed to have access to the ancient texts themselves.  But you cannot quote a single text to defend this new batch.  That's because they twist the evidence and cannot be be found as such.  Prove me wrong!  In any case, my thread proves that even these would be irrelevant even if valid!  You cannot duck the hard positive evidence for Jesus' existence which I will shortly begin to provide in spades.

Don

Jesus and Christianity revealed as a mystical fact - I would say is a more appropriate title to this work  :)

Dude your research into ancient Egypt and Christianity is excellent; I am sure this will enrich your knowledge further in the afterlife.  Don your knowledge is respected and admired.  I cannot actually see where there is any point of disagreement here between your two posts and think both your understanding of Christianity and how it has evolved in the hands of mencompliment one another.

And this is my point 'in the hands of men'.  Dude everything you have written about 'against' has come about through power struggles between men using God's name as a tool to wield their thirst to gain control over people.

Imagine how God must feel about this?

This is why the Mystical fact of Christianity went underground and became secular - for the very reason of guarding the sacredness against the follies and power hunger men and organisations which use God's name for their own personal gain.

And as the Mystical facts of Christianity come to light - people associate Christianity with the History of Crime as opposed to the Invisible History.  For example; most people associate Christianity with the Roman Church and the Pope assuming this is the authority on Christianity.  No offence intended at all.  If we look at the word Religion - it means covering; religion means covering.  And we must ask ourselves what is it covering?  It is covering Christianity as a Mystical fact.  

Some organisations did not want their members to gain knowledge of higher kingdoms for fear of loosing the control they had over them.  Personal knowledge is individual empowerment.  

But we cannot today hold the past as a contention - it is not healthy and does not advance growth in evolution; besides things happen for a reason.   People learn great things while in Earth and upon translating into spirit and coming back again into Earth - they have gone through a metamorphose of personality and character through this experience.  New soil is under their feet and new understanding is in their hearts.  For this everyone must be respected.

I do think though it is incorrect to judge God upon the actions of men.  The actions of people should be the judge of the fruit reaped or not reaped through personal knowledge attained in growth and evolution.  

I also think it is sad to argue whether there is a God Christ because anyone who has felt the love of Christ will tell you it is in those quite moments of contemplation and in those moments of despair and in those moments of confusement and uncertainty when the Spirit of Christ touches the heart and says : 'Come on cheer up; I am your guide and your pillar of strength you can lean upon me for support'.  This is the Mystical fact which becomes a Joy to the heart.

Dude; your Egyptian research shows us the Golden Thread of Creation.  For God reveals himself throughout history with this assurance of stability and re-birth so we can follow this Thread with confidence in the similarities of His Divine Plan.  Yesterday, today and tomorrow is the corner stone guidance of God.

:) my offerings to the table.

[Dude:] "Nazareth did not exist in the 1st century AD – the area was a burial ground of rock-cut tombs."
_________________________

Wow!  Your New Age sources border on the psychotic!  Jesus' hometown of Nazareth is not only widely attested in the Gospels.  It was a source of ridicule by Jesus' opponents because of its small and rustic character.  If Christians wanted to invent Jesus' hometown, they would have chosen a less embarassing locale.  We have NON-CHRISTIAN Jewish sources for Nazareth's existence in the first cnentury!  For example, the priestly family named Hapizez fled there from Jerusalem after the Roman legions closed in on Jerusalem in 66 AD (Mishmaroth 18).  There are many casual references to trips to Nazareth in the first few Christian centuries.  Archaeologists have even been able to establish the village's approximate area (60 acres) and population (about 480)!

When I agreed to engage you in this discussion, I initially assumed you had actually read at least the Gospels and the actual ancient sources relevant to its illumination.  But after reading your recent posts, I now realize the extent of your illiterate presumption and regret engaging you in this way.  I intended to playfully expand your horizons, not to humiliate you.   My God, please read any standard New Testament introduction (e. g. Raymond Brown, "An Introduction to the New Testament." It really is unseemly to dogmatically rave on as you do without having read the New Testament or the basic ancient texts that shed light on its historical background.  Do you even pretend to consider yourself  open-minded on these issues?

Don
*****************
Much of what Dude is posting is not "New Age", Don. I've read
many of the same ideas in such publications as Skeptical
Inquirer (the official publication of CSICOP) and Free Inquiry.
(Not exactly magazines you'd expect find in the same house
with some hippie's collection of love beads, runestones and
healing crystals...)
Hope you don't think Dude is "possessed by Satan" or something.
(I wonder if he WAS, could he do that cool 360 degree thing
with his neck and create pea soup ex nihilo..?)
You mention OPEN-MINDEDNESS, Don. Open-mindedness is a
great thing, unless you get SO open-minded, that your brains
fall out. You ridicule "New Age" beliefs and call them psychotic.
But YOU believe:
-A man could be born from a VIRGIN, with no sperm (OOOooooh,
that must have hurt when her hymen was busted open from the
***wrong end***)...
-A man ("Lazarus") could be "raised" as an undead zombie after three
days in a tomb (complete with the expected B.O.!!!)
-For some inexplicable reason, this "perfect new "Adam", the son of "God" Himself in human flesh, this paragon of "Divine Wisdom" curses a fig tree for not having figs out of season (it is bad enough when you consider that "He" is behaving exactly like I did the time I kicked that chair (at the age of eight) after stubbing my toe on it... but since "Jesus" CREATED the fig tree to be out of season that time of year, it is DOUBLY weird and disturbing. That sounds like something Charles Manson would do - ANOTHER professed "godman", BTW...)
-And finally, JESUS himself comes a-crawlin' out of his grave after
three days also. Complete with unhealed, un-painful, non-healing bodily damage from his crucifixion... just like you'd expect a reanimated Hollywood ghoul to have
(George Romero woulda LOVED this!) in his hands and feet. If everybody REALLY believed stuff like this (but most "Christians" don't really, it is a "Sunday Truth") I'd imagine property values around graveyards would drop like a rock. (Maybe the story would have been more fun, if Jesus had "risen" with a thirst for brains...)
-The list goes on and on!!!
Heck, compared to believing in "crystal power" or what have you, being a sincere Christian requires belief in things that ordinarily would get you hauled off by men in white coats, Don. SO...
Once again, beware that glass house you're in! It's already taken a few returned hits from the very stones you're throwing. (Is that a
crack I see..?)

B-man

::)

Hi outofbodydude I have seen Jesus and felt his love.And i love him very much.

Jesus walked upon the sea,
In the land of Galilee,
His disciples watched, in silent awe,
As Jesus walked, back to the shore.

He truly is the son of God,
Whos come , to show us the way,
To Gods beautiful kingdom, up above,
Come hither, we now must pray.

To God in heavens, glorious high,
Sending to us, his beloved son,
Down to this earth, to free us of sin,
His sacred will, which will be done

Jesus said, to be at peace,
My father is there for you,
My children, who are blessed be,
For every word is true

So do not fear, and believe,
Into heaven, you will be received,
With all my heart and loving care,
I will never desert you anywhere.

My sister Deanna wrote this and i and Deanna love and beleive in the only son of God  our dear saviour Jesus.  Horus can go swivel in the daisies for all we care.

Love and God bless     Love Juditha

Your totally wrong dude JESUS DID EXIST , jesus saved us from our sins so that we may enter the kingdom of heaven with god ,i love jesus and so does my sister juditha ,i dont care what you say ,how many times you say it dude JESUS DID EXIST ,YOU WILL NEVER CONVINCE ME AND JUDITHA ANY DIFFERENT ,to say that jesus did not exist then you must be a hethen you say  the devil dont exist  dude you poor deluded fool  deanna

Myths tend to grow around historical fact; if there are myths added on to history, it does not directly contest the truth of the matter - whether or not JC walked the earth.

Man notoriously gets things wrong in communication amongst his fellow men; I posted the example of a staged incident in a college class with people remembering it diffently as an example.

Another humorous example comes from Monty Python's "The Life of Brian," a great religious satire.  Brian is mistaken for the messiah, and is running away from a mob of followers.  During his mad rush, a sandal falls to the ground.  The mob stops, and looks at the sandal.  "Behold the holy sandal of our lord!"  "What can it mean"  Then another fellow takes his own sandal off in the mob:

"Can't you see?  Our lord wishes that like him we walk without one sandal on."   They all then proceed to take off and throw away one shoe or sandal.  Humorous?  Yes.  Ridiculous?  Yes.  But myth can be created even in this satire.  Brian, the innocent taken for the messiah really did exist.  However, his followers, the "mob" began to build a myth around him and make outrageous statements/ideas that he never said or willingly did.

So I still say that the growth of any myths around JC, or parallels to other similar saviours and the like do not disprove that JC walked the earth as a man.


M

deanna wrote on Jan 9^th, 2007 at 2:37pm:

Your totally wrong dude JESUS DID EXIST , jesus saved us from our sins so that we may enter the kingdom of heaven with god ,i love jesus and so does my sister juditha ,i dont care what you say ,how many times you say it dude JESUS DID EXIST ,YOU WILL NEVER CONVINCE ME AND JUDITHA ANY DIFFERENT ,to say that jesus did not exist then you must be a hethen you say  the devil dont exist  dude you poor deluded fool  deanna

I think it is possible for us to hear each other out without taking it personally or making accusations. These kinds of discussions, due to their emotional impact on us, can cause us to take sides and create distance between us.  

However, it is also possible to look more deeply to see where we DO agree. Find the common ground.....it does exist.  My recent personal experiences lead me to believe that it can be right in front of us the entire time.

love, blink

Quote:

Much of what Dude is posting is not "New Age", Don. I've read many of the same ideas in such publications as Skeptical Inquirer (the official publication of CSICOP) and Free Inquiry. (Not exactly magazines you'd expect find in the same house with some hippie's collection of love beads, runestones and healing crystals...) Hope you don't think Dude is "possessed by Satan" or something. (I wonder if he WAS, could he do that cool 360 degree thing with his neck and create pea soup ex nihilo..?) You mention OPEN-MINDEDNESS, Don. Open-mindedness is a great thing, unless you get SO open-minded, that your brains fall out. You ridicule "New Age" beliefs and call them psychotic. But YOU believe: -A man could be born from a VIRGIN, with no sperm (OOOooooh, that must have hurt when her hymen was busted open from the ***wrong end***)... -A man ("Lazarus") could be "raised" as an undead zombie after three   days in a tomb (complete with the expected B.O.!!!) -For some inexplicable reason, this "perfect new "Adam", the son of "God" Himself in human flesh, this paragon of "Divine Wisdom" curses a fig tree for not having figs out of season (it is bad enough when you consider that "He" is behaving exactly like I did the time I kicked that chair (at the age of eight) after stubbing my toe on it... but since "Jesus" CREATED the fig tree to be out of season that time of year, it is DOUBLY weird and disturbing. That sounds like something Charles Manson would do - ANOTHER professed "godman", BTW...) -And finally, JESUS himself comes a-crawlin' out of his grave after three days also. Complete with unhealed, un-painful, non-healing bodily damage from his crucifixion... just like you'd expect a reanimated Hollywood ghoul to have (George Romero woulda LOVED this!) in his hands and feet. If everybody REALLY believed stuff like this (but most "Christians" don't really, it is a "Sunday Truth") I'd imagine property values around graveyards would drop like a rock. (Maybe the story would have been more fun, if Jesus had "risen" with a thirst for brains...) -The list goes on and on!!! Heck, compared to believing in "crystal power" or what have you, being a sincere Christian requires belief in things that ordinarily would get you hauled off by men in white coats, Don. SO... Once again, beware that glass house you're in! It's already taken a few returned hits from the very stones you're throwing. (Is that a crack I see..?)

Your dead on here Bman.  Doc says its historical facts with a lot of myths added in... then we have Berserk saying its absolutely no myths although quite clearly it is, no matter how much he attempts to hide the fact(clearly a sign of denial, when we have members here on the same side of this debate who acknowledge that myth was a strong influence, even after seeing Bererks attempts at diluting the fact.)  But wasn't the bible written less than a century after "Jesus was alive"?  That doesnt give the story much time to be passed down and for the story to be changed and for myths to be added.  In one generation, how much can a story change?  Unless it was changed on purpose?  Unless there was no ture story to change at all?  Doc, it seems like every major point of Jmans life can be traced back into ancient myths.  So tell me, what parts were real?  What parts really did happen?  Christians claim that the whole thing was the words of god.  I don't think god lies.  I think man lies.  Which is why the entire bible is lies.  Because it was a fabrication of man.

And Juditha and Deanna.. why have you resorted to insulting me?  I have not done any harm to you.  If you do not approve of the nature or subject of this debate, simply do not read it.  You can continue to believe a man was born without his mother having intercourse, that he walked on water, that he made fish appear out of nowhere, that he rose from the dead(hahahaha), that he died to save mankind, and that his similarities to ancient myths and his obvious connections to astrology mean nothing.  Good day!

" Doc, it seems like every major point of Jmans life can be traced back into ancient myths.  So tell me, what parts were real?  What parts really did happen?  Christians claim that the whole thing was the words of god.  I don't think god lies.  I think man lies.  Which is why the entire bible is lies.  Because it was a fabrication of man."

Dude pssstt......listen.......a secret for you...........we are God.  Our consciousness is part of a greater whole; the divine spark is within us.  The bible is lies?  Perhaps embellishments.  The teachings of the bible, even the NT (not my book by upbringing) of loving thy neighbor and the lord, turning the other cheek, service to others - all explorers in consciousness confirm these principles.  They resonate with the deepest truths of our "souls."    

New Agers believe we all are God in hiding.  That our memories have been wiped after reincarnation.  That we are here to learn about love.  JC, by text was God born incarnate as a man.  With the frailties of a man.  JC then is an example of someone who went through the earth school of hard knocks, preached unconditional love, experienced hardship beyond imagining, and was resurrected.  Most New Agers believe in all of this for themselves - that there will be a resurrection of spirit after they die (maybe not body and spirit).  JC then is the prototypical role model for living a just earthly life and ascending in consciousness in death.  

So be careful, you intelligent, young, OOB travelling marvel, when you speak of the bible or JC as being completely myth and lies.  There is evidence to support the general historical accounts of Jesus.  Eyewitness testimony, and then subesquent mystical experiences afterward (even by atheists such as Howard Storm's NDE) that seem to confirm that the notions of a Christ consciousness and PUL are true.  

As one who believes in the unity of all things and consciousness, who is also Jewish, I still am respectful of christianity, its basic teachings and the true message behind it.

Matthew

Let’s look at something of great importance.  When did Jesus actually live (if he did)?  If you are to believe Matthew, Jesus was born during the reign of Herod…Herod died in 4 BCE, so Jesus had to be born prior to that date…yet Luke records that he was born during the tenure of Cyrenius as governor of Syria and during the census ordered by Augustus…that would be sometime between 6 and 9 CE.  Now we have two different birth dates for this man-god, coming from supposedly inerrant scriptures.  Not only that, but Jesus was supposed to be baptized by John the Baptist.  John began his ministry in 28-29 CE (the 15th year of Tiberius) and was imprisoned by no later than 30 CE…If Matthew were right, then Jesus would have missed John by 2 to 4 years (assuming that Jesus was about 30 when he started his ministry as Luke reported).  Now if Luke is right, then in 30 CE (at the time John was imprisoned) Jesus would have only been 21-24, missing John by 6 to 9 years.  We also have the problem that John was supposed to have died before Jesus, but if Matthew is right, then Jesus would have died before John even started his ministry and if Luke is right, then Jesus would have died either at the same time as John (Josephus implies that John died around 36 CE) or a year or two after John.  Then there is the problem of Pontius Pilate, if Matthew is right, then Pontius would have just taken his position and would have all of Judea against him (including Herod Agrippa), which would have made for some dicey relations between the two groups and if Luke were correct, Jesus would have died after Pontius was relieved and sent back to Rome.  If these books were early, they would have realized this, only books written generations after the occurrences and generations after the death of the last witnesses would make such a mistake.

There is much to the Gospel story that doesn't add up even without cross-referencing it to what we know of history.

Jesus supposedly performed many obviously supernatural feats, such as healing the sick, feeding thousands with magically created food and even bringing back the dead.  These miracles were performed in front of witnesses, sometimes crowds, all of whom were (rightly) amazed.  If these stories are true, we should expect his reputation to spread like wildfire.  

The Gospels claim Jesus wasn't very famous.  Pilate, by all four accounts, had absolutely no idea who this guy was.  The Pharasie guards also apparently didn't know him, as they needed Judas to point out who to arrest.  Shouldn't such a miracle worker be identified on sight?

What about the disciples themselves?  With each miracle Jesus performed, they were amazed only to forget by the beginning of the next miracle so they might be amazed anew.  Classic case of this was Matthew chapter 14 where Jesus feeds 5000 familes with five loaves and two fish.  Then in chapter 15, Jesus feeds 4000 families with seven loaves and some fish.  Before the chapter 15 feeding, the disciples asked "Where are we to get the food?"  They'd witnessed Jesus feed more with less only a chapter previously.  Why did they ask such a stupid question?

The disciple Thomas is particularly two-dimensional.  He doubts the ressurection of Jesus after all that he'd witnessed, including the ressurection of Lazerus and the dead saints coming to life at the death of Jesus.  After traveling with a clearly divine being who performs one miracle after another, what idiot would have any doubts that this is not a normal human being?  

In Jesus' home town, people were reluctant to accept claims about his divinity.  Didn't they remember the star, the wise men, the angels singing at his birth and guiding shepherds to the scene in the manger?  

Doc,
You are totally right.  We are god.  I know this, you know this.  When I say.. the words of god... I am speaking of the god that Christians believe in.  The big bad dude up there judging us and the one who is repsonsible for our good times and bad times.  The separate entity god.  However, I know very well he is not a separate entity.  God isnt even a he.  God is us, god is everything.  I also very much agree that there are absolutely great moral teachings in the bible.  In fact, the teachings of the bible are about the only thing I do believe to be truth.  When I say lies, I am referring to the crap like Jesus making food appear, bringing people back to life, rising from the dead, things of that nature.  Basically, everything besides the teachings.  The teachings are wonderful.  But you know as well as I do how silly some of these stories are.  Just as silly as the stories of the myths of ancient times.  Because they are essentially the same stories.  Perhaps worded a little differently, which allows Berserk to dissmiss them as rubbish.  But eyewitness testimonies from 2000 years ago?  That may be the least effective, accurate, and convincing type of evidence in the history of evidence.  They make up stories in the bible, and then they make up the eyewitness testimonies after theyre finished the book of lies.  Its as simple as that.  The other types of evidence are often either found to be hoaxes or victims of interpolation.

But I agree.. there are great lessons in the bible.  Hell, they even give cooking tips!
Mark 9:50
Salt is good: but if the salt have lost his saltness, wherewith will ye season it? Have salt in yourselves, and have peace one with another.

History's Troubling Silence About Jesus  

...the surviving writings of some 35 to 40 independent observers of the first one hundred years following the alleged crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus give virtually no confirmation of Jesus' existance. These authors were respected, well-traveled, articulate, thinkers and observers, the philosophers, poets, moralists, historians of that era.

Some of the most prominent figures who make no mention of Jesus are:

Seneca, 4BCE - 65CE Rome’s most prominent writer on ethics, philosophy, morals, natural scientist who tracked eclipses & quakes; the alleged correspondence between Paul and Seneca was later exposed as fraudulent.
Pliny the Elder, 23-79 CE Natural History 37 books on natural events such as earthquakes, eclipse and healing.
Quintilian 39-96CE authored Instituio Oratio 12 books on morals and virtue.
Epictetus 55-135CE, former slave who became a recognized moralist, philosopher and wrote about the "brotherhood of man" and the importance of helping the poor and oppressed.
Martial 38-103CE Poet, wrote epic poems about human foibles and the diverse characters of Roman Empire
Juvenal, 55 - 127 CE Rome’s most powerful satirical poet, wrote about injustice and tragedy in Roman gov’t
Plutarch, 46 - 119 CE Greek, traveled Rome to Alexandria, wrote Moralia on morals and ethics.

Three Romans whose writings contain minimal reference to a Christ, Chrestos or Christians are:

Pliny the Younger, 61-113CE Governor of Bithynia In a letter in 112CE asking Emperor Trajan about prosecuting Christians who "met regularly before dawn on a fixed day to chant verses alternately amongst themselves in honor of Christ as to a god." Some eighty years after Calvary, somebody was worshiping a Christ (Hebrew equivalent for Messiah)! But, nothing is said as to whether this Christ was Jesus, a teacher and miracle working man who was crucified and resurrected in Judea or a mythic Christ of the pagan mystery religions. Even Jesus allegedly said there would be many false Christs, so Pliny’s statement lends little if any credence for Jesus of Nazareth historicity.
Suetonius, 69 - 122 CE Lives of the Emperors , a history of 11 emperors; writing in 120 about Emperor Claudius 41-54CE who "expelled from Rome the Jews who under the influence of Chrestus, did not cease to cause unrest." Who is Chrestus? No mention of Jesus. Is this Chrestus a Jewish agitator, one of many false Messiah’s or a mythic Christ? This statement proves nothing for a historical Jesus of Nazareth.
Tacitus, 56 -120 CE noted Roman historian, in his Annuals 14-68 CE Book 15, chapter 44 written about 115CE gives the first non-Christian reference to Christ as a man executed in Judea by Pontius Pilate. Tacitus states "Christus, the founder of the name, had undergone the death penalty in the reign of Tiberius, by sentence of the procurator Pontius Pilate." Scholars point out several reasons to suspect this statement was not from Tacitus or any Roman records, but instead a later insertion in Tacitus’ Annuals. #1. Pilate is referred to as "procurator" which is appropriate in Tacitus’ day, but in Pilate’s day the correct title was "prefect". #2. If Tacitus’s comment was written in the early 2nd Century, why didn’t later church fathers who all sought to find proofs for Jesus historicity such as Tertullian, Clement, Origen, even Eusebius (Father of Church History) quote Tacitus? #3 Tacitus is not quoted by any Christian writer prior to the 15th Century. This quotations inaccuracy and lack of use strongly suggest it is a later insertion.
The clear and indisputable fact is 80 to 100 years is a suspiciously long time after alleged events of such magnitude for no credible written recognition . Further, the brevity and scarceness of substantive fact in these three writings relative to the claim that this was about a miracle working Jewish Messiah named Jesus who was God in human flesh, crucified, and resurrected clearly calls into question the credibility of these writings.

