What if Christian theology dismissed the virgin birth and other miracles as fairy tales? What if your pastor/priest told you to flush the Ten Commandments down the toilet and instead live life to the fullest? What if Sunday service at your local church consisted in a juicy orgy? All of this could have happened had Carpocrates had his way.

Carpo … who? The lead character in our story was the leader of a second century Christian community based in the Greek islands. Back in those days, early Christians couldn’t agree on just about anything. Official Christian doctrine hadn’t been fully established yet, so an extremely wide range of opinions and teachings fell under the label of “Christianity.” The only thing they had in common was that they all thought Jesus was a cool guy. Other than that, everything else was up for debate since they couldn’t even agree on which books should become official scriptures. Some Christians believed their religion was to remain exclusively for Jewish people. Others wanted to open it to all ethnicities. Some believed Jesus and God were one. Others were far from sold about this. Some were strict ascetics. Others enjoyed a very sensual life. Some promoted women as leaders within their groups. Others felt women were good to cook dinner and make babies, but religious leaders? Ha!

In the midst of this very chaotic beginning, Carpocrates emerged as a particularly charismatic preacher, who soon attracted enough of a following as to give birth to his own branch of Christianity. His ideas were just a tad on the wild side. Jesus—Carpocrates argued—was as human as anyone else. He was a visionary whose brilliance and wisdom put him in touch with God, but was not God himself. This didn’t diminish Jesus’s status in Carpocrates’s eyes, since it set him up as a model of behavior that regular human beings could hope to emulate. The whole story of the virgin birth made Carpocrates laugh. In his view, good old Jesus was conceived in the old fashioned way: through sweaty sex. The depth of Jesus’s wisdom was enough for Carpocrates to admire and love him, so he felt no need for any supernatural special effects.

Since this beginning was apparently not controversial enough, Carpocrates promptly taught his followers to reject Mosaic Law as well as the prevailing morality of his times as mere human opinions, not divine commandments. A goodie-goodie morality was according to Carpocrates nothing but a cage built by those who were too scared by life’s intensity. The soul could only achieve freedom and fulfillment by experiencing all of life, without discriminating too much. Only in this way, it would free itself from the cycle of reincarnation …

Oh, yeah, did I forget to mention that? Carpocrates’s followers—like the members of many other early Christian sects—fully believed in reincarnation. And just like several tantric schools found in the history of both Hinduism and Buddhism, they also believed that human beings should explore every emotion without holding back. Sensual pleasure in their eyes was not any less sacred than the most spiritual practices, so good food, sex and every other earthly joy was embraced as a stepping stone toward liberation.

This determination to live life to the fullest went hand in hand with another radical notion. Carp considered differences in wealth and social class as unnatural perversions. Since everyone is born naked and equal in front of God, human attempts to gain status at the expense of others were misguided and ultimately against God’s plan. The cure for the very human tendency toward ego aggrandizing was to discourage the evil of private property. Instead, everything—from material possessions to sexual partners—was to be held in common. Coupled with Carp’s insistence on indulging in sensual pleasures, this idea led his followers to regularly stage sexual orgies as part of their spiritual practices … which makes you wonder: just how different would the world be had mainstream forms of Christianity decided to embrace Carpocrates rather than stern moralists like Saint Paul and Saint Augustine? I think it’s a safe bet that church attendance would be much higher.

In December 1945, during the tail end of the most devastating war in human history, a peasant named Mohammed Ali of the al-Samman clan stumbled upon an earthenware jar near limestone caves in the deserts of Upper Egypt. He feared an evil djin (genie) resided inside, but hoping for lost riches, he still opened the jar. To his disappointment, twelve ragged leather-bound codices fell onto the ground. He didn’t realize these 1,200 weathered pages contained a priceless treasure with dozens of lost Christian gospels that had been hidden away for 1,600 years. Mohammed carried them home to his mother, who kept warm throughout the night by feeding pages of what we now call The Nag Hammadi Library to her fireplace.

These fifty-two texts, with titles like The Gospel of Thomas, Secret James, The Gospel of Mary, The Origin of the World, The Gospel of Philip, Secret John, and The Sophia of Jesus, showed that first-through-fourth century Christianity was much more varied than previously thought, comprised of diverse sects claiming “secret knowledge” of heavenly realms. Modern scholars now label these texts as “Gnostic,” since they lay out an initiatory process for candidates to overcome the “forgetfulness,” “drunkenness,” “blindness,” and “sleep” of the illusory world in order to access gnosis, direct experience or personal revelation of a divine reality.

The Nag Hammadi Library supported the popular theory that Christianity stemmed from the ancient mystery school traditions of the Mediterranean, which featured “dying and resurrecting godmen.” In Egypt they worshiped Horus; in Greece, Dionysus; in Syria, Adonis; in Asia Minor, Attis; in Persia (and later Rome), Mithras; and in Israel, Jesus (historically the most recent). The similarities among these hierophants were uncanny. Several of them, according to the legends, were born on December 25 around the winter solstice to a virgin in humble surroundings (a cave or a manger) with a star in the Eastern sky. Some grew up to be spiritual masters with twelve disciples (Horus, Mithras, Jesus), performing miracles, giving baptisms and communions. They all died (Dionysus dismembered by Titans, Attis and Adonis eaten by wild boars, and Horus, Mithras, and Jesus crucified) before experiencing a miraculous resurrection.

In The Jesus Mysteries, authors Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy discuss how the Vatican sits atop a destroyed Mithraic Temple. “Where today the gathered faithful revere their Lord Jesus Christ, the ancients worshiped another godman who, like Jesus, had been miraculously born on December 25 before three shepherds. In this ancient sanctuary Pagan congregations once glorified a Pagan redeemer who, like Jesus, was said to have ascended to heaven and to have promised to come again at the end of time to judge the quick and the dead. On the same spot where the Pope celebrates the Catholic mass, Pagan priests also celebrated a symbolic meal of bread and wine in memory of their savor who, just like Jesus had declared: ‘He who will not eat of my body and drink of my blood, so that he will be made one with me and I with him, the same shall not know salvation.”¹

Freke and Gandy argue adamantly that there never was a historical Jesus who walked the sands of Israel, but rather he is a composite of the earlier godmen. But perhaps that’s too hard of a line to draw, since mythical figures are often based on real people — think of Benjamin Franklin and George Washington, for example.

According to Freke and Gandy, a number of the Mystery school godmen were called the “Son of God,” and some the “Sun of God.” The word “horizon” comes from “Horus-Sun,” meaning sunrise. As the Egyptian God of daytime, Horus battled his jackal-headed enemy Set (“Sun-Set”), the bringer of night, in a cosmic battle of light and dark. Jesus played a similar role as Horus being “the light of the world” surrounded by twelve disciples who represented the twelve months of the year, and the twelve signs of the zodiac. The sun enters each zodiac sign at thirty degrees (30 x 12 = 360); thus, these “Suns of God” embarked on their ministry at the age of thirty. The classic zodiac cross bisects the twelve astrological signs within a circle. The sun hangs “crucified” in the center as it passes through the precession of the equinoxes, something the mystery schools followed closely as each new sign marked the next world age.

Given the astrological significance of the cross, wisdom traditions often depicted the crucifixion in their writing and art. A notorious second-to-third century European talisman reveals a human figure that looks like Jesus on the cross (with a crescent moon and seven stars above him), but the inscription reads “Orpheus becomes a Bacchoi.” Orpheus was a prophet in the Dionysian mysteries and Bacchio refers to an enlightened disciple who had undergone the final stages of initiation. Around the same time as the talisman had been crafted, a Roman graffiti artist sketched on a pillar the image of a crucified donkey, which symbolized the initiates’ death to their animalistic nature and ascension to the higher Self. The first portrayal of Jesus on a cross wouldn’t appear until 200 years later.

