The Chuch of Allan - The Plain Truth About God

A serialization of the book, The Plain Truth About God.

Chapter 11. “THE JESUS TAPES”

From all the evidence we have about the spread of early Christianity it might be fair to say that without Paul, the fledgling movement might not have ever got off the ground.

Above everything else, Paul was a masterful compromiser.

He knew when to hold them, and he knew when to fold them.

He knew when issues mattered and when something should be let go in favor of expansion of the Church.

Although this gave his writings a sense of indecisiveness, contradiction and opportunism, Paul’s ultimate goal was the expansion of the central teachings of Jesus of Nazareth throughout the Roman world.

As long as Paul felt the “spirit of the teachings” was being adhered to, he was willing to compromise on other things, or even tolerate one situation while he wouldn’t another.

So much for the infallible and literate word of God!

** “Never let a sense of morals prevents you from doing what is right!” - Asimov

About the same time that Jesus and Paul where spreading the message of what was to become known as Christianity, there was a whole host of different religions and beliefs that had been traveling around not only the Middle East, but also most of the known world for hundreds and even thousands of years.

This proliferation of ideas and beliefs took many forms and names but they all seemed to fit a general mold that was repeated time after time!

Religions and religious sects are a lot like a family business. Most come and go within three generations! This has been true throughout most of history, but never more so than at the time of Jesus in the Middle and Far East.

There seems to have been numerous contenders for the throne.

We do not know with certainty how much of the lore from these competing religions was borrowed from, and incorporated into Christianity, but there is a remarkable similarity between them and I will leave it up to you to draw any conclusions from them.

Gnosticism;

Gnosticism (Greek for knowledge) was popular throughout most of the Greek world at the time of Christ. Although we do not know much about the origins of this sect, the first recorded Gnostic was Simon Magus who lived at the time shortly before the first Jewish uprising against the Romans about 30-40 years after the death of Jesus.

Gnosticism was based on an old Canaanite religion that goes back to at least the seventh or eighth century B.C.E.

One of the remarkable features about Gnosticism is that it was like almost every other belief system prevalent in the area at that time. The Gnostic religion centered on the figure of Sophia (or Wisdom), who was believed to have been disgraced, but raised up again by God.

The worship of Sophia easily found itself at home with Zoroastrianism and its battle between good and evil, Judaism with its concept of a supreme God, Mithraism, with its story of the descent and resurrection of the sun-god, and above all else with Christianity and its story of the descent and resurrection of Christ.

At one time there were Zoroastrian Gnostics, Jewish Gnostics, Mithra Gnostics and of course Christian Gnostics.

Christian Gnosticism was a major competing religion for early Christianity.
One of its most popular manifestations was the assertion that the Divine spirit of Christ dwelled in the body of the man Jesus.

In this respect, then, the spirit of Christ did not die on the cross with Jesus.

There is now a belief that Jesus himself was a Gnostic.

Some of the other competing beliefs at the time of Jesus:

MITHRA, Sun God of Persia.

Official recognition of sun worship in the Roman Empire began when they instituted the cult of “Sol Invictus.” (The cult of Sol Invictus and that of Mithra are virtually the same.)

The story of Mithra precedes the Christian Jesus by over a thousand years.
It first appeared as an Aryan sun god in Sanskrit and Persian literature, circa 1400.
Mithra was introduced into the Roman Empire in the 4th century BCE.

The cult was, shortly before the Christian era began, the most popular and widely spread “Pagan” religion of the times.

Mithra has the following in common with the Christ character:
**Mithra was born of a virgin in a stable on the winter solstice, frequently December 25 in the Julian calendar.
**Attended by shepherds who brought gifts.
**Shown with a nimbus, or halo, around his head.
**Believed not to have died, but to have ascended to heaven, whence it was believed he would return at the end of time to raise the dead for a final judgment.
**Granted his followers immortal life following baptism.
**He had 12 companions or disciples.
**He performed miracles.
**He was killed for his views.
**After three days, he rose again. His resurrection is celebrated every year.
**Mithra was called, “The Good Shepherd.”
**He was “the Way, the Light, the Redeemer, the Savior, and The Messiah.”
**His sacred day was Sunday, “The Lord’s Day,” hundreds of years before the appearance of Christ.
**Mithra had his principal festival on what was later to become Easter, the time he was resurrected.
**His religion had a Eucharist or “Lord’s Supper.”
**Followed a leader called a ‘papa’ (pope), who ruled from the Vatican hill in Rome; celebrated sacramenta (a consecrated meal of bread and wine).
**Had a Myazda -corresponding exactly to the Catholic Missa {mass}.
**Used chanting, bells, candles, incense, and holy water in remembrance of the last supper of Mithra.

HORUS of Egypt

The legends of Horus go back thousands of years, and he shares the following in common with Jesus:
**Horus was born of a virgin on December 25th in a cave/manger.
**His birth was announced by a star in the east and attended by three wise men.
**He was a child teacher in the Temple and was baptized when he was 30 years old.
**Horus was also baptized by “Anup the Baptizer,” who becomes “John the Baptist.” –
**He had 12 disciples. **He walked on water.
**He performed miracles and raised one man from the dead.
**Horus was transfigured on the Mount.
**He was crucified, buried in a tomb and resurrected. **He was “Way, the Truth, the Light, the Messiah, God’s Son, the Son of Man.”
**He was the Good Shepherd, the Lamb of God, and the Word, etc.
**He was “The Fisher,” and was associated with the Lamb, Lion and Fish. **Horus was called “The KRST,” or “Anointed One,” long before the Christians duplicated the story.
**In the catacombs at Rome are pictures of the baby Horus being held by the virgin mother Isis - the original “Madonna and Child.”

