Most people we assume lived from those days had people who lived in the same time recording the events. Jesus was dead 90yrs before someone started writing those fables. I don't consider that the same level of acceptance.Both are not true: sources of many historical people were written (a long time ) after they died. And some letters of Paul are written only about 20 years after Jesus' death. Paul refers to the fact that he met Jesus' brother, James, and Peter. The gospel of Mark was written only between 20 and 40 years after the crucifixion. See here]. Of course, it could all be fake, but then you can use Occam's razor. What is the simpler explanation for the Christian movement, with all its writings and stories: to assume that they were all fabricated, or to assume that there really was some Rabbi preaching an apocalyptic message? Of course you must strip the myth from the man, and what remains might not be liked by many modern day Christians... Trying to get the historical facts about Jesus the best as we can might be a better deconstruction of Christendom than completely deny his existence. Most Christians have no idea about what historians know about the history of the bible. Did you read Bart Ehrman's] 'Did Jesus exist?'
Lausten, very well said.
Really hate talking to anyone about religion in America today, because it is mostly based upon belief. To me religion is about history and our ancestry and the bible is just a small part of the past religions.
The post “If Jesus returned", I have to agree that he would not like what the Christian religion turned into.
I try and work with a timeline of thoughts and ideas of the past. A good example is the old pictures of Jesus in the churches and in the old bibles of Jesus standing on a cloud that is omitting light. That cloud is called the Spirit or the Gnostic Spirit. When enough knowledge gathers in one spot it forms a gnostic cloud of knowledge. This cloud lights up when it is transforming the knowledge to people. Jesus the teacher is standing on this cloud.
Just as the religious college in Alexandria was split in half, with one side teaching the Italian version of god and the other half teaching the Gnostic version of god. Jesus is portrayed as the teacher of both versions of god mixed together. And like the Beatles, he did a great job and was needed at the time. But there were just too many versions of other branches of the new Gnostic thought mixed with other religions that came after Jesus that got put into Christianity.
I think that if Jesus returned, what he would dislike the most is the fact that we have not been able to take the deity out of God and return God to the Gnostic state of being the combined knowledge of mankind.
But there is hope yet. The internet may just be the closest thing we have to the first Gnostic god.
Oh, yeah, the original question: of course, Jesus would join the republican party and the NRA, and preach his apocalyptic message on tea party gatherings, and ground a new fracking company. At least, this is what Christians do, don’t they? Bringing the apocalypse closer ASAP.
Of course, it could all be fake, but then you can use Occam's razor. What is the simpler explanation for the Christian movement, with all its writings and stories: to assume that they were all fabricated, or to assume that there really was some Rabbi preaching an apocalyptic message?Using Occam's razor, I would say it is more likely that there were a variety of mythical themes floating around that were applied to some specific political events and written about using this character, Jesus. That would be an acceptable explanation for the book of Mark. We know subsequent writings are copies of that. The only thing that's a little hard to explain is the longevity and proliferation. Part of the mythology is that the movement quickly grew. It didn't. It remained a cult for a couple centuries, among other cults. Any one of them could have been the one chosen by a later Roman emperor and made the official religion, enforced by the military. At that point, the Councils were "making it all up". They were claiming to base their theology on the original scripture, but they had no idea what they were looking at or what it was originally intended to mean. I don't doubt they sincerely thought they were getting it right, but we now know they had no clue.
We know subsequent writings are copies of that. The only thing that's a little hard to explain is the longevity and proliferation. Part of the mythology is that the movement quickly grew. It didn't. It remained a cult for a couple centuries, among other cults. Any one of them could have been the one chosen by a later Roman emperor and made the official religion, enforced by the military. At that point, the Councils were "making it all up". They were claiming to base their theology on the original scripture, but they had no idea what they were looking at or what it was originally intended to mean. I don't doubt they sincerely thought they were getting it right, but we now know they had no clue.I could not agree with you more. That’s what I have been seeing also. The only thing I could add is that at the time the Romans were choosing the state religion, parts of the empire was experiencing the biblical “end of the world" situation caused by the plague. And afterlife must have been on the minds of the masses. As in many of the Gnostic religions, you only got to your level of heaven by being very, very good. In this Christian cult you could pay the church to forgive your past and get you to heaven. If you had no money you could be baptized and go to heaven. This had to be attractive to a lot of people. If I remember right, wasn't the Roman Emperor baptized on his death bed so he could go to heaven? Licinius I was leading Rome until 324 AD, then the next leader was Constantine II in 337 AD. So at the time of the Council of Nicea, Rome had about 15 years of uncertain leadership, unlike any other time in Rome’s history. It is in that window of time that Christianity came together.
You might want to look up Theodosius, 381. Constantine passed a law of tolerance of religions, including Christianity. Theodosius made all of them illegal except a very specific version of Christianity.