Three 1st Century Jewish authors of great significance are:

Philo-Judaeus, 15 BCE - 50 CE of Alexandria, a Greek speaking Jewish theologian-philosopher, personally knew Jerusalem because of family living there. He wrote extensively on Jewish history and religion from a Greek perspective and taught the following concepts all prominent in John’s Gospel and Paul’s epistles: God and His Word are one; the Word is the first-begotten Son of God; God created the world thru His Word; God holds all things together thru His Word; the Word is the fountain of eternal life; the Word dwells in and among us; all judgment is committed to God’s Word; and the Word never changes. Philo also taught on God as Spirit, the Trinity, the virgin birth, Jews who sin will go to hell, Gentiles who come to God will be saved and go to heaven, and God is love and forgives. Yet, Philo, a Jew in nearby Alexandria, who would have been a contemporary of Jesus[/u] never once mentions anybody named Jesus[/u] nor any miracle worker being crucified and resurrected in Jerusalem, let alone an eclipse, an earthquake, or graves opening and resurrected Jewish saints walking the streets of Jerusalem. Why? Philo’s total silence about a Jesus is deafening!
Josephus, 37-103CE a Jerusalem born Pharisee, living in Rome wrote History of the Jews, 79CE and Antiquities of the Jews,93CE. Christian apologists (defenders of the faith) consider Josephus’ Jesus testimony the one sure evidence of the historicity of Jesus. This Jesus Testimony is found in Josephus’, Antiquities of the Jews. Contrary to those Christian apologists, the Jesus testimony is considered by many scholars including the Encyclopedia Britannica’s scholars as "an insertion by later Christian copyists". This Jesus testimony states "Jesus is the Christ, a doer of wonderful works, was crucified, and appeared the third day as the divine prophets foretold".
Why is this Jesus testimony considered a later insertion?
1. Josephus was a Pharisee. Only a Christian would call Jesus the Christ. Josephus would have had to renounce his pharisaical beliefs to say Jesus was the Christ. Josephus died a pharisee.
2. Josephus writing style is to write chapter upon chapter about the most insignificant people and events. The Jesus testimony consists of four sentences. Why would Josephus’ Christ (the Jewish Messiah) deserve only four sentences?
3. The paragraphs before and after the Jesus testimony describe Romans killing Jews. The paragraph following the Jesus testimony begins "About the same time another sad calamity put the Jews in disorder". Would the "sad calamity" refer to the appearing of the "doer of wonderful works" or Romans killing Jews? The Jesus Testimony clearly does not follow the preceding paragraph and characteristic of later insertions is out of context.
4. Finally, and most convincing had Josephus actually written the Jesus testimony, church fathers in the following 200 years would surely refer to it in fending off critics of Jesus’ being just another myth. But, not once does Justin, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, or Origen ever refer to Josephus’ Jesus testimony. We know Origen read Josephus because Origen’s writings criticize Josephus for attributing the destruction of Jerusalem to the killing of James. The church fathers made no reference to Josephus’ alleged Jesus testimony because it was not in Josephus’ writing.
Not only does the Jesus Testimony appear fraudulent, but Josephus’ historical accounts both contradict and omit other New Testament bible stories:
1. According to the bible John the Baptist was killed about 30 CE at the beginning of Jesus ministry. In Josephus, John the Baptist is killed by Herod when Herod is at war with King Aertus of Arabia in 34 - 37 CE.
2. Josephus makes no reference to the celebration of Pentecost in Jerusalem when allegedly devote Jews of every nation gathered and all received the Holy Spirit evidenced by speaking in new tongues; a Jewish fisherman Peter is head apostle of the new church; a fellow pharisee named Saul of Tarsus becomes the apostle Paul, or of the church’s explosive growth throughout Palestine, Alexandria, Greece, or Josephus’ city of residence Rome. Peter and Paul’s alleged martyrdoms in Rome about 60 CE is unknown to Josephus. It bears noting that Christian apologists so determined to rely on the veracity of Josephus’ Jesus testimony excuse his later oversights.
Is it probable, as the Encyclopedia Britannica asserts that Christian copyists distorted truth by inserting the Jesus testimony? Eusebius (265-339 CE), acknowledged as "Father of Church History" and known to be the emperor Constantine’s overseer of doctrine writes in his The Preparation of the Gospel published by Baker House (a Christian company)on page 619 "it will be necessary sometimes to use falsehood as a remedy for the benefit of those who require such treatment". Eusebius, one of the most influential Christians in church history, condoned fraud as a tool to promote Christianity! The probability of Constantine’s Christianity being a product of fraud is directly related to the desperate need of evidence to support the historicity of Jesus. Without Josephus’ alleged Jesus testimony there is no credible first century non-Christian evidence of a historical Jesus.
Justus of Tiberius is the third 1st Century Jewish writer. The writings of Justus of Tiberius have been lost, but Photius, the patriarch of Constantinople 878-886 CE wrote Bibleotheca in which he reviewed the writings of Justus of Tiberius. Photius records "of the advent of Christ, of the things that befell him one way or another, or of the miracles that he performed, (Justus) makes absolutely no mention". Justus’ home was Tiberius in Galilee (Jn 6:23). Justus’ writing preceded Josephus’ Antiquities of the Jews 93CE, so it is probable he lived and wrote during or immediately after the alleged era of Jesus, yet remarkably "makes absolutely no mention of him".

Rabbinic literature would logically be the one final inquiry for the historicity of Jesus of Nazareth. The Bible’s New Testament alleges Jesus is the fulfillment of Jewish prophesy for the Messiah, having been crucified on Passover Day. On that day allegedly Jerusalem had an earthquake, its temple veil was split in two, there was an eclipse of the sun, Jesus is resurrected, even resurrected Jewish saints walked the streets of Jerusalem, a few days later on the Day of Pentecost Jews gathered from every nation to witness the Holy Ghost descending with tongues of fire, and the Christian church growth exploded with both Jewish and Gentile converts, signs and miracles being unleashed in abundance. In 70 CE Jerusalem is besieged by the Roman army and Israel as a nation is destroyed and dispersed. Regardless of Rabbinic rejection of Jesus as Messiah, the historical impact of events surrounding Jesus would logically be noted in Israel’s Talmudic commentaries known as the Midrash. Jewish oral traditions and history recorded in the Midrash were updated and given final form by Rabbi Jehudah ha-Qadosh around 220 CE. Quoting Frank Zindler’s The Jesus The Jews Never Knew " Remarkably, not a single early rabbinic source so much as hints at the events of a 1st Century false Messiah, of the events alleged surrounding Jesus crucifixion and resurrection, or for that matter of anyone identifiable with the Jesus of Christianity."


The Holy Land’s historic landmarks do not confirm the historicity of Jesus of Nazareth.

Local monks, priests, and tour guides pointing Christian pilgrims (donations accepted) to the locations of events described in the Bible can hardly be considered as objective. Again quoting portions of Zindler, "Unbiased confirmation of these locations is severely lacking. Nazareth is not mentioned once in the Hebrew Old Testament. The Talmud mentions 63 Galilean towns, yet never mentions Nazareth. Josephus mentions 45 Galilean towns or villages, yet never once mentions Nazareth. Josephus does mention a Japha which is a suburb of present-day Nazareth. Lk 4:28-30 describes Nazareth having a synagogue and a "brow of a hill whereon their city was built" presumably steep enough to kill Jesus had they succeeded in throwing him over it. But, present-day Nazareth occupies a valley floor and the lower half of a hillside. There is no hill. Further, present-day Nazareth has no 1st Century synagogue ruins. Origen 182-254 CE who lived in Caesarea 30 miles from present-day Nazareth does not mention Nazareth. The first solid reference to Nazareth comes from Eusebius in the 4th Century. The best guesti-mates are that Nazareth did not come into existence until the 2nd Century. This historic evidence strongly suggests why no 1st Century non-Christian Roman, Greek, Jewish historian, or Rabbinic literature mentions a Jesus of Nazareth, i.e. there was no 1st Century Nazareth.

Time and space do not allow for discussion of other significant New Testament towns. The historical and archaeological evidence for 1st Century Capernaum (mentioned 16 times in the New Testament), Bethany, Bethpage, Bethabara, and Calvary, like Nazareth is equally unconvincing or even counter-indicative.

The mark of an objective, critical thinking mind is to seek non-biased confirmation of alleged facts. When the only available evidence of an event or product is, not only suspiciously questionable, but is what the event or product’s promoters want you to believe then "Buyer Beware". The facts are that non-Christian Jewish, Greek, and Roman writers of the decades following the alleged events of Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection are virtually silent about any person named Jesus of Nazareth. Though the fair-minded critical thinker is always willing to consider further evidence, today 2,000 years later, Christianity has no more 1st Century objective, unbiased evidence for its historicity then The Wizard of Oz, Paul Bunyan, Zeus, or any of the many mythical savior-gods of that era.

good post Doc. I always like your posts :) have we met? :D  I think we all can do our own mental explorations as well as altered state explorations into the life of J and get what we need to know from doing that. slinging his name around as well as his mother, well, c'mon, the man has already been crucified once, cut him some slack.

miracles in general happen everyday, as the real miracle is love, now you see it, now you don't. it depends if you focus your mind to see them, then they start revealing themselves, if you don't look in that direction, you won't tune into what's in front of you.

the mind is like a radio receiver. We can program it to receive. as well the brain has it's interpretor programs. DNA is a program also. any of this is changable by focusing the mind where you want to study.
first rule of the game is don't take any body's word for nothing. yet everybody wants a hero or wants to put somebody on a pedestal. it's just human nature, just as it is for the serpent to eat its own tail.

the main message of J is that he did say "I and the Father are one."

somehow we really made a mess out of that statement! to mean we said J is the only son of god. What he meant is the kingdom of heaven is within you and each of us are "son's of god."  we are one with his spirit of supremacy over this world when and if we choose to be at one with god, with all that is. all that is ..means the animal kingdom, the mother earth principle, who is a "she" by the way, as the male polarity could represent the sun. sorry, I study the male principle but haven't figured "him" out yet. I do love the warmth the sun gives me though. and I do suppose we each have both polarites within us, where the kingdom of god lays unsullied by insults we sling.

about walking on water. you can walk on water in your astral body. also some humans are now able to levitate, Chris does it right on TV. Eastern folk do it all the time. no biggee.  therefore, gravity must be a collective belief system.
belief is everything. as J said, the minute you look down to see if you're really and truly able to walk on water, what happens? you begin to sink.

same with walking on coals. and no I don't feel the urge to walk on coals, but I understand the principle, that you don't walk slowly across the coals, you run! because if you're walking slowly you're going to be having those doubt thoughts which raise the blister.
we are stepping into an age of miracles so get used to it you guys. nothing ever stays the same around here.
love, alysia

Hi dude how could you laugh at jesus he was the son of god ,he was our saviour , look you dont believe in jesus thats your right as a human being but i do and i always will and i need and want jesus in my life forever.

I have had some very bad times in my life and if it wasnt for my faith in jesus i dont know how  i would have coped .

i am a practising medium i have experienced different things to do with the afterlife so i know that their is definitley an afterlife and jesus  is a big part of it .

Jesus said whosoever believeth in me shall have everlasting life .

And i do believe satan exists as well i,ve seen evidence of this my sister and i both have ,you cant call us liars because you wasnt there ,you didnt see what we see it was definitley demonic  and i hope to never see it again in my lifetime .

We have all mostly experienced different things in our lives we are all individual PEOPLE WE ALL HAVE OUR OWN VIEWS ON THINGS ,WE ALL HAVE FREE WILL  DEANNA

Dude, Dude!

Why do you continually google material (lately replies 51, 53) from online skeptics' sites and present this material as if it represents your own thinking?  Meanwhile, you display no authentic thoughts because you have read none of the relevant primary ancient sources yourself.  This inauthenticity causes you to constantly blur the distinction between our issue (whether Jesus ecisted) and the irrlevant issue (whether there are historical flaws in biblical tradtion).  Therefore, I will be blunt in my refutation of this drivel.  Why don't you have the integrity to identify your plagiarized material and then honestly ask us to assess its merits?   That approach would have eliicited courteous replies from me.  Authentic discussion requires an admission of what you don't know from direct investigation, but would like to know through honest and open inquiry.

I note that you have not specifically addressed any of my refutations.  Nor have you responded to my challenge to quote the original ancient texts that have been so warped and misconstruded by your incompetent New Age source.  Without responding to these challenges, your case against Jesus' existence is decisevely discredited.   Stay tuned.  I will also hold you accountable point by point for your incoherent barrage of googled material.  I'm going to make a man out of you yet!   :-)

Don

Dear Don,

I can very well list the sources for the material I am presenting.  But what good will that do?  These articles that I am posting are not my original thoughts and I am not claiming them to be.  They simply are in tune with my beliefs and support my claims.  They are not coming from my mouth(or fingers), but who cares?  I did not claim to have copyright on them.  My authentic thoughts are found inbetween the long articles I post, they are there so your claim that I display no authentic thoughts is incorrect.  I am not writing a thesus, so why do you put so much importance on identifying sources and plaigarism?  How does where a piece of information comes from effect your ability to assess its merits?  I did not address your challenge to quote the original texts because I cannot. lol.  But so?  Your claim that every New Age source is incompetent and bogus is grossly untrue and biased, you say this simply because they do not agree with your beliefs, as you tend to do with everyone who is not in tune with your conservative thinking.  But I have asked you to answer many questions as well, and you have not stepped up either.  So the road goes two ways.  I am admitting that I cannot quote the ancient texts.  But why can you not address my questions?  

                                                   Love, Dude

P.S.  I was told that your girl Achariya stepped up and was willing to challenge you in a debate, and yet you backed out after your ongoing critique of her work.  What is this about?  Afraid she'd put you in your place?

Man notoriously gets things wrong in communication amongst his fellow men; I posted the example of a staged incident in a college class with people remembering it diffently as an example.

I've had several newspaper articles written about me that didn't even resemble what was said in the interviews.  And that was articles written two days after the fact, in this modern age, when any possible doubts could have been dispelled by a phone call.  I wouldn't even be impressed if the gospels could all be proven to have been written during the life of Jesus, since those very inaccurate articles were written during the life of me.  

Quote:

Jesus said whosoever believeth in me shall have everlasting life .

This quote proves just how bogus Jesus and Christianity are.  That I would not have everlasting life if I do not believe in Jesus is the most obsurd statement I have ever heard.  So your saying the 90% of humans who did not believe in Jesus have faced annahilation?  Wow.  I better get on that Christianity bandwagon.  And just think, if I held these beliefs in the early days of A.D., I would have been killed!  Alright!

I will now show all of the problems with the story of Jesus that you all know of.

Part 1: His name was Jesus Christ?

There never was a person named Jesus Christ! His first name wasn’t Jesus and his last name wasn’t Christ. Would you believe that Jesus’ real name in pre-exilic Hebrew was Yehoshua or in the Second Temple period Yeshua or Joshua? When the English rendered the Latin IESVS from the Greeks who translated the Semitic name Yeshua they came up with Jesus (Yehoshua became Yeshua became Iesous became Jesus), and that name stuck. But his real name in his own language was Yeshua, which was a very good name in the Hebrew tradition. It meant – “Yahweh (God) is savior (helper)”.

Josephus mentions more than 20 Joshuas, the most famous of whom was the “Son of Nun” (Exodus, 33:11), from the tribe of Ephraim, who was the successor to Moses as the leader of the Israelites. We remember him best as the trumpeter who blew down the walls of Jericho. What is not so well known is that Nun in Hebrew means fish, the symbol of life, especially for Galileans who lived by the Sea of Galilee. Interestingly enough, the symbol of the fish became associated with Jesus [1], as did the fact that the start of the Age of Pisces (symbolized by the fish) represented the start of the “end of times”, since Pisces was the last symbol of the Zodiac, and the start of the new age coincided with Jesus’ birth. Moreover, the symbol for “Nun” is equivalent in the Jewish gematria [2] to the number 50, which represents freedom and the fullness of life, and Nun is the fourteenth letter of the Hebrew alphabet, the number 14 symbolizing David, the King of Israel. Thus, in many ways the name Joshua was a very holy name and had many connotations that later became associated with Jesus’ life (e.g., Jesus was said to be descended from David, was said to be a “fisher of men”, preached the “end of times”, etc.).

Joshua ben Nun was not the only Joshua. Some of the other Joshuas included:

Joshua ben Stada was a Nazorean in 80 BC, who studied under a famous religious man, formed his own group, had disciples named Matthew and Thaddeus, was betrayed and killed at Passover. He came from Galilee and his mother’s name was Mary.
Joshua ben Sirach, the reputed author of the Book of Sirach (part of the Old Testament Apocrypha), who combined Jewish “wisdom” literature with Homeric-style heroes.
Joshua ben Gamala was a well known rebel and “peace activist” who was put to death during the first Jewish rebellion.
Joshua ben Ananias (Ananius) was known for prophecy (e.g., destruction of the Temple) and preached the “end of times” until his death at Roman hands in 68/69 A.D.
Joshua ben Saphat was a Galilean who led the Zealot revolt in Tiberias. Just before the city fell to Vespasian’s Legionnaires he fled north to Tarichea on the Sea of Galilee.

As far as his last name goes, in those days, people didn’t have last names. He would have been called Yeshua bar Yahosef bar Yaqub, Joshua, son of Joseph, son of Jacob. Yet many people think his last name was Christ! Not true. He was never called Jesus Christ! Jesus/Joshua was believed, by some, to be the Messiah, which in Hebrew (moschiach) means “the anointed one” [3]. The Greek word for the oil used to anoint someone is “khrisma”, and the person so anointed is “Khristos” in Greek, “Christus” in Latin, and “Christ” in English. In reality, had he been considered someone deserving of anointing, he would have been called Joshua the Anointed, or Jesus the Christ.

Many people mistakenly believe that because Jesus was the “anointed one” he was the Messiah. Not true: being anointed was not solely reserved for the Messiah. Other people who were anointed were Kings, High Priests, and prophets. Indeed, in special circumstances, sick people would be anointed to help in the healing process (James 5:14).

The person referred to as “Jesus Christ” is best understood, then, to have been “Yeshua bar Yahosef ” or “Joshua, son on Joseph, son of Jacob” or “Joshua the Anointed One”. No one ever called him Jesus Christ!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] The fish was also one of the symbol for Horus, a precursor to Jesus, who was also known as a “fisher of men” (Harpur, 2004).

[2] The numerology of the Hebrew language, that involves translating Hebrew characters into numbers, then seeking the meaning of the numbers.

[3] The Hebrew word, in turn, was derived from the Egyptian word messeh, the “holy crocodile”, which referred to the practice of the Pharaoh’s sister-brides anointing their husbands with the fat of the crocodile. Interestingly enough, it’s a woman (with the alabaster jar) who anoints Jesus during his fatal trip to Jerusalem (Mark 14:3). Later Gospels changed this event to hide the fact that a woman anointed Jesus, since this action implied that a woman was a priest, which was anathema to the later Gospel writers who had a definite masculine prejudice.

Part 2: Jesus was born in Bethlehem?

The Gospel of Mark tells us nothing about Jesus’ birth. It begins with his baptism and then concentrates on the last week of his life. The likely reason for this omission was that devout followers of what was to become Christianity firmly believed that they lived in the “end of times” and that the end of the world was imminent. With civilization in the balance, what mattered was what Jesus said and did, not his biographical information. Thus, the Gospel of Mark hits the ground running, with Jesus’ baptism and the heavenly pronouncement that he was God’s “beloved son”.[1] But one problem with Mark’s language is that it implied that Jesus set out on his messianic journey only as a result of heavenly insights during his baptism. Many early Christians held to the position that Jesus was born to be a Messiah, so Mark’s position needed to be changed to coincide with the prevailing wisdom. Hence, some time later, both Luke (2:4-7) and Matthew (2:1) spent substantial time clarifying Jesus’ birth and his in vitro messianic future.

Both Matthew and Luke claim that Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea (there was another Bethlehem in Galilee), but Matthew claims the family lived there while Luke claims they made the trip from Nazareth to participate in a census. The first census in Israel was in A.D. 6-7 [2], so it makes no sense to say that Joseph and Mary traveled to Bethlehem in response to a census in 6 to 7 B.C, when the first census was more than a decade later. In fact, it makes no sense that Joseph would travel to Bethlehem at all because the census was based on the person’s residence, not his birthplace (Craveri, 1967; Perkins, 1988). Moreover, his wife was pregnant, and the journey from Galilee to Bethlehem is about 75 miles, which, in those days, would have taken a week or more. The journey would have been perilous, not only because of its length and the difficult terrain, but also because of the presence of thieves. Duquesne (1994) notes: “… travelers had also to make their way across dry, rocky, tortured country, riddled with caves which served as hide-outs for the bandits who terrorized the roads (p.11).” And in any event, even if Joseph went, he would not have been required to bring his pregnant wife, as only men were required to register (Perkins, 1988).

Indeed, the only reason to have Joseph and Mary travel to Bethlehem is to have Jesus fulfill the Old Testament prophecies that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem:

“But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, the least of the clans of Judah, out of you will be born for me the one who is to rule over Israel” (Micah 5:2)

“I am sending you to Jesse of Bethlehem, for I have chosen myself a king among his sons.”  (1 Samuel 16:1)

In other words, there was no evidence that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, but his “history” was made to fit into the prophecies of the Old Testament. But these prophesies referred to a person, not a place.

A careful reading of the Gospel of John shows that Jesus was not born in Bethlehem. During the Festival of Booths, as Jesus was recruiting new followers, the crowd questioned his credentials. One asked: “How does this man have such learning, when he has never been taught?” (7:15) and Jesus replied in an extended passage to the effect that what he was teaching came from God. But when others asked: “Surely the Messiah does not come from Galilee [3], does he? Has not the scripture said that the Messiah is descended from David and comes from Bethlehem, the village where David lived?” (7: 41-42). To this question, Jesus offered no reply. Given his penchant to reply to even the most oblique questions, his omission here was telling. Had he been born in Bethlehem, Jesus probably would have said something, but he doesn’t [4]. In addition, Jesus is never referred to as “Jesus of Bethlehem”, but only as “Jesus the Nazarene”. Had he been born in Bethlehem, and given the Old Testament prophecies, surely he would have been known by the name “Jesus of Bethlehem”.

While Jesus does not specifically deny that he comes from Bethlehem, he does specifically deny that he is the “Son of David”, which is the entire basis for placing his birth in Bethlehem [5]. Jesus says: “How can the Scribes say that the Messiah is the son of David?…David himself calls him Lord, so how can he be his son?” (Mark 12: 35-37; Matthew 22:45). In other words, if the Messiah was alive when David was alive, it was impossible for him to be David’s son.

In summary, Jesus was probably born in Galilee (possibly in the village of Bethlehem in Galilee). The two Gospels that claim he was born in Bethlehem of Judea have an agenda of proving that Jesus fulfilled the Old Testament prophecies, and for that reason, they misshape the truth to place him there. Jesus himself never claimed to have been born in Bethlehem, even when he was being taunted to so declare. And there is no reason to believe that he was born there
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] Starting a biography at adulthood is not an exception, however. Res Gestae Divi Augusti (Achievements of the Divine Augustus) begins with Augustus (future Roman Emperor and declared God) at age 19.

[2] Schonfield, 1974, p.49

[3] This comment has a deeper meaning. To 1st Century Jews, the word Galilean was synonymous with being a zealot (Bultmann, 1925).

[4] One author (Wilson, 1992) interprets this verse as follows: “…the Fourth Gospel very specifically states that Jesus was not born in Bethlehem.” (p. 75)

[5] Indeed, this denial of Davidic descent is a major bone of contention between Mark and the later Gospels. It would appear that for Mark Jesus is neither the Messiah from birth nor the Messiah from the line of David.

Part 3: Jesus lived in Nazareth?

FROM SCHOLARS :
"If our reasoning is correct, they [ the Essenes] were not left out [of the Gospels], but appeared under the name nazoraioi, a word which has been mistakenly assumed to refer to the little town of Nazareth in Galilee (and never mentioned in the Old Testament)...Accordingly, ' Jesus of Nazareth' would be a mistranslation of 'Jesus the Nazorean' or grecicised, Jesus the Essene." (Ellegard, 1999, p. 241)

"For Christians brought up on the gospel stories, it might seem obvious that 'Nazarene' should mean 'of Nazareth'. Yet this is not necessarily the case. Although modern NT translations repeated references to 'Jesus of Nazareth', 'Jesus the Nazarene' is the more common form of words in the original Greek version. And one problem rarely appreciated by Christians is that, according to one school of thought, Nazareth may not have even existed in the first century AD." (Wilson, 1984, p. 67)

"There is no such place as Nazareth in the Old Testament or in Josephus' works, or on early maps of the Holy Land." (Holley, 1994, p. 190)

"...[people in Nazareth were] living in wretched caves...from about 900 BC to about 600 AD." (Keller, 1980, p. 337)

"...architectural elements and decorations suppose the construction of a "public" building...a church-synagogue.....before the Council of Ephesus (431)" (Bagatti, 1955)

"We cannot be totally sure that Jesus ever lived in the very tiny Galilean village of Nazarus, for the gospel reference to this may derive from the authors' mistaking the description Jesus the Nazarene for a reference to Nazareth." (Wilson, 1999, p. 217)

"To associate a Nazarite with the town of Nazareth was the kind of data a scribe, trained in the tradition of midrash, would employ" (Spong, 1992, p. 96)

"...none of the ceramic material accompanying them...suggests a date earlier than the third or fourth century. Even if it were a synagogue, it could not have been from the time of Jesus but centuries later...(Crossan & Reed, 2001, p. 25)."

"[the population of Nazare that the time of Jesus] lived in hovels and simple peasant houses (Crossan & Reed, 2001, p. 32)."

"The prophecy [that Jesus is a Nazarene from Nazareth] is based on Matthew's total misunderstanding of a passage from Isaiah (11:1), where the Messiah is called a nezer (branch); in other words, a branch from Jesse's (father of David) "stump". Matthew reads into "nezer" the city of Nazareth... (Ranke-Heinemann, 1994, p. 22)."