KRISHNA of India

The similarities between the Christian Jesus and the Indian messiah are many.
**It should be noted that a common earlier English spelling of Krishna was “Christna,” which reveals its relation to ‘”Christ.” –
**Krishna was born of a Virgin -His father was a carpenter. –
**His birth was attended by angels, wise men and shepherds, and he was presented with gold, frankincense and myrrh. –
**He was persecuted by a tyrant who ordered the slaughter of thousands of infants.
**He was baptized in the River Ganges.
**He worked miracles and wonders.
**He raised the dead and healed lepers, the deaf and the blind.
**Krishna used parables to teach the people about charity and love.
**He was transfigured in front of his disciples.
**In some traditions he was crucified between two thieves.
**He rose from the dead and ascended to heaven.
**Krishna is called the “Shepherd, God” and “Lord of lords,” was considered “the Redeemer,” and “The Word.”
**He is the second person of the Trinity, and proclaimed himself the “Resurrection” and the “Way to the Father.”
**His disciples called him “Jezeus,” meaning “pure essence.”
**Krishna is to return to do battle with the “Prince of Evil,” who will desolate the earth.

Tomorrow; The Council of Nicea – What Christianity is really about!

Allan W Janssen is the author of the book The Plain Truth About God (What the mainstream religions don't want you to know!) and is available at the web site www.God-101.com

Visit the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

The Chuch of Allan - The Plain Truth About God

A serialization of the book, The Plain Truth About God.

Chapter 11. “THE JESUS TAPES”

Here we have, after decades and even centuries of research, what can be defined as the core sayings of Jesus.

These sayings -at least- can be directly attributed to Jesus.

Researchers have considered many variables to gain an insight into what Jesus actually said to his disciples and followers. All of the sayings had to have the ring of authenticity of having originally come from the historical Jesus.

They also had to be in character with Jesus and not something that was obviously added later by one of his “Christian” followers.

In other words, it had to be historically appropriate rather than something that was obviously a product of early Christianity or borrowed from the contemporary world! (His or Ours)

It was also helpful to have it confirmed by being included in two or more Gospels.

1.**-“The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed; nor will they say, ‘Lo, here it is!’ or ‘There! ‘For behold, the kingdom of God (Father) is in the midst of you.” (Luke 17:20)

2.**-“From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of God (Father) has suffered violence, and men of violence take it by force.” (Matt 11:12; cf., Luke 16:16.)

3.**-“But to what shall I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the market places and calling to their playmates, ‘we piped to you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.’ For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon’; I came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Behold, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!” (Matt11:16-19; Luke 7:31-34)

4.**-“Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God (Father) like a child shall not enter it!” (Mark 10:15 = Luke 18:17)

5.**-“If it is by the finger of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God
(Father) has come to you!” (Luke 11:20)

6.**-“No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom
of God (Father).” (Luke 9:62)

7.**-“It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God (Father)!” (Mark 10:25 = Matt 19:24 = Luke 18:25)

8.**-“Father. Hallowed by thy name. Thy kingdom come. Give us this day our daily bread. Forgive us what we owe those whom we have injured. As we ourselves forgive what is owing from those who have injured us. Put us not to the test!” (Luke 11:2-4 Matt 6:9-10)

There is one other saying attributed to Jesus but not one of the core sayings because it was widely used in antiquity and is know from both pagan and Jewish sources - but the thrust of it coheres with the meaning of Jesus’ core sayings.

**“The gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter it are many”! “The gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those that find it are few.” (Mat 7:13-14: cf., Luke 13:24)

This saying, whether a core saying or not, is in the tradition of a neutral observer of the human condition. An observer who notices that most people lead lives that end in destruction. (As well as quiet desperation)

Only a few “find” the way to life, a way that involves hardship, and presumably, courage. The saying, if authentic, promises to those who choose to enter the realm of the power of God nothing more than life itself!

A life in the here and now, that if properly lived, opens the door to whatever may come after!

There are no transcendental promises, no rewards, or punishments.

It is an eloquent expression of the fulfillment or destruction of human existence.
It depends entirely on the mode of being human that one chooses.

“Hell” then would be the wasting of human existence, and “Heaven” would be life fulfilled!

This sounds very interesting from an Eastern viewpoint, since, as we speculated before, there are hints that Jesus was exposed to Hinduism and other eastern philosophies.

It also relates to a belief among North American Indians that the way to live is to be in the “Now.”

That is, life is meant to be lived moment by moment in the present, not wondering abut what is to come, or remorse about what has happened.

We are rather to fully experience, and if possible, enjoy life, from one moment to the next.

****To be fully human there is nothing more or less than to live “now.”

*THE ELEVEN PARABLES OF JESUS ACCORDING TO “Q”

1.-The Sower. - “The kingdom of heaven can be compared to a man who sowed good seed. Some fell on the path and did not grow, some fell amongst thorns and were choked, and some fell on good ground and increased a hundredfold.”
** -This tells us that in a ministry not everyone will be converted. Those that do multiply!

2.-The Mustard Seed. “The kingdom of God is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of seeds, but grows to be the greatest of all shrubs, giving shade to the birds of the air.”
** -In spreading the word of a ministry, it may start out small indeed, but has the potential to grow beyond all bounds.

3.-The Leaven. “There was a woman who took leaven, and hid it in three measures of meal, till it was all leavened.”
**-In a ministry, scatter or hide the faithful amongst the masses and they will eventually “leaven” the rest.

4.-The Hidden Treasure. There was a man who found treasure hidden in a field, which he covered up; he then went and sold all that he had and bought that field.
**-The kingdom of God is like a treasure hidden in a field. If you find it, give all you have to posses it!

5.-The Lost Sheep. “The Kingdom of God is like a shepherd who has one hundred sheep. If one goes astray he will leave the other 99 to seek the one.”
**-Everyone is important. If 99 are safe, go after the one who wandered.

6.-The Lost Coin. “What woman, having ten silver coins, if she looses one coin, does she not light a lamp and sweep until she finds it? And when she finds it, she calls her friends to rejoice with her. Likewise when God finds one sinner who repents, there is joy in heaven.”
**-God rejoices in finding a sinner who repents and comes back into the fold.