Rather than rejoicing in their similarities, “literalist” Christian leaders — those who had not experienced the secret gnosis (direct knowledge) of the highest mysteries — created dams and divisions between the diverse spiritual streams that originally flowed from the same mystical source. As Freke and Gandy explain, the parallels between Mithras and Jesus threatened the emerging “Literalist Church.” Roman bishops such as Justin Martyr, Tertullian, and Irenaeus made the ridiculous claim that the devil had engaged in “diabolical mimicry,” “plagiarizing by anticipation” the story of Jesus before it had actually happened in order to mislead the weak-minded.

The Golden Bough’s James Frazier noted a similar contention between Attis, the mystery god from Asia Minor, and Jesus. “In point of fact it appears from the testimony of an anonymous Christian, who wrote in the fourth century of our era, that Christians and pagans alike were struck by the remarkable coincidence between the death and resurrection of their respective deities, and that the coincidence formed a theme of bitter controversy between the adherents of the rival religions, the pagans contending that the resurrection of Christ was a spurious imitation of the resurrection of Attis, and the Christians asserting with equal warmth that the resurrection of Attis was a diabolical counterfeit of Christ.”²

Literalist Christians refused to accept that the rites of the mystery schools form the central narrative of The New Testament. But the similarities are too plentiful to ignore. Jesus encounters a baptism (spiritual cleansing), a eucharist (communion), an anointing (“Christ” means “the anointed one”) and the death and resurrection ritual. These mystical rites provided a rare alchemical education, unifying spiritual energies (pneuma, as the early Christians called it) for candidates. In the words of The Gospel of Philip, one of the so-called Gnostic texts, “The Lord did everything in a mystery, a baptism and a chrism, and a eucharist and a redemption and a bridal chamber. […] he said, ‘I came to make the things below like the things above, and the things outside like the things inside. I came to unite them in the place.”

The word “mystery” appears twenty-seven times in The New Testament with Paul telling fellow Christians, “Let a man regard us in this manner, as servants of Christ and stewards of God.” Jesus speaks of clandestine teachings for those in the inner circles when he says to his disciples, “You have been given the secret of God’s imperial rule; but to those outside everything is presented in parables.” (Mathew 4:11)

As an energy healer, I found myself especially drawn to how early Christians utilized pneuma for personal transformation. Jesus baptizes with “fire and spirit,” heals with “power,” and transmits wisdom to his disciples through the “bubbling spring” drawn from a higher source. The purpose of these schools was to create Pneumatics, people full of spiritual energy. In the Gospel of Thomas, Jesus announces to his disciples, “Whoever drinks from my mouth will become like me; I myself shall become that person, and the hidden things will be revealed to him.”

Even common Christian terms revealed clues to this ancient transformational process. I studied the original Greek word for “sin,” Harmatia, which turned out to be an archery term meaning “missing the mark.” It lacked the guilt and shame pastors used to control their flocks and simply indicated when seekers strayed from their path and needed to get back on course. Similarly, the Hebrew word Satan (“adversary”) highlighted the ego/personality attachment the soul needed to overcome in order to reach higher states of consciousness.

Repent (metanoia) meant to “change one’s mind” or “have a shift in consciousness,” which can occur when absorbing higher frequencies from someone closely connected to source-energy, like Jesus. Most surprisingly, Christ was not our Lord and “savior” but rather our “soter,” meaning “healer,” “bestower of health,” or “one who makes whole.” Staying connected to universal spirit, Jesus travels through the rift of separation consciousness to heal us and bring us back to our celestial home. “I am the one who comes from what is whole” (Gospel of Thomas). When we finally release our attachments to the material realm, we become “redeemed” (apolytrosis), meaning “released.”

Of course, I couldn’t help wonder what happened to the original meanings of these words, as well as the numerous Gnostic churches that had proliferated in the Middle East. When the Romans destroyed Jerusalem and its Second Temple in 70 AD, after the Jewish revolt, they left one-third of the population dead, and the Christian mysteries fractured into pieces. Members joined the mass exodus out of the country. Those who hadn’t been exposed to the inner mysteries started up literalist churches. The remaining Gnostics called these rigid sects “imitation churches” as they did not teach the secret gnosis of “the Christ within.”

According to the Apocalypse of Peter, literalist church fathers were “waterless canals” bereft of consciousness-expanding pneuma who arrogantly claimed to be the sole gatekeepers of heaven. “Some who do not understand mystery speak of things which they do not understand, but they will boast that the mystery of truth is theirs alone.” These “empty” churches sprouted up across the Roman Empire. In a sad touch of historical irony, their leaders, like the infamous Irenaeus, the Bishop of Lyon, became heretic hunters attacking those who still carried the inner teachings of their religion. “We were hated and persecuted, not only by those who are ignorant, but also by those who think they are advancing the name of Christ, since they were unknowingly empty, not knowing who they are.” (The Second Treatise of the Great Seth).

As the number of Christians multiplied in Roman lands, power-hungry Constantine switched the state religion to co-opt this growing movement, uniting Rome under “one God, one religion,” and incidentally, one emperor. In 325 he oversaw the Council of Nicaea, where church fathers reduced the vast library of Christian written knowledge to a few documents that we now call The New Testament.

In 391 Emperor Theodosius passed an edict to close all “pagan” temples and burn their books. Christian hordes set out on murderous rampages across the empire smashing all traces of the mystery traditions from which their own religion had blossomed. They killed off the last of the Gnostic circles, including their libraries, churches, scrolls, and most importantly, the flame of gnosis that had been carefully passed down throughout the ages. By 410 AD, the Roman Empire had nearly torn itself apart and the Visigoths strolled in to finish the job. Only 85 years after the Council of Nicaea, the Dark Ages had begun.

While poring over the lost Gnostic texts of The Nag Hammadi Library, I was surprised how many of them focused on reframing the Garden of Eden story. These tales, like The Secret Book of John, explained the human origin story quite differently than Genesis. They described a complicated cosmology that began with a single being (or parent), who was ineffable, eternal, immeasurable light, and created an image or reflection of itself, Barbelo, which in turn begot a multitude of heavenly planes (aeons) that were part of a wider divine realm (the pleroma).

Christ was not just a man but a distinct aeon or larger divine being in the pleroma. Those who fully realized the mysteries became one with “Christ,” carrying this high vibrational force inside themselves. Bedazzled by the cosmic palace, Sophia, the aeon of wisdom, created her own world without consent from the über-parent or her male counterpart. This experiment went awry and Sophia separated from the pleroma, creating a sinister Frankenstein ruler called the Demiurge (craftsman or maker), who manufactured our “counterfeit” material world.

This was The Old Testament God, who Gnostics called Yaldabaoth, Samael (God of the blind), and Saklas (a fool), as he believed himself to be the only god in the universe, ignorant of the pleroma and the omnipresent light of the parent. Breathing life into Adam (and unknowingly the divine spirit of Sophia), the Demiurge ruled over humans with his demonic bully-friends, the archons. The angelic realms of the pleroma embarked on a rescue mission for both Sophia and Adam and Eve. Like an undercover agent, Jesus snuck behind enemy lines into the Garden, inviting the first humans to eat of the Tree of Knowledge (“the Epinoia of pure light”) to “awaken them out of the depth of sleep” and their “fallen state.”

The Gnostic’s description of archons immediately intrigued an activist side in me. These devilish autocrats seemed representative of the oppressive empires that dominated Western history books. Today’s Halliburtons and Bechtels, Neo-cons and Exxons, seemed to follow a long shadowy lineage of hierarchical powers profiting from human suffering while expanding their empires. Maybe the Gnostics understood that we needed mystical agents of transformation smuggling in celestial light to liberate lost souls on the planet.