"...six oil lamps were discovered in a Nazareth tomb, and have been used in the scholarly literature as proof of a village at Nazareth in Hellenistic times, as early as III BCE. In fact, the six lamps date from the Middle Roman to the Late Roman periods, long after the time of Christ. Gross misdatings of the primary evidence, sometimes involving discrepancies of up to 500 years, are frequently encountered in the Nazareth literature (Salm, 2006, Chapter 3)."

THE REALITY  
Most people believe Jesus was raised in Nazareth. Speaking of Joseph, the Gospel of Matthew (2:23) says:  “he made his home in a town called Nazareth, so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be fulfilled, ‘He will be called a Nazorean.’” A careful reading of this passage reveals that the writers of Matthew are trying to fulfill the prophecy, not Jesus, and in order to fulfill the prophecy that “He will be called a Nazorean”, Matthew gives his hometown as Nazareth.  But in fact, there is no Old Testament prophecy to the effect that a Messiah will come from a place called Nazareth (which is another in the long list of errors that the writers of the Gospel of Matthew made about Old Testament prophecies). The closest we come to any such description is a passage in Judges (13:5) where Samson’s mother is warned: “…the child shall be a Nazarite [nazirarios in Greek, nazir in Hebrew] unto God from the womb, and he shall begin to deliver Israel; out of the hand of the Philistines.” The words Iesou Nazarene (Nazareneus) refer to the fact that Jesus was a Nazarene (or Nazarean), not to the fact that he came from Nazareth. To indicate that Jesus came from a place called Nazareth, the correct wording would have been Nazarethenos or Nazarethaios.

Thus, the idea that Jesus came from Nazareth is a result of a mis-translation of the Old Testament by the writers of Matthew.

From another point of view, there is a wealth of evidence that Nazareth did not even exist at the time of Jesus as it is described in the New Testament. It may have been a tiny spot where transient Arabs established tent cities or where people lived in "wretched caves", but it certainly wasn't a town that supported a sizable population and a synagogue. Cross and Reed (2001) claimed its inhabitants "lived in hovels and simple peasant houses (p. 32)." Keller (1988) calls them "cave dwellers".  In support of this, Nazareth is never mentioned in the Old Testament, or in the works of Jewish historian Josephus nor in any of the Epistles, nor in the Talmud [1]. Nor was there a major road in that area at that time (Sanders, p. 104). In fact, from the archeological evidence available to date (Crosson & Reed, 2001), the town of Nazareth was created after the time of Jesus, partly as a result of a mis-translation. One scholar (Gardner, 2004) dates it from 60 A.D. and Crosson (1991) from 70 A.D. Finegan (1969) provides a thorough discussion of the archeological evidence, and offers the belief that Nazareth existed at the time of Jesus (largely because of the number of graves), yet the earliest date he can muster is after the destruction of the Temple in 70 A.D., more than 30 years after Jesus’ death.

Some scholars have argued that any synagogue that might have existed in Nazareth was destroyed and hence no trace can be found. Yet 1st Century synagogues have been found in a number of Galilean cities (Masada, Gamla, Capernaum), and there are no records of any mass destructions taking place in Nazareth that would have obliterated a synagogue if it existed.

Some scholars have argued that for 1st Century Jews, a synagogue could simply be the place where 10 men gathered to pray. In this case, a house temporarily becomes a "synagogue" for religious purposes. And this house/synagogue would not have lasted very long. While this practice did occur, a study of the language used in the gospels shows that the word synagogue, used only 43 times, is used to describe separate buildings in Capernaum (Mark 1:21; Luke 7:5; John 6:69), Jerusalem (John 9:22; 12:42; 18:20), or Gadarenes (Mark 5:22; Luke 8:4). So when the word is applied to the synagogue in Jesus' hometown, we should assume it too was a separate structure. Moreover, the synagogue in Jesus' hometown is referred to as a synagogue without any reference to the "sabbath day". Thus, while a home might become a synagogue on the sabbath day for religious purposes, to otherwise refer to the synagogue (Matthew 13:54) implies a seperate structure. Thus, the linguistic analysis leads us to believe that Jesus' hometown had a synagogue, and as far as we know from the archeological evidence, no such place existed in Nazareth.

If Nazareth didn’t exist as the town described in the gospels, and if the only connection between Jesus and Nazareth was a false translation, where might Jesus have called home? A careful reading of the Gospel of Mark indicates that Jesus’ hometown was Capernaunm [2], not Nazareth. He notes “When he returned to Capernaum after some days, it was reported that he was at home…” (2:1). Later the Gospel says that “He left that place and came to his hometown, and his disciples followed him. On the sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue…” (6:1). Given that Nazareth, if it existed at all, was too small to host a synagogue, how could Nazareth have been his hometown? Capernaum, on the other hand, had a “sizable synagogue” (Asimov p. 820; Sanders, p. 103), and there is some archeological evidence for that fact (Loffreda, 1985; Wilson, 1992).

Returning to the issue of Jesus the Nazarene, raised by Matthew’s mistaken attribution, is it possible that Jesus was a Nazarene? A Nazarene was someone who lived an ascetic life, known as much for what they did (a lot of praying) as for what they didn’t do (eat animals, sacrifice animals, shave, cut their hair, drink fermented beverages). Nazarenes were originally called Nazorenes, and they were a prominent sect in northern Palestine, and according to Epipanius, were also known as Mandaeans. They derived their name from the word “Nasrani” which referred to a school of small fish. The metaphor to the early Christians is obvious, as is their early symbol, the fish. Famous examples of Nazarenes included John the Baptist, the warrior Samson and the prophet Samuel. It is also likely that Jesus’ brother, Jacob (James) the Just, was a Nazarene. All things considered, Jesus life shared many of the characteristics of a Nazarene, and two of the most prominent people in his life, John the Baptist and his brother James, also were Nazarenes. Yet his proclivity for fermented beverages indicates that if he was a Nazarene, he was a poor one.

Some authors treat the word Nazarene and Nazarite (also Nazirite) as if they are the same word; they certainly look the same in English. However, the word Nazarite (nazir in Hebrew, meaning consecrated or separated) refers to a type of short-term vow (30 to 100 days), usually made to God to achieve a specific purpose, and then discontinued when the goal had been achieved (e.g., I promise not to drink alcohol if I get a new car for Christmas). Nazarite vows are described in Numbers (6: 1-21) and usually involve abstaining from wine, vinegar, grapes, raisins, contact with dead bodies, and cutting the hair on your head. Many people took Nazarite vows, including Samson (Judges 13:5), the prophet Samuel (1 Samuel 1:1), the apostle Paul (Acts 21:20-24), John the Baptist (Luke: 1:15), and others.

The bottom line, therefore, is that we have no idea where Jesus grew up, but we can be reasonably certain that he grew up in the countryside, and not in the city, because Jesus used the language of the villages. When Jesus answered questions or when he used parables, almost all his examples came from the simple life of peasants and villagers. For example, he talked about women making bread, men planting trees, people working in the vineyards, etc. Almost all of his talk about wealth was derisive, as was his attitude toward those who promoted themselves and tried to set themselves above others.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] Josephus mentions 45 Galilean towns, the Talmud lists 63 Galilean towns, but neither mentions Nazareth.

[2] Indeed, Jesus rarely addresses citizenry, but when he does, Capernaum is mentioned (Matthew 11:23) but never Nazareth. Other cities he mentions include Tyre, Sidon, Chorazin and Bethsaida (Luke 10:13)

Part 4:  Mary was a Virgin?  

FROM SCHOLARS:  
"What escapes them [rationalists] is that the virginity of Mary is a religious belief, not a historical fact..." (Craveri, 1967, p. 25)

"There was nothing peculiar about the birth of Jesus. He was not God incarnate and no Virgin Mother bore him. The Church in its ancient zeal fathered a myth and became bound to it." (Schonfield, 1965, p. 50)

"One of the strongest arguments against the authenticity of the virgin birth is that apart from Matthew and Luke the New Testament never refers to it." (Porter, 2004, p. 69)

“According to the faith of the Church, the Sonship of Jesus does not rest on the fact that Jesus had no human father: the doctrine of Jesus’ divinity would not be affected if Jesus had been the product of a normal human marriage…” (Pope Benedict, 1969, 274-275)

THE REALITY  
Everyone is familiar with the story of the “virgin birth”, but what is not so familiar is the fact that only in the Gospels of Luke and Matthew is the virgin birth postulated. Neither Mark nor John makes any mention of it at all, nor is it referenced in the rest of the New Testament. In addition, apart from its mention at the start of Luke and Matthew, Jesus’ virgin birth plays no part in his subsequent life. It is never mentioned by anyone, even though one can imagine that it would have enhanced his image and added support to the theory that he was a Messiah. Indeed, the story of the virgin birth appears as an isolated entry in both Gospels, important unto itself, but then neglected and forgotten.

There are several issues related to Mary. Was Jesus’ birth a “virgin” birth? Or is it his conception that is virginal? Was Mary a “perpetual” virgin? Let’s look at all these issues.

The so-called “virgin birth” is best described as a “virginal conception”, for It’s the conception that supposedly occurs without sexual contact, not the actual birth [1]. In any event, virgin conceptions or births are not common today, but in ancient times, especially among the famous, they were not unknown. Famous children born of a virgin include: Buddha (China), Krishna (India), Zoroaster (Persia), Adonis (Babylon), and Mithra (Syria). Among the Greeks it was even more common. For example, Alexander the Great was believed to have been conceived from a celestial thunderbolt, or to have been the result of a union between Philip’s wife Olympias and the God Jupiter who took the form of a serpent. Perseus, the Greek hero who decapitated Medusa, was born of a virgin named Danae, by the God Zeus who came to her in a golden shower [2].  Even Plato was said to be born of the union of a virgin (Amphictione) and a God (Apollo), and only after his birth did Ariston, Amphictione’s husband, have sex with her. More relevant to Jesus’ time, Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, were born of a Vestal Virgin whose father was the God of War, Mars. The Roman emperor Octavian was born from the union of his mother, Atia, and the God Apollo. The Egyptian goddess Isis gave birth to Horus despite the fact that her husband, Osiris had his phallus cut off by his brother Seth[3]. Thus, virgin conceptions were quite popular at the time, although this was only in “pagan” worlds, not in the Jewish world.  

The choice to give Jesus a “virgin birth” like many of the rich and famous of his time appears to be more of a marketing ploy than a historical fact. Not only did it serve the purpose of competing with contemporaneous cults, but also the virgin birth was another in the line of prophesies (e.g., born in Bethlehem, descended from David) which Jesus was said to fulfill. In this case, the prophecy was from Isaiah (7:14) – “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Emmanuel.” [4] Unfortunately there was a mis-translation here (as in so many other places) and the original Hebrew word almah [5] ( young girl or young woman) had been mistakenly translated into the Greek parthenos (virgin) [6], so that the original prophesy did not, in fact, call for a virgin to conceive, but simply for a young woman to conceive [7]. Moreover, Isaiah was talking about an Eighth Century B.C. sign that would appear to King Ahaz during his reign. Thus, the prophecy was not only the result of an error in translation, it was also 800 years too late.

Even if the translation were correct, which it wasn’t, the use of the word “virgin” within the context of Essene marriages had a different meaning than it does today. In those days, the elite of the Essene who were allowed to procreate (this included descendants of the King David and the High Priest Zadok) went through an elaborate procedure to insure that they kept to strict purity laws even while fulfilling their marital obligations. Gardner (2001) describes it as follows:

“Three months after a betrothal ceremony, a ‘First’ Marriage’ was formalized to begin in the espousal month of September. Physical relations were allowed after that, but only in the first half of December. This was to ensure that any resultant Messianic birth occurred in the Atonement month of September. If the bride did not conceive, intimate relations were suspended until the next December [8], and so on. Once a probationary wife had conceived, a ‘Second Marriage’ was performed to legalize the wedlock. However, the bride was still regarded as an almah (young woman) until the completion of the Second Marriage which, as qualified by Flavius Josephus, was never celebrated until she was three months pregnant.” (pp. 30-31)

The exact quote from Josephus (Wars 2), on which Gardner (and Theiring) base their assessment is:

"Moreover, there is another order of Essenes, who agree with the rest as to their way of living, and customs, and laws, but differ from them in the point of marriage, as thinking that by not marrying they cut off the principal part of human life, which is the prospect of succession; nay, rather, that if all men should be of the same opinion, the whole race of mankind would fail. However, they try their spouses for three years; and if they find that they have their natural purgations thrice, as trials that they are likely to be fruitful, they then actually marry them. But they do not use to accompany with their wives when they are with child, as a demonstration that they do not many out of regard to pleasure, but for the sake of posterity."

In the event that a woman became pregnant before the first marriage, it was said that “a Virgin had conceived”, meant as a play on words since the young woman was still legally (if not biologically) a virgin. This early pregnancy may account for the rumors, reflected in The Gospel of the Hebrews, that Jesus was in Mary’s womb for only seven [9] months. In other words, instead of being born in September as would be expected (9 months after impregnation in December), Jesus was born around July, meaning that Joseph and Mary had sex in October, when she was technically a virgin [10].

Joseph was an elite member of the Essene and Mary, chosen as his wife, was similarly highly esteemed and had been the equivalent of a nun [11] within the Essene circles [12]. These women were referred to as “virgins” in much the same way as the Greeks and Romans referred to “vestal virgins”. Thus, for Mary to conceive during this engagement period would mean that, Mary, a virgin (aka a nun) had conceived which she was still a virgin (aka during the engagement period). There was nothing supernatural about this at all. But there was a danger that the future husband could avoid the marriage, and the child, as a result, would be considered illegitimate. For a future king of the New Israel, the status as an illegitimate child could be problematic, hence the advice to Joseph from a senior member of the Essene (hence an “angel” which along with “saint” was a synonym) to go through with the first marriage as if it were the second marriage (the second marriage being one in which the woman was already pregnant) [13]. Years later, after Jesus’ death, the ascension of Jacob (aka James), Jesus’ brother and the unquestionably legitimate son of Joseph and Mary, was unchallenged.

The fact that the “virgin” birth as described above was not supernatural at all explains why there is no mention of Jesus’ birth throughout the Gospels (except the start of Luke and Matthew). Had it been supernatural or divine, the story would have followed Jesus around and been repeated. The fact that we don’t find it in the Gospels or anywhere else in the New Testament confirms that we are not dealing with anything out of the ordinary.

As indicated earlier, only Matthew and Luke postulated a virgin conception. The Gospel of John has the disciple Philip say that Jesus is the “son of Joseph” (1:45).  Paul, describing Jesus’ birth, says that “God sent his Son, born of a woman” (Galatians 4:4), using the word gune (woman) rather than parthenos (virgin).  In Romans, Paul specifically states that Jesus came “from the seed of David, according to the flesh.” (1:3) Surely Paul, the Christian master of marketing, writing before even Mark, would have promoted Jesus’ virgin birth if it had been the case.

Jesus’ natural conception is not only supported by the Gospel of John and Paul’s letters, but also the works of Cerinthus (c 100 A.D.) and Marcion (c 160 A.D.).  In addition, Jesus’ natural conception is a basic tenet of the Ebionites (“poor ones”), who were the Jerusalem based Jewish sect that emerged following Jesus’ death. James the Just, Jesus’ brother, was the head of this sect until his death, and leadership was then passed on to his brothers and then nephews. If anyone should know the true story of Jesus’ conception and birth, it would be these people. Though little survives of their texts, since they valued the oral tradition over the written one, we have extensive quotations from early Christian leaders (Irenaeus of Lyon, Eusebius of Caesarea) who complained about the Ebionites failure to believe in the virgin birth:

“Their interpretation is false, who dare to explain the Scripture thus: Behold a girl (instead of a virgin) shall conceive and bear a son. This is how the Ebionites say that Jesus is Joseph’s natural son. In saying this they destroy God’s tremendous plan for salvation…” (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, III 21.1)

“Those who belong to the heresy of the Ebionites affirm that Christ was born of Joseph and Mary and suppose him to be a mere man.” (Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, XI, 17)

Thus, the sect that was founded by and led by Jesus and his family specifically argued against the virgin conception.

There is another problem with the idea of a virginal conception, and this problem occupied tens of thousands of hours of debate among Christian theologians, even to this date. If the Messiah was to be of the line of David – and Joseph was said to be of David’s line – but if Jesus was conceived by the Holy Ghost, ipso facto, Jesus would not be of the line of David, and hence, not a true Messiah. Proponents of the orthodox view claim that by marrying Mary, Joseph “adopted” Jesus and thus the child was entitled, by law, to be considered Joseph’s son. While this is true in the strict sense, It’s obvious that for the purposes of the Old Testament, the kinship was meant to be biological, not legal.

A final problem with the idea of the virgin birth/conception is that following the birth, as described in Luke (2:22), Mary undergoes the ritual purification ceremony. Had Jesus’ birth been virginal, there would be no need for Mary to be purified. Indeed, as the virgin bride of God, the thought of purification would be anathema.

In summary, the original idea of the “virgin birth” came from a mistranslation of an Old Testament prophecy, and all the supporting evidence (e.g., Mary’s ritual purification following the birth, Jesus’ descent from David through Joseph, the testimony of the Ebionites, etc.) point to a normal birth. Lest the extremely orthodox take offence at this conclusion, we can note the following comment by Pope Benedict XVI:

“According to the faith of the Church, the Sonship of Jesus does not rest on the fact that Jesus had no human father: the doctrine of Jesus’ divinity would not be affected if Jesus had been the product of a normal human marriage…” (1969, 274-275)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] In the Protoevangelium of James, Mary is said to have an actual virgin birth, in which the baby Jesus is born without any change to Mary’s body. This miracle is tested by a friend of the midwife, Salome, who reaches in and certifies that Mary’s hymen is still intact, whereupon God withers her hand for having doubted.

[2] Curiously enough, the Rabbi Trypho writing in 155 to St. Justin in Rome in the 2nd Century, said: You should blush at telling the same stories as [the Greeks]…If you do not want people to say you are as mad as the Greeks, you must stop speaking [about the virgin birth].”

[3] One can easily see that the images of Isis suckling Horus are the prototypes for the Mary/Jesus art that followed.

[4] If we continue to the next verse we can see that this quote has nothing to do with Jesus. It reads – “Butter and honey shall he eat…” As far as we know, this was not Jesus’ diet, although it does resemble the diet of John the Baptist.

[5] The Hebrew word for virgin was bethula, not almah.

[6] The word originates from Parthenis, a Greek virgin who had sex with the God Apollo, giving birth to Pythagoras (ca 569 – 475 B.C.). Some authors believe that the use of the word here is a play on the word “Panthera” which was one of the names of the Roman soldier believed to been the biological father of Jesus (Yeshu, 2006)

[7] Of course, looking at that quote from Isaiah, one has to wonder why they called him Jesus and not Emmanuel, which was required to fulfill the prophecy?

[8] The December mating was meant to mimic the planting of the wheat in December, wheat being the main crop in Israel.

[9] Dionysus was also said to have been born after 7 months. The number 7 was sacred not only to the Jews, but even earlier, to the Pythagoreans, who considered 7 the number of the virgin, because it was the only one of the prime numbers (1 – 10) which could not be divided evenly into 360 (the number of degrees in a circle). Thus, the rumor that Jesus was born at 7 months may not be entirely accurate, and may be another example of the symbolism replete in the Bible. It may be true, however, that he was born earlier than expected (i.e., prior to September).

[10] Having sex prior to the specific time “…was not regarded as a serious sin in Jewish society.” (Harvey, 1970, p.19). In fact, it was commonplace among the Jews (Craveri, 1967, p. 17); more so in Judea; less common in Galilee (Spoto, 1998, p. 20)

[11] The name Mary was synonymous with “Sister”. This practice is continued even today among various sects.

[12] Note the comment in Josephus about Essene couples not having sex after the woman was pregnant matches the passage in Matthew (1:25) that Joseph and Mary refrained from sex until after Jesus was born.

[13] Thiering, 1992, pp. 44-46.

Part 5: Jesus was nailed to the cross?

CHURCH POSITION  
“Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe." (Gospel of John, 20:25)

"And then they drew the nails from the hands of the Lord and laid him on the earth. And the whole earth shook and there came a great fear. Then the sun shone again..." (Gospel of Peter, 6:20)

SCHOLARS  
“it was normal Roman practice to bind the convict to the cross by ropes, not to nail him to it.” (Cohn, 1963, p. 219)

"These obiter dicta by Justin, Tertullian, and Origen set the mold for Western artists to portray Jesus nailed to the cross instead of bound to it." (Dimont, 1991, p. 122)

"...of the three oldest representations of the crucifixion...one, a brown jasper...shows Jesus hung by his wrists from the cross...These triats correspond to Roman practice..." (Morton Smith, 1978, p. 61)

THE REALITY  
Tradition says that Jesus was crucified by driving nails into his hands and feet. Jesus’ legs weren’t broken, as were the legs of his unfortunate companions, probably because of the long-standing belief that resurrection was only possible for someone whose bones had not been broken. Jesus was not left on the cross, but taken down after a few hours.

To consider the evidence, we have to examine a number of issues: (1) Did the normal mode of crucifixion involve nailing hands and feet? (2) Is it possible to secure someone to a cross by driving nails through their hands? (3) If not through their hands, through their wrists or forearms? (4) And how likely is it that Jesus was treated in this way?

Overview of Crucifixion

According to Cicero (106-43 B.C.), crucifixion was “the worst and cruelest” form of torture (Contra Verres, II, 5-14).  It was intended to inflict pain as well as serve as a deterrent to others, and hence was usually carried out in a public place. The victim was attached to two pieces of wood (usually shaped in a T, called a tau or Saint Anthony’s cross), by nails or ropes [1], and left to hang. Death was by suffocation, which could be delayed by pressing one’s feet against a titled ledge (sedula in Latin, pegma in Greek) midway down the post, if available.  If the victim survived too long, their legs were broken, preventing them from pressing their feet for support, and rushing on the eventual suffocation. However, this was rarely done since the idea was to extend the punishment as long as possible, not only for the sake of the pain, for also the public deterrent. Typically, victims were left on the cross as food for wild beasts and birds of prey (Hengel, 1977), so the cross was just high enough off the ground to let animals feed; and typically “the agony of the crucified never ended in less than two days (Craveri, 1967, p. 418).”

Did the normal mode of crucifixion involve nailing through the hands and feet?

To determine the “normal mode” we can look at three sources of information: anthropological, graphic, and textual. Anthropological is obviously the most powerful form, for no matter what pictures we have and no matter what the texts tell us, nothing is as persuasive as a good corpse.

Anthropological: We have only one corpse from this era who shows the effects of crucifixion. He was 1 of 35 individuals discovered in 1968 at Giv’at ha Mivtar, in northeastern Jerusalem. The adult male had been 5’5” tall. His arms had been hung to the cross, not nailed, and his feet had been crossed and nailed to a small olive wood plaque set behind his heel. His legs had not been broken. So, the anthropological evidence suggests tying the hands but nailing the feet.

Graphic: The earliest artifacts show people being hung from the cross, not nailed. Sometimes their feet were nailed, sometimes not. A brown jasper gem, dated from 200 A.D., shows the victim hung by his wrists. Neither his hands nor his feet were nailed. An equally ancient artifact, scribbled on the walls of the Imperial Palace in Palatine Hill in Rome between 193 and 235 A.D., shows a crucified figure also hung, not nailed (Morton, 1977). A ring seal amulet dating from the Third Century depicting Dionysus crucified also omits any signs of being nailed (Freke & Gandy, 1999). So graphic evidence from the earliest artifacts supports the anthropological evidence.

Textual: There is very little textual evidence for the method of affixing people to crosses. Most accounts  simply state that people were crucified without mentioning exactly how, although Josephus in the Jewish Wars (V) specifically says that they were nailed. However, he was writing about events in 70 C.E., and the situation involved the mass execution of thousands of Jews. Moreover, the avowed goal of crucifixion was to provide an extended death, not only as a punishment but also for the purposes of demonstrating to the public. From that perspective, a long slow death was preferred, and this suggests tying, not nailing, since nailing a person to the cross could bring on sudden death from severing an artery.

Look at this description from the martyrdom of Andrew as described in this 2nd Century text:

"...Then he sent him [Andrew] off to be crucified and commanded the executioners not to impale him with nails but to stretch him out tied up with ropes [and] to leave his knees uncut, supposing that by doing so he would punish Andrew more severely... (Acts of Andrew, 51.1)."