I’ll bet Christians today, even the most liberal, would shun Jesus. Like most people in his day he probably had bad teeth, bad body odor, and he in particular was probably unkempt…your basic stereotypical day laborer. He definitely wouldn’t look anything like Fabio, as he’s usually depicted. Probably a lot like the attached pic.
You might want to look up Theodosius, 381. Constantine passed a law of tolerance of religions, including Christianity. Theodosius made all of them illegal except a very specific version of Christianity.Theodosius had his problems with the split of the Roman Empire and the Tsunami of 365 destroying ships of trade that had not been replaced because of the ecological disaster caused by the use of wood for heat and building. He had to keep the flow of grain out of Egypt to Rome. Theodosius needed the Cedar trees of Eastern Mediterranean and that land was being taken over his enemies and the spread of the popular Manichaeism religion. It makes all the scene in the world to pull your people together under one religion to be able to fight the spread of Manichaeism, the religion use by Theodosius enemies. It was a great opportunity for Christianity, as it was the closest religion in Rome to the highly popular Manichaeism other than the Manichaeism that existed in Rome itself and Theodosius needed to shut it down.
It makes all the scene in the world to pull your people together under one religion to be able to fight the spread of Manichaeism, the religion use by Theodosius enemies. It was a great opportunity for Christianity, as it was the closest religion in Rome to the highly popular Manichaeism other than the Manichaeism that existed in Rome itself and Theodosius needed to shut it down.I don't know, why not just embrace Manichaeism? Theodosius gained almost nothing by proclaiming the one true God. Rome didn't unite under him and the intelligentsia was destroyed. Rome still fell and if he was not a major cause, he at least added greatly to how hard and how far it fell.
He would smite his so called followers immediately, then roll one up and listen to some Dead:)
I don't know, why not just embrace Manichaeism? Theodosius gained almost nothing by proclaiming the one true God. Rome didn't unite under him and the intelligentsia was destroyed. Rome still fell and if he was not a major cause, he at least added greatly to how hard and how far it fell.Not enough research to answer the question. Not sure how much Zoroastrianism or in this time period Zurvanite was mixed into the Manichaeism. But the good vs. bad and going to hell was quite heavy. But off hand I would have to say the Manichaeism was gnostic and the religion was designed to keep the king or government ruling under the laws of God, therefore it would not have worked very well as a state religion for Rome. Jesus on the other hand from what I understand was molding his religion to work for both the government and the people. He soften the good and bad by forgiveness and doing good deeds.
Jesus on the other hand from what I understand was molding his religion to work for both the government and the people. He soften the good and bad by forgiveness and doing good deeds.I think you just stumbled on it there MikeYohe. People like to think that if Jesus came back, he could better explain what he was trying to do and maybe even develop some leaders who could create this compassionate government that would somehow handle both progress and care for those who can't contribute to that progress. A government that responded to the will of the will of the people while maintaining control over the extremes. Thing is, that original small group failed, and so did every variation of it for 250 years. If I knew why it failed or how to fix it, then I'd be the next messiah. No one has figured that out. What was tried is sometimes called the Leviathan government. It was overreaching and controlling, but it succeeded in creating order for a 1,000 years. It requires tremendous hubris to maintain and often lacks compassion. Any religion that has the power to control people and allows for a totalitarian state would have worked.
I hate long posts, but to take the subject one step deeper and keep clear thought I have to, sorry.
To step back and look at mankind and religion and where Jesus fits in. Note, this is from my research/point of view and not backed up by any scholars.
First there are the Ages of religion.
Age of the Red Ochre from 120K BC to 1K AC. The Red Ochre burials followed man to all points of the earth man inhabited. Most likely last used in North America even after the time of Christ, but had died out in other areas of earth tens of thousands of years earlier. Burials were made with items or gifts for the dead that may contain money, tools, items of prestige and weaponry. We do not know if the burial of man and the use of Red Ochre had any connection to a deity. Most likely not. But after life was a need of mankind.
Age of Domestication from 100K to 1K AC. It was all about knowledge. Man created God during this period. “God" was not a deity, god was term that meant “the knowledge of man". Or put another way God was Gnostic. Priests were created to balance the power of the “leaders". The leaders had to rule within the laws of Gnostic and the Priests or “protectors of mankind’s knowledge" kept the leaders power in check. It was during this time, according to old Genesis stories that God was created. In 74K BC Mt. Toba put mankind on the extinction list. Like the Red Ochre the domestication stopped in Asia, Europe and Africa but continued in the Americas. Egypt had to start up much latter in history than India and come after Mt. Toba. In Egypt God was the “Word". All knowledge was given by the god RA (sun). Knowledge traveled by sunlight to you and was stored in your heart. The brain was discarded during burial do to the fact it had no value. All thinking was done by God and God sent the knowledge to you and you stored that knowledge in your heart.