And the Christ story seemed to be the perfect place to help free us from worldly bondage. I don’t think it’s an overstatement to say that millions of people living today have been wounded or mislead by literalist Christianity, robbed of their own divine spark. For more than a millennia, the Judeo-Christian tradition has supplied the underlying operating platform for our whole society — our languages, laws, mores, work ethic, sexuality, even our way of perceiving time (with the Gregorian calendar) — shaping our worldview, whether we realize it or not.

Integrating this tradition could prove a powerful tool in coming to terms with ourselves, and our history. And that doesn’t necessarily mean plodding through obscure Gnostic texts, making sense of strange Demiurge names. The mysteries lay right there in The New Testament for those with “eyes to see” and “ears to hear.” But we need an upgrade of the Protestant Revolution, one that incorporates the gnosis of Christ-consciousness. Imagine already established churches, the ones on your block, enhancing their services with meditation, prayer, breathwork, energy healing, body movement, possibly even late night dancing, and among the more radicalized churches, the ingesting of psychoactive sacraments in a safe and protected space. Why build entirely new systems for connecting us to pneuma when the institutions have already been created, whether Methodist, Lutheran, or Baptist? But these “waterless” religions would have to give up their addiction to dominating worshipers, address the evolution of the spirit, and infuse the essence of the mysteries into their hollow edifices.

Many of the popular Eastern disciplines of today have us turning away from the world around us, meditating on our navel. But Christ wasn’t only a yogi; he was a mystical activist, carrying his message to those who most needed it. In this time of great transition, our ailing planet needs spiritual warriors, ones capable of standing up to the Western materialist machine, so we can create sustainable societies that care for their citizens, harmonize with the cycles of nature, and receive and honor the vast healing light that quietly connects us all.

1. Timothy Freke & Peter Gandy, The Jesus Mysteries (New York: Three Rivers Press, 1999), 1.

2. Sir James George Frazier, The Golden Bough (New York: Macmillan, 1992), chapter 37.

Tiny ghosts and goblins hoping for sugary snacks may find something odd in their loot bags this Halloween: a bible.

A Calgary pastor is promoting Jesus Ween, a faith-based alternative to the traditional holiday fare of candy and spooky garb.

Instead of chocolate bars and gummy bears, he’s asking people to shun demonic costumes and instead dole out pocket-sized bibles or other “Christian gifts.”

The idea has caught on in communities across North America, according to Jesus Ween creator Paul Ade. He’s hoping it will bring a new perspective to an otherwise pagan festival, he said.

“I do not associate myself with ghosts, demons, Satan and witches. These are things I want to get rid of,” he said.

“If it’s OK for a child to know about demons, it should also be OK for a child to know about Jesus.”

Read more: Calgary Herald

One idea he presented was that humans were the only “sinners” out of God’s creation, and are therefore the only ones that require a savior, but he considered other possibilities as well.

“If there are extra-terrestrial intelligent beings at all, it is safe to assume that most of them are sinners too,” Weidemann said. “If so, did Jesus save them too? My position is no. If so, our position among intelligent beings in the universe would be very exceptional.”

If other life forms exist in our universe, he said, we should try to understand why Jesus chose to save those from Earth over other civilized life forms from other planets.

Did God reserve His grace solely for Earthlings and abandon the rest of the intelligent creatures in the universe? If not, how did God deal with the sin problem on multiple planets?

One possibility he mentioned is that God-incarnate visited each of the civilized planets and saved each of the races that inhabited them separately.

Read entire article at the Christian Science Monitor

What better disguise for the ultimate false messiah to deceive the world than Jesus?

As I posted earlier, the Dominionist Joel’s Army movement believes less in feeding the poor and visiting those in prison like the Biblical Jesus taught than in slaughtering unbelievers and taking over all the countries of the world militarily and politically.  The following video examines, from a more traditional Christian perspective, the possibility that Joel’s Army and the Dominionist movement are in fact the forces of the Antichrist, that the spirits that fill them are demons, and that the god they worship is actually Satan in disguise.

There is probably no other figure in modern Jewish historical research who is more controversial or famous than Dr. Schonfield, who once said: “The scholars deplore that I have spilled the beans to the public. Several of them have said to me, ‘You ought to have kept this just among ourselves, you know.’”

What he did to “spill the beans” was present historical evidence suggesting that Jesus was a mortal man, a young genius who believed himself to be the Messiah and deliberately and brilliantly planned his entire ministry according to the Old Testament prophecies—even to the extent of plotting his own arrest, crucifixion and resurrection.

The book has sold millions of copies in the decades since its original publication in 1965 and is still a popular read for those interested in the real story of Jesus’s life. Far less well known, however, is the 1976 film starring Donald Pleasance (Escape From NY, Halloween) based on the book. MGM has been sitting on the rights, unwilling to make the film available to the public but also unwilling to license it to anyone else (like us!). Maybe they’ll change their minds one day. In the meantime director Michael Campus has posted a trailer on his YouTube channel. Happy Easter/Passover!

The Four Evangelists, by Jakob Jordaens

Phil Zuckerman, Professor of Sociology at Pitzer College in Claremont, CA, reveals some wonderfully ironic facts about the loudest bible bashers, at Huffington Post:

The results from a recent poll published by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life reveal what social scientists have known for a long time: White Evangelical Christians are the group least likely to support politicians or policies that reflect the actual teachings of Jesus.

It is perhaps one of the strangest, most dumb-founding ironies in contemporary American culture. Evangelical Christians, who most fiercely proclaim to have a personal relationship with Christ, who most confidently declare their belief that the Bible is the inerrant word of God, who go to church on a regular basis, pray daily, listen to Christian music, and place God and His Only Begotten Son at the center of their lives, are simultaneously the very people most likely to reject his teachings and despise his radical message.

Jesus unambiguously preached mercy and forgiveness. These are supposed to be cardinal virtues of the Christian faith. And yet Evangelicals are the most supportive of the death penalty, draconian sentencing, punitive punishment over rehabilitation, and the governmental use of torture. Jesus exhorted humans to be loving, peaceful, and non-violent. And yet Evangelicals are the group of Americans most supportive of easy-access weaponry, little-to-no regulation of handgun and semi-automatic gun ownership, not to mention the violent military invasion of various countries around the world.

Jesus was very clear that the pursuit of wealth was inimical to the Kingdom of God, that the rich are to be condemned, and that to be a follower of Him means to give one’s money to the poor. And yet Evangelicals are the most supportive of corporate greed and capitalistic excess, and they are the most opposed to institutional help for the nation’s poor — especially poor children. They hate anything that smacks of “socialism,” even though that is essentially what their Savior preached. They despise food stamp programs, subsidies for schools, hospitals, job training — anything that might dare to help out those in need. Even though helping out those in need was exactly what Jesus urged humans to do.

In short, Evangelicals are that segment of America which is the most pro-militaristic, pro-gun, and pro-corporate, while simultaneously claiming to be most ardent lovers of the Prince of Peace.

What’s the deal?…

[continues at at Huffington Post]

Here’s the commercial in case you’re curious, oh and by the way, he claims “Do we really believe that Jesues hates Obama?

Of course not! … Our products may be a joke but so are the policies of this administration”:

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Russ Kick writes: H. G. Wells is best-remembered as a late-Victorian pioneer of science fiction, mainly due to his 1890s novels The Time Machine, The Invisible Man, and The War of the Worlds. He cranked out dozens of books in numerous genres of fiction and nonfiction, and 1945—the year before his death—saw the publication of his last two books to come out during his lifetime: The Happy Turning: A Dream of Life and Mind at the End of Its Tether.