In summary, while textual evidence suggests that nails were used (at least with regard to mass executions), based on the only corpse ever found and all the earliest graphic evidence, it appears that, in general, individuals were crucified by being tied, not nailed to the cross. Surely some people were nailed, and especially in the case of mass crucifixions or when a rapid death was desirable, but it’s impossible to know what proportion were nailed vs. what proportion were tied. It seems most likely that individuals were tied, not only because this is supported by the anthropological and graphic evidence, but also because it holds true to one of the main goals of crucifixion – a long and painful death.

Is it Possible to Secure Someone to a Cross by Driving Nails Through their Hands?

While it was not uncommon for someone to be nailed to the cross, nailing through the hands was rarely done because the composition of the hands was not sufficient to support a person’s body weight. Thus, nailing through the hands would result in a person’s hands splitting and the person would fall to the ground.

If not through their hands, through their wrists or forearms?

If nailed, a person was nailed between the bones of the forearm or the wrist. The executioner had to be careful not to sever an artery, but when done successfully, a person could be suspended in this manner, assuming there was support from a sedula. Despite this being the only way to nail someone to a cross, most graphic depictions of Jesus’ death still show the nails being driven through his hands.

How Likely is it that Jesus Would be Nailed to the Cross?

It seems that the normal way to fix Jesus to the cross would have been to tie him, not nail him. Yet the traditional view is that he was nailed. Where did this come from? Neither the Gospels of Mark nor Matthew nor Luke mention anything about Jesus being nailed to the cross. John’s description of the crucifixion also omits any reference to being nailed to the cross, but  the Gospel of John does say that Jesus “…showed them his hands and his side (20:20).” It is only when Thomas says: “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe (20:25).”  Later (20:27) Jesus replies - "Reach here with your finger, and see My hands; and reach here your hand and put it into My side; and do not be unbelieving, but believing." Thus, only from John 20:20-27 comes the tradition.

What can we infer from this? Why is the issue of Jesus being nailed to the cross absent from the first three gospels, and only present in the Gospel of John? And why does the Gospel of John claim that Jesus is nailed through the hands, when we know this is not physically possible, and if he were nailed at all, it would be through the wrists?

One possibility for the fact that only the Gospel of John mentions that Jesus was nailed is that by the time the Gospel of John was written (more than 100 years after Jesus’ death), critics of the Jesus story [2] had pointed out that if Jesus had only been on the cross for a few hours, then it was unlikely that he would have died. For example, the two Zealots crucified alongside him were still alive and their legs had to be broken to hasten their death, and it was well known that death by crucifixion could take days (see Josephus). By the time the Gospel of John was written in the Second Century, there were rumors that Jesus had not died on the cross, and so the addition of the nails and the spear may be an apologist strategy to explain why he died so suddenly. We see a similar apologist strategy in the Gospel of Matthew (28:12-15) which sought to answer the criticisms of the empty tomb theory by positing a “plausible” alternate theory [3]. In fact, some scholars maintain that “doubting Thomas” is specifically inserted into the Gospel of John to deal with the broader issues of doubt about the Gospel’s authenticity throughout the Roman world. Thomas, for example, is not a doubter in any of the earlier gospels, and certainly not a doubter in his own gospel. Yet in the Gospel of John, Thomas’s skepticism is mentioned more than once (e.g., 14:5; 20:27).

A second possibility for the story’s inclusion is the OT prophesy about a pierced Messiah [4]. Large parts of the Gospels were written not because they reported historical fact, but because they referred back to OT prophecies (Ehrman, 2006). Indeed, Professor Gerd Ludemann’s (2001) extensive analysis of the New Testament has this to say about John 20:27 – “…the narrative is a creation of the evangelist, who in it makes concrete the motif of doubt also known from other resurrection stories. The historical value is nil…(p. 582).”

Finally, it must be noted that John 20:27 invites Thomas to put his finger in Jesus’ hands and side. Can Jesus be touched? The Gospel of John contradicts itself in 20:17 when it has Jesus say to Mary, earlier that day  – “…Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father.” How then can he now be asking Thomas to touch him?

Thus, there are good reasons why the story may not be historically accurate and probably an invention of the writers of the Gospel of John or taken from the oral stories told by others that the writers of John put down.

An additional reason to believe the story may not be historically accurate is the simple fact that nailing through the hands was not physically possible. To counter this claim, some historians have argued that the Greek word used for hand(s) (xeipa, xeipac) could also apply to a person’s wrists (xepiou), so that when the Gospel of John claims that Jesus showed Thomas his “hands” (20:27) it really meant “wrists”. These apologists point to one verse in Acts (12:7) in which chains fall from Peter’s wrists, and indeed, in some translations of Acts, xepiou is translated as hands (e.g., King James, American Standard). However, in other versions it is translated as wrists (e.g., New Revised Standard, New International), so the analogy doesn’t necessarily apply. In any event, Acts and the Gospel of John were written at different times by different people who used different forms of Greek, so it’s not valid to compare the wording in one book as a proof of the meaning in another book.

More importantly, in Greek there are separate words for wrists and hands (just as there are in English), so one has to assume that when the Gospel of John refers to hands they are talking about hands and not wrists. For example, when the Gospel of John refers to fingers (20:25, 20:27) or being slapped with hands (19:3) different words were used, so had the Gospel writers intended to use the word for wrists, surely they would have used it.

Against the single testimony of the Gospel of John, which requires us to translate the word “hands” as “wrists”, we have numerous descriptions of the death of Jesus which specifically refer to him being hung, not nailed. Here are some examples…


·         “The God of our ancestors raised up Jesus whom you had killed by hanging…” (Acts 5:30. See also Acts 10:39 and 13:29).  

·         “On the eve of Passover they hanged Yeshu.”  (Sanhedrin 43a)

·         "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us - for it is written, 'Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree' (Galatians 3:13).”

·         “He himself carried up our sins in his body to the tree…” (1 Peter 2:24)

·         “One hanged was I, and yet not hanged (Acts of John, 101).”

In summary – while textual evidence suggests that being nailed to the cross was common for mass executions, the only surviving corpse of a crucified person was tied, not nailed to the cross. Moreover, all early graphic representations of crucifixion show individuals being tied, not nailed. What evidence is there, then, that Jesus was nailed? Only the report in the Gospel of John. No other gospel makes this claim. Moreover, the claim is presented in a contradictory position, asking a disciple to touch his hands while earlier telling a disciple that he could not be touched until he had ascended. And the claim in the Gospel of John is that Jesus was nailed through his hands, a possibility that almost all scholars dismiss. Moreover, there were good reasons for the writers of the Gospel of John to invent this story, and many leading scholars believe it has no historical basis.

When you look at the evidence as a whole, it seems far more likely that Jesus was tied to the cross, not nailed.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] Cohn (1963) – “it was normal Roman practice to bind the convict to the cross by ropes, not to nail him to it.” (p. 219)

[2] Including Jews, Jewish Christians, and competing early Christian sects such as the Docetists and the Gnostics.

[3] “And when they were assembled with the elders, and had taken counsel, they gave much money unto the soldiers, saying, Say ye, His disciples came by night, and stole him away while we slept. And if this come to the governor's ears, we will persuade him, and rid you of care. So they took the money, and did as they were taught: and this saying was spread abroad among the Jews, and continueth until this day.”

[4] Zechariah 12:10 – “…then they will look on Me whom they pierced…”

Part 6: Jesus was beaten?

CHURCH POSITION  
“Some began to spit on him, to blindfold him, and to strike him, saying to him ‘Prophesy!’ The guards also took him over and beat him.” (Mark 14:65)

"And they stripped him, and put on him a scarlet robe. And they platted a crown of thorns and put it upon his head, and a reed in his right hand; and they kneeled down before him, and mocked him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews! And they spat upon him, and took the reed and smote him on the head." (Matthew 27:28-30)

"Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged him. And the soldiers platted a crown of thorns, and put it on his head, and arrayed him in a purple garment; and they came unto him, and said, Hail, King of the Jews! and they struck him with their hands." (John 19:1-3)

SCHOLARS  
“...if Jesus suffered, it was from the taunts rather than from the blows, from the assault rather on his dignity than on his body." (Cohn, 1963, p. 202)

"The basic message transposed onto Jesus [in Mel Gibson's film "The Passion"] struck me as offensive. In this case it was something like "More pain, more gain": people have a lot of sins to atone for, so Jesus goes at it with full vigor, being beaten to a bloody pulp before our very eyes....This strikes me as at odds with how the Gospels portray Jesus' last hours, and I can't help but find the message a bit repulsive." (Ehrman, 2004, p. 187)

THE REALITY  
Mel Gibson notwithstanding, there is very little evidence that Jesus suffered from a severe beating before crucifixion. For example, Luke says that on the night before “the men who were holding Jesus began to mock him and beat him (22:63).” Matthew says that: “and after flogging Jesus, he handed him over to be crucified (27:26).” John notes that Jesus was “flogged” (19:1) and that the guards were “striking him on the face (19:3).” Mark’s description is the most harsh – “some began to spit on him, to blindfold him, and to strike him, saying to him, ‘Prophesy’. The guards also took him over and beat him (14:65).” Later, he notes: “So Pilate, wishing to satisfy the crowd, released Barabbas for them; and after flogging Jesus, he handed him over to be crucified (15:15).”

Needless to say, being struck in the face, beaten, and flogged is not very gentle treatment. But the issue is not whether Jesus was beaten (which he obviously was), the issue is whether the perception that he was severely beaten (ala The Passion) is true.  In those days there were two types of instruments used to flog hapless victims – the flagella which was an ordinary leather strap, and the flagra, which was an iron chain with spikes made of iron or bone.  The more severe instrument, the flagra, was not in general use and was reserved for slaves who committed heinous crimes. Most likely Jesus would have been punished with the flagella (or strap) since there is no indication that the punishment in this case was life threatening or even that he was seriously injured as a result [1]. Indeed, the Gospel of John indicates that Jesus was “carrying the cross by himself (19:17)” which clearly implies that he was not injured, and none of the other Gospel writers who claim that Simon of Cyrene carried the cross (Luke 23:26; Mark 15:21; Matthew: 27:32), indicate that he carried the cross because Jesus was unable to do so. Moreover, while on the cross, Jesus is conscious and sufficiently self-possessed to carry on conversations with the other two victims, address his mother and inquire after her future treatment, etc. Obviously his physical punishment had not incapacitated him.

In an extensive analysis of the laws and customs surrounding the trial and death of Jesus, Israeli Supreme Court Justice Haim Cohn concluded: “if Jesus suffered, it was from the taunts rather than from the blows, from the assault rather on his dignity than on his body (p. 202).” He continues: “no dependable tradition or information exists that there were any aftereffects, wounds, or other external injury…(p. 202).”

Had Jesus’ punishment been great, the New Testament writers would surely have noted it.  For example, compare those descriptions of Jesus’ treatment with the treatment of Polycarp: “…their skin was ripped to shreds by whips, revealing the very anatomy of their flesh, down to the inner veins and arteries…(2:2).” Clearly, Jesus’ punishment did not rise to these standards. Cohn affirms this position. He notes: “…if the evangelists did not describe the pitiable condition of a scourged Jesus, it was because there was none, and that he was in fact unscathed, his outward appearance unchanged (p. 202).”

While there is no evidence that Jesus was harshly treated, there is some evidence to the contrary, that his treatment was stellar. The Gospel of Nicodemus, dated to the Fourth Century [2], claims that Pilate instructed his soldiers: “Let Jesus be brought with gentleness (I, 1-2).” Most scholars dismiss the validity of this document, as shall we, however, it is worth noting. But Cohn (1963), in his exhaustive examination of the trial of Jesus, noted: “not only were Jesus’ hands not bound to the beams of the cross, but he had not even to bear it himself [3] (p. 201).” In addition, he noted: “not only was he not divested in nakedness, but he was given his own garments when led to the place of crucifixion…[and]…the usual beatings on the way were not his portion either (p. 207).”  He concluded: “the soldiers must have taken pity on him (p. 201).”

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] There are cases reported in Josephus in which a victim of flogging died during the process, although these cases were rare. As a prelude to crucifixion, flogging was designed to make the victim less likely to resist, and the extent of the flogging was left to the Roman Lictors to decide. Given Jesus’ demeanor, it undoubtedly did not call for an extensive flogging to get Jesus to be subservient.

[2] Mention of the Acts of Pilate, that constitute the bulk of the Gospel of Nicodemus, was referred to centuries earlier by Justin Martyr, Tertullian, and Eusebius; however, the earliest copy of the document is traditionally ascribed to 425 A.D.

[3] The normal procedure would have been to bind the hands to the cross and whip the victim while he carried the cross.

Part 7: Jesus was in his 30s at death?

THE REALITY  
The idea that Jesus was 30 years old when he died came about from a confluence of errors and mis-interpretations. The first error was the long standing belief that Jesus was born in the year 0 or 1, because that was the date at which BC - before Christ - and AD -the year of the lord - started. The second error was that Jesus started his ministry at age 30 and then died during the first year. All of this is incorrect.

With regard to Jesus' birthdate, unfortunately this was an error made by a 6th century Monk in dating the birth of Jesus, and most people now accept that Jesus was born in 6 BC when Herod was the King.
The next mistake is believing that when Luke says "about 30 years of age" he actually means that Jesus was 30. Not only does he say "about", Luke's work is notoriously inaccurate, so the phrase "about 30 years" leaves wide latitude.
The next mistake is the assumption that Jesus died during his first year or ministry, which the 2nd error places at the age of 30.
Thus, Jesus is born in the year 0, starts his ministry at age 30, and dies in the 1st year of his ministry = Jesus died at age 30.

So, if he wasn't 30 years old when he died, how old was he? There are claims that Jesus escaped his execution and lived to the ripe old ages of 106 and even 120. Putting these aside for the moment, if we accept the common theory that Jesus died as a result of his crucifixion or hanging, there are several ways to date his death. It can be dated with respect to the central players (i.e., Pilate, the High Priest Caiaphas, and John the Baptist) for whom there is a reasonable amount of historical information. Or it can be dated with respect to the Gospel text, or even with respect to other canonical publications. Hopefully, all three ways coincide.

Historical Data

The best way to date the death of Christ is to look for the key players in his death drama, about whom there is considerable information, and to establish the context surrounding Jesus’ death. We begin by acknowledging that Jesus’ death followed the death of John the Baptist, and occurred while Caiaphas was High Priest and while Pilate was Prefect. We have reason to believe that John the Baptist met his gruesome death in 35 A.D. [1], Caiaphas was deposed by Lucius Vitellius, the legate of Syria, in 36 A.D. and Pilate was recalled to Rome at the end of 36 A.D [2]. Ipso facto, Jesus must have been crucified in the year 36 A.D. Having been born in 6 B.C. and having died in 36 A.D. means that Jesus was in his 40s when he died, probably 42 years old.

The Gospel Record

Further proof that Jesus was in his 40s when he died comes directly from the Gospel of John. Jesus is discussing the destruction of the temple and he says: “Destroy this temple, and in 3 days I will raise it up.” The Jews then said, ‘This temple has been under construction for 46 years, and you will raise it up in 3 days?’ But he was speaking of the temple of his body (John 2:20-21).” John points out that later, when he is crucified, Jesus’ disciples remembered his prophecy of the 3 days; however, no one seems to recall the 46 years. Taken at his word, Jesus is clearly saying that he is 46 years old, and that when he dies, he will resurrect in 3 days. If Jesus was 46 years old when he died in 36 A.D., it means he was born in 10 B.C., which is theoretically possible, although 6 B.C. is a more probable date.

We find further proof that Jesus is in his 40s from the Gospel of John. Jesus is in a Temple, close to the Mount of Olives, talking to the Scribes and Pharisees. The subject turns to Abraham, and the “Jews” ask Jesus: “You are not yet 50 years old, and have you seen Abraham? (8:57).”Jesus answers: “…before Abraham was, I am”, but the important thing to observe here is that the questioners describe Jesus as not yet being 50. Were he in his 20s or 30s, they would have chosen a different year, but by saying that he is not yet 50, they clearly identify him as being in his forties.

Other Christian Sources

The noted Christian Irenaeus (130-202 A.D.) in Against Heresies (2:22:6) believed that Jesus was nearly 50 years old when he died.

All this evidence shows a significant divergence from the commonly accepted idea that Jesus was in his 30s when he died. All three methods indicate Jesus died in his 40s, between 42 and 46. It also suggests that Jesus’ ministry was significantly longer than the 1 to 3 years that are traditionally attributed to it, because if he began his ministry when he was about 30, and he died between 42 and 46, his ministry was 12 or more years, not 1 or 3.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] Schonfield, The Jesus Party, 1974, p.51

[2] Josephus, Antiquities, XVIII, 90, vol ix. P.65

Part 8: Gospels written in 1st century?

SCHOLARS  
"There are various evidences which suggest that Luke made use of the works of Josephus, and it may well be that the two-part Luke-Acts was inspired by Josephus' two-part book Against Apion, published around A.D. 100." (Schonfield, 1975, p. 35)

“No work of art of any kind has ever been discovered, no painting, or engraving, no sculpture, or other relic of antiquity, which may be looked upon as furnishing additional evidence of the existence of these gospels, and which was executed earlier than the latter part of the second century.” (Waite, 1992 p. 346)

"My own impression...was that the arguments for placing the Gospels as early as the end of the first century were rather weak. I found that the respected theological scholar Helmut Koester, editor of the Harvard Theological Review, made a good case for a later date, early second century, for most of the Gospels." (Ellegard, 1999, p. 3)

The first [factor] was the evolution of a canon of New Testament writings. Although oral tradition continued to be important right up till the end of the second century, most traditions had found written form by its early decades..." (Johnson, 1976, p. 54)

"What, then, are my reasons for putting Mark as 90 instead of, with most theologians, at about 70? (Wells, 1988, p. 107)

"The first reasonably complete copy we have of Galatians... dates to about 200 C.E." (Ehrman, 2006, p. 60)

"...the Gnostics began to write gospels at about the same time John composed his - around 110 - 140 AD." (Dimont, 1991, p. 159)

"...by the time the Gospels came to be written in the form that we know them, the finer details of the administration in Judea [ ie., the difference between a Procurator and a Prefect] had been forgotten." (Marsh, 1975, p. 72)

"By the time of Claudius, around 46, the title...had been changed to 'procurator' and Tacitus made the mistake, in about 115, of attaching this title to Pilate." (Wroe, 1999, p. 65)

"The Epistle of Barnabas...was probably composed...between 96 and 98 CE. It shows no knowledge whatsoever of any New Testament texts...(Crossan, 1995, p. 122)."

THE REALITY  
There is so much evidence that the Gospels were written in the Second Century that it’s hard to believe that the vast majority of scholars still stick stubbornly to the belief that they are a First Century production. The earliest known Christian writings are the letters of the Apostle Paul, dated sometime between 48 and 58 A.D.; but there are no copies of these original documents [1], and there are many questions about their authenticity [2]. Some people believe that the earliest versions of the four Gospels were written between 60 A.D. (Mark) and 100 A.D. (John), but there is no proof of these early dates, and some scholars believe that all the Gospels were written after 100 A.D. (e.g., Acharya, 1999; Ellegard, 1999; Keeler, 1965; Koester, 1980; Wheless, 1990). Here is some evidence to support this theory:

The first epistle of Clement of Rome (c 64-96 A.D.), which is reasonably dated to 95 A.D., makes no mention of any of the Gospels although it does mention the epistles of Paul. This is a strange omission had the Gospels been circulating at that time.
The Gospel of Luke borrows heavily from material in Josephus’ (37–100 A.D.) later works [3], especially Life and Against Apion, implying that the Gospel of Luke was not composed (much less published) until after 100 A.D., since Josephus’ later works weren’t published before 95 A.D.
None of the Gospels are mentioned in the letters of Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, which can be dated from 110 A.D.
Archeologically, the earliest dated portion of any gospel is a tiny fragment consisting of a few words from what could be the Gospel of John, and this dates to 125 AD (Funk & Hoover, 1993, p. 9).

The earliest allusion to any of the Gospels is from about 130 A.D. in the works of Bishop Papias, who refers to a collection of Jesus’ sayings/oracles in a Hebrew book whose author is said to be the disciple Matthew [4]. This book of sayings may refer to the lost document Q, but it obviously does not refer to the Gospel of Matthew, as we know it. Papias also mentions recollections of the disciple Peter, recorded by his secretary Mark. Though neither of these references is to what we now know as the Gospels of Mark and of Matthew, they begin to suggest that some things resembling these Gospels were in circulation after 130 A.D. Yet they were certainly not very well known since other prominent Christian writings from this period do not contain any references to them (e.g., Polycarp, the Epistle of Barnabas, the Exigetica, The Book of Hermas).

The first mention of the Gospels, as we know them, comes around 140 A.D. in the work of Aristides of Athens who refers to “the holy Gospel writing”. Yet we can’t be certain that these are the same Gospels. Shortly thereafter, a Christian reformer named Marcion (110–160 A.D.) broke with the traditional church over the issue of Jesus’ divinity, and set up his own church, including in its writings a stripped down version of the Gospel of Luke. In 150 A.D. Justin Martyr (c 100-163 A.D.) of Rome composed the first of his two Apologies, in which he specifically refers to the writings of Luke, Matthew, and Mark as “memoirs” (in the tradition of Papias 20 years earlier), but clearly not in the form of the Gospels as we know them (Waite, 1992). About 10 years later, Justin’s student, Tatian (c 110-185 A.D.), brought together the four Gospels and combined them into one harmonized book which he called the Diatessaron, written in Tatian’s native language of Syric. And by 180 A.D. Irenaeus (c 130-202 A.D.) wrote in his principal work, Against Heresies, that: “The Gospels could not possibly be either more or less in number than they are. Since there are four zones of the world in which we live, and four principal winds…Now the Gospels, in which Christ is enthroned, are like these…” (3.11.7-8).

Another indication that the gospels were written in the Second Century comes from the genealogy in the Gospel of Matthew. Herein the inclusion of four women with "questionable" backgrounds is usually taken by scholars to be an attempt by the writers of Matthew to discount the rumors that Mary had an affair with a Roman archer. In other words, if these four women with questionable backgrounds nonetheless led exalted lives, then Mary's questionable background can be discounted too. While there is near unanimity that this is the rationale, as far as we know, rumors about Mary are a Second Century phenomenon, mentioned for the first time in Celsus, around 175 AD. Hence, any remedies to offset these rumors must also have been from the Second Century.

Continuing with the Gospel of Matthew, those writers attempted damage control again in the passage about the resurrection, in which they claimed "this story [stealing the body of Jesus from the tomb] is still told among the Jews to this day (28:15).” In fact, there are no references to this story in the literature of the First Century and only in the Second Century is it mentioned by writers such as Tertullian [c. 155 - 230] and Justin Martyr [c. 100 - 165]. So, if the writers of Matthew are writing when these rumors are “still being told”, they must be writing in the Second Century, not the First.

Or consider the Gospel of Luke. Luke goes to great lengths to tone down the apocalyptic emphasis clearly present in Mark [5]. Ehrman (1999) notes: “Luke continues to think that the end of the age is going to come in his own lifetime. But he does not seem to think that it was supposed to come in the lifetime of Jesus’ companions. Why not? Evidently because he was writing after they had died… (p. 130).” Now consider what the “lifetime of Jesus’ companions” involved. Assuming Jesus died in 36 AD and assuming that some of his followers were 12 to 15 years old at the time (a reasonable assumption, particularly considering that “boy” is often mentioned), and assuming that it wasn’t unusual for a person to live to be 60 years old in those days (some people are said to live to be 100, but that’s probably an exaggeration), it means that the boys who attended Jesus would have lived until the end of the First Century. So if the writers of the Gospel of Luke were writing after the followers of Jesus were all dead, ipso facto, they were writing at the very end of the First Century, or more likely, in the Second Century. If you narrow the definition of "followers" to refer only to the disciples, we have to consider John, son of Zedebee, who was said to have lived to be 100. If John was 30 when Jesus died, and lived another 70 years, it still places the writing of Luke into the Second Century.