7.-The Unjust Steward. (servant) There was a rich man who had a steward. He said to him, “what is this I hear about you?” “You are no longer able to steward!” The man then went to his master’s debtors one by one and said, “Write down half of what you owe (1/2, 4/5, ¾ etc.) so that they might be ingratiated to him in the future when he no longer was a steward.”
**-This parable is about trust.

8.-The Great Supper. There was a man who once gave a dinner and invited guests. At the time of the dinner, he sent his servants to call those who had been invited. They all made excuses why they could not come so the master said; “Go outside to the streets and bring back the first people you meet.”
**-Share your bounty with those who appreciate it.

9.-The Laborers in the Vineyard. A man went into the town market at dawn and hired men for his vineyard. He agreed to pay them one (1) denarius for the days work. He went back at mid morning and hired more and again in the early afternoon and hired more. All for one denarius per day. When we wanted to pay them at suppertime, the ones who had been there since early morning complained, saying: “We worked many more hours for the same pay as those that started in the afternoon and it’s not fair.” The man said: “Of course it’s fair, you agreed to work for a denarius, and how I pay my money is my business!”
**-Life is not fair!

10.-The Prodigal Son. A son asked his father for an early share of his inheritance and then went out into the world. He did not do well and thought: “Even my father’s servants are better off than me. I will go back to my father and ask to be treated as one of the servants so that I may at least eat.” While he was still some distance off, his father saw him and came running saying: “Bring a robe for my son and kill a fated calf for him, for my son was dead but now he is alive and returned to me!”
** - What we have done is in the past. A father will always love his son.

11.-The Good Samaritan. A man fell amongst robbers who beat him and departed, leaving him half-dead. Several men who passed him walked to the other side of the road until a Samaritan stopped and helped him. He dressed his wounds and then took him to an Inn. As he left he said to the Innkeeper: “Here are two denarii’s, give him what he needs till he is better!”
** -Two lessons here! First, it is our responsibility to look after each other. Secondly, the Samaritans were considered outcasts at the time, so the lesson was also do not judge a person by what he is, rather by what he does!

Allan W Janssen is the author of the book The Plain Truth About God (What the mainstream religions don't want you to know!) and is available at the web site www.God-101.com

Visit the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

The Chuch of Allan - The Plain Truth About God

A serialization of the book, The Plain Truth About God.

Chapter 10. - Will the Real Jesus Please Stand Up!

With all the different views presented in the various Gospels and Sayings we have looked at so far it makes sense to try to find out how many in total actually came from Jesus.

We do not know exactly how the texts in the bible were chosen but we do know that whatever happened occurred principally in the middle of the second century up until 325 C.E. when the First Ecumenical Council of Nicea was convened by Emperor Constantine.

He established the Nicene Creed as the fundamental statement of Christian doctrine........................

In his book “The Silence of Jesus,” James Breech takes an in-depth and impartial view of the words that have been attributed to “Christ,” and compared these with the words that composed the core material said by the historical “Jesus.” (See previous chapter!)

According to Breech, all the thoughts attributed to Jesus, a collection of eight sayings and eleven parables, can definitely be followed back to (Q) and do not have the taint of something said by “Christ.”

Modern day scholars would agree that these sayings, at least, are authentic.

They are remarkably free of the language and concepts of the early Christian movement, and show a purity of thought and concept, that upon close examination, reveals a simplicity and universal message not constrained by time or culture.

To truly understand the sayings that were uttered by the historical Jesus, we must keep an open mind and not make assumptions, or at least keep them to a minimum.

To do otherwise would be to fall into the same trap that ensnared the early “Christians.”

They created a body of work that first collected, then glossed over and distorted the sayings of Jesus to provide a basis for their own teachings.

One of the most basic assumptions that Breech examines is the concept of Christian “love” that forms the basis of most of the teachings of Jesus.

Let me explain:

** The foundation of Christian ideology revolves around “Love” for one and another.

To understand this we need to define exactly how the term or meaning of “Love” is used when compared to (the small L) love!!

In the first instance, there is the true “Love,” which means it is rooted in the power of the kingdom of God.

This is the “Love” that the historical Jesus preached to his followers.

The second type of Christian “love” (small L) is defined solely as an ethical idea that was propagated by the spreading Christian faith in trying to define the words of Christ.

Nietzsche probably best defined this form of Christian ‘love’ as a masked feeling of pity or charity.

In other words, we feel sorry for others and from this superior moral ground, we lend a helping hand.

Nietzsche claims that Christian ‘pity’ (love) is a device used by those who are not themselves truly vital and alive to obtain a perverse elevation of their own position by undermining others.

In other words, “I can make myself feel better by thinking you or someone else is worse-off and deserving of love.”

We often confuse the feeling of Christian “love” for someone with:

1. Pity for them.

2. Humanitarianism-or a love of Mankind.

3. Altruism, or self denial, and:

4. Sentimentalism, or wanting to be with others.

** These concepts of “love” have been re-enforced over and over again through one story or another.

What Jesus actually said was something more basic and infinitely harder to achieve.

The historical Jesus did not urge us to love humankind or to feel pity for someone else. He did not tell us to deny ourselves for someone else’s sake, or flagellate ourselves, or even to enjoy another’s company!

What He did say was pure and simple and straight to the point, “Love one another!”

This sort of Love is not the altruistic love of humanity, nor the possessive love for our mate, but rather something that requires hard work, tenacity, and sacrifice.

It is easy to love your wife or husband, child or parent, but to Love your neighbor (or stranger) is a task that is never ending and always requires effort.

It is a Love that seems to have no immediate benefit and is therefore not practiced by many people.

However, in the end, this is what will make Humanity rise up to it is potential and approach what Jesus referred to as the “Kingdom of God.” (The Father)

This is not something that is to be expected in the near, or far, future. Rather, it was a state of being that is present at this time, and only has to be observed and followed in order to achieve a state of Grace.