The Happy Turning is a slim, strange work that gets even stranger as it continues. Wells sets it up by claiming that sometimes he dreams about taking his daily walk and coming across a pathway he’s never noticed in real life. Taking this turn (the “Happy Turning”) leads him to the utopian Dreamland (a/k/a the Beyond), where his body is perfectly fit, where society knows no war, poverty, or inequality, and where his “subliminal self” lets loose with a flood of “cryptic and oracular” symbols.

Wells then steps back in time to relate some dreams he had when he was young, including the one that “made me an atheist.” Having read about “a man being broken on the wheel over a slow fire,” the preteen Wells had a nightmare. “By a mental leap which cut out all intermediaries, the dream artist made it clear that if indeed there was an all powerful God, then it was he and he alone who stood there conducting this torture.” Upon awakening, he felt that he had two alternatives: go insane or stop believing in God. “God had gone out of my life. He was impossible.”

The following is Wells’ Dreamland chat with Jesus, which takes up two of the longest chapters. The excerpt below is
approximately the first thousand words of this encounter:

THE COMPANION I FIND most congenial in the Beyond is Jesus of Nazareth. Like everything in Dreamland he fluctuates, but beyond the Happy Turning his personality is at least as distinct as my own. His scorn and contempt for Christianity go beyond my extremest vocabulary. He was, I believe, the putative son of a certain carpenter, Joseph, but Josephus says his actual father was a Roman soldier named Pantherus. If so, Jesus did not know it.

He began his career as a good illiterate patriotic Jew in indignant revolt against the Roman rule and the Quisling priests who cringed to it. He took up his self-appointed mission under the influence of John the Baptist, who was making trouble for both the Tetrarch in Galilee and the Roman Procurator in Jerusalem. John was an uncompromising Puritan, and the first thing his disciples had to do, was to get soundly baptised in Jordan. Then he seemed to run out of ideas.

After their first encounter John and Jesus went their different ways. There was little discipleship in Jesus. He played an inconspicuous role in the Salome affair, and he assures me he never baptized anybody. But he was brooding on the Jewish situation, which he felt needed more than moral denunciation and water. He decided to get together a band of followers and march on Jerusalem. Where, as the Gospel witnesses tell very convincingly, with such contradictions as are natural to men writing about it all many years later, the sacred Jewish priests did their best to obliterate him. He learnt much as he went on. He seems to have said some good things and had others imputed to him. He became a sort of Essene Joe Miller. He learnt and changed as he went on.

Gods! how he hated priests, and how he hates them now! And Paul! “Fathering all this nonsense about being ‘The Christ’ on me of all people! Christian! He started that at Antioch. I never had the chance of a straight talk to him. I wish I could come upon him some time. But he never seems to be here…. There are a few things I could say to him,” said Jesus reflectively, and added, “Plain things….”

I regretted Paul’s absence.

“One must draw the line somewhere,” I said.

[“]In this happy place, Paul’s in the discard.”

“Yes,” reflected Jesus, dismissing Paul; “there were such a lot of things I didn’t know, and such a lot of snares for the feet of a man who feels more strongly than he understands. I see so plainly now how incompetently I set about it.”

He surveyed his shapely feet cooling in the refreshing greensward of Happyland. The stigmata were in evidence, but not obtrusively so. They were not eyesores. They have since been disgustingly irritated and made much of by the sedulous uncleanness of the saints.

“Never have disciples,” said Jesus of Nazareth. ‘’It was my greatest mistake. I imitated the tradition of having such divisional commanders to marshal the rabble I led to Jerusalem. It has been the common mistake of all world-menders, and I fell into it in my turn as a matter of course. I had no idea what a real revolution had to be; how it had to go on from and to and fro between man and man, each one making his contribution. I was just another young man in a hurry. I thought I could carry the whole load, and I picked my dozen almost haphazard.

“What a crew they were! I am told that even these Gospels you talk about, are unflattering in their account of them.

“There is nothing flattering to be told about them. What a crew to start upon saving the world! From the first they began badgering me about their relative importance….

“And their stupidity! They would misunderstand the simplest metaphors. I would say, ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is like so-and-so and so-andso’…. In the simplest terms….

“They always got it wrong.

“After a time I realised I could never open my mouth and think aloud without being misunderstood. I remember trying to make our breach with all orthodox and ceremonial limitations clear beyond any chance of relapse. I made up a parable about a Good Samaritan. Not half a bad story.”

“We have the story,” I said.

“I was sloughing off my patriotism at a great rate. I was realising the Kingdom of Heaven had to be a universal thing. Or nothing. Does your version go like that?”

“It goes like that.”

“But it never altered their belief that they had come into the business on the ground floor.”

“You told another good story about some Labourers in the Vineyard.”

“From the same point of view?”

“From the same point of view.”

“Did it alter their ideas in the least?”

“Nothing seemed to alter their ideas in the least.”

“It was a dismal time when our great March on Jerusalem petered out. You know when they got us in the Garden of Gethsemane I went to pieces completely…. The disciples, when they realised public opinion was against them, just dropped their weapons and dispersed. No guts in them. Simon Peter slashed off a man’s ear and then threw away his sword and pretended not to know me…

“I wanted to kick myself. I derided myself. I saw all the mistakes I had made in my haste. I spoke in the bitterest irony. Nothing for it now but to know one had had good intentions. ‘My peace,’ I said, ‘I give unto you.’

“The actual crucifixion was a small matter in comparison. I was worn out and glad to be dying [...] But being crucified upon the irreparable things that one has done, realising that one has failed, that you have let yourself down and your poor silly disciples down and mankind down, that the God in you has deserted you—that was the ultimate torment.”

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Read this article and many others in the Disinformation anthology Everything You Know About God Is Wrong: The Disinformation Guide to Religion, edited by Russ Kick, available on Amazon and in all good bookstores.

About The Author: H. G. Wells (1866–1946) is best-remembered as a late-Victorian pioneer of science fiction, mainly due to his 1890s novels The Time Machine, The Invisible Man, and The War of the Worlds. These are just a sliver of the approximately 180 books he wrote, covering topics such as politics, science, history, and the future.

That’s the message on 40 billboards around Nashville, proclaiming May 21, 2011, as the date of the Rapture. Billboards are up in eight other U.S. cities, too.

Fans of Family Radio Inc., a nationwide Christian network, paid for the billboards. Family Radio’s founder, Harold Camping, predicted the May date for the Rapture.

Their message is simple — “He Is Coming Again” — and their aim is to get unbelievers to turn around quickly. But critics say the billboards are a waste of time, one more failed attempt to predict the end of the world.

Read More in the Tennessean

I don’t know if the Condom-Mary is an old idea or not…

From the Winston-Salem Journal comes this charming story about an elderly fellow, Bill Johnson, who has discovered the image of Jesus in a tree limb that fell in his front yard. He believes it to be a “robed image of Jesus with an outstretched hand. The head is near the center of the limb where the rings of the tree are lighter, giving an almost halo appearance.”

And he’s milked this observation in newspapers and TV … but seriously. Halo, or no halo, that’s not Jesus.

That’s a Dalek.

The two differ in a number of ways. One is the saviour of the world, the Son of God, who died and is risen and will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead.

And the other is a mutated Kaled life form from Skaro, bred to eblieve in its own genetic superiority with a desire to destroy everything else in existence, and a propensity to scream “Exterminate”.

Read More on Bleeding Cool

Authorities in South Florida have charged the man they say backed out of robbing a MetroPCS store after an employee spoke with him about Jesus. The Broward County Sheriff’s Office said Friday that 37-year-old Israel Camacho of Coral Springs later committed an armed robbery caught on surveillance video at a Payless ShoeSource.

Investigators say Camacho entered a Metro PCS store in Pompano Beach last Friday, chatting with an employee and then displaying a gun and demanding cash from the register. The employee, Nayara Goncalves, spoke with Camacho about church and God and eventually convinced him not to hurt her.