A further indication that the gospels are Second Century inventions comes from a careful study of the non-Christian writings (Van Voorst, 2000). The earliest works by Thallos (55 AD), Mara bar Serapion (73 AD), Pliny the Younger (100 AD), Tacitus (116 AD), and Suetonius (120 AD) contain virtually no historical information about Jesus, despite mentions of Christ, Chrestus, etc. But starting with Lucian of Samosata (165 AD), Jesus is mentioned as a "crucified sophist" and then with Celsus (175 AD) there is a plethora of historical information. Something happened between 120 AD and 170 AD that the non-historical Jesus suddenly assumed his historical mantle. Our assumption is that the appearance of the gospels, in the early to mid Second Century, accounts for this phenomenon. Had the Gospels been circulating in the First Century, historical material about Jesus would have appeared in the works of these writers early non-Christian writers such as Thallos, Pliny, and Tacitus.

We get still another indication that the Gospels were written in the Second Century from Pilate's title, Prefect. The office of Prefect was abolished around 46 AD, 10 years after Pilate had been removed from office. In 115 AD, Tacitus made the error of referring to Pilate as a Procurator, instead of a Prefect, probably because by that time the distinction had disappeared (Wroe, 1999, p. 65). Yet the Gospels refer to Pilate as a Procurator. Had they been written shortly after Jesus' death, the writers would have known about the difference between the Prefect and Procurator, and surely would have remembered the title of the longest serving Prefect in Judea. Instead, they use the term Procurator, implying that they are using the Tacitus error or, if not, they are writing at a similar time in which they and Tacitus make the same error. This places the gospel writings into the Second Century.

Another indicator that the Gospels are Second Century inventions comes from the rabid anti-Semitism contained therein. In the very early years, Christians were all Jews. By mid First Century, if the letters of Paul are to be believed, the Gentile movement took hold, but Jews and Gentiles still got along. But it was only after the destruction of the Temple and at the end of the First Century that relationships between Christians and Jews deteriorated, illustrated by the special malediction placed in the central Jewish prayer, the Shermoneh Esrei (aka Sherman Esrei), cursing the Nazarenes and other Christian groups. Thus, the rabid anti-Semitism of the gospels is clearly a Second Century phenomenon. groups, cementing the schism between Christians and Jews. Prior to this date (approximately 90 AD), such vehement anti-Semitism would not have been expected.

Finally, our survey of the early Christian art indicates that prior to the Third Century there are almost no portraits of Jesus in any medium. Had Jesus’ life been celebrated by the gospels as early as the First Century, one would have expected any explosion of artwork in the Second Century. Instead, it is only in the Third Century that we find such an explosion, suggesting that the gospels and the celebration of Jesus’ life is a Second Century phenomenon.

To summarize – Evidence from carbon dating, language analysis (e.g., use of Pilate, rabid anti-Semitism, the allusion to rumors about Mary, etc.) and citation as well as First Century non-Christian sources, show that the Gospels were written in the Second Century. Moreover, inferences from the artwork confirm this conclusion. By 160 A.D. we know, without question, that all four gospels were in circulation, and by 180 A.D. they were considered authoritative. Yet this is more than 100 years after Jesus’ death [6].

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1]The oldest copy of a letter from Paul (Galatians) is dated at approximately 200 A.D. (Ehrman, 2005, p. 60)

[2] “Of the 13 letters of Paul in the New Testament, seven are accepted as largely authentic. (Freke & Gandy, 2001, p. 233).”

[3] Schonfield (1974), p. 36-43. See also Perkins (1988), p. 229

[4] “Matthew compiled the Sayings in the Aramaic language, and everyone translated them as well as he could (Quoted in Wilson, 1984, p. 44).” Schonfield (1965) translates the word “sayings” as “oracles”. If we accept Schonfield’s translation, the oracles would more clearly represent an early version of the later Gospel.

[5] For example, in Mark 9:1 the Kingdom is God is described as coming “in power”, but when Luke (9:27) copies the section he deletes this phrase.

[6] Many orthodox scholars still stick stubbornly to the traditional earlier dates, however, there is an increasing number of scholars who believe the later dates are more accurate (e.g., Koester, 1980; Ellegard, 1999; Freke & Gandy, 1999). Ellegard (1999) notes that the word synagogue does not appear in 1st  Century writings (such as Paul) but does in 2nd Century texts, and that the word appears in all 4 canonical Gospels (Luke 17 times, Mark 12, Matthew 9, and John 5) thus suggesting their 2nd Century origins. He also notes that in 1st Century writings the early Christians are referred to as “saints” whereas in 2nd Century writings this usage is extremely rare. The only usage of “saint” in the canonical gospels is in Matthew (27:52), again suggesting that the Gospels were written in the 2nd Century.

Part 9: Empty Tomb?

CHURCH POSITION  
"...and looking up, they see that the stone is rolled back: for it was exceeding great. And entering into the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, arrayed in a white robe; and they were amazed. And he saith unto them, Be not amazed: ye seek Jesus, the Nazarene, who hath been crucified: he is risen; he is not here: behold, the place where they laid him! " (Mark 16:4-6)


SCHOLARS  
"...the empty tomb is a later legend, introduced by Mark for the first time into the narrative." (Fuller, 1971, p. 52)

"...inner criteria support the supposition that the tomb story and the passion narrative were not originally an organic unity." (Alsup, 1975, p. 96)

"...the narrative of the burial in Mark belongs to the passion traditiion and is ancient. The visit to the tomb is legendary." (Mann, 1986, p. 660)

"I can no longer hold the story of the empty tomb, with all its surrounding details, including the Jerusalem setting, to be anything other than a later legendary addition to the faith story." (Spong, 1994, p. 180)

"There is a fair distribution of the opinion among contemporary scholars that the empty tomb narratives are later additions to the gospel narratives and are separate from the passion accounts." (Thompson, 2006, p. 36)

THE REALITY  

The empty tomb saga is a major issue in studying the historical Jesus. While Paul’s mention of the resurrection is the first historical reference, he doesn’t offer many details; rather, his focus is on the theological importance of the event. It is Mark’s record of the resurrection that offers our first glimpse at what might have actually happened, and the stories in the other Gospels derive from Mark’s account. Since Mark’s “empty tomb” is the lynchpin around which the other three Gospels’ stories revolve, we need to turn our attention there.

The "empty tomb" is a common phrase used to describe the fact that Jesus' dead body is not found in the tomb. In three of the gospels (Matthew, Luke, and John), the tomb is devoid of any person, but in the Gospel of Mark, Mary Magdalene does encounter a "young man sitting on the right side, arrayed in a white robe (16:5)." Mark never tells us who this is. A gardener? Jesus? a disciple? an angel? The other gospels will expand and modify this scene, but the bottom line is that Jesus' body is missing and hence the expression "empty tomb".

The Empty Tomb is Literary

Each of the writers of the gospels has their own unique literary style, the most famous example being Matthew's use of the "Jesus is the new Moses" motif. Mark also has a literary style he employes. One of the styles employed by Mark is the "reversal of expectation" motif (Carrier, 2005). Mark likes to shock us. It's a Roman soldier who recognizes Jesus is the Messiah, not the Jews who watch his crucifixion. It is the women who discover him missing, not the men. It is a foreigner (Simon of Cyrene) who helps him carry the cross, not his own disciples. etc. So part of this reversal of expectation is that when they come to the tomb, it is empty.

The adoption of a literary style does not negate the fact that the historical Jesus may have done this or that, or said this or that, but the overwhelming number of instances “begs credulity” as a true historical account. In other words, did all these unexpected things really happen, or is this just part of the Gospel of Mark's dramatic style?

We can't know for sure. But since the empty tomb fits so well into Mark's literary style, this does raise a "red flag" and give us reason to look more closely to see what evidence exists for this as a historical event.

The Empty Tomb is Derivative

Carrier (2005) offers an extensive analysis of the “empty tomb” concept in the Gospel of Mark, noting some of the possible historical, religious, and literary antecedents, which include…

the myth of Osiris, who was persecuted by 72 conspirators (the Sanhedrin had 71 members + Judas = 72), whose dead body was sealed in a casket (cave), and who arose during the full moon (Passover) after three days.
passages in Psalms, especially Jesus’ cry on the cross (Mk. 15:34; Ps. 22:1), the taunts of onlookers (Mk. 15:29, Ps 22:7), casting lots for the garments (Mk. 15:24, Ps 22:18), piercing the body (Ps. 22:16), and the third day resurrection (Ps. 24).
Orphic theology, dating back as far as 400 B.C., that speaks of “white cypress on the right hand side” of the tomb (Mk. 16:5), the guardians in the tomb (Mk. 16:6) who advise that the searchers must seek elsewhere (Mk. 16:7), and the admonition to drink of the sacred waters (Mk. 14:24).

It’s likely that the writers of the Gospel of Mark were familiar with these myths and legends, and this may account for the close similarities.  Indeed, it brings into question whether or not Mark’s account is truly historical or merely derivative, a retelling of the myths and legends already identified. And without Mark’s account as a firm basis, any further retelling by Matthew, Luke, and John is without empirical merit.

Again, the fact that the empty tomb is derivative as well as literary does not mean it is not historical, but it does raise questions. Let's continue.

Would Jesus Have Been Buried At All?

Not only is the idea of the empty tomb suspect due to the many literary precursors, the idea does not square with the practices at the time (Crossan, 1991; Hengel, 1977; McCane, 2003). To the Romans, crucifixion was both a punishment and a deterrent, so they tended to deny burial to people who were crucified. Typically victims were left to hang for days, their corpses rotting in the sun, picked clean by the birds, the pathetic remains savaged by dogs. [1] Would an exception have been made for Jesus? One has to ask: “Why?” After all, according to the Gospels, he was found guilty of blasphemy by the Sanhedrin and guilty of treason by the Romans. At the time of his death, contrary to the popular opinion that his followers were a small group of rag-tag fishermen, Jesus had gathered a large following and a wide support system. To show mercy or favoritism to him would only encourage his followers and add some substance to his claims, an act the Romans would not likely take.

Would Jesus Be Given an Honorable Burial?

Moreover, according to Jewish law, having been found guilty of blasphemy, Jesus would not have been entitled to an honorable burial. As an executed criminal, he would have been buried in a public graveyard and denied such niceties as anointing, wrappings in linen, placement in a tomb, etc. (Lowder, 2005; Schonfield, 1965). Given their influence with the Roman authorities, the Sanhedrin surely would have insisted on a dishonorable burial, something that the Romans would have been inclined to anyway. Indeed, there is evidence of such a dishonorable burial in the Secret Book of James, written about the same time as the Gospels of Luke and John (i.e., early First Century), which indicates that Jesus was buried “in the sand [2] (v. 5).”

Crossan (1994) has studied the evidence and concludes:

“If the Romans did not observe the Deuteronomic decree, Jesus’ dead body would have been left on the cross for the wild beasts…If the Romans did observe the decree, the soldiers would have made certain Jesus was dead and then buried him themselves as part of their job (p. 154).”

Spong (1994) says: “His body was probably dumped unceremoniously into a common grave, the location of which has never been known (p. 225).”

Had Jesus Been Buried, Where is His Tomb?

Another factor that brings Jesus’ tomb burial into question is the fact that there was no tradition prior to the Fourth Century of veneration of his tomb or grave sight. Surely the man who inspired thousands of people during his lifetime, and hundreds of thousands thereafter, would have also inspired people to visit his tomb, if it existed! This is true especially since the tomb served two important spiritual functions – his death served as atonement for the sins of humanity, and his resurrection served as a sign of his divinity. This omission is made more poignant when we realize that the tombs of lesser men were well known at the time of their deaths. For example, John the Baptist’s tomb was said to be in Samaria-Sebaste [3]. Herod Agrippa I was buried at Caesarea, James the Just was buried near Jerusalem, Lazarus’ tomb was in Bethany, etc. (Finegan, 1969).

The Empty Tomb and Disasters

As if all these problems were not sufficient to question the historicity of the empty tomb, we have the additional problem of Mark’s other unsupportable claims surrounding the death of Jesus. For example, Mark records: “When it was noon, darkness came over the whole land, until three in the afternoon (15:33)”, and later he notes: “Then Jesus gave a loud cry and breathed his last. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom (15:37-38).” Neither one of these events are mentioned in any non-Gospel sources, yet given their magnitude, one would expect some reference to them, especially in the works of Josephus or Pliny. This lack of reference leads many authors to conclude that Mark was simply using symbolism  here (e.g., Spong, 1994), yet if he uses symbolism in these two cases, why isn’t the empty tomb another case of symbolism. Indeed, Carrier (2005) makes exactly this case – the empty tomb is symbolic, not historical.

Joseph of Arimathaea

Without Joseph, Jesus was slated for an ignoble death. Let’s look closely at the profile of Joseph. The gospels say he is from Arimathaea, but there never was a place called Arimathaea. He shows up at the last minute, is never referenced prior to his mission, and as soon as he completes it, he disappears. He is said, variously, to be a follower (Mark), a disciple (Matthew) or a secret disciple (John). In two accounts (Mark, Luke) he is a Sanhedrim member and in one account (Matthew) he is a rich man. In three accounts he handles Jesus’ body by himself, and moves the stone by himself, and in one case (John) he is helped by Nicodemus. In those same three accounts he wraps Jesus in linen, and in the fourth account he includes 100 pounds of spices.

When Joseph asks for Jesus’ body, three of the gospels (Matthew, Luke, John) tell us that Pilate simply gave it to him. In Mark, Pilate marvels that Jesus is already dead and asks for assurance from a centurion, then gives him the body.

These inconsistencies don’t necessarily invalidate the historicity of Joseph, but they don’t give us a firm handle on his existence either. In any event, being a good Jew, Joseph would be bound by the Jewish conventions. Remember, Jesus was a Jew and he wasn’t seeking to start a new religion, he was seeking to reform the existing religion. Since Jesus was guilty of blasphemy (Mark 14:64), he was not entitled to an honorable death, and a good Jew like Joseph would not be able to provide one for him.

Moreover, who is Joseph to convince Pilate to give him Jesus’ body. Not being related to Jesus, Joseph would have no claim to the body. And why would Pilate release it to him? It could only cause Pilate grief down the line, and there was no upside. From what we know of Pilate, he was not the kind of person who would do something like that.

Speedy Joseph?

If you put aside all of these issues with regard to Joseph, you still have to contend with the time factor. How does this old guy get around so quickly. Thompson (2006) notes: "Joseph would have to have acted with great dispatch to go to Pilate, obtain permission to bury Jesus, return to the scene of the crucifixion, remove the body from the cross, wrap it and lay it in the tomb, all before sundown (p. 43)." Consider where Pilate was and where the cross was [4], add in the time it takes to get an audience with Pilate, etc. and it's virtually impossible for Joseph to accomplish these tasks.

All these issues bring into question whether or not Joseph ever existed, or was merely a literary technique invented to get Jesus from the cross into a tomb. Spong (1994) refers to the story of Joseph  as “the realm of legend (p. 226).” Why was this necessary? Because burial in a common grave would not so easily allow for a resurrection. And without the resurrection, as Paul noted so many times, there was no story from a Christian perspective.

Summary

The empty tomb scenario is the lynchpin for the resurrection stories, yet when we examine this scenario, we find many issues that question its historicity. There are three reasons to disbelieve the scenario: (1) the empty tomb has literary precursors in the Osiris and Orphic mythologies, both of which were popular in the First and Second Centuries, (2) its existence is part of a series of literary conventions used by the writers of the Gospel of Mark, called the “reversal of expectation”, and (3) the same gospel which includes the empty tomb also talks about darkness (solar eclipse?) and temple irregularities which are substantial yet not noted in any other histories of the times.

Putting these three issues aside, there are several more issues which make the description of the burial unlikely: (1) as convicted by the Jews and the Romans, Jesus would not have been entitled to an honorable burial, (2) in fact, given the practices in use at the time, he wouldn’t have been buried at all, but rather his body would have been left to the beasts and then the remains thrown into a common grave, and (3) according to the law, having been convicted of blasphemy, Jesus' body did not have to be taken down before sunset.

In order to overcome these objections, the Gospel of Mark posits that a character of questionable identity, against his own religious laws, manages to get an audience with Pilate and without much promoting, has Pilate give him the body of Jesus, even though he is not a relative of Jesus. This same Jew just happens to have a tomb that sits in a garden next to the place where people are crucified [4], an extremely unlikely event given the Jews' aversion to death and dead bodies. Even less likely, Pilate (known for his cruelty), who is specifically in Jerusalem to deal with rebels, allows the body of a rebel leader to be given special treatment.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] This practice undoubtedly accounts for why only one crucified corpse has ever been uncovered.

[2] A church was built over the gravesite in the 4th Century. Nearly a thousand years later, Crusaders built a cathedral there, some portions of which remain extant today.

[3] In the Gospel of John,  Pilate is present at the crucifixion, so the "speedy Joseph" theory is not applicable to this one gospel.

[4] Only in the Gospel of Matthew is the tomb said to be owned by Joseph.

Part 10: Visit from wise men?

CHURCH POSITION  
“In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem…” (Matthew 2:1)

THE REALITY  
The appearance of the Magi is only told in the Gospel of Matthew, where the Magi (from magos, a Greek word for priests of Ancient Babylon and Persia) from the East, led by a star, go in search of Jesus whom they expect is to be “the King of Jews”. They bring him gold, frankincense (used for royal ceremonies and for cleaning white linen), and myrrh (according to John’s Gospel, used in embalming Jesus). The gold and frankincense were foretold in Isaiah (60:6), the myrrh appears to be an added bonus, or may come from the Song of Solomon (3:6) or 1 Kings (10:1-13).

Although the common myth is that the Magi came to worship Jesus in his crib, the Gospel has them arrive while Jesus is a child (pais in Greek). Indeed, this is the reason that Herod orders the death of all children two years of age or under (not all infants!), since he must reckon that Jesus was born two years before the Magi arrived. Somehow the Magi were transformed into three Kings, although in the Gospel of Matthew they were neither Kings nor were there three of them! This idea came much later, in the Fifth Century, first appearing in the Armenian Gospel of the Infancy, and probably relates to a prophecy in Isaiah (60:3).

Most scholars maintain that the story of the Magi was an invention and not meant to be historical. As told by Matthew, it is another of his prophesies from the Old Testament (Hendrickx, 1984; Spong, 1992). One of the best arguments against its veracity is the fact that the Magi appear this one time and then never again. Can you imagine these wise men traveling thousands of miles to attend the birth of “the King of the Jews”, bringing costly gifts, and then disappearing, never to be heard from again? No subsequent visits? No mention by Mary of this important tribute to her and her son? No, nothing. Their abrupt disappearance suggests that they were simply literary devices, inserted into the text to make a point, and then omitted from future references.

Another issue that questions the veracity of the Magi story is the fact that they go to Herod to inquire about Jesus. If they are so smart, why don't they know where he is, and even if they need to stop and ask directions (there are no GPS at the time), why are they asking the one person who seeks to do Jesus harm? In fact, it is their questioning of Herod which sets in motion the "slaughter of the innocents."

The story of the Magi is undoubtedly a metaphor, told by the writers of Matthew to indicate that Jesus deserved recognition from birth. Matthew’s authors were probably responding to the claims that Jesus was simply a magician, and having Magi worship him at birth would indicate that he was more than a mere magician.

Part 11: Jesus the Prince of Peace? Prince of violence is more like it!


SCHOLARS  
“The Dead Sea Scrolls provide a context for understanding the role of Jesus and the political machinations that would have featured behind his birth, marriage, and active role in this Zealot aspiration for victory.” (Baigent, 2006, p. 38)

"[Jesus] was not so much a wandering preacher giving sermons or a wandering philosopher offering maxims as like a radical politician gathering support for a new and highly risky movement." (Wright, 1999, p. 36)

“…it was not the Jews who killed the apostles because they were Christians, but the Romans who executed them because they were…Zealots." (Dimont, 1991, p. 69)

THE REALITY  

Most people think of Jesus as the “Prince of Peace”, the ultimate non-violence advocate, a precursor to Gandi and MLK. Yet there is reason to believe that while Jesus preached peace, he also preached violent action. As astounding as that may be for most people, let’s look at the evidence. First we’ll look at some of Jesus’ sayings that suggest a harsher view of humanity that we usually ascribe to Jesus. Next we’ll look at his disciples, and then we’ll look at his behavior in Jerusalem, and finally we’ll examine the relationship between the Essenes and the Zealots.

Jesus’ Sayings

Jesus has sayings that are overtly aggressive/violent and some that while not being violent, show a side of him that is vindictive and unforgiving. Here are some examples:

Violent Advocacy and Imagery

“And if thy right eye causeth thee to stumble, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not thy whole body be cast into hell. And if thy right hand causeth thee to stumble, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not thy whole body go into hell.” (Matthew 5:29-30)

"And the brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the child: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and cause them to be put to death." (Matthew 10:21)

“Think not that I came to send peace on the earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law: and a man's foes shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And he that doth not take his cross and follow after me, is not worthy of me. “(Matthew 10:34-38)

“I say unto you, that unto every one that hath shall be given; but from him that hath not, even that which he hath shall be taken away from him. But these mine enemies, that would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me .” (Luke 19:26-27)

“And he said unto them, But now, he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise a wallet; and he that hath none, let him sell his cloak, and buy a sword. For I say unto you, that this which is written must be fulfilled in me, And he was reckoned with transgressors: for that which concerneth me hath fulfilment. And they said, Lord, behold, here are two swords. And he said unto them, It is enough.” (Luke 22:36-38)

Vindictive and Unforgiving Sayings

“Then began he to upbraid the cities wherein most of his mighty works were done, because they repented not. Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee, Bethsaida! for if the mighty works had been done in Tyre and Sidon which were done in you, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you. And thou, Capernaum, shalt thou be exalted unto heaven? thou shalt go down unto Hades: for if the mighty works had been done in Sodom which were done in thee, it would have remained until this day. But I say unto you that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment, than for thee.” (Matthew 11:20-24)

“He that is not with me is against me, and he that gathereth not with me scattereth. Therefore I say unto you, Every sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men; but the blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven.” (Matthew 12:30-31)

“And on the morrow, when they were come out from Bethany, he hungered. And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came, if haply he might find anything thereon: and when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves; for it was not the season of figs. And he answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit from thee henceforward for ever.” (Mark 11:12-14)

Apologists will explain away each of these sayings as metaphor, symbolism, or mere zealousness. Moreover, they will point to sayings that uphold Jesus’ image as the Prince of Peace (e.g., Matthew 26:52 - "Put your sword back in its place," Jesus said to him, "for all who draw the sword will die by the sword."). Certainly the violent and/or vindictive sayings represent a minority of Jesus’ sayings, yet they are not a miniscule minority, and certainly most of Jesus’ sayings are of a loving and caring nature. Nonetheless, there are a substantial number of sayings of Jesus from the canonical gospels which suggest that as zealous as Jesus was in his devotion to God and as much as he emphasized love toward one another, he could be equally zealous in his attitudes against people with whom he disagreed.

The Zealot Disciples

Jesus’ disciples included a high percentage of people who appear to have been Zealots, including Simon the Zealot [1] Peter called Simon bar Jona [2], Judas the Dagger man, and the Sons of Thunder. Moreover, Jesus’ own philosophy and the philosophy of the Zealots were similar in many ways. They both stressed the importance of the law and both were dissatisfied with the sad state of affairs in which the Temple authorities were corrupt and the Romans ruled Israel with an iron fist, exacting taxes that impoverished the people. Of course, Jesus, on the whole, professed peace while the Zealots were committed to the violent overthrow of the Roman authorities. However, there were occasions in which Jesus also advocated armed resistance, as when he urged his disciples to gather up swords (Luke 22:36) or when he said: “Think not that I came to send peace on the earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword (Matthew 10:34).”

Dimont (1991) also believes that Jesus was a Zealot, and he claims that when viewed in this light, Jesus’ advice to his disciples (Matthew 10:5-23) takes on new meaning:

“He gave them strict instructions to contact only Israelites. They were to stay in one place only long enough to deliver the message, then take off. If they felt they were under suspicion, they were to disappear quickly from the scene. They were to exercise great caution in speech and action…(p. 67).”

In other words, Jesus’ advice suggests that the disciples are Zealots who need to be extremely careful in what they do. Had they been merely religious teachers, many of Jesus’ cautions would appear to be highly unusual.