One of the core sayings of Jesus was “The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed, nor will they say ‘Lo, here it is!’ or ‘There!’ For behold, that kingdom of God is in the midst of you.”

Jesus tells us quite clearly that the “Kingdom of God” is not a coming kingdom, or a future kingdom, but rather something already in and amongst his disciples. It is not a place, but rather a state of mind!

Allan W Janssen is the author of the book The Plain Truth About God (What the mainstream religions don't want you to know!) and is available at the web site www.God-101.com

Visit the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

The Chuch of Allan - The Plain Truth About God

A serialization of the book, The Plain Truth About God.

Chapter 10. - Will the Real Jesus Please Stand Up!

This leads us to another question: “Does the Gospel of Thomas really reflect the views of Jesus?” ……………..Maybe!

There was once a “Q” gospel and a Mark gospel. These were revised and combined into a Matthew gospel and a Luke gospel. Therefore, four interrelated texts testify to a single view of Jesus.

That in turn leads us to the further question of what is “Q” and what does it have to do with Thomas since none of this material existed in a written, coherent, or universal form for several decades after the death of Jesus.

At some point, scholars believe that a written text of only the sayings and teachings of Jesus was in circulation. This was probably in an effort to standardize the proliferating teachings attributed to Jesus in the oral tradition.

If you realize that Matthew and Luke are revised versions of Mark you will see that an extended set of sayings are in Matthew and Luke that do not occur in Mark.

Both Matthew and Luke, it is generally agreed to in scholarship, took those sayings from a mid-first century document that consisted of a list of Jesus’ sayings. That document, called “Quelle,” has come to be known as Q.

It does not exist any longer, but it can be recovered by analysis of Matthew and Luke. Simply put, Q was the written list of sayings that we find common and not too apocalyptic in Mark, Matthew, and Luke.

In other words, things that have a high probability of being said by the historical Jesus, instead of the apocalyptic sayings of “The Christ” that we find in the Gospel of John.

** At the end of the first century C.E. The “Alexandrian School of Thought,” of which Origin and Clement of Alexandria were part, taught that there were three possible approaches to be taken to the scriptures.

(That there were already discussions of this magnitude and significance tells us a lot of the early Christian movement.)

The first approach was the literal translation, the second was symbolic, or allegorical, and the third was spiritual.

1. The first/ literal was described as simplistic and solely for the un-educated.

2. The second/symbolic was the use of parables to convey a deeper meaning.

3. The third/spiritual transcended the mortal plane and bought us closer to God.

Unfortunately at that time, as now, the un-washed masses cried out for a ready-made, simplistic, popular faith. A faith that can best be described as closer to a romance novel than any serious attempt at theology, history and philosophy.

This is also the reason that the “Resurrection” was proclaimed as the basis for Christianity.

This version of the “Faith,” when combined with the Roman gift of organization and brute force, led to the “Christianity” that has been handed down to us.

It seems to be the consensus among New Testament scholars that “Jesus” preached a message that teaches a way of behaving and living that applied to a first century reality.

However, the words of “Christ” are another matter.

If the sayings and parables of “Christ” are examined closely with the purpose of separating those words that were actually uttered by “Jesus” from those that were later attributed to him, we see a vast difference in the context, meaning, and purpose between the two.

The sayings of “Christ” display a metaphorical and allegorical context that suggest someone slightly removed from the everyday world.

The biblical words of “Jesus,” however, were indeed a direct reflection of their place and time. (Just as today, we are all products of our own time and age)

The actual sayings of the historical “Jesus,” which upon close examination shows only a handful of thoughts and parables, are so simple and basic, with such underlying truth, that they can be applied to the human condition of any age.

The origin of Thomas is a question hotly debated by scholars. Many scholars say that it was written at about the same time, or even somewhat before, the gospels in the bible.

Their argument is that most of the sayings in Thomas show no signs of having any dependence on, or knowledge of the Biblical gospels and so Thomas’ sayings derive from oral tradition and not from written Biblical texts.

This does not seem to have been possible after the end of the first century. This is when the Biblical texts began to be authoritative.

Other scholars find bits of evidence that indicate Thomas was indeed dependent in part, on Biblical texts. They surmise that the author of Thomas must have edited out almost all indications of the particular styles and ideas of the Biblical authors.

(Those scholars date Thomas in the mid second century C.E. and are suspect.)

However, the choices for a compilation were made at this time, it could well have been that Thomas was unknown to those who made them.

Alternatively, there might have been elements of Thomas that were distasteful to them.

On the other hand, given a preference for narrative biographical gospels, Thomas might have been thought dry and irrelevant.

We know hardly anything about the process of Canonical gospel choice except that biblical canon is not open for debate, it is a closed entity.

A church that adds Thomas to its collection of scriptures would move outside the margins of orthodox Christianity and no well-known denomination has the slightest intention of adding Thomas to its scriptures.

If you take the set of sayings that are in common in Thomas and either “Q” or the gospels of Mark or Matthew or Luke (no sayings in Thomas are repeated in John) then you have a pared down set that could have come from Jesus himself.

These we will list at the end of the chapter.

The only thing that is known about Thomas for sure is that it will never be included in the Bible.

There is even more conjecture about the lost years of Jesus, between the time when he was in his late teens until he began his ministry at about the age of thirty.

During this time, it must be assumed that he followed the normal Hebrew custom of learning a trade and getting married.

Yes, married! It would have been highly unusual - even suspect, for him to be in that society and not be married!

Mary Magdalene, by the way, was his wife.

She was only drastically reduced in her role much later by the church hierarchy.

They could not stand the thought of a woman with that much influence on the “Son of God” so they reduced her to the status of a whore!

Allan W Janssen is the author of the book The Plain Truth About God (What the mainstream religions don't want you to know!) and is available at the web site www.God-101.com

Visit the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

The Chuch of Allan - The Plain Truth About God

A serialization of the book, The Plain Truth About God.