Authorities say he robbed the Payless ShoeSource a few hours later. He has been charged with armed robbery and attempted armed robbery.

That sounds like a Warren Zevon song from hell, but it’s not. It’s what I saw on someone’s car on the way to work today. Three bumper stickers, right in a row; the first one said Jesus Saves, Obama Spends. The second said Obama is Socializing and Sodomizing America. The third said Body Piercings by Glock.

Let me pull up my favorite arm chair and give this guy a go. I think his choice in bumper stickers has less to do with his distaste for Obama and his policies and more to do with his fervent desire to get reamed long and hard by a Jewish hippie. Of course, that’s really none of my business. But is it appropriate to put your deep seated sexual fantasies on the back of your car?

Also, I thought christians were supposed to be anti-sodomy? I distinctly remember a ‘no spilling your seed in a rent boy’ clause in the bible. And who among us is still threatened by body piercings? Who even has body piercings anymore? Is this guy also confounded by Jnco jeans and skateboarding video games and ska music?

I probably lost you there. I’m not sure what my point was. When I try to incorporate Jesus and sodomy and guns, people call me an awful human being. This guy does it as some kind of affront to the effete, bruschetta eating, liberal elites. People like me, I guess. I am rather high siddity. Sometimes Quake and I just sit in the living room talking about what color to paint the walls. I didn’t see that coming.

Read More: First Church of Mutterhals

Here’s the story at Gawker:

Dream presidential candidate Glennifer Beck was on his television program last night talking about liberation theology and religion and stuff and he dropped some theological-historical knowledge on us: The Jews killed Jesus! Haven’t you missed that old saw?

Yeah, the “Jews killed Jesus” thing is one of the bedrock “arguments” of antisemitism and Glenn Beck, known Mormon, just up and said it on his variety hour, which is watched by millions of people who lap up his particular brand of horror water like… well, like thirsty Jews wandering in the desert. Beck was also saying some humblybumbly about liberation theology and various other things that he doesn’t really understand, but that’s not worth dignifying. What’s important is Glenn’s important religious thinking when it comes to social justice and the history of his favorite old dude:

This is kind of complex, because Jesus did identify with the victims. But Jesus wasn’t a victim, he was a conqueror. Jesus conquered death. He chose to give his life. Jesus didn’t come back from the dead and make the Jews pay for what they did. That would have been an abomination.

Glenn Beck says this with absolute authority! Because he was there, or something. Or he’s a religion genius, maybe. It’s sort of unclear. That he’s patently cherry picking from the Bible and flat-out making other things up is not something that you should worry about. Here, don’t you want to buy some gold? (You know who likes gold? JEWS.)…

[continues at Gawker]

The crucifixion is apparently under review. In his doctoral thesis, newly graduated Swedish theologian Gunnar Samuelsson argues that the cross Jesus supposedly died on may not actually have been a cross. He explains in an interview with DRadio Wissen, a German station: “the New Testament said that Jesus died some way on something called a staurus … that’s a Greek name for a cross or a pole or something … I call it an execution device only to be [distinguished] from the common notion that it must be a cross, because it mustn’t be a cross–it could be a pole, for instance, or a tree trunk, or something else.”

Samuelsson did some serious research before advancing this provocative argument: “I spent almost three years,” he says, “reading all the ancient texts I could find … from about Homer until the first century of the Common Era.” He says “some kind of suspension of a living or a dead person or a part of a person” was indeed common at the time, but crucifixion is not mentioned. In the Bible itself, all it says is that Jesus carried and then was executed on a staurus–”there is no other description beyond that.”

]]> http://www.disinfo.com/2010/06/did-jesus-die-on-a-cross/feed/ 23 http://www.disinfo.com/2010/06/lightning-burns-up-six-story-jesus-statue-in-ohio-video/ http://www.disinfo.com/2010/06/lightning-burns-up-six-story-jesus-statue-in-ohio-video/#comments Tue, 15 Jun 2010 22:22:25 +0000 ralph http://www.disinfo.com/?p=31399 Act of God? Can you believe this statue was nicknamed "Touchdown Jesus"? Man, God is a tough quarterback ... Reports the AP:

A six-story statue of Jesus Christ was struck by lightning and burned to the ground, leaving only a blackened steel skeleton and pieces of foam that were scooped up by curious onlookers Tuesday. The "King of Kings" statue, one of southwest Ohio's most familiar landmarks, had stood since 2004 at the evangelical Solid Rock Church along Interstate 75 in Monroe, just north of Cincinnati. The sculpture, about 62 feet tall and 40 feet wide at the base, showed Jesus from the torso up and was nicknamed "Touchdown Jesus" because of the way the arms were raised, similar to a referee signaling a touchdown. It was made of plastic foam and fiberglass over a steel frame, which is all that remained Tuesday. The nickname is the same used for a famous mural of the resurrected Jesus that overlooks the Notre Dame football stadium.

The fire spread from the statue to an adjacent amphitheater but was confined to the attic area, and no one was injured, police Chief Mark Neu said.

]]> Act of God? Can you believe this statue was nicknamed “Touchdown Jesus”? Man, God is a tough quarterback … Reports the AP:

A six-story statue of Jesus Christ was struck by lightning and burned to the ground, leaving only a blackened steel skeleton and pieces of foam that were scooped up by curious onlookers Tuesday.

The “King of Kings” statue, one of southwest Ohio’s most familiar landmarks, had stood since 2004 at the evangelical Solid Rock Church along Interstate 75 in Monroe, just north of Cincinnati.

The sculpture, about 62 feet tall and 40 feet wide at the base, showed Jesus from the torso up and was nicknamed “Touchdown Jesus” because of the way the arms were raised, similar to a referee signaling a touchdown. It was made of plastic foam and fiberglass over a steel frame, which is all that remained Tuesday.

The nickname is the same used for a famous mural of the resurrected Jesus that overlooks the Notre Dame football stadium.

The fire spread from the statue to an adjacent amphitheater but was confined to the attic area, and no one was injured, police Chief Mark Neu said.

Read More: AP

]]> http://www.disinfo.com/2010/06/lightning-burns-up-six-story-jesus-statue-in-ohio-video/feed/ 14 http://www.disinfo.com/2010/05/what-did-jesus-do/ http://www.disinfo.com/2010/05/what-did-jesus-do/#comments Fri, 21 May 2010 19:26:31 +0000 majestic http://www.disinfo.com/?p=30330 Adam Gopnik asks some tough questions about Jesus, "reading and unreading the Gospels," in the New Yorker:

When we meet Jesus of Nazareth at the beginning of the Gospel of Mark, almost surely the oldest of the four, he’s a full-grown man. He comes down from Galilee, meets John, an ascetic desert hermit who lives on locusts and wild honey, and is baptized by him in the River Jordan. If one thing seems nearly certain to the people who read and study the Gospels for a living, it’s that this really happened: John the Baptizer—as some like to call him, to give a better sense of the original Greek’s flat-footed active form—baptized Jesus. They believe it because it seems so unlikely, so at odds with the idea that Jesus always played the star in his own show: why would anyone have said it if it weren’t true? This curious criterion governs historical criticism of Gospel texts: the more improbable or “difficult” an episode or remark is, the likelier it is to be a true record, on the assumption that you would edit out all the weird stuff if you could, and keep it in only because the tradition is so strong that it can’t plausibly be excluded. If Jesus says something nice, then someone is probably saying it for him; if he says something nasty, then probably he really did...