In addition, the violent deaths of many of the disciples (Peter, Simon, Andrew, and James were crucified, Bartholomew was flayed to death, Thomas was killed by arrows, etc.) makes sense from this perspective. Dimont claims “…it was not the Jews who killed the apostles because they were Christians, but the Romans who executed them because they were…Zealots (p. 69).”

Biblical scholar N. T. Wright (1999) says that Jesus “…was not so much a wandering preacher giving sermons or a wandering philosopher offering maxims as like a radical politician gathering support for a new and highly risky movement (p. 36).”

We get another hint that Jesus may have been a zealot from the good shepherd imagery. Going back to the Gospel of Luke, the appearance of shepherds may be a hint of Jesus’ Zealot sentiments. Today we associate shepherds with pastoral peace, but in Jesus’ time the shepherds were considered robbers (Spong, 1992, p. 147), and robbery was often a profession taken up by the Zealots. The good shepherd may be an analogy to the person who takes care of his sheep, but it would have a second meaning for First Century Jews – the good robber chief.

Jesus in Jerusalem

Pike and Kennedy (1972) believe that Jesus was a Zealot and they point out that his first public recognition as the Davidic Messiah comes during the Feast of the Dedication (John 10:22), a ceremony that commemorates the first Jewish revolution under the Maccabees. In addition, both the Zealot movement and the Jesus movement were controlled by dynastic succession: in the case of the Zealots, from Hezekiah to Judas to Menahem and Eleazar, and in the case of Jesus, from Jesus to James to Simeon to Jude’s grandsons.

The scene in the Temple (John 2:15 – “and he made a scourge of cords, and cast all out of the temple, both the sheep and the oxen; and he poured out the changers' money, and overthrew their tables…”) in which Jesus overturns the tables and chases the money lenders out shows a Jesus who is certainly not your classic peacenik. This example of civil disobedience goes beyond the traditional non-violent code and borders on aggression.

It’s always been questionable as to why his disciples deserted him once he was arrested. Had his movement been purely theological, his disciples had no need to fear from the Romans. Yet all the men fled, suggesting that perhaps they were afraid for their lives, implying that the Jesus movement had political overtones rather than merely being theological.

Michael Baigent in The Jesus Papers (2006) also theorizes that Jesus was a Zealot, and he claims that the two “leste” who were crucified with him were also Zealots, as was Barabbas. Baigent adds to his list of Zealots, Paul (Acts 21:38) as well as the Essenes, and he claims that: “The Dead Sea Scrolls…provide original documents from the Zealots (p. 36).”  

The Essenes and the Zealots

There is some justification for linking the Essenes and the Zealots (see Eisenman, 1997). Hippolytus, a disciple of Irenaeus, in his 2nd Century text Origenis Philosophumena sive Omnium Hæresium Refutatio wrote:

"Some of these [Essenes] observe a still more rigid practice in not handling or looking at a coin bearing an image, saying that one should neither carry nor look at nor fashion any image; nor will they enter a city at the gate of which statues are erected, since they consider it unlawful to walk under an image. Others threaten to slay any uncircumcised Gentile who listens to a discourse on God and His laws, unless he undergoes the rite of circumcision; should he refuse to do so, they kill him instantly. From this practice they have received the name of 'Zealots' or 'Sicarii.' Others again call no one Lord except God, even though one should torture or kill them (Jewish Encyclopedia v. 228-230)."

Thus, according to Hippolytus, the Zealots emerged as the military wing of the Essenes, in much the same way that the Therapeuts emerged as the healing wing of the Essenes. And given Jesus’ involvement with the Essenes, it would be surprising if he had not been exposed to the Zealot philosophy and felt comfortable in the presence of Zealots among his disciples. Perhaps the situation is best described in contemporary terms. The Republican Party in the 21st Century has under its broad umbrella individuals and groups that advocate bombing abortion clinics, invading foreign countries, deposing leaders of sovereign countries, editing school books, and building enormous fiscal deficits to fund massive government spending. In these aspects they can be distinguished from the Libertarian and the Democratic parties, as well as from the 20th Century Republican Party. Yet not all Republicans advocate all these positions. In a similar way, Jesus as an Essene may have adopted the Therapeut orientation to healing as well as the Essene eschatology, while rejecting the extreme violence of the Zealots.

Summary

Our major image of Jesus is as the Prince of Peace, however, this view ignores  substantial evidence that Jesus had a harsher side, that could involve violent actions (in the Temple) and advocating violence as well as vindictive and unforgiving attitudes. We tend to ignore this evidence or find explanations to negate it, but the sheer number of examples and their wide spread reference across various gospels and at different times in Jesus’ life suggest that indeed these tendencies were there. The fact that ultimately Jesus chose peace and non-violence shows the strength of his character. The real life Jesus had to struggle with the same problems as everyone else, and the hallmark of the story of his life is the fact that he chose peace over violence, not that he was without any violent impulses.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] Luke (6:15) calls him “the Zealot” but in Mark (3:18) and Matthew (10:4) he is called the “Cananaean”. Fosdick (1949, p. 194) says that “Cananaean” is best translated as “hot” or “fervid” and may refer to religious zeal rather than armed insurrection. Josephus in Antiquities claimed the term Zealots came into common use after 66 A.D. as a synonym for rebellious, yet he also talked about the Zealots as a “fourth philosophy” founded by Judas of Gamala in 6 A.D.

[2] Craveri (1967, p. 91) and Dimont (1999, p. 69) claim that Simon bar Jona ordinarily means “Simon, son of Jonah”, but as used in Israel at the time, the term baryon meant “open country” referring to the place where Zealots fled to escape the Romans. Thus it meant “Simon, the Zealot”.

I know that that series of posts does not disprove Jesus' existance.  Rather, it proves the falseness of the story of Jesus as told in the bible.  So many lies, so many lies.

Doc,
You are totally right.  We are god.  I know this, you know this.  When I say.. the words of god... I am speaking of the god that Christians believe in.  The big bad dude up there judging us and the one who is repsonsible for our good times and bad times.  The separate entity god.  However, I know very well he is not a separate entity.  God isnt even a he.  God is us, god is everything.  I also very much agree that there are absolutely great moral teachings in the bible.  In fact, the teachings of the bible are about the only thing I do believe to be truth.  When I say lies, I am referring to the crap like Jesus making food appear, bringing people back to life, rising from the dead, things of that nature.  Basically, everything besides the teachings.  The teachings are wonderful.  But you know as well as I do how silly some of these stories are.  Just as silly as the stories of the myths of ancient times.  Because they are essentially the same stories.  Perhaps worded a little differently, which allows Berserk to dissmiss them as rubbish.  But eyewitness testimonies from 2000 years ago?  That may be the least effective, accurate, and convincing type of evidence in the history of evidence.  They make up stories in the bible, and then they make up the eyewitness testimonies after theyre finished the book of lies.  Its as simple as that.  The other types of evidence are often either found to be hoaxes or victims of interpolation.

But I agree.. there are great lessons in the bible.  Hell, they even give cooking tips!
Mark 9:50
Salt is good: but if the salt have lost his saltness, wherewith will ye season it? Have salt in yourselves, and have peace one with another.
*****************
I'll agree that minus the Hollywood "magic" stuff (dead people walking around, ect.) as well as most of the Old Testament (barbarism!) AND the entire book of Revelation, the Bible does contain some good moral advice. What's good in the Bible, however, is not necesarily unique (Buddha and Confucius having stated many of the same precepts.) I understand that Thomas Jefferson commissioned a Bible with all of the insanity cut out, and which ended with Jesus' burial...

B-man

Ah Dude, for the first time you make admissions that your prior posts seem to have implicitly overlooked.  Good!   True, you express some authentic thoughts.  But you keep overlooking my key point.   Modern academic scholars do not recognize the truthfulness of the textual basis for many of your parallels with pagan savior figures.  So your case depends on your ability to respond by quoting these ancient texts themselves.  Why won't you directly address my critique point by point as I have addressed yours?  In any case, I have not yet posted the key positive evidence that Jesus ecisted.  That evidence  renders any discussion of the parallels irrelevant.    

But let's change the subject for a moment. Let me share my agenda for setting up this useful confrontation.  No one can rhetorically sledge hammer another into a new faith posture.  Everything ultimately depends on whether you directly experience Christ's reality and power through an experience of intimate union with Him.  But such a personal revelation is most likely to happen when one is vehemently opposed to Christ's reality!  For this and other reasons, the risen Jesus expresses a remarkable preference: "I'd prefer you to be [spiritually] hot or cold--anything but lukewarm towards me (Revelation 3:15-16)."  Why does Christ prefer seekers to be "cold" towards Him rather than "lukewarm?"  Because lukewarm believers embrace their faith for superficial reasons (e. g. church as a social club; Jesus as a useful working construct for life, but no more, etc.)  The cold make no pretensions of commitment towards Him.  But if  they eventually do convert, they make the most dedicated Christians.  St. Paul, the former anti-Christian persecutor, is a good example of this.

But let me give you a modern example of how a debate such as ours has paid great spiritual dividends.  My Dad's acquaintance, Ken, is an oil baron in Alberta, Canada and is a good friend of Alberta's former Premier.  He is an excellent debater and used to love confusing simple-minded Christians with his skeptical arguments.   After one such rhetorical triumph, he was gloating as he drove to an oil meeting in a tall office building in downtown Edmonton.  As he relived key moments of his debate, he confidently challenged Christ: "OK, Jesus, if you're for real, then let some homeless guy confront me at the revolving door of the building and cry, `Alms please!"  No one speaks like that any more.  And panhandlers were virtually unknown in this upscale part of the city.  Ken congratulated hiimself on his  insight that Jesus can't respond to such requests for verification.  

After parking, he walked towards the doorway. Out of nowhere, he was confronted by a young man dressed in a kilt like a Scotsman.  The man shouted, "Alms please!'  Annoyed, ken brushed past hiim through the revolving door.  In a couple of seconds, the significance of what had just happened suddenly dawned on him!  He raced back through the doorway and looked for the panhandler, but "the scotsman" was nowhere to be seen.  In the couple of seconds since the encounter, he had nowhere to escape Ken's gaze.  The area  was far too open. Ken's realization that "the scotsman" had dematerialized quickly led to Ken's spiritual transformation.   I could share a somewhat analogous example from my own life.

In a recent post, you mentioned that you had dreamed about Jesus, but attributed this to our debate.  You may be correct, but this illustrates the point that when we get our mental jiuces flowing about controversial spiritual issues, the unconscious can  be operating behind the scenes to engage these issues intuitively and with the imagination.  Given your paranormal orientation, we'll have to wait and see what happens.

A while ago, I badgered you to read Malachi Martin's "Hostage to the Devil."  In truth, I don't think it matters that much whether one believes in a literal devil or not.  I think you'd be more blown away by atheist Howard Storm's book, "My Descent into Death," easily the most powerful NDE book I've ever read.

Don

I randomly sampled Dude's quotes of violent saying in the NT.

One area sampled was Luke:
“I say unto you, that unto every one that hath shall be given; but from him that hath not, even that which he hath shall be taken away from him. But these mine enemies, that would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me .” (Luke 19:26-27)

I read through this passage.  This is not Jesus talking.  This is a tale of a nobleman, and the nobleman was speaking in Jesus' story in this passage! (Luke 19:12).  Yet Dude tries to pass this off as JC being cruel.  Ridiculous.  Understand what you are reading, people - please!

The same is true for Luke 19:26, 27.


Matthew

Last night before going to bed I stated my intent... I said to myself, If Jesus exists, may he come to me and show me his love.  I made some other statements involving having a guide or Jesus himself reveal the truth about him.  I had some very spiritual dreams last night.  I cannot remember the details, I can only remember the mood of the dreams and possibly some themes.  Spirituality, Jesus, are some things that come to mind.  But I cant remember!  The only dream I do remember is one of my friend killing someone and then me getting blamed for it by my friend.  It really sucks because I woke up after the spiritual dreams and remembered what was said and what they were about, but when I woke up after falling back asleep the memories were gone.  Ill just have to keep it up and see where it takes me.  

I must say, I wouldn't mind Jesus being real, having love for me and all this.  It just doesn't seem to fit in with the way I see life and the things I know of creation and the afterlife.  Not to mention what I know about the true motives of large authoritarian organizations such as religion, the government, ect.. And of course, I can't overlook the fact that there were 15 other "saviors of man."  They can't all be the son of god.  Therefore my logical thinking is that none of them are.  And the thought that we need some holy man to come and erase our "original sins" due to "Adam"(another clearly mythical character) is just rediculous.  The ease at which such things as religious texts and stories can be simply made up is too great.  And the fact that these stories are 2000 years old greatly decreases the validity of any "evidence" proving the Bible and Jesus to be real.  The evidence could be created just as easy as the bible was, and by the same people for the soul purpose of making the bible's stories seem true.  Even the "non-Christian sources" could easily be part of the scam, or at least influenced in some way by those in charge.  Whether this is true or not is not the point.  The point is, it is very possible.   At least the ancient cultures admitted that their religious saviors were myth.  

Quote:

I randomly sampled Dude's quotes of violent saying in the NT. One area sampled was Luke: “I say unto you, that unto every one that hath shall be given; but from him that hath not, even that which he hath shall be taken away from him. But these mine enemies, that would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me .” (Luke 19:26-27)   I read through this passage.  This is not Jesus talking.  This is a tale of a nobleman, and the nobleman was speaking in Jesus' story in this passage! (Luke 19:12).  Yet Dude tries to pass this off as JC being cruel.  Ridiculous.  Understand what you are reading, people - please! The same is true for Luke 19:26, 27.

Regardless of who said it, it is still a pretty crappy thing to put in the bible.  So much for great morals, eh?

I Am Dude wrote on Jan 9^th, 2007 at 11:24pm:

Quote: I randomly sampled Dude's quotes of violent saying in the NT. One area sampled was Luke: “I say unto you, that unto every one that hath shall be given; but from him that hath not, even that which he hath shall be taken away from him. But these mine enemies, that would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me .” (Luke 19:26-27)   I read through this passage.  This is not Jesus talking.  This is a tale of a nobleman, and the nobleman was speaking in Jesus' story in this passage! (Luke 19:12).  Yet Dude tries to pass this off as JC being cruel.  Ridiculous.  Understand what you are reading, people - please! The same is true for Luke 19:26, 27. Regardless of who said it, it is still a pretty crappy thing to put in the bible.  So much for great morals, eh?

ALL books are written by man. And if the books were dictated by Gods, the secretaries could make mistakes in their translation/transcription. I know if I was a secretary recieving dictation from a big man writing a big book, I might want to put some of my own personal stories in there, just to leave my own mark... just for kicks.

This is all out of my domain though. Except.... the books part.

I Am Dude wrote on Jan 9^th, 2007 at 11:22pm:

Last night before going to bed I stated my intent... I said to myself, If Jesus exists, may he come to me and show me his love.  I made some other statements involving having a guide or Jesus himself reveal the truth about him.  I had some very spiritual dreams last night.  I cannot remember the details, I can only remember the mood of the dreams and possibly some themes.  Spirituality, Jesus, are some things that come to mind.  But I cant remember!  The only dream I do remember is one of my friend killing someone and then me getting blamed for it by my friend.  It really sucks because I woke up after the spiritual dreams and remembered what was said and what they were about, but when I woke up after falling back asleep the memories were gone.  Ill just have to keep it up and see where it takes me.   I must say, I wouldn't mind Jesus being real, having love for me and all this.  It just doesn't seem to fit in with the way I see life and the things I know of creation and the afterlife.  Not to mention what I know about the true motives of large authoritarian organizations such as religion, the government, ect.. And of course, I can't overlook the fact that there were 15 other "saviors of man."  They can't all be the son of god.  Therefore my logical thinking is that none of them are.  And the thought that we need some holy man to come and erase our "original sins" due to "Adam"(another clearly mythical character) is just rediculous.  The ease at which such things as religious texts and stories can be simply made up is too great.  And the fact that these stories are 2000 years old greatly decreases the validity of any "evidence" proving the Bible and Jesus to be real.  The evidence could be created just as easy as the bible was, and by the same people for the soul purpose of making the bible's stories seem true.  Even the "non-Christian sources" could easily be part of the scam, or at least influenced in some way by those in charge.  Whether this is true or not is not the point.  The point is, it is very possible.   At least the ancient cultures admitted that their religious saviors were myth.

My respect for you increases Dude. On numerous levels. I don't want to isolate the quotes to say where I draw inspiration and joy from you though. I gotta say... at times I've had a 'oh no' feeling about these continuing threads ( i don't have much personal interest in the specific subject matter; only in the voices speaking it) but I really am enjoying both yours and Don's posts tremendously right now.

I will tell you... "I'll have to keep it up and see where it takes me" is a quote that gives me joy. It's a commitment to find your own answer... outside of any book or opinion.

[smiley=2vrolijk_08.gif]

I can offer some advice if you are having trouble remembering dreams aside from simply having a journal on hand.  

First, I have found it very helpful if I have a firm value for dreams.  In my experience, the memories I recall the best are the ones I have value to.  Still even if I don't add much significance to a memory, I find I can still remember even the most trivial bits of info if I dig into the memory banks;  nothing is lost IMO.  If some detail in a dream is forgoten, I often remember it by seeing an associated image in C1.

Try analyzing your belief about dreams and change it if you feel compelled to.  It could help you in memory recall if there is indeed a belief that censors out a majority of dreams. (Your call)  Bruce has an article about changing a belief on the main section of his site so go check it out.  ;)

The quote in question above, although a bit different in his translation, comes up a lot in the conversations of a friend of mine. In my understanding, he interprets it to mean that the spiritual gifts that we "store up" during our life on earth are taken with us into the afterlife. Therefore, if we do not store these up for ourselves here, we will not only "not have" them when we cross over but we may lose what we do have.  It's sort of an "opposite" way of interpreting the words than what a person would normally do. He extends it to mean the development of all of your unique qualities as a human being....the development of the person that you are, your talents, your special contributions to the world.

This seems to be quite possible if there is, indeed, a sort of "justice" which occurs after our physical deaths.  It can certainly be true of people right here in this lifetime. Those who search deeply do find "riches" along the way which are worth much more than other kinds of wealth.

The "violent" imagery used can be discouraging, and perhaps the translations don't carry the full meanings very well. I often interpret the words "death" and "life" very differently than they are often written about in a materialistic sense. I think it's okay to feel free to do this. I think in simply searching for multiple interpretations we can find an expanded viewpoint at times which more than makes up for the time spent.

love, blink

Straight from Acharya S.'s website Truthbeknown.com
(Don claims she is a kook, yet he fears her wrath! He knows she will school him.)

History and Positions of the Debate
This controversy has existed from the very beginning, and the writings of the "Church Fathers" themselves reveal that they were constantly forced by the pagan intelligentsia to defend what the non-Christians and other Christians ("heretics")4 alike saw as a preposterous and fabricated yarn with absolutely no evidence of it ever having taken place in history. As Rev. Robert Taylor says, "And from the apostolic age downwards, in a never interrupted succession, but never so strongly and emphatically as in the most primitive times, was the existence of Christ as a man most strenuously denied."5 Emperor Julian, who, coming after the reign of the fanatical and murderous "good Christian" Constantine, returned rights to pagan worshippers, stated, "If anyone should wish to know the truth with respect to you Christians, he will find your impiety to be made up partly of the Jewish audacity, and partly of the indifference and confusion of the Gentiles, and that you have put together not the best, but the worst characteristics of them both."6 According to these learned dissenters, the New Testament could rightly be called, "Gospel Fictions."7

A century ago, mythicist Albert Churchward said, "The canonical gospels can be shown to be a collection of sayings from the Egyptian Mythos and Eschatology."8 In Forgery in Christianity, Joseph Wheless states, "The gospels are all priestly forgeries over a century after their pretended dates."9 Those who concocted some of the hundreds of "alternative" gospels and epistles that were being kicked about during the first several centuries C.E. have even admitted that they had forged the documents.10 Forgery during the first centuries of the Church's existence was admittedly rampant, so common in fact that a new phrase was coined to describe it: "pious fraud."11 Such prevarication is confessed to repeatedly in the Catholic Encyclopedia.12 Some of the "great" church fathers, such as Eusebius13, were determined by their own peers to be unbelievable liars who regularly wrote their own fictions of what "the Lord" said and did during "his" alleged sojourn upon the earth.14

The Proof
The assertion that Jesus Christ is a myth can be proved not only through the works of dissenters and "pagans" who knew the truth - and who were viciously refuted or murdered for their battle against the Christian priests and "Church Fathers" fooling the masses with their fictions - but also through the very statements of the Christians themselves, who continuously disclose that they knew Jesus Christ was a myth founded upon more ancient deities located throughout the known ancient world. In fact, Pope Leo X, privy to the truth because of his high rank, made this curious declaration, "What profit has not that fable of Christ brought us!"15 (Emphasis added.) As Wheless says, "The proofs of my indictment are marvellously easy."

The Gnostics
From their own admissions, the early Christians were incessantly under criticism by scholars of great repute who were impugned as "heathens" by their Christian adversaries. This group included many Gnostics, who strenuously objected to the carnalization of their deity, as the Christians can be shown to have taken many of the characteristics of their god and godman from the Gnostics, meaning "Ones who know," a loose designation applied to members of a variety of esoteric schools and brotherhoods. The refutations of the Christians against the Gnostics reveal that the Christian godman was an insult to the Gnostics, who held that their god could never take human form.16

Biblical Sources
It is very telling that the earliest Christian documents, the Epistles attributed to "Paul," never discuss a historical background of Jesus but deal exclusively with a spiritual being who was known to all gnostic sects for hundreds to thousands of years. The few "historical" references to an actual life of Jesus cited in the Epistles are demonstrably interpolations and forgeries, as are, according to Wheless, the Epistles themselves, as they were not written by "Paul."17 Aside from the brief reference to Pontius Pilate at 1 Timothy 6:13, an epistle dated ben Yehoshua to 144 CE and thus not written by Paul, the Pauline literature (as pointed out by Edouard Dujardin) "does not refer to Pilate18, or the Romans, or Caiaphas, or the Sanhedrin, or Herod19, or Judas, or the holy women, or any person in the gospel account of the Passion, and that it also never makes any allusion to them; lastly, that it mentions absolutely none of the events of the Passion, either directly or by way of allusion."20 Dujardin additionally relates that other early "Christian" writings such as Revelation do not mention any historical details or drama.21 Mangasarian notes that Paul also never quotes from Jesus's purported sermons and speeches, parables and prayers, nor does he mention Jesus's supernatural birth or any of his alleged wonders and miracles, all which one would presume would be very important to his followers, had such exploits and sayings been known prior to "Paul."22

Turning to the gospels themselves, which were composed between 170-180 C.E.22a, their pretended authors, the apostles, give sparse histories and genealogies of Jesus that contradict each other and themselves in numerous places. The birthdate of Jesus is depicted as having taken place at different times. His birth and childhood are not mentioned in "Mark," and although he is claimed in "Matthew" and "Luke" to have been "born of a virgin," his lineage is traced to the House of David through Joseph, such that he may "fulfill prophecy."23 He is said in the first three (Synoptic) gospels to have taught for one year before he died, while in "John" the number is three years. "Matthew" relates that Jesus delivered "The Sermon on the Mount"24 before "the multitudes," while "Luke" says it was a private talk given only to the disciples. The accounts of his Passion and Resurrection differ utterly from each other, and no one states how old he was when he died.25 Wheless says, "The so-called 'canonical' books of the New Testament, as of the Old, are a mess of contradictions and confusions of text, to the present estimate of 150,000 and more 'variant readings,' as is well known and admitted."26 In addition, of the dozens of gospels, ones that were once considered canonical or genuine were later rejected as "apocryphal" or spurious, and vice versa. So much for the "infallible Word of God" and "infallible" Church! The confusion exists because the Christian plagiarists over the centuries were attempting to amalgamate and fuse practically every myth, fairytale, legend, doctrine or bit of wisdom they could pilfer from the innumerable different mystery religions and philosophies that existed at the time. In doing so, they forged, interpolated, mutilated, changed, and rewrote these texts for centuries.27

Non-Biblical Sources
Basically, there are no non-biblical references to a historical Jesus by any known historian of the time during and after Jesus's purported advent. Walker says, "No literate person of his own time mentioned him in any known writing." Eminent Hellenistic Jewish historian and philosopher Philo (20 B.C.E.-50 C.E.), alive at the purported time of Jesus, makes no mention of him. Nor do any of the some 40 other historians who wrote during the first one to two centuries of the Common Era. "Enough of the writings of [these] authors...remain to form a library. Yet in this mass of Jewish and Pagan literature, aside from two forged passages in the works of a Jewish author, and two disputed passages in the works of Roman writers, there is to be found no mention of Jesus Christ."28 Their silence is deafening testimony against the historicizers.