Chapter 10. - Will the Real Jesus Please Stand Up!

The early Christian gospels are not historical biographies of Christ and do not really give us insight into the personal life of Jesus.

These gospels proclaim a message about Jesus and express a significance that the early Christians found in Jesus.

They are written in a way that appeals to historical truth, but they are not history in any actual sense.

The gospels expressed what people experienced about Jesus in the context of the first century Near East.

This experience was taken as a “revelation” of the Divine, and they tell us what the early Christians actually believed about Jesus!

Until the recent deciphering of the Gospel of Thomas and the discovery of the “Q” sayings, this knowledge of Christ was the only bases we had to explore the historical Jesus.

As a result, it was very difficult to differentiate between the actual words of Jesus and the words his followers (Christians) attribute to him.

It must be noted that “Q” (German for Quelle, or source) has only recently been deciphered from the first three gospels by comparing them side by side.

In this comparison, there were many divergent views and stories, but scholars also found a commonality within them that made no mention of the miracles of Christ.

Rather they pointed to the striped down sayings and parables that were probably the “authentic words of Jesus.”

Since the first gospel Mark, was not written until thirty-five or forty years or so after the death of Jesus, (Well over a generation later!) we have to remember that early Christian preachers told stories about Jesus in order to convey the significance they saw in him.

In explaining his parables and stories, it was necessary to paraphrase them and even add to them by way of clarification.

The early Christians did not distinguish between the actual Jesus and the Christ of their religion. They also did not distinguish between the sayings of the earthly Jesus and the explanations and interpretations of Christ’s sayings given by their leaders.

Here we have a case where the actual sayings of the earthly Jesus, (Q) were mixed with Christian interpretations of his words.

Then, various popular sayings and words of wisdom of the time, and the purported words of the risen “Christ” were all collected in a primary work which started out with the synoptic gospels of Mark, then Matthew and Luke.

After these three gospels, things took an even sharper turn and went in the direction of our modern version of Christianity with the apocalyptic works of John.

The authors of the gospels were actually anonymous, (Except for Paul) but for convenience sake, we use the traditional names of Mark, Matthew, Luke and John.

The first gospel -Mark, is loosely based on the first three or four decades of oral tradition plus “Q,” and the “Gospel of Thomas,” which was passed down to the author(s)

The first gospels were written largely in an attempt to provide some standard collection of the stories circulating about Jesus.

All, that is, with the exception of the Gospel of John, which is apocalyptic and more concerned with making a theological statement.

These gospels were not immediately recognized as authority.

As late as 96 A.D. Clement, the Bishop of Rome proclaimed the only authoritative texts of Christianity to be the Old Testament and the various sayings attributed to Jesus then in circulation.

The Gospels did not appear in purely Christian writings (as opposed to Jewish writings) until around 135 AD.

The same lack of authoritarian certification can be said of the Gospel of Thomas, which might well be the most informative discovery about Christian origins in modern history.

The Gospel was often mentioned in early Christian literature, but no copy was thought to have survived until the discovery of a Coptic manuscript in 1945 at Nag Hammadi in Egypt.

Portions of Greek versions of the Gospel of Thomas were found in Oxyrhynchus Egypt about one hundred years ago and these can be dated to about 140 C.E. or somewhat before.

A complete version in Coptic (the native Egyptian language written in an alphabet derived from the Greek alphabet) as we mentioned, was found in Nag Hammadi Egypt in 1945.

That version can be dated to about 340 C.E. This Coptic version was a translation of the Greek version.

Thus most, if not all, of the Gospel of Thomas was written well prior to 140 C.E.

Thomas is a pure sayings gospel; that is, it consists only of a collection of the sayings of Jesus without any extended narrative or explanation.

While Thomas is not Q, its discovery proves the theory that such collections existed in the early days of Christianity.

The discovery of Thomas as part of a Gnostic library has led many to believe it a Gnostic creation.

However, very little of it would have been considered unorthodox to the early church. What little questionable material can be found is probably a later addition.

Thomas does represent a Jewish “Wisdom” philosophy that was embraced by Jesus and the Gnostics. “That the kingdom of God is not something we must await for, but is in fact already here, if we can only become spiritual enough to see it.”

One of these documents found at Nag Hammadi begins with a note in the margin, “The Gospel According to Thomas.”

The first sentence of that document says, “These are the secret words which the living Jesus taught and which Judas Thomas Didymos wrote down.” Then they start over 110 sayings, each introduced with “and Jesus said.”

Now this is very reveling since some of those sayings have parallels with the gospels of Mark, Matthew and Luke, -- and some not.

However, we can state that sayings or parables that are repeated two or more times in any of the early Gospels have a much higher chance of being an actual utterance by the historical Jesus.

These sayings may go back to a very early period of Christianity, and some of them may have been added later.

The document itself comes from the fourth century and as with all gospel text, we have to remember that these texts were fluid.

Remember, scribes could add, could leave things out, or could add comments and even their own interpretations.

They not only could, but also did!

We cannot reconstruct with certainty what the Gospel of Thomas looked like around the year 100 or earlier.

It is very likely that it existed at that time or before, and that a good deal of the material that’s now in that manuscript was already in a Greek manuscript that dates back to the first century.

Now what is typical about these sayings is that in each instance, they tell us that if you want to understand what Jesus said, you have to first recognize yourself.
You have to know yourself, know who you are.

It begins with a saying about the Kingdom of God, which is probably one of the most important, and reveling proclamations.

“If you seek the Kingdom of God in the sky then the birds will precede you, ad if you seek it in the sea, then the fish will precede you, but the Kingdom is in you, and if you know yourself, then you know the Kingdom of the Father.”

However, if you do not know yourself, you live in poverty, not knowledge! To know yourself is the knowledge of our Divine origin.

“The fact that we have come from the Kingdom of the Father.”

What does it mean really to know oneself?