]]> Adam Gopnik asks some tough questions about Jesus, “reading and unreading the Gospels,” in the New Yorker:

When we meet Jesus of Nazareth at the beginning of the Gospel of Mark, almost surely the oldest of the four, he’s a full-grown man. He comes down from Galilee, meets John, an ascetic desert hermit who lives on locusts and wild honey, and is baptized by him in the River Jordan. If one thing seems nearly certain to the people who read and study the Gospels for a living, it’s that this really happened: John the Baptizer—as some like to call him, to give a better sense of the original Greek’s flat-footed active form—baptized Jesus. They believe it because it seems so unlikely, so at odds with the idea that Jesus always played the star in his own show: why would anyone have said it if it weren’t true? This curious criterion governs historical criticism of Gospel texts: the more improbable or “difficult” an episode or remark is, the likelier it is to be a true record, on the assumption that you would edit out all the weird stuff if you could, and keep it in only because the tradition is so strong that it can’t plausibly be excluded. If Jesus says something nice, then someone is probably saying it for him; if he says something nasty, then probably he really did.

So then, the scholars argue, the author of Mark, whoever he was—the familiar disciples’ names conventionally attached to each Gospel come later—added the famous statement of divine favor, descending directly from the heavens as they opened. But what does the voice say? In Mark, the voice says, “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased,” seeming to inform a Jesus who doesn’t yet know that this is so. But some early versions of Luke have the voice quoting Psalm 2: “You are my Son; today I have begotten you.” Only in Matthew does it announce Jesus’ divinity to the world as though it were an ancient, fixed agreement, not a new act. In Mark, for that matter, the two miraculous engines that push the story forward at the start and pull it toward Heaven at the end—the Virgin Birth and the Resurrection—make no appearance at all…

[continues in the New Yorker]

]]> http://www.disinfo.com/2010/05/what-did-jesus-do/feed/ 13 http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/image-of-jesus-in-google-maps/ http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/image-of-jesus-in-google-maps/#comments Sun, 25 Apr 2010 21:08:26 +0000 ralph http://www.disinfo.com/?p=28217 Jesus, why so long to appear on Google Maps?

Was the burned bacon fat in the frying pan coming from a false messenger?

More on perceptions of religious imagery in natural phenomena on Wikipedia.

]]> Jesus, why so long to appear on Google Maps?

Was the burned bacon fat in the frying pan coming from a false messenger?

More on perceptions of religious imagery in natural phenomena on Wikipedia.

]]> http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/image-of-jesus-in-google-maps/feed/ 10 http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/axis-of-awesome-what-would-jesus-do/ http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/axis-of-awesome-what-would-jesus-do/#comments Sat, 24 Apr 2010 04:40:39 +0000 ralph http://www.disinfo.com/?p=28187 these gents' vicinity might be wide-awake right now, here's a question for you. What is the chance of the Axis of Awesome going on American TV with this song? Thanks for the input, Disinfo readers around the globe. My take is I'd never see these guys on American network TV with this song, or basic cable (but they may have a shot on the pay-extra cable networks). Good luck to them... ]]> Since those of you in these gents‘ vicinity might be wide-awake right now, here’s a question for you. What is the chance of the Axis of Awesome going on American TV with this song?

Thanks for the input, Disinfo readers around the globe. My take is I’d never see these guys on American network TV with this song, or basic cable (but they may have a shot on the pay-extra cable networks). Good luck to them…

]]> http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/axis-of-awesome-what-would-jesus-do/feed/ 8 http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/a-panorama-of-the-passion/ http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/a-panorama-of-the-passion/#comments Tue, 06 Apr 2010 07:25:32 +0000 cybercasualty http://www.disinfo.com/?p=26518 The JoeBot writes on Confessions of a CyberCasualty:

Pt 1: The Death Day of Jesus Christ

Millions believe that all of human history hinges on a killing that occurred outside the walls of Jerusalem, nearly two thousand years ago. Jesus of Nazareth entered the city on a donkey one day and left carrying a cross. This was an apparent victory for the Pharisees, an incomprehensible tragedy for his disciples, and a brutal spectacle for the multitudes. It was also a great disappointment to Jews clinging to conventional expectations of the Messiah. Their prophets had foretold a Son of David who would liberate the nation of Israel, restoring her to earthly supremacy. Yet there was Jesus — the supposed “King of the Jews” — hanging powerless on a blood-drenched tree.

According to the Evangelists, the wandering rabbi saw it coming. Three chapters of John’s Gospel are devoted to Jesus’ reflection upon his impending demise.…

]]> The JoeBot writes on Confessions of a CyberCasualty:

Pt 1: The Death Day of Jesus Christ

Millions believe that all of human history hinges on a killing that occurred outside the walls of Jerusalem, nearly two thousand years ago. Jesus of Nazareth entered the city on a donkey one day and left carrying a cross. This was an apparent victory for the Pharisees, an incomprehensible tragedy for his disciples, and a brutal spectacle for the multitudes. It was also a great disappointment to Jews clinging to conventional expectations of the Messiah. Their prophets had foretold a Son of David who would liberate the nation of Israel, restoring her to earthly supremacy. Yet there was Jesus — the supposed “King of the Jews” — hanging powerless on a blood-drenched tree.

According to the Evangelists, the wandering rabbi saw it coming. Three chapters of John’s Gospel are devoted to Jesus’ reflection upon his impending demise. It was all part of a master plan—one antithetical to mundane sensibilities. As he told Pilate: “My kingdom is not of this world.” (Jn 18:36)

Death by crucifixion was commonplace in ancient societies — from Babylon to the British Isles — but that made the sight of dying criminals hanging on trees no less horrifying. Contemporary observers record numerous variations upon this sadistic art. The ancient Romans considered it to be the absolute worst form of execution — above both decapitation and being burned alive. It was therefore a sentence reserved for the lowest classes, the so-called servile supplicium — the “slaves’ punishment.” Stripped, shamed, beaten, and hung out to dry — only an extreme masochist would call this a winner’s fate.

Yet Jesus’ crucifixion came to be hailed as the most magnificent moment of the greatest story ever told. The scene is reenacted every year in church Passion Plays, enshrined in stained glass the world over, rendered in high-res Hollywood effects, echoed in history’s glorified martyrs. Of course, there are various accounts of what actually transpired that day.

The confusion begins with the Gospels. According to Matthew, Mark, and Luke, Jesus died at 3pm on the day after Passover — thus placing the Last Supper in its Paschal context. Mark even specifies the time of crucifixion as being 9am. According to John, however, Jesus was crucified after noon, on the day before Passover — thus linking him to the sacrificial lambs being killed in the Temple. (Mk 15:25, 34; Jn 19:14)

Gospel accounts of Jesus’ final words are also contradictory. Matthew and Mark portray a sorrowful Jesus, moaning: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” In Luke, Jesus calls out faithfully: “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” And in John — who consistently refers to Jesus’ immanent death as his “glorification” — Christ proclaims victoriously: “It is accomplished!” before giving up the ghost. (Mt 27:46; Lk 23:46, Jn 19:30)

From there the theologies multiply like gold crucifixes in a Vatican sweatshop. Jesus becomes the ultimate Passover lamb—an unblemished offering slaughtered for carnivorous rites. He is the final human sacrifice for the sins of the world—a ransom to the Devil for all the souls in Hell. For the oppressed, Jesus’ death represents the suffering of innocent men and women throughout humanity’s continuous miscarriage of Justice. Some scholars interpret his death as a fulfillment of the Prophets—others call him a failed Messiah. To skeptics, the Passion seems like a reckless suicide, or a divine infanticide, or just another fanciful myth of a dying and rising god. The more mystical types see a symbol for the individual self surrendering to Absolute Divinity—”Not as I will, but as you will.” (Mt 26:39) And of course, for some the crucifixion is simply a morbid joke. The Word may be one, but its faces are many.