In the entire works of the Jewish historian Josephus, which constitute many volumes, there are only two paragraphs that purport to refer to Jesus. Although much has been made of these "references," they have been dismissed by all scholars and even by Christian apologists as forgeries, as have been those referring to John the Baptist and James, "brother" of Jesus. Bishop Warburton labeled the Josephus interpolation regarding Jesus as "a rank forgery, and a very stupid one, too."29 Wheless notes that, "The first mention ever made of this passage, and its text, are in the Church History of that 'very dishonest writer,' Bishop Eusebius, in the fourth century...CE [Catholic Encyclopedia] admits... the above cited passage was not known to Origen and the earlier patristic writers." Wheless, a lawyer, and Taylor, a minister, agree that it was Eusebius himself who forged the passage.

Regarding the letter to Trajan supposedly written by Pliny the Younger, which is one of the pitifully few "references" to Jesus or Christianity held up by Christians as evidence of the existence of Jesus, there is but one word that is applicable--"Christian"--and that has been demonstrated to be spurious, as is also suspected of the entire letter. Concerning the passage in the works of the historian Tacitus, who did not live during the purported time of Jesus but was born two decades after his purported death, this is also considered by competent scholars as an interpolation and forgery.30 Christian defenders also like to hold up the passage in Suetonius that refers to someone named "Chrestus" or "Chresto" as reference to their Savior; however, while some have speculated that there was a Roman man of that name at that time, the name "Chrestus" or "Chrestos," meaning "useful," was frequently held by freed slaves. Others opine that this passage is also an interpolation.

As to these references and their constant regurgitation by Christian apologists, Dr. Alvin Boyd Kuhn says:

"The average Christian minister who has not read outside the pale of accredited Church authorities will impart to any parishioner making the inquiry the information that no event in history iis better attested by witness than the occurences in the Gospel narrative of Christ's life. He will go over the usual citation of the historians who mention Jesus and the letters claiming to have been written about him. When the credulous questioner, putting trust in the intelligence and good faith of his pastor, gets this answer, he goes away assured on the point of the veracity of the Gospel story. The pastor does not qualify his data with the information that the practice of forgery, fictionizing and fable was rampant in the early Church. In the simple interest of truth, then, it is important to examine the body of alleged testimony from secular history and see what credibility and authority it possess.

"First, as to the historians whose works record the existence of Jesus, the list comprises but four. They are Pliny, Tacitus, Suetonius and Josephus. There are short paragraphs in the works of each of these, two in Josephus. The total quantity of this material is given by Harry Elmer Barnes in The Twilight of Christianity as some twenty-four lines. It may total a little more, perhaps twice that amount. This meager testimony constitutes the body or mass of the evidence of 'one of the best attested events in history.' Even if it could be accepted as indisputably authentic and reliable, it would be faltering support for an event that has dominated the thought of half the world for eighteen centuries.

"But what is the standing of this witness? Not even Catholic scholars of importance have dissented from a general agreement of academic investigators that these passages, one and all, must by put down as forgeries and interpolations by partisan Christian scribes who wished zealously to array the authority of these historians behind the historicity of the Gospel life of Jesus. A sum total of forty or fifty lines from secular history supporting the existence of Jesus of Nazareth, and they completely discredited!"30a

Of these "references," Dujardin says, "But even if they are authentic, and were derived from earlier sources, they would not carry us back earlier than the period in which the gospel legend took form, and so could attest only the legend of Jesus, and not his historicity." In any case, these scarce and brief "references" to a man who supposedly shook up the world can hardly be held up as proof of his existence, and it is absurd that the purported historicity of the entire Christian religion is founded upon them.31 As it is said, "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof"; yet, no proof of any kind for the historicity of Jesus has ever existed or is forthcoming.

The Characters
It is evident that there was no single historical person upon whom the Christian religion was founded, and that "Jesus Christ" is a compilation of legends, heroes, gods and godmen. There is not adequate room here to go into detail about each god or godman that contributed to the formation of the Jewish Jesus character; suffice it to say that there is plenty of documentation to show that this issue is not a question of "faith" or "belief." The truth is that during the era this character supposedly lived there was an extensive library at Alexandria and an incredibly nimble brotherhood network that stretched from Europe to China, and this information network had access to numerous manuscripts that told the same narrative portrayed in the New Testament with different place names and ethnicity for the characters. In actuality, the legend of Jesus nearly identically parallels the story of Krishna, for example, even in detail, as was presented by noted mythologist and scholar Gerald Massey over 100 years ago, as well as by Rev. Robert Taylor 160 years ago, among others.32 The Krishna tale as told in the Hindu Vedas has been dated to at least as far back as 1400 B.C.E.33 The same can be said of the well-woven Horus mythos, which also is practically identical, in detail, to the Jesus story, but which predates the Christian version by thousands of years.

As concerns the specious claim that the analogies between the Christ myth and those outlined below are "non-existent" because they are not found in "primary sources," let us turn to the words of the early Church fathers, who acknowledged that major important aspects of the Christ character are indeed to be found in the stories of earlier, "Pagan" gods, but who asserted that the reason for these similarities was because the evidently prescient devil "anticipated" Christ and planted "foreshadowing" of his "coming" in the heathens' minds.

In his First Apology, Christian father Justin Martyr (c. 100-165) acknowledged the similarities between the older Pagan gods and religions and those of Christianity, when he attempted to demonstrate, in the face of ridicule, that Christianity was no more ridiculous than the earlier myths:

"ANALOGIES TO THE HISTORY OF CHRIST. And when we say also that the Word, who is the first-birth of God, was produced without sexual union, and that He, Jesus Christ, our Teacher, was crucified and died, and rose again, and ascended into heaven, we propound nothing different from what you believe regarding those whom you esteem sons of Jupiter. For you know how many sons your esteemed writers ascribed to Jupiter: Mercury, the interpreting word and teacher of all; Aesculapius, who, though he was a great physician, was struck by a thunderbolt, and so ascended to heaven; and Bacchus too, after he had been torn limb from limb; and Hercules, when he had committed himself to the flames to escape his toils; and the sons of Leda, and Dioscuri; and Perseus, son of Danae; and Bellerophon, who, though sprung from mortals, rose to heaven on the horse Pegasus. For what shall I say of Ariadne, and those who, like her, have been declared to be set among the stars? And what of the emperors who die among yourselves, whom you deem worthy of deification, and in whose behalf you produce some one who swears he has seen the burning Caesar rise to heaven from the funeral pyre?"

In his endless apologizing, Justin reiterates the similarities between his godman and the gods of other cultures:

"As to the objection of our Jesus's being crucified, I say, that suffering was common to all the aforementioned sons of Jove [Jupiter]... As to his being born of a virgin, you have your Perseus to balance that. As to his curing the lame, and the paralytic, and such as were cripples from birth, this is little more than what you say of your Aesculapius."

In making these comparisons between Christianity and its predecessor Paganism, however, Martyr sinisterly spluttered:

"It having reached the Devil’s ears that the prophets had foretold the coming of Christ, the Son of God, he set the heathen Poets to bring forward a great many who should be called the sons of Jove. The Devil laying his scheme in this, to get men to imagine that the true history of Christ was of the same characters the prodigious fables related of the sons of Jove."

In his Dialogue with Trypho the Jew, Martyr again admits the pre-existence of the Christian tale and then uses his standard, irrational and self-serving apology, i.e., "the devil got there first":

"Be well assured, then, Trypho, that I am established in the knowledge of and faith in the Scriptures by those counterfeits which he who is called the devil is said to have performed among the Greeks; just as some were wrought by the Magi in Egypt, and others by the false prophets in Elijah’s days. For when they tell that Bacchus, son of Jupiter, was begotten by [Jupiter’s] intercourse with Semele, and that he was the discoverer of the vine; and when they relate, that being torn in pieces, and having died, he rose again, and ascended to heaven; and when they introduce wine into his mysteries, do I not perceive that [the devil] has imitated the prophecy announced by the patriarch Jacob, and recorded by Moses? And when they tell that Hercules was strong, and travelled over all the world, and was begotten by Jove of Alcmene, and ascended to heaven when he died, do I not perceive that the Scripture which speaks of Christ, "strong as a giant to run his race," has been in like manner imitated? And when he [the devil] brings forward Aesculapius as the raiser of the dead and healer of all diseases, may I not say that in this matter likewise he has imitated the prophecies about Christ?... And when I hear, Trypho, that Perseus was begotten of a virgin, I understand that the deceiving serpent counterfeited also this."

And in his Octavius, Christian writer Minucius Felix (c. 250 CE) denied that Christians worshipped a "criminal and his cross," and retorted that the Pagans did esteem a crucified man:

"Chapter XXIX.-Argument: Nor is It More True that a Man Fastened to a Cross on Account of His Crimes is Worshipped by Christians, for They Believe Not Only that He Was Innocent, But with Reason that He Was God. But, on the Other Hand, the Heathens Invoke the Divine Powers of Kings Raised into Gods by Themselves; They Pray to Images, and Beseech Their Genii.

"These, and such as these infamous things, we are not at liberty even to hear; it is even disgraceful with any more words to defend ourselves from such charges. For you pretend that those things are done by chaste and modest persons, which we should not believe to be done at all, unless you proved that they were true concerning yourselves. For in that you attribute to our religion the worship of a criminal and his cross, you wander far from the neighbourhood of the truth, in thinking either that a criminal deserved, or that an earthly being was able, to be believed God... Crosses, moreover, we neither worship nor wish for. You, indeed, who consecrate gods of wood, adore wooden crosses perhaps as parts of your gods. For your very standards, as well as your banners; and flags of your camp, what else are they but crosses gilded and adorned? Your victorious trophies not only imitate the appearance of a simple cross, but also that of a man affixed to it..."

The Jesus story incorporated elements from the tales of other deities recorded in this widespread area, such as many of the following world saviors and "sons of God," most or all of whom predate the Christian myth, and a number of whom were crucified or executed.33a

Adad of Assyria
Adonis, Apollo, Heracles ("Hercules") and Zeus of Greece
Alcides of Thebes
Attis of Phrygia
Baal of Phoenicia
Bali of Afghanistan
Beddru of Japan
Buddha of India
Crite of Chaldea
Deva Tat of Siam
Hesus of the Druids
Horus, Osiris, and Serapis of Egypt, whose long-haired, bearded appearance was adopted for the Christ character34
Indra of Tibet/India
Jao of Nepal
Krishna of India
Mikado of the Sintoos
Mithra of Persia
Odin of the Scandinavians
Prometheus of Caucasus/Greece
Quetzalcoatl of Mexico
Salivahana of Bermuda
Tammuz of Syria (who was, in a typical mythmaking move, later turned into the disciple Thomas35)
Thor of the Gauls
Universal Monarch of the Sibyls36
Wittoba of the Bilingonese
Xamolxis of Thrace
Zarathustra/Zoroaster of Persia
Zoar of the Bonzes

The Creation of a Myth
The Christians went on a censorship rampage that led to the virtual illiteracy of the ancient world and ensured that their secret would be hidden from the masses64, but the scholars of other schools/sects never gave up their arguments against the historicizing of a very ancient mythological creature. We have lost the arguments of these learned dissenters because the Christians destroyed any traces of their works. Nonetheless, the Christians preserved the contentions of their detractors through the Christians' own refutations.

For example, early Church Father Tertullian (@ 160-220 C.E.), an "ex-Pagan" and Bishop of Carthage, ironically admits the true origins of the Christ story and of all other such godmen by stating in refutation of his critics, "You say we worship the sun; so do you."65 Interestingly, a previously strident believer and defender of the faith, Tertullian later renounced Christianity66.

The "Son" of God is the "Sun" of God 67
The reason why all these narratives are so similar, with a godman who is crucified and resurrected, who does miracles and has 12 disciples, is that these stories were based on the movements of the sun through the heavens, an astrotheological development that can be found throughout the planet because the sun and the 12 zodiac signs can be observed around the globe. In other words, Jesus Christ and all the others upon whom this character is predicated are personifications of the sun, and the Gospel fable is merely a rehash of a mythological formula (the "Mythos," as mentioned above) revolving around the movements of the sun through the heavens.68

For instance, many of the world's crucified godmen have their traditional birthday on December 25th ("Christmas"69). This is because the ancients recognized that (from an earthcentric perspective) the sun makes an annual descent southward until December 21st or 22nd, the winter solstice, when it stops moving southerly for three days and then starts to move northward again. During this time, the ancients declared that "God's sun" had "died" for three days and was "born again" on December 25th. The ancients realized quite abundantly that they needed the sun to return every day and that they would be in big trouble if the sun continued to move southward and did not stop and reverse its direction. Thus, these many different cultures celebrated the "sun of God's" birthday on December 25th.70 The following are the characteristics of the "sun of God":

The sun "dies" for three days on December 22nd, the winter solstice, when it stops in its movement south, to be born again or resurrected on December 25th, when it resumes its movement north.
In some areas, the calendar originally began in the constellation of Virgo, and the sun would therefore be "born of a Virgin."
The sun is the "Light of the World."
The sun "cometh on clouds, and every eye shall see him."
The sun rising in the morning is the "Savior of mankind."
The sun wears a corona, "crown of thorns" or halo.71
The sun "walks on water."
The sun's "followers," "helpers" or "disciples" are the 12 months and the 12 signs of the zodiac or constellations, through which the sun must pass.
The sun at 12 noon is in the house or temple of the "Most High"; thus, "he" begins "his Father's work" at "age" 12.
The sun enters into each sign of the zodiac at 30°; hence, the "Sun of God" begins his ministry at "age" 30.
The sun is hung on a cross or "crucified," which represents its passing through the equinoxes, the vernal equinox being Easter, at which time it is then resurrected.72
Contrary to popular belief, the ancients were not an ignorant and superstitious lot who actually believed their deities to be literal characters. Indeed, this slanderous propaganda has been part of the conspiracy to make the ancients appear as if they were truly the dark and dumb rabble that was in need of the "light of Jesus."73 The reality is that the ancients were no less advanced in their morals and spiritual practices, and in many cases were far more advanced, than the Christians in their own supposed morality and ideology, which, in its very attempt at historicity, is in actuality a degradation of the ancient Mythos. Indeed, unlike the "superior" Christians, the true intelligentsia amongst the ancients were well aware that their gods were astronomical and atmospheric in nature. Socrates, Plato and Aristotle74 surely knew that Zeus, the sky god father figure who migrated to Greece from India and/or Egypt, was never a real person, despite the fact that the Greeks have designated on Crete both a birth cave and a death cave of Zeus. In addition, all over the world are to be found sites where this god or that allegedly was born, walked, suffered, died, etc., a common and unremarkable occurrence that is not monopolized by, and did not originate with, Christianity.74a

Etymology Tells the Story
Zeus, aka "Zeus Pateras," who we now automatically believe to be a myth and not a historical figure, takes his name from the Indian version, "Dyaus Pitar." Dyaus Pitar in turn is related to the Egyptian "Ptah," and from both Pitar and Ptah comes the word "pater," or "father." "Zeus" equals "Dyaus," which became "Deos," "Deus" and "Dios"--"God." "Zeus Pateras," like Dyaus Pitar, means, "God the Father," a very ancient concept that in no way originated with "Jesus" and Christianity. There is no question of Zeus being a historical character. Dyaus Pitar becomes "Jupiter" in Roman mythology, and likewise is not representative of an actual, historical character. In Egyptian mythology, Ptah, the Father, is the unseen god-force, and the sun was viewed as Ptah's visible proxy who brings everlasting life to the earth; hence, the "son of God" is really the "sun of God." Indeed, according to Hotema, the very name "Christ" comes from the Hindi word "Kris" (as in Krishna), which is a name for the sun.75

Furthermore, since Horus was called "Iusa/Iao/Iesu"76 the "KRST," and Krishna/Christna was called "Jezeus," centuries before any Jewish character similarly named, it would be safe to assume that Jesus Christ is just a repeat of Horus and Krishna, among the rest. According to Rev. Taylor, the title "Christ" in its Hebraic form meaning "Anointed" ("Masiah"77) was held by all kings of Israel, as well as being "so commonly assumed by all sorts of impostors, conjurers, and pretenders to supernatural communications, that the very claim to it is in the gospel itself considered as an indication of imposture..."78 Hotema states that the name "Jesus Christ" was not formally adopted in its present form until after the first Council of Nicea, i.e., in 325 C.E.79

In actuality, even the place names and the appellations of many other characters in the New Testament can be revealed to be Hebraicized renderings of the Egyptian texts.

As an example, in the fable of "Lazarus," the mummy raised from the dead by Jesus, the Christian copyists did not change his name much, "El-Azar-us" being the Egyptian mummy raised from the dead by Horus possibly 1,000 years or more before the Jewish version.80 This story is allegory for the sun reviving its old, dying self, or father, as in "El-Osiris."81 It is not a true story.

Horus's principal enemy--originally Horus's other face or "dark" aspect - was "Set" or "Sata," whence comes "Satan."82 Horus struggles with Set in the exact manner that Jesus battles with Satan, with 40 days in the wilderness, among other similarities.83 This is because this myth represents the triumph of light over dark, or the sun's return to relieve the terror of the night.

"Jerusalem" simply means "City of Peace," and the actual city in Israel was named after the holy city of peace in the Egyptian sacred texts that already existed at the time the city was founded. Likewise, "Bethany," site of the famous multiplying of the loaves, means "House of God," and is allegory for the "multiplication of the many out of the One."84 Any town of that designation was named for the allegorical place in the texts that existed before the town's foundation. The Egyptian predecessor and counterpart is "Bethanu."85

The Book of Revelation is Egyptian and Zoroastrian
One can find certain allegorical place names such as "Jerusalem" and "Israel" in the Book of Revelation. Massey has stated that Revelation, rather than having been written by any apostle called John during the 1st Century C.E., is a very ancient text that dates to the beginning of this era of history, i.e. possibly as early as 4,000 years ago.86 Massey asserts that Revelation relates the Mithraic legend of Zarathustra/Zoroaster.87 Hotema says of this mysterious book, which has baffled mankind for centuries: "It is expressed in terms of creative phenomena; its hero is not Jesus but the Sun of the Universe, its heroine is the Moon; and all its other characters are Planets, Stars and Constellations; while its stage-setting comprises the Sky, the Earth, the Rivers and the Sea." The common form of this text has been attributed by Churchward to Horus's scribe, Aan, whose name has been passed down to us as "John."88

The word Israel itself, far from being a Jewish appellation, probably comes from the combination of three different reigning deities: Isis, the Earth Mother Goddess revered throughout the ancient world; Ra, the Egyptian sungod; and El, the Semitic deity passed down in form as Saturn.90 El was one of the earliest names for the god of the ancient Hebrews (whence Emmanu-El, Micha-El, Gabri-El, Samu-El, etc., and his worship is reflected in the fact that the Jews still consider Saturday as "God's Day."91

Indeed, that the Christians worship on Sunday betrays the genuine origins of their god and godman. Their "savior" is actually the sun, which is the "Light of the world that every eye can see." The sun has been viewed consistently throughout history as the savior of mankind for reasons that are obvious. Without the sun, the planet would scarcely last one day. So important was the sun to the ancients that they composed a "Sun Book," or "Helio Biblia," which became the "Holy Bible."91a

The "Patriarchs" and "Saints" are the Gods of Other Cultures
When one studies mythmaking, one can readily discern and delineate a pattern that is repeated throughout history. Whenever an invading culture takes over its predecessors, it either vilifies the preceding deities or makes them into lesser gods, "patriarchs" or, in the case of Christianity, "saints." This process is exemplified in the adoption of the Hindu god Brahma as the Hebrew patriarch Abraham.92 Another school of thought proposes that the patriarch Joshua was based on Horus as "Iusa," since the cult of Horus had migrated by this period to the Levant. In this theory, the cult of Joshua, which was situated in exactly the area where the Christ drama allegedly took place, then mutated into the Christian story, with Joshua becoming Jesus.93 As Robertson says, "The Book of Joshua leads us to think that he had several attributes of the Sun-god, and that, like Samson and Moses, he was an ancient deity reduced to human status."

Indeed, the legend of Moses, rather than being that of a historical Hebrew character, is found around the ancient Middle and Far East, with the character having different names and races, depending on the locale: "Manou" is the Indian legislator; "Nemo the lawgiver," who brought down the tablets from the Mountain of God, hails from Babylon; "Mises" is found in Syria and Egypt, where also "Manes the lawgiver" takes the stage; "Minos" is the Cretan reformer; and the Ten Commandments are simply a repetition of the Babylonian Code of Hammurabi and the Hindu Vedas, among others.94 Like Moses, Krishna was placed by his mother in a reed boat and set adrift in a river to be discovered by another woman.95 A century ago, Massey outlined, and Graham recently reiterated, that even the Exodus itself is not a historical event. That the historicity of the Exodus has been questioned is echoed by the lack of any archaeological record, as is reported in Biblical Archaeology Review ("BAR"), September/October 1994.96

Like many biblical characters, Noah is also a myth97, long ago appropriated from the Egyptians, the Sumerians and others, as any sophisticated scholar could demonstrate, and yet we find all sorts of books--some even presumably "channeling" the "ultimate truth" from a mystical, omniscient, omnipresent and eternal being such as Jesus himself - prattling on about a genuine, historical Noah, his extraordinary adventures, and the "Great Flood!"98

Additionally, the "Esther" of the Old Testament Book of Esther is a remake of the Goddess Ishtar, Astarte, Astoreth or Isis, from whom comes "Easter"99 and about whose long and ubiquitous reign little is said in "God's infallible Word."100 Per Harwood (Mythology's Last Gods, 230), "Esther" is best transliterated "Ishtar" and "Mordechai" is "Mardukay." The Virgin Mother/Goddess/Queen of Heaven motif is found around the globe, long before the Christian era, with Isis, for instance, also being called "Mata-Meri" ("Mother Mary"). As Walker says, "Mari" was the "basic name of the Goddess known to the Chaldeans as Marratu, to the Jews as Marah, to the Persians as Mariham, to the Christians as Mary... Semites worshipped an androgynous combination of Goddess and God called Mari-El (Mary-God), corresponding to the Egyptian Meri-Ra, which combined the feminine principle of water with the masculine principle of the sun."