To know is to have insight into one’s own ultimate Divine identity.

“Know yourself” is a very old Greek maxim... That is, you have to know that your own soul is Divine, and then you know that you are immortal.

Whereas, the body is the mortal part of human existence.

Now this is radicalized in the Gospel of Thomas into saying that everything that is experienced physically and through sense perception, everything in the world that you can perceive in this way is nothing.

It is, at best, chaos and, at worst, it does not even exist in reality.

The only thing that really exists is your Divine spirit or your Divine soul, which is identical in its quality with God.

This, in many ways, exactly reflects the philosophy of the Eastern Religions.

(There is even a lot of conjecture about the lost years of Jesus, between the time when he was in his late teens until he began his ministry at about the age of thirty. There are also unsubstantiated reports of his having visited a monastery in India and studying Eastern Philosophy!)

TOMORROW: The Gospel of Thomas and "Q"

Allan W Janssen is the author of the book The Plain Truth About God (What the mainstream religions don't want you to know!) and is available at the web site www.God-101.com

Visit the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

The Church of Allan - The Plain Truth About God

A serialization of the book, The Plain Truth About God.

Chapter 9. ONWARD CHRISTIAN SOLDIERS .

There has been much debate on why there are no early records of the sayings of Jesus.

It would be natural to assume that they would be preserved and handed down to us, and this would normally be the case, but remember the early Christians felt no need for either a biography of Jesus or a collection of his sayings.

They believed that the “Christ” event in history was the immediate prelude to the end of the world and final judgment of humankind.

Paul, in his epistles, wrote that the present generation, his own, would see the apocalypse.

In the Synoptic gospels, Jesus of Nazareth also claimed that the people around him would still be alive for the “Last Days.”

Anticipating the immediate end of the world at any moment, the early Christians felt no obligation to record the life or sayings of Jesus.

There was, after all, no future anticipated for this material.

These early Christians were more concerned with preparing themselves for the expected apocalypse and for spreading the truth of Christianity to as many people as possible before the end of history.

As a result, the life and sayings of Jesus circulated in an oral form through Christian teachers and public speakers.

This oral material included stories and sayings attributed to Jesus, but they did not exist in any systematic, organized, or universal form.

Teachers and speakers alike would use these sayings and stories to emphasize the particular occasion or subject. In other words, a public speaker would use a saying attributed to Jesus as an occasion to lecture or discuss some aspect of Christianity or morality with his audience.

What the speaker talked about largely determined what the speaker chose to remember about the life and sayings of Jesus.

The very first thing that needed to be accounted for was the death and resurrection of Jesus. The history of Jesus’ death (The Passion) and the resurrection are probably the oldest of the stories surrounding Jesus.

The early Christians, however, needed more than the Passion and the Resurrection to legitimize Christ as having Divine status.

Therefore, the early Hebrew teachers of Christianity turned to the prophetic and messianic tradition of Judaism and began to develop proofs of Christ’s divinity by aligning events in Jesus’ life with older prophecies.

This process also included configuring the humbly born Jesus of Nazareth to a descendant of King David through his father, Joseph, since the messianic prophecies were clear that the Messiah would come from the line of David.

This legitimizing process continued when the religion entered the Greek world.

The Greeks associated divinity with miraculous stories and miraculous birth. From here came the idea that Jesus of Nazareth was born of a virgin…….. even though the virgin birth of Jesus contradicted the placement of Jesus as a descendant of David through Joseph.

We also, dare I say it, have a major problem with the physical resurrection of Jesus.

This we will discuss further when we have a look at St. Paul.

The Gospels, in spite of being a “product of their time,” and open to various revisions and alterations during their telling and eventual documentation, still came from a recognizable and firm historical reality.

This was a time of rebellion, political unrest, civil disobedience, and social discontent. It was also a time of religious questioning, and hopes and dreams for the arrival of a new King.

It was a time where the anticipation of the arrival of a new Messiah reaches a fever pitch verging on mass hysteria.

It was a time where the political freedoms of Judea were brutally extinguished by the two wars of A.D. 66-74 and again A.D. 132-135 that led to the destruction of Massada.

The Gospels were the first attempts in early Christianity to come up with a coherent picture of the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth.

During and after this time there was a wholesale destruction of written records and documents, including, no doubt, the first few gospels of Mark, Matthew, Luke, and even John.

The earliest of these documents, Mark, seems to have been actually composed during the revolt of 66-74 or shortly after.

Although not one of Jesus’ original disciples, Mark (whoever he was) was a disciple of Paul and his Gospel bears an affinity to Pauline thought.

Mark is the shortest of the Gospels and shows the greatest familiarity with Jewish life and thought.

The later gospels, however, show increasingly less familiarity with the Jewish context of Jesus’ life and mission until we come to the last gospel whose author is totally uninterested in that context.

All of the authors of the gospels show some unfamiliarity with Palestinian geography which indicates that they were written by non-Palestinians, either Jewish or Greek.

Mark seemed to be a native of Jerusalem, and as Clement of Alexandria stated many years later, the document (as well as Paul’s epistles) was composed in Rome, and addressed to a Greek-Roman Audience.

Judea and Galilee had recently been in open revolt against Rome. Thousands of Jews were being crucified for their rebellion against the state, just as Jesus had.

If Mark wanted his Gospel to survive and impress a Roman Audience, he could not possibly present Jesus as being politically oriented, let alone anti-Roman!

In order to ensure the survival of his message, he would have to exonerate the Romans of all guilt for Jesus’ death and blame the “death of the Messiah” on certain Jews who were against his teachings because Jesus challenged the existing power structure.

This was the start of the myth that the Jews were responsible for the death of Jesus.

About a decade later, the authors of Matthew expanded Mark’s gospel, this time also using “Q” and other traditional material.

Five to ten years after this, the author of Luke-Acts (a two-volume work produced by the same person) also published his own revised and expanded version of Mark, again using “Q” and even more traditions about Jesus.