Even more baffling—and more often than not, ignored—is Jesus’ demand that one must take up his or her own cross to become his disciple. (Mt 10:38; Lk 14:27) A review of the long history of martyrdom reveals many who did. In a figurative sense, this willing self-sacrifice is shared by the monastics and stringent ascetics who have died to the world in order to find God.

Though Paul of Tarsus is quite confident in his interpretation that Jesus died to atone for the sins of humankind, the Evangelists—recording what Jesus actually said—are not so conclusive. Jesus’ words are often cryptic and paradoxical, generally raising questions rather than granting certainty. Whether the magic of the Nazarene’s sacrifice lies in the moment of his death, the power of its image, or in clever postmortem promotion, one message does appear repeatedly in the Gospels: by denying material preoccupations and the cravings of the body—perhaps even destroying the body outright—one comes closer to God.

In this light, Jesus’ Passion represents a total inversion of typical worldly values. It is common sense that the good things in life are hearty food, a prime sexual partner, fertile land, sufficient fortifications, and nice possessions. As the new Spring dawns, we are reminded of what a bitter sacrifice Jesus truly made by dying at the height of his manhood. Therefore it comes as no surprise that most Christians are content to share his burden vicariously—through ritual drama and elaborate artifice. And who could blame them?

Yet for the attentive student, unsettling doubts remain. What did Jesus mean when he said: “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.”? (Lk 14:26) Pressed day-by-day to “be somebody,” what are we to make of his cryptic prophesy: “For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” (Lk 14:11)

Those who have chosen martyrdom or the monastic path must already know. As for the rest of us, we are left in the comfort of our fleeting securities to quietly wonder.

Pt 2: Images of Jesus Resurrected

So it came to pass that Jesus died and was buried, leaving his followers in total confusion. What would become of them now that their master had gone? If Jesus was not the Anointed One—prophecied to deliver Jerusalem from her oppressors—then who was he?

Numerous answers have been proposed. Over the next two thousand years, Christianity would spread across the entire globe. As the Gospel was told and retold, different perspectives created countless images of Jesus.

As usual, each Evangelist tells his own version of what happened after Mary Magdalene discovered the empty tomb. Suffice it to say that while there are common threads, each account is remarkably different. Yet one peculiar detail—described in both Luke and John—stands out. When Jesus reappears to the mourning disciples, they do not recognize him at first. (Lk 24:16; Jn 20:14)

If Jesus did not look like himself, who did he look like? As it turns out, he would look different to every culture and each individual that encountered the Gospel. More often than not, he began to look just like them.

We first meet Jesus as a wandering Rabbi prone to invective diatribes. His ministry was to the nation of Israel, to whom he interpreted the Torah, and the Gospels consistently frame his life—and death—as a fulfillment of the Prophets. When asked which commandment in the Law is the greatest, Jesus responded:

“‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind… And you shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the Law and the prophets.”

As with many bright minds of Jewish lore, Jesus was despised by the reigning authorities. They were tired of his constant confrontations, and troubled by bold claims that he was the Son of God. So they did what rulers do best—they had him killed. But they could not kill his words, which would go on to pervade the world.

The Gospel of John describes Jesus as the Word incarnate—the Logos (Gk. λόγος). “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God… And the Word became flesh and lived among us…” (Jn 1:1, 14) This term was loaded with multiple meanings. In classical Greek thought (particularly Stoicism), Logos refers to the underlying rational principle–synonymous with God or Nature—which directs and sustains the Universe. By identifying Jesus as an incarnation of the Logos, John imagines a divine being—a demigod—that would be familiar to any Greek listener. Jesus’ identity is shifted to meet the theological expectations of Greek culture. Such a refashioning would prove to be quite common as the Gospels spread.

Among the popular mystery schools of the Hellenistic and Roman worlds was the cult of Osiris—the ancient Egyptian god of the dead. According to the myth, Osiris was betrayed and murdered by his wicked brother, Seth, who eventually cut him into pieces, scattering the parts throughout the world. Osiris’ wife, Isis, combed the land for each piece until she had recovered her husband’s body—except his penis, for which she fashioned a replacement. Isis put his dismembered corpse back together and performed magical rituals to give him eternal life. The resurrected Osiris then went on to the Underworld where he judges and rules over the dead.

Many scholars have noted significant parallels between the stories of Osiris and Jesus. Again, to an ancient audience which knew the story of Osiris, the Gospel narrative would be quite familiar. While Christian apologists have claimed that such ancient myths are satanic deceptions or pagan prophecies of the coming Christ, other scholars have suggested that the Gospel narrative is simply a clever retelling of these “dying and rising god” motifs.

Indeed, many scholars have searched extensively for resonant themes between pagan mythology and the Gospel—sometimes grasping at straws, but other times uncovering fascinating parallels. Sometimes one finds strong evidence of pagan influence upon New Testament narratives. But these bridges run both ways—sometimes one finds that the Christ image has been incorporated into the theology of other religions.

The International Society of Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON)—a popular form of bhakti Vishnu devotion—is a case in point. Worshipped throughout India, Krishna is hailed by his devotees as an incarnation of Vishnu, the Supreme Being. ISKCON, and Vaishnavism in general, is distinctive in its ready acceptance—and occasional incorporation—of the divine representatives of other religions. As such, Jesus is considered to be one of many incarnations of the Supreme Being, sent to the West in order to restore divinity to our part of the world. Faced with the challenge of explaining the variety of religious expressions, Hinduism has generally taken the stance that all religions are different paths leading to the same mountaintop.

For medieval Catholic evangelists pouring into Europe, however, there was only one path to Heaven—and the hostile Aryan tribes they encountered were not on it. These pagan warriors became an unbelievably difficult conversion project for proselytizing priests, who were consistently slaughtered. The chieftain’s devotion to the horned god, Odinn (Woden, Wotan) was unshakeable. Revered as the source of magical Intelligence, poetic Inspiration, and lascivious Intoxication, Odinn was—in modern vernacular—”the bitch’s bastard.”

There was one chink in the god’s armor, however. According to the myths, Odinn gained his knowledge of the runes—the magical Words—by hanging himself from the World Tree. Through this bodily mortification, he was given a new vitality. The authors of The Heliand exploited such parallels magnificently. An ingenious amalgamation of the four Gospels, The Heliand takes great liberties in retelling Jesus’ story, casting him as the most powerful chieftain and his disciples as his warrior “thanes.” The berserker hordes could really feel this one, and the rest is history.

African American liberation theologians have found a kindred spirit in Jesus as well. For them, Jesus represents the vindication of slaves throughout history. Seeing reflections of the Passion in the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcom X—indeed, in every horrific lynching of a Negro—liberation theology finds solace in the promise that the meek shall inherit the earth. Jesus preached that the exalted would be humbled and the humble would be exalted. What greater hope could be offered to the battered spirits of those scarred by the whip of slavery?

Jesus may not have been black—he certainly didn’t look like a white man either. Then again, after the Summer of Love abolished the shave and a haircut, plenty of white guys wound up looking a lot like Jesus. During the Sixties and Seventies, millions of suburbanite teenagers turned on and tuned in to the Golden Rule. As resistance to the war in Vietnam and the class struggles of the Civil Rights Movement intensified, a popular reaction among America’s Baby Boomers was one of total pacifism. To their credit, these kids didn’t just turn the other cheek—they submitted themselves to brutal beatings by riot police. Bristling with a psychedelic Sanhedrin complex, love-crazed hippies jammed flowers into the rifletips of the Establishment’s centurions.

Even the pop icons of the era struck a Jesus Christ pose. Some of the most notable rockstars of the Love Generation died young—and to phenomenal fanfare. Brian Jones, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, and Jim Morrison all passed at the tender age of 27. They had suffered passionately for their art—finding their own view from Golgotha at the bottom of a bottle—and were mourned by their fans with all the breast-beating fervor of devout worshippers at a Passion Play.