To the study the “Atom" by 500 BC there were three colleges in India and two colleges in Europe studying the atom, yet no college in Alexandria or Egypt was teaching about the atom. Even the religious colleges in Alexandria was split in half, with one half teaching the Gnostic version of God and the other half teaching the Italian version of God.
On the Greek learning, the brain did the thinking, on the Egyptian learning, the knowledge was sent to you by light from God. One of Jesus’s biggest problems was how the people he preached to could understand “thought". The bible is full of “light to the heart" type of dialog. Jesus’s had to move the God Ra from the sun into another deity. Most of the Jewish religion came from Egyptian religion. And Egyptian had a lot of Rig Vega in it, which is a form of Gnostic. Egypt also had a lot of twelfth generation Europeans living in Egypt. It looks like the datum that Jesus used was the Gnostic data that was in what the people’s understanding about heaven and the reward for being “good" and having “faith".
The Age of Domestication ended in the Eastern Hemisphere with a Burckle type of event. The Age of Deities which started after the Little Ice Age was now banging heads with the old Gnostic thinking. One college in India was said to have twenty thousand foreign students before the time of Jesus. How much of the advanced thinking of Europe came from India we will never know.
Now jump to Theodosius. He had the threat of Manichaeism. He also had to keep the flow of grain from Egypt. Both Christianity and Manichaeism were branches of old Gnostic thinking that had the mix of different religions mixed in. Jesus’s Christianity had been hijacked by Eastern Mediterranean theologians. The way I see it, Theodosius did what he had to do for Rome. He picked one of the seven different branches of Jesus’s Christianity because it was the only Roman religion that could stop the spread of Manichaeism and was accepted by Egypt and the near East. Jesus’s Christianity was the only religion that could help in Rome’s need for controlling the grain in Egypt and the Olive oil in the Near East and Mediterranean coast.
As the Age of Deities is still going strong today, Jesus being a smart man would most likely understand the changes to his religion. He would be very upset about the Christianity creating the Dark Ages. And he would most likely be disappointed in us for not taking the deity out of the religion and not returning mankind to Gnosticism. Jesus had no choice but to use a deity at the time. But it is said that Jesus taught a higher level of religion to several disciples but not to the general public. As it takes years to comprehend changes of thinking, the gospels of Thomas and Mary have some of the Gnostic sayings but not the Gnostic thoughts in more than entry level.
I think Jesus would have embraced what Muhammad did because of where Christianity was at that time, but sad about Muhammad’s religion being hijacked too
I hate long posts, but to take the subject one step deeper and keep clear thought I have to, sorry. To step back and look at mankind and religion and where Jesus fits in. Note, this is from my research/point of view and not backed up by any scholars.Coulda just stopped right there
As it takes years to comprehend changes of thinking, the gospels of Thomas and Mary have some of the Gnostic sayings but not the Gnostic thoughts in more than entry level. I think Jesus would have embraced what Muhammad did because of where Christianity was at that time, but sad about Muhammad's religion being hijacked tooAnd you know this because......? If those two gospels are missing something, then you should be able to show me the the other gospels, or whatever you want to call them, that has the missing parts. Or, show me something else that refers to these missing parts. Or some results that came about as result of these things that Thomas and Mary missed but still had an affect on history. When something is missing, there is still something around it showing us that there was once something there.
And you know this because......? If those two gospels are missing something, then you should be able to show me the the other gospels, or whatever you want to call them, that has the missing parts. Or, show me something else that refers to these missing parts. Or some results that came about as result of these things that Thomas and Mary missed but still had an affect on history. When something is missing, there is still something around it showing us that there was once something there.Your right, I should not have taken it a step deeper on this site. I did not say the gospels are missing anything other than they are written in an introductory level. They did not cover the levels of heaven or any of the astrological aspects. Which is very understandable in what Jesus was try to accomplish. Remember Jesus got taken to court for claiming to be god. I think that made Jesus realize that he had to spoon feed his ideas to his followers. What I found interesting in discussing the gospel of Mary with an old time preacher was Mary’s use of the word “Lord". The preacher was unaware that the term Lord at the time of Mary does not always mean god and can mean husband or male family member. For example it is still used in England today for uses other than god. My feeling are the efforts of Mary and Thomas are like the use of bone boxes, they were there at the center of the Jewish religion for less than one hundred years, then gone from history. The changes in Islam from the time of Muhammad is well documented. I think what was happening to Christianity at that time, Jesus would understand why Muhammad wanted to create a new branch. Did you catch in the news several months back where writings were found from around the time of Muhammad where they were trying to change Vega stories to use in Islam? As Vega sayings are in a rhythm the writings were a complete mess and unusable. What I am trying to get across is that Jesus was teaching from what he had learned. Most of the knowledge from the Age of Domestication was lost by the time of Jesus and they were working from the Vega and bits and pieces of the past. For example in Jesus’s time they did not even have a good calendar. It is now discover that there was a calendar that must of come from the age of domestication. But that calendar was based upon the menstrual cycles of animals and the planting and cycles of crops. In other words a domestication calendar. Man’s time was kept using the donkey, because the donkey has the same menstrual cycles as woman.