As Christian teachers moved into different communities, it had a couple of results.
First, they would find need for different parts of the tradition for different circumstances.

Second, the long period of oral transmission and the decentralized way in which the stories and sayings were distributed indicate that many of these were distorted, or even made up whole-cloth, to suit particular needs.

This has led some scholars to assert that, even if there was a historical Jesus, his life and teachings are permanently lost to history.

In spite of this, there is a remarkable consistency to the teachings and actions of Jesus of Nazareth. (Except those contained in John)

This lends tremendous credence to the Christian belief that the fact of a historical Jesus is not only proven, but that he is the Jesus of the Gospels.

Therefore, it would be a fair bet to assume that Jesus was an actual historical figure who had great influence on his peers and times. As for his teachings, they have to be looked at not only by what he said, but also by what his actions portrayed.

There is much truth to the saying “Actions speak louder than words!”

The truth probably lies somewhere between the scholarly belief in the unreliability of the gospels and the Christian belief in them as an infallible, literal portrait of Jesus.

Most Christians would say that their religion is based on the teachings of Jesus, in words divinely inspired to men who wrote the New Testament.

But, the first books of the New Testament all came from one man, Paul of Tarsus.

The books were later rearranged to take some of the emphasis off Paul, but it is impossible to deny that he was the primary architect of what would become Christianity.

Paul of Tarsus, or Saint Paul, is the person most responsible for the spread of Christianity. Without Paul, Christianity may have well died as an obscure apocalyptic Jewish sect.

Paul wrote up to about half of the New Testament. His influence on the bible is hard to discount.

Many Christians will tell you that his words were God inspired, so it doesn’t matter who actually penned them, or when.

If that is true, it doesn’t explain the myriad contradictions between the ideas of Paul and the rest of the bible.

Paul knew little of the actual life and history of Jesus, and most likely never met him. What mattered to Paul was the resurrected Christ and his soon to be expected return.

Paul was very apocalyptic and believed the return of Christ to be imminent, and preached so.

In his letters and writings that became part of the Christian New Testament, Paul put forth much of the doctrine followed by Christians today.

Paul had very stern things to say when it came to matters of home life, including husband wife relationships and sexuality. He wrote that a woman “may not teach or have authority over a man” although Jesus never said that.

He also railed against homosexuality, another subject not mentioned by Christ.
Paul may well have been the first popular Christian homophobe!

One of the most important differences in the teachings of Paul, as they differed from what other Christians at the time were teaching and learning, was the doctrine of salvation through grace.

Essentially, Paul taught that the lost are forgiven through the grace of God, not through any works.

This has come to be an excuse where individual Christians and Churches separate themselves from the teachings of Jesus.

Instead of living a life that helps others, Christians were able to free themselves from the heavy responsibilities for their brothers that Jesus taught, and instead put all the responsibility on Christ’s resurrection.

But, however you come down on Paul himself and how he related (or manufactured) Christian doctrine, his influence throughout the Mediterranean and the Mid-East cannot be denied.

He dedicated a good portion of his life to traveling throughout the area, converting Gentiles to Christianity.

Churches that he started grew until Christianity overtook the Pagan traditions and eventually led to their demise.

In spite of Christianities triumph over the unbelievers, remember a very important fact!

Jesus never personally claimed to be conducting his ministry to “erase man’s sins,” just as he never claimed to be Divine himself.

Jesus constantly referred to himself as the “son of God,”—just as we all are!

TOMORROW: Will the Real Jesus Please Stand Up!

Allan W Janssen is the author of the book The Plain Truth About God (What the mainstream religions don't want you to know!) and is available at the web site www.God-101.com

Visit the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

The Church of Allan - The Plain Truth About God

A serialization of the book, The Plain Truth About God.

Chapter 7. Have I got a deal for you!

Zoroastrianism

There has been a lot of debate about the origin of what we could call modern day Western Religion, as compared to early Hindu, pagan and tribal sects.

It is believed the concept of Monotheism, as it is practiced now, began in ancient Sumeria with the teachings of Zarathustra.

Although personally never claiming to be a prophet and only being elevated to that position many years later by his followers, his teachings were finally written down (650-700 B.C.E.) and gained wide acceptance about a thousand years after his death.

They not only had a profound influence on religion in general, but also are actually considered by some to be the foundation for Judaism, and then by default, Christianity and Islam.

** The historical Zarathustra, by some accounts, lived somewhere between 1500-2000 B.C.E., although it could even have been as late as about 800-600 B.C.E., since this is when his religion became mainstream and popular amongst the masses.

His followers, of course, attribute many wonders and miracles to him that never really happened and also claim he lived about 10,000 years ago (8000 BCE) right after the end of the last ice age.

Zarathustra, after much debate and conjecture about the duality of good and evil finally decided that there was only one God, “Ahzura Mazda” and that life in the physical world was a battle between good and evil.

As per a man’s actions, he would either cross the “sword bridge” after death, and reach Heaven, or fall and go to the abode of evil.

In the “final days,” there would be a battle between good and evil.

Evil would be vanquished and the world would be purified by a bath of fire. God would then judge the world, resurrect the dead, and His kingdom would be established on earth. (Sound Familiar?)

Zarathustra was convinced that all events of the world are based on cause and effect. He therefore based his teachings on three principles:

“Good reflection.”
“Good Word.”
“Good Deed.”

The creed recognized that all motives of human beings are based on action and reaction. So in the realm of human intercourse, when people act favorably, they receive a favorable reaction. (As in today’s Modern Age “Law of Attraction.”)

Zarathustra never assumed prophet-hood. He never claimed to be associated with God, and never ordered his followers to perform certain rituals. Rather, he urged them to try to know God and Heaven and adopt a good manner.

Zarathustra, during his lifetime, was never officially a prophet, nor can we call his spiritual path an actual “religion.”

He was a thoughtful man who recognized God because of his wisdom and never said he had been conscripted or chosen to bring any special message from God to humanity.