Hedonistic rockstar martyrdom has a long tradition. From Robert Johnson, Hank Williams, and Buddy Holly, to the sacred lambs of Elvis Presley, John Lennon, Kurt Cobain, and Tupac Shakur, many music industry fortunes have been accumulated by riding the shock waves of a dying star.

Of course, plenty of fortunes are accumulated every day in the name of Jesus. World-renowned televangelists, megachurch superpastors, and all the various promoters of the so-called “Prosperity Gospel” are totally unashamed to claim that worldly wealth is a conspicuous sign of God’s grace. This tradition of holy treasury also has a long history. The Catholic Church has always been a prominent landholder, collecting gold as shrewdly as it does redeemed souls. Where there is a concentration of devout followers, there is almost always a substantial pile of widows’ mites, covered in rust and swarming with moths.

Jesus held a perplexing view of worldly wealth. He once quipped:

“It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven… [but] with God, all things are possible.” (Mk 10:25-27)

The infinite possibilities of God must have been apparent to those who witnessed Jesus’ spectacular healings, but today most people do not wait for otherworldly miracles. We generally turn to the modern heirs of Hippocrates: the physicians, surgeons, lab technicians, and pharmacologists who heal the ailing body by directly manipulating its biomachinery—and with remarkable success. One would imagine that an ER surgeon would have as much success reattaching the ear of the Roman soldier as Jesus did in Gethsemane—but only if the soldier was insured.

The wonders of science and technology turn the magical powers of ancient lore into commonplace phenomena. Today we enjoy cellphone telepathy—televised scrying—the laying on of ointment-slathered hands–Lazarus revisited in the defibrillator—mountains moved telekinetically by hulking Caterpillars—reality programming via cyber-surfing—the Internet as a virtual Oversoul—even uploaded reincarnation and cryogenic resurrection are tantalizing possibilities on the horizon. Fueled by the Promethean impulse of our post-human age, we fashion ourselves into cybernetic images of Jesus.

Arthur C. Clarke’s third law of prediction is apt:

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

So it comes as no surprise that there are people who imagine Jesus as a high-tech extraterrestrial being, descending to Earth from another world to save the human race from self-annihilation. You will find them waiting on the deserted fringes for the Second Coming of the Mothership. Hopefully they won’t wait too long.

With every individual’s introduction to the Gospel, our wandering Nazarene is resurrected as a unique image of Jesus. With any luck, the potential of our human imagination is nowhere near exhaustion. If there is one valid image, it is up to each individual to decide for his or herself which one is the true Jesus. Otherwise, I suppose there is nothing left to do but sit back and enjoy the show.

[In Loving Memory of Dr. David Dungan - renowned scholar on the Images of Jesus - my mentor and confidant whom I will forever hold dear.]

Resources

“Crucifixion.” “Passion.” The Anchor Bible Dictionary. Eds. David Noel Freedman, et al. New York: Doubleday, 1992.

Dungan, David L.  A History of the Synoptic Problem: The Canon, the Text, the Composition, and the Interpretation of the Gospels. New York: Doubleday, 1999.

Ehrman, Bart D.  The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. 3rd ed.  New York: Oxford University Press, 2004.

Goad, Jim.  The Redneck Manifesto: How Hillbillies, Hicks, and White Trash Became America’s Scapegoats. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1998.

Johnson, Paul.  The History of Christianity. London: Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1997.

Kurzweil, Ray.  The Age of Spiritual Machines. New York: Viking, 1999.

Lachman, Gary. Turn Off Your Mind: The Mystic Sixties and the Dark Side of the Age of Aquarius. New York: The Disinformation Company, Ltd., 2003.

Murphy, S.J., G. Ronald. The Heliand: The Saxon Gospel. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992.

New Oxford Annotated Bible. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010.

“Osiris.” “Resurrection.” The Encyclopedia of Religion. Ed. Mircea Eliade.  New York: Collier MacMillan, 1987.

Patterson, R. Gary.  Take a Walk on the Dark Side: Rock n’ Roll Myths, Legends, and Curses. New York: Fireside, 2004.

Peale, Norman Vincent. The Power of Positive Thinking. New York: Prentice Hall, Inc, 1952.

Prabhupada, A.C. Bhaktivedanta. Bhagavad-Gita: As It Is. The Bhaktivedanta Book Trust, 1986.

Smith, Huston.  The World’s Religions. San Francisco: Harper’s, 1991.

Thompson, Dave.  Better to Burn Out: The Cult of Death in Rock n’ Roll. New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press, 1999.

]]> http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/a-panorama-of-the-passion/feed/ 0 http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/philip-pullman-on-free-speech-and-the-good-man-jesus-and-the-scoundrel-christ/ http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/philip-pullman-on-free-speech-and-the-good-man-jesus-and-the-scoundrel-christ/#comments Sun, 04 Apr 2010 22:58:25 +0000 ralph http://www.disinfo.com/?p=26361 The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ (available now in the UK and the U.S. on May 20th). This video was filmed at the Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford on March, 28 2010. ]]> Philip Pullman answers a question on the title of his new book, The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ (available now in the UK and the U.S. on May 20th). This video was filmed at the Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford on March, 28 2010.

]]> http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/philip-pullman-on-free-speech-and-the-good-man-jesus-and-the-scoundrel-christ/feed/ 2 http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/religion-in-america/ http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/religion-in-america/#comments Thu, 01 Apr 2010 07:03:38 +0000 ralph http://www.disinfo.com/?p=26071 All That's Interesting: Much more to discover on All That's Interesting]]> Via the very interesting Tumblr blog All That’s Interesting:

Much more to discover on All That’s Interesting

]]> http://www.disinfo.com/2010/04/religion-in-america/feed/ 38 http://www.disinfo.com/2010/03/jesus-hates-klingons/ http://www.disinfo.com/2010/03/jesus-hates-klingons/#comments Mon, 29 Mar 2010 15:00:43 +0000 JacobSloan http://www.disinfo.com/?p=24295 The video you've been waiting for ... if what you've been waiting for is a low-budget version of Star Trek in which the Enterprise crew are evangelicals. From Everything Is Terrible:

Glenn Beck at CPAC 2010. Photo: Gage Skidmore CC

Hard to believe, but mad Mormon Glenn Beck has publicly told Christians to give up their churches if they hear anything there about social justice, as reported in the New York Times:

Last week, the conservative broadcaster Glenn Beck called on Christians to leave their churches if they heard any preaching about social or economic justice because, he claimed, those were slogans affiliated with Nazism and Communism.

This week, the Rev. Jim Wallis, a liberal evangelical leader in Washington, D.C., called on Christians to leave Glenn Beck.

“What he has said attacks the very heart of our Christian faith, and Christians should no longer watch his show,” Mr. Wallis, who heads the antipoverty group Sojourners, wrote on his “God’s Politics” blog. “His show should now be in the same category as Howard Stern.”

Mr. Beck, in vilifying churches that promote “social justice,” managed to insult just about every mainline Protestant, Roman Catholic, African-American, Hispanic and Asian congregation in the country — not to mention plenty of evangelical ones.

Even Mormon scholars in Mr. Beck’s own church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, said in interviews that Mr. Beck seemed ignorant of just how central social justice teaching was to Mormonism.

The controversy began when Mr. Beck said on his radio show: “I beg you, look for the words ’social justice’ or ‘economic justice’ on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words.

“Am I advising people to leave their church? Yes! If I am going to Jeremiah Wright’s church,” he said, referring to the incendiary black pastor who led the church attended by the Obama family members when they lived in Chicago. “If you have a priest that is pushing social justice, go find another parish. Go alert your bishop and tell them, ‘Excuse me, are you down with this whole social justice thing?’ ”…

[continues in the New York Times]