In jesus times they did not even have good calendars? I hope our calendar is good, because it happens to predate and run through Jesus’ times, at least in origin. And there were dozens of others that apparently worked well enough, and in some parts of the world better than our own.
I hate long posts, but to take the subject one step deeper and keep clear thought I have to, sorry. To step back and look at mankind and religion and where Jesus fits in. Note, this is from my research/point of view and not backed up by any scholars. First there are the Ages of religion. Age of the Red Ochre from 120K BC to 1K AC. The Red Ochre burials followed man to all points of the earth man inhabited. Most likely last used in North America even after the time of Christ, but had died out in other areas of earth tens of thousands of years earlier. Burials were made with items or gifts for the dead that may contain money, tools, items of prestige and weaponry. We do not know if the burial of man and the use of Red Ochre had any connection to a deity. Most likely not. But after life was a need of mankind. Age of Domestication from 100K to 1K AC. It was all about knowledge. Man created God during this period. “God" was not a deity, god was term that meant “the knowledge of man". Or put another way God was Gnostic. Priests were created to balance the power of the “leaders". The leaders had to rule within the laws of Gnostic and the Priests or “protectors of mankind’s knowledge" kept the leaders power in check. It was during this time, according to old Genesis stories that God was created. In 74K BC Mt. Toba put mankind on the extinction list. Like the Red Ochre the domestication stopped in Asia, Europe and Africa but continued in the Americas. Egypt had to start up much latter in history than India and come after Mt. Toba. In Egypt God was the “Word". All knowledge was given by the god RA (sun). Knowledge traveled by sunlight to you and was stored in your heart. The brain was discarded during burial do to the fact it had no value. All thinking was done by God and God sent the knowledge to you and you stored that knowledge in your heart. To the study the “Atom" by 500 BC there were three colleges in India and two colleges in Europe studying the atom, yet no college in Alexandria or Egypt was teaching about the atom. Even the religious colleges in Alexandria was split in half, with one half teaching the Gnostic version of God and the other half teaching the Italian version of God. On the Greek learning, the brain did the thinking, on the Egyptian learning, the knowledge was sent to you by light from God. One of Jesus’s biggest problems was how the people he preached to could understand “thought". The bible is full of “light to the heart" type of dialog. Jesus’s had to move the God Ra from the sun into another deity. Most of the Jewish religion came from Egyptian religion. And Egyptian had a lot of Rig Vega in it, which is a form of Gnostic. Egypt also had a lot of twelfth generation Europeans living in Egypt. It looks like the datum that Jesus used was the Gnostic data that was in what the people’s understanding about heaven and the reward for being “good" and having “faith". The Age of Domestication ended in the Eastern Hemisphere with a Burckle type of event. The Age of Deities which started after the Little Ice Age was now banging heads with the old Gnostic thinking. One college in India was said to have twenty thousand foreign students before the time of Jesus. How much of the advanced thinking of Europe came from India we will never know. Now jump to Theodosius. He had the threat of Manichaeism. He also had to keep the flow of grain from Egypt. Both Christianity and Manichaeism were branches of old Gnostic thinking that had the mix of different religions mixed in. Jesus’s Christianity had been hijacked by Eastern Mediterranean theologians. The way I see it, Theodosius did what he had to do for Rome. He picked one of the seven different branches of Jesus’s Christianity because it was the only Roman religion that could stop the spread of Manichaeism and was accepted by Egypt and the near East. Jesus’s Christianity was the only religion that could help in Rome’s need for controlling the grain in Egypt and the Olive oil in the Near East and Mediterranean coast. As the Age of Deities is still going strong today, Jesus being a smart man would most likely understand the changes to his religion. He would be very upset about the Christianity creating the Dark Ages. And he would most likely be disappointed in us for not taking the deity out of the religion and not returning mankind to Gnosticism. Jesus had no choice but to use a deity at the time. But it is said that Jesus taught a higher level of religion to several disciples but not to the general public. As it takes years to comprehend changes of thinking, the gospels of Thomas and Mary have some of the Gnostic sayings but not the Gnostic thoughts in more than entry level. I think Jesus would have embraced what Muhammad did because of where Christianity was at that time, but sad about Muhammad's religion being hijacked tooThanks, I enjoyed the read!!