Even the Hebraic name of God, "Yahweh," was taken from the Egyptian "IAO."101

In one of the most notorious of Christian deceptions, in order to convert followers of "Lord Buddha," the Church canonized him as "St. Josaphat," which represented a Christian corruption of the buddhistic title, "Bodhisat."102

The "Disciples" are the Signs of the Zodiac
Moreover, it is no accident that there are 12 patriarchs and 12 disciples, 12 being the number of the astrological signs, or months. Indeed, like the 12 Herculean tasks and the 12 "helpers" of Horus, Jesus's 12 disciples are symbolic for the zodiacal signs and do not depict any literal figures who played out a drama upon the earth circa 30 C.E. The disciples can be shown to have been an earlier deity/folkloric hero/constellation.103 Peter is easily revealed to be a mythological character104, while Judas has been said to represent Scorpio, "the backbiter," the time of year when the sun's rays are weakening and the sun appears to be dying.105 James, "brother of Jesus" and "brother of the Lord," is equivalent to Amset, brother of Osiris and brother of the Lord.106 Massey says "Taht-Matiu was the scribe of the gods, and in Christian art Matthew is depicted as the scribe of the gods, with an angel standing near him, to dictate the gospel."107 Even the apostle Paul is a compilation of several characters: The Old Testament Saul, Apollonius of Tyana and the Greek demigod Orpheus.108

Was Jesus an Essene Master? 109
As regards Jesus being an Essene according to "secret" Dead Sea Scrolls, even before the discovery of the scrolls, over the centuries there has been much speculation to this effect, but Massey skillfully argued that many of Jesus's presumed teachings were either in contradiction to or were non-existent in Essene philosophy.110 The Essenes did not believe in corporeal resurrection, nor did they believe in a carnalized messiah. They did not accept the historicity of Jesus. They were not followers of the Hebrew Bible, or its prophets, or the concept of the original fall that must produce a savior. Massey further points out that the Essenes were teetotalers and ate to live rather than the other way around. Compared to this, the assumed Essene Jesus appears to be a glutton and drunkard. Also, whereas according to Josephus the Essenes abhorred the swearing of oaths, Jesus was fond of "swearing unto" his disciples.111 While many Essenic doctrines are included in the New Testament, the list of disparities between the Dead Sea Scroll Essenes and their alleged great master Jesus goes on.112

Qumran is Not an Essene Community
It should also be noted that there is another debate as to whether or not Qumran, the site traditionally associated with the Dead Sea Scrolls, was an Essene community. In BAR, previously cited, it is reported that archaeological finds indicate Qumran was not an Essene community but was possibly a waystation for travelers and merchants crossing the Dead Sea. In BAR, it has also been hypothesized that the fervent tone and warrior-stance of some of the scrolls unearthed near Qumran belie any Essene origin and indicate a possible attribution to Jewish Zealots instead. In Who Wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls, Norman Golb makes a very good case that the Dead Sea Scrolls were not written by any Essene scribes but were a collection of tomes from various libraries that were secreted in caves throughout eastern Israel by Jews fleeing the Roman armies during the First Revolt of 70 A.D. Golb also hypothesizes that Qumran itself was a fortress, not a monastery. In any case, it is impossible to equate the "Teacher of Righteousness" found in any scrolls with Jesus Christ.

Was the New Testament Composed by Therapeuts?
In 1829 Rev. Taylor adeptly made the case that the entire Gospel story was already in existence long before the beginning of the Common Era and was probably composed by the monks at Alexandria called "Therapeuts" in Greek and "Essenes" in Egyptian, both names meaning "healers."113 This theory has stemmed in part from the statement of early church father Eusebius, who, in a rare moment of seeming honesty, "admitted...that the canonical Christian gospels and epistles were the ancient writings of the Essenes or Therapeutae reproduced in the name of Jesus."114 Taylor also opines that "the travelling Egyptian Therapeuts brought the whole story from India to their monasteries in Egypt, where, some time after the commencement of the Roman monarchy, it was transmuted in Christianity."115 In addition, Wheless evinces that one can find much of the fable of "Jesus Christ" in the Book of Enoch116, which predated the supposed advent of the Jewish master by hundreds of years.117 According to Massey, it was the "pagan" Gnostics--who included members of the Essene/Therapeut and Nazarene118 brotherhoods, among others--who actually carried to Rome the esoteric (gnostic) texts containing the Mythos, upon which the numerous gospels, including the canonical four, were based. Wheless says, "Obviously, the Gospels and other New Testament booklets, written in Greek and quoting 300 times the Greek Septuagint, and several Greek Pagan authors, as Aratus, and Cleanthes, were written, not by illiterate Jewish peasants, but by Greek-speaking ex-Pagan Fathers and priests far from the Holy Land of the Jews."119 Mead averred, "We thus conclude that the autographs of our four Gospels were most probably written in Egypt, in the reign of Hadrian."120

Conclusion
As Walker said, "Scholars' efforts to eliminate paganism from the Gospels in order to find a historical Jesus have proved as hopeless as searching for a core in an onion." The "gospel" story of Jesus is not a factual portrayal of a historical "master" who walked the earth 2,000 years ago. It is a myth built upon other myths and godmen, who in turn were personifications of the ubiquitous sungod mythos.

"The Christ of the gospels is in no sense an historical personage or a supreme model of humanity, a hero who strove, and suffered, and failed to save the world by his death. It is impossible to establish the existence of an historical character even as an impostor. For such an one the two witnesses, astronomical mythology and gnosticism, completely prove an alibi. The Christ is a popular lay-figure that never lived, and a lay-figure of Pagan origin; a lay-figure that was once the Ram and afterwards the Fish; a lay-figure that in human form was the portrait and image of a dozen different gods."

Gerald Massey

I'm tired right now, and when I'm tired, I  tend to trot out my canned answers.  When rested, I try to rethink my "answers" that may seem stale from  overuse.  Sometimes I still regurgitate the canned answers, but other times I may discern one new wrinkle that brings the issue to life again for me.  

Posters have commented on some difficult Gospel sayings.  I hope to offer my explanations later, but for now I just want to offer 2 often overlooked  points about Jesus that are very meaningful to me.

(1) To me, the Gospels are the equivalent of entrusting Einstein's relativity theory to a typical college freshman.  Jesus' teachings are reduced to oversimplified maxims to facilitate memorization.  But much of the profundity is removed in the process.   This oversimplification can best be seen by inquiring into the Jewish background of His teachings.  This inquiry makes one realize that Jesus presumes the need for healthy self-esteem, but distnguishes this from inordinate pride.  He is concerned that people discern the subtle line between these positive and negative qualities.  Similarly, He is concerned to distinguish the virtue of humility from low self-esteem and unhealthy humiliation.  These distinctions emerge from the Jewish background of Jesus' thought, but they get buried in a straightforward reading of our Gospels.  The disciples were not fully up to the task of transmitting Jesus' teaching.

In this respect, it is very interesting to understand why St. Paul quotes the historical Jesus only 3 times in his epistles.  Paul explains that a simple memorization of principles makes you live in your head and can kill your spiritual growth.  What Paul taught was the need for a contemplative or mystical consciousness.   For him, the big question is not: "What was Jesus saying to His audience back then?," but rather, "What is the Christ Spirit saying to you right now as you face your complex problems?"   He stressed a right-brain spirituality, not a left-brained one.  This point generally gets lost in our Christian pulpits.

Also, Jesus makes some statements that make it clear that for Him Hell is not a permanent abode, but an instrument of purgation.  This becomes even more clear when one researches the background of those sayings.  But the early church was angry about its persecution and determined to make converts.  It is clear to me that they succumbed to the temptation of accentuating fear-based religion to a degree that Jesus enver intended.  Again, our Gospels at times create a false impression.  

(2) Christians like to stress Jesus' messianic status and divinity, His teachings and His spiritual example.   But they ignore His personality as distinct from His character.  This neglect make Jesus seem too much like a cardboard figure who is hard to identify with and, for some, harder to love.  Discerning Jesus' personality can be threatening to believers because it makes Him all too human.  Christians affirm the fully humanity of Jesus, but are very reluctant to think through the full implications of this.  

One of my favorite scenes in a Jesus movie comes from the old Spanish movie, "The Milky Way."  Two grim Christian pilgrims are en route to a sacred shrine in France and they stop at an inn for lunch.  They get lost in a grim, joyless, unctious conversation about spirituality that drives their waiter to distraction.  Finally, he intervenes and asks coyly: "Tell me gentlemen, do you think Jesus ever laughed?"  In the next scene, you see a man sprinting through a field of grain, laughing his head off in a most undignified fashion.  The viewer eventually discovers to his dismay that this is Jesus en route to the wedding feast at Cana (see John 2).  He has a funny incident to share with His disciples.

Another scene has Jesus teaching until he experiences a bit of a coughing spasm, laughs, and says, "Where was I?"  I'm sure some found this offensive, but ask yourself this question: Don't you think Jesus got the occasional cold or coughing spasm like the rest of us?  

3 aspects of Jesus' personality stand out in our Gospels.  (a) He loves to use corny puns in His teaching.  This puns are clear in the underlying Aramaic, but get lost in our Greek (and of course English) translations.  (b) He loves to use shock tactics and Semitic hyperbole to make many points.  This pedagogical style is partly a function of an oral culture in which many cannot read and there is no media to spread ideas.  So Jesus feels the need to take drastic mesaures to make His points memorable.  This means that a literalistic approach to many of His sayings leads to misunderstanding.  Jesus may just be going for laughs at times.  Shock tactics and deliberate exaggeration are conducive to more memorable communication, but these ploys also presume a whole new set of implicit rules to detect meaning.  (c) Jesus believed that true spirituality is better caught than taught and was low-key in the way He led His disciples.  Thus, He never explains His parables to outsiders.  Our earliest Gospel (Mark) demonstrates that He didn't just share His identity with His disciples.  He expected them to discern that from their direct experience of His lifestyle and example.  In this respect, John somtimes gives a false impression, but John is a spiritual Gospel whose discourses incorporate genuine sayings of Jesus, but were never delivered as such.  As speeches, they are the author's creations.  

There are roughly 12 sayings of Jesus outside the Bible that have an excellent claim to being genuine.  My favorite illustrates Jssus' sense of humor.  It is found in the Gospel of the Poor, which is usually referred to by its Latin name, the Gospel of the Ebionites.  This Jewish Gospel was written shortly after our canonical Gospels.  It survives only in snippets quoted by church fathers.  
It describes how Jesus decided to accept baptism from John.  Scholars view Jesus' baptism as the most historically secure event in Jesus' life.  The reason for this is obvious.  John's was a baptism of repentance.  By accepting it, Jesus seems to repudiate His own sinlessness.  In truth, He viewed sin more as the condition of alienation from God than a legalistic series of vices.  The New Testament makes clear that, being human, Jesus needed to learn by trial-and- error like rest of us.  He is sinless in the sense that his learning curve never alienated Him from God.  Anyway, here's the quote from the Gospel of the Poor that provides yet another glimpse into Jesus' sense of humor:

"The mother of the Lord and His brothers said to Him, `John the Baptist baptizes for the forgiveness of sins.  Let us go and be baptized by him.'  But He said to them, `In what way have I sinned that I should go and be baptized by him?  Oops!  Unless, perhaps, what I just said is a sin of ignorance!"

The "Oops!" is not in the text but is implied by the tone.  No Christian would dare invent a saying in which Jesus makes light of the doctrine of His sinlessness.  So I'm confident that this saying is an authentic example of His sense of humor.  

Don

Can you please tell me what the other quotes are that are outside of the Bible? Or, can you tell me where to find them?

Thank you!

Hi outofbodydude  You say of the empty tomb and where Jesus is buried.but when Jesus came before Pilate before his cruxifixtion,Pilate said to Jesus"Well have you anything to say,why dont you speak,do you not know that i have the power to sentence you to death or realease you."and Jesus answers and says to Pilate "You would not have any power over me ,if it had not been given to you from my father above.

Then when pilate told the crowd to choose between Barrabus and Jesus,one of the romans said to him,"You surely are not going to realease Barrabus,he is an enemy of rome" and Pilate looks across at Jesus and says"I wonder who is the true enemy of Rome.

Pilate had Jesus buried in that tomb because he was afraid deep down and i feel he sensed something in Jesus about being the son of God but would never had let on because the Romans would have lynched him.

And also he told roman soldiers to guard the tomb of Jesus,because he was afraid deep down and these roman soldiers guarded his tomb all night,until his mother mary and mary magdalen and i think it was miriam came to annoint the body of Jesus, and even the roman soldiers were took back because the tomb was empty after they had guarded it all night.and also pilate had it in his head that the people might try and take jesus body from the tomb in the night and say look jesus has risen again but thats because pilate knew deep down that Jesus was the son of God but also didnt want to beleive that this was the son of God and when the tomb was discovered empty the next day,the sanhedrin went in there and his words were"Now it all begins"

Also Pilate let the people decide the fate of Jesus because deep down he did not want to be held personally responsible for the death and cruxifixtion of THE SON OF GOD OUR SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST.

Mary magdalene saw Jesus afterwards and he said to her to go and tell the diciples.Jesus also says to Mary"Do not touch me for i have not yet accsended to the father.

Jesus was the proof that life goes on after death and that we have a spirit.If you beleive in the spirit leaving the body at death and going home to the spirit world ,then you must beleive in our saviour jesus rising again after 3 days.


Love and God bless    Love Juditha

Dude, I take it you are actually reading what you are pasting?!  The absorbing and internalising of literature does helps every so slighty!  No scarcasm intended  :) Gosh I think I need a week to read through what you and Don have written.

Hi there Lady Earth.  There is the Golden Thread which runs throughout literature; literature which has firmly grasped the significant importance that Christ was born in Earth, walked upon Earth, Died and was Risen in form after three days in Earth and His Blood was spilt into the Earth.

It takes seeking but if your heart is willing you will find it.

At hand I have an account of reincarnations of the Prophets, Sages and Disciples; authors of the Bible and although not quotes per say (these are generally written in forms of poems and entire works are based upon the sayings in the Bible which is indeed a rich esoteric book which needs to be read with spiritual eyes to be fully understood) However this work Im quoting below runs parallel to the Bible.

Anway I hope you find it of interest.  I have posted this before beginning of last year but the board had a crash so I'll just type it out again .. lol and copy it!)  Don your comments are welcome.

Taken from: Atlantis to the Latter Days inspirationally dictated to HC Randall-Stevens (El Eros) by the Masters Oneferu and Adolemy of the Osirian Group.  Published by the Knights Templars of Aquarius, London 1957.

A brief summary of re-incarnation History-

Amos
Ahmose, 1376 BC scribe under Akhnaton
Levi, 1760 BC, Son of Jacob & Leah, half brother to Joseph
Amos, 745 BC Prophet of Judea
Mer,  one of the Three Wise Men
Matthew of Galilee, Apostle
St Francis of Assisi, AD 1181-1226 Founder of the Franciscan Order

Baruch
Imenhotep 3000 BC
Thoth of Atlantis
Amenophis, 1412 BC architect and adviser of Amunhotep III deified as god of science and medicine
Baruch 586 BC
Euclid 300 BC, geometrician
Sir William Herschel 1738-1822 astronomer

Daniel
The Ruling Prince of Lemuria 12,000 BC time of 'Merk and Lady of the Sun'
Amraphel or Hammurabi 2000 BC, contemporary with Abraham
Ahmose I, 1580-1529 BC 1st Pharaoh of 18th Dynasty Egypt
Joseph 1761 BC of the 'coat of many colours'
King David, 1580 - 1540 BC of Israel
Rekhmire, 1501 - 1447 BC vizier under Thutmose III
Moses, 1313 - 1193 BC who led out of Egypt
Ahmose II 569 - 525 BC of Egypt
Daniel 606 - 538 BC Prophet
Joseph 44 BC, father of the Master Jesus
Joseph Barnabas 92 AD of Cyprus who worked with St Paul
Merlin 500 AD of King Arthur's court
Leader at Mesa Verde, Indian  who came from the South AD 1200
Montezuma 1500 AD, Aztec of Mexico
Joseph Smith 1805-1844 AD organiser of the Mormon Church

Isaiah
Seti or Anub-Khper-re 1292 BC, 9th son of Ramses II, killed during the Exodus
Isaiah 765 BC, Major Prophet
Aristotle 384-322 BC
John the Beloved of Galilee
Leonarda da Vinci 1452-1519 AD

James
Huya 1376 BC, Major-domo for Queen Tiyi and Aton Priest
James the Less Apostle

Joshua
Tutu 1376 BC minister of forgien affairs for Akhnaton
Uriah the Hittite 1580 BC husband of Bathsheba before David took her
Joshua who led the Israelites into the Promised Land
St Clement 91-100 AD

Jeremiah
Sinuhe or Setymeramun 1376-1356 BC, court physician time of Akhnaton and Pharoah of Egypt for one month
Khaemweset or Setne-Khaem 1292 BC, 4th son of Ramses II, the wizard Prince
Jeremiah 612-550 BC of Judah, Major Prophet
Luke, the physician of Antioch

Joel
Hittite, Ambassador to Egypt time of Akhnaton and Pharoah of Egypt for one month
Joel 720 BC Minor Prophet
John the Baptist 4 BC of Judah
Thomas the doubter, Apostle
(Elijah entered John the Baptist, John the Baptist went over immediately and re-incarnated as Thomas)

Mark
Tutankhaton (not Tutankamen) 1360 - 1350 BC boy King of the 18th dynasty
Merk, space vistor from Hesperus (Venus) who came from Lemuria 12, 000 years ago
Waif on the Nile at the time of Joseph and Asenath - 15th Dynasty
Hadad, 1565 BC of Syria, contemporary with David and Solomon
Menkheperre-Seneb 1501 BC High Priest of Egypt under Thutmose III
Aaron 1316 BC Brother of Moses
Ezekekiel 606-538 BC of Judah, Major Prophet
Simmias 480 BC student of Phylos contemporary with Socrates and Plato
Zacharias or Zechariah of Judah, father of John the Baptist
Mark 18 AD the Evangelist
St George, martyred 303 AD
Doge Giustiniano Porteciazio AD 829 of Venice
Father Ricardo during the Spanish inquistion
Atahualpa 1532 AD, Inca assasinated by Pizarro
Dr Robert Browne 1550-1633 AD of England, father of congregationalism

Peter
Akhnaton 1370-1361 Pharaoh of Egypt
Socrates 469-399 BC philosopher of Greece
Simon Peter (died 67 AD one of the twelve Apostles
Epictetus 67-125 AD Roman stoic philosopher
William Lloyd Garrison 1805-1879 AD Saxon King who established liberation at Boston to advocate emancipation of slaves.

Timothy
Smenkhkare 1361-1360 BC, nine months  Pharaoh of Eqypt
Seti 1321-1300 BC, Pharoah of Egypt whose daughter rescused Moses from the bulrushes and father of Ramses II
Rehoboam 1501 BC son of Solomon
Timothy of Asia minor, favourite disciple of Paul.

Jesus Christ One of a Kind.

:)

Great post Juditha, we must have been writing at the same time  :)

Hi augoiedien  Yours is a great post as well,i really enjoyed reading it.

Love and God bless       Love Juditha

And the debate goes on. Just as it has for the past 2,000 years.  --cat

This question is one that Don always asks.  If you are wrong, would you want the opportunity to know and be shown that you are wrong?  Well I can tell just by your posts that the answer to that is clearly NO.  But, if you decide to change your minds, if you can manage to break past the deep fear that the Christian religion has instilled in you since you were a little tot, if you ever realise that you will not go to hell for not putting your blind faith in Jesus, let alone simply taking a look at him and his life with rationality which is all I am asking you to do...  Then read "Sons of God" by your favorite author Acharya.  I would like to see Don read this, and then say she is full of baloney.    

Invisible History for some perspective :)

Think of the vast difference between man and mineral!
Yet man is only three stages above the mineral.  Try to conceive of the sublimity of beings who are nine, eight, or even seven stages above man.  These supersensible beings, the highest of the Spiritual Hierarchies, are called the Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones – the First Hierarchy.

It is they who comprise the twelve differentiated groupings which we call the Zodiac, which forms as it were, the womb of our solar system.  As a teacher was once a student and as a mother was once a child, so these exalted divine beings came from an earlier solar system in which they passed through their lower stages, until they were so advanced that their solar system could be transformed into our Zodiac and they could rise to mighty, creative, cosmic deeds and make the great sacrifice which gave birth to our solar system. Beyond them is the Divine Trinity, the Threefold Unity.

From the twelve directions of space, they organised the warmth and laid the foundation for the twelvefold differentiated warmth we bear in our twelve-membered physical body today, from Aries-head to Pisces-feet.

There is no chance or accidental coincidence in the recurrent reflection of the heavenly pattern in earthly life.  We find it in the twelve sons of Jacob, the twelve tribes of Israel, the twelve disciples of Christ Jesus and the twelve Knights of the Round Table.

And with same principle mankind, with Earth at the midway station, is evolving the three spirit principles: the spirit-self, life-spirit and spirit-man. All mankind will evolve them somewhat in the course of their future incarnations, and fully in the future planetary existences, called the Jupiter, Venus and Vulcan Periods, through which the Earth will pass in the future, before the beings of our solar system reach the stage of creativity when they can participate in the birth of a new Zodiac and solar system. For man is becoming the Fourth Hierarchy, named the Spirits of Freedom and Love.  At the end of the Earth Period, love should be part of everything, as wisdom is now.

For an approach to this consciousness, we need an enlarged- a cosmic –concept of the Christ, the sublime Sun Spirit who incarnated in Jesus of Nazareth from the Baptism till the Mystery of Golgotha, when he become the Spirit of the Earth and ‘The Lord of all the heavenly forces upon Earth.’ Christ is the being who in the Sun Period selflessly gave himself up in devotion to the Twelve Voices of the Word of Worlds, which kindled in him such Light that he can say, ‘I am the light of the world.’  He belongs to our cosmos as a whole and spreads life throughout our entire universe.  For those who direct their thought to him during waking life, he becomes their guide through the cosmos during sleep and between death and rebirth.  The Midnight Sun; The Spiritual Sun.

***

I agree with that article because the author realizes the obvious connections of ancient themes to astrology.  However, this author blunders like the rest of them in the fact that they take these stories literally.  The ancients were smart enough to realize that their religions were in fact myth, and their son of god was nothing more than their way of representing and worshiping the sun which gave them life.  Of course, the newer civilizations on earth, although claiming to be more advanced than the ancients, cannot seem to realize this and take every story literally.  Silly humans.

Hi OOBD How do you know you are right about it all,weres the actual proof that you have got it right and that others have got it wrong,Chumley is the same,thinks he knows it all. ::)

Love and God bless       Love Juditha

wrote on Jan 13^th, 2007 at 10:48am:

Hi OOBD How do you know you are right about it all,weres the actual proof that you have got it right and that others have got it wrong,Chumley is the same,thinks he knows it all. ::) Love and God bless       Love Juditha

You're right, Juditha..none of us knows it all.  I just had a funny visual..all of us sitting There..laughing at how silly we were Here..

Juditha.  Although it has been debated in the past, it is a scientific fact that the ancients who worshipped a mirror-image Jesus character(Horus, Krishna, ect.. theres 15 to choose from!) knew that this person was simply a representation of the sun.  They worshiped the sun, and they knew this.  They chose to personify the sun by creating a character and myths to go along with it.  Modern religions have been taken far to literally, however.  I believe I have the capability to see through this because while you are already on the Christian side of the fence, you have been worshiping the sun, I mean Jesus, for your whole life, I was presented these facts on middle ground, I did not have any strong beliefs for or against religion or Jesus.  It was my unbiased eye that allowed me to see the truth, and it is your biased eye that prevents you from doing the same.  

Hi Shirley I agree with you,we will all be laughing together one day in the spirit world ,how we was down here.

Love and God bless    Love Juditha


Hi outofbodydude I have to say that you have made a fair point here.

" It was my unbiased eye that allowed me to see the truth, and it is your biased eye that prevents you from doing the same. "

Its not that im biased,i just love Jesus and I have seen him and I have said the lords prayer with him and my catholic nun spirit guide was there with me as well,when i did this.

I will always beleive in Jesus,he loves us all.

Love and God bless       Love Juditha

outofbodydude:

The bible is in our lives the only living arcive of our existence. Putting that all aside, the bible does not teach, or niether does any of the churches teach the true teachings of Jesus that were left out of the Bible as a way to control. By going out of body you can find out these truths if your heart is filled with the love of God. For jesus was the true messhiah, and not many believeed him in his time. In the spirit world you will find that most of the sayings in that bible that jesus said he will tell you himself that he did not say, along with some of the so-called miricales, such as raising Lazzaras from the dead, he was only in a death like condition, and the silver cord had not yet been severed. For once the silver cord is severed, there is no earthly law, or any law in the spirit kingdom of the government that can return a spirit back to the body. Also all of the apostiles will tell you that alot of the books they did not write, only in the recopying and translation, and through the imagination of other writers these books were altered so that enen the originater of said book can not identify with it. And even a scolar of the bible can not discern the truths form the untruths. But these truths are there for those that want to seek them out by talking to these spirits. Although it is diffucult to reach the celesstial heavens, these exalted beings come down to the lower realms to answer any and all questions. The only thing needed is faith and lover in your soul to a degree, that you can see and communicate with these spirits, to learn these truths. As the Bible states: "Seek and ye shall find"


dimensionally yours,

ricktimet

Juditha.

You are blessed to have such a special relationship with Jesus.  May he always bring love into your life.  You need not worry about what I believe regarding Jesus, or anyone else for that matter.  If he is true in your heart then that is all that matters.

Dude

Dude!  I think you just grew by a few years! :)

Hi OOBD   Thanks for those lovely words you have written to me.

God love and bless you     Much love  Juditha


God love and bless you to Shirley   Much love Juditha