Zarathustra never imagined praising a God who is bribed by worship, and then rewards his worshiper with a promise of paradise.

God, to him, was not a deal maker. He was neither a buyer nor a seller, and did not need be flattered.

**“You cannot petition the Lord with prayer!” - Jim Morrison - The Doors

The God of Zarathustra was the initiator of justice, kindness, and truthfulness and guided his flock to the same principles.

Zarathustra based his philosophy on good reflection, good word, and good deed. Everyone had the liberty to choose the right way. (Free will!)

According to tradition, Zoroastrianism had only one symbol of note. “Faravahar” is the human spirit that existed before our birth and will continue to exist after our death.

Faravahar should not be confused or replaced with God, but rather looked upon as our soul!

Zarathustra also never believed in anthropomorphism of any feature of God. In no way was there any mention of the “Face of God,” or any reference to a Divine figure in a material form.

Zarathustra was reputed to have said, “God, when I was looking for you, I recognized that you are the starter and the end of everything. You are the source of wisdom and reflection. You are the creator of truthfulness and purity, and the judge for the behavior of all human beings.”

Zarathustra was against bartering to gaining power through the name of God. In other words, he did not teach any form of ritualized religion.

He was also against the needless sacrificing of animals, which was a common practice and lucrative source of income for religious leaders of that day.

Zarathustra’s philosophy frequently indicated that the three principles of good reflection, good words and good deeds lead to human enlightenment.

Therefore, there was no need for religious leaders to assume the role of mediators between God and his people. (The priesthood did not exist.)

Although Alexander the Great destroyed most of the teachings of Zoroastrian concepts and ideals, surprisingly, many survived down through the years to become Christian, Judaic, and Islamic dogma.

** Concepts such as heaven and hell, good and evil, the coming of the Savior, born of a virgin, the end-time purge of the world by fire, followed by the resurrection of the dead, and the final battle between good and evil.

These beliefs filtered down to Judaism and from there they came to Christianity and finally Islam.

There are scholars who consider Zoroastrianism to be the mother religion of all the present day Western World’s faiths.

It is probable that the Jews were influenced by the Zoroastrian faith in those days -and originally took on the concepts of heaven and hell, God’s evil adversary Satan, the resurrection and the final purification of the world, the virgin birth, any many others, and adapted them as their own.

There are other similarities too. Certain purification observances such as the impurity of menstruation etc. are found in our modern faiths.

** Indeed, the very idea of the “Messiah” could well be Zoroastrian in origin.

Zarathustra’s religion was the prominent one in Iran until the conquest by Arabs around 1300 years ago.

To preserve the Zoroastrian faith, a band of Zarathushtrians sailed to India about 1300 years ago and settled in the now familiar Indus Valley where they were, and are now, called the Parsees (from “Pars” i.e. Iran).

Although one of the oldest of religions, Zoroastrians have been decimated over the centuries, first by Alexander the Great, and then by everybody else who happened to come along.

At last count, the total world population of the followers of Zarathustra numbered around 150,000.

Buddhism:

**Q: What did a Buddhist say to the hot dog vendor?
A: “Make me one with everything.”
The vendor prepares the hot dog and gives it to the monk.
The monk pays him and asks for the change.
The hot dog vendor says, “Change comes from within.” :-)

**“Buddhism has the characteristics of what would be expected in a cosmic religion for the future: it transcends a personal God, avoids dogmas and theology, and covers both the natural and spiritual.” “It is based on a religious sense aspiring from the experience of all things, natural and spiritual, as a meaningful unity!” - Albert Einstein

Although Buddhism is the fourth largest religion in the world after Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism, it is difficult to imagine a religion that would be much closer in spirit (no pun intended!) to the views of an agnostic or atheist. Nonetheless, a spiritual leader who now has some 350 million adherents throughout the world started it.

The Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama, founded it in Northern India.

He was born in what is now Nepal in 563 B.C.E. Although leading a privileged life that was pre-determined for him, he followed the practice of the time and left his wife and children to lead the life of an ascetic.

First, he studied Brahmanism, but rejected its tenets.

He did acknowledge that the basis of Hinduism was correct in declaring that “suffering” was the basis for all of humanities ills and foibles.

This concept of suffering will be addressed in detail later on in the book, along with its parallels to other religions, and theologies.

Through his insights, Siddhartha Gautama attained enlightenment in 535 B.C.E. and assumed the title Buddha.

Siddhartha Gautama’s story is one of rejection and then acceptance.

He became disillusioned with Hindu teachings concerning creation and the self, but remained close to Hinduism in his acceptance of the belief that existence continues through many lives and controlled by the laws of Karma.

He rejected useless speculations that go beyond human experience, such as creation, God and the nature of a future life.

He urged a pattern of conduct and meditation leading to enlightenment and freedom from sorrow.

His belief was that man has no soul but is only a combination of elements controlled by Karma!

He taught that when man is free from the illusory attachment to this world he becomes free from rebirth and attains “Nirvana” or nothingness.

What happens then is beyond our powers to know so it is not worth idle speculation.

*”All that we are - is the result of what we have thought.”—Buddha

Unlike Hinduism, Buddhism is simpler and more direct in its approach to the correct way to lead your life.

It begins with the “Eightfold Path” which is a combination of three qualities that lead to eight courses of action in the quest for “Nirvana.”

** The first is “Wisdom” that is achieved through the right view and right thought.

** The next is “Morality” which is practiced by right speech, right action and right livelihood.

** Finally there is “Meditation.” It depends on right effort, right mindfulness and right contemplation.

According to the Buddha’s way, our lives of transience, sorrow and selfishness can be helped by the “Four Boundless States” of loving kindness, compassion, The five hindrances to a life well lived almost sound like the “seven deadly sins” of the West.

They are:

1- Aversion and ill will

2- Sloth and torpor

3- Restlessness and worry

4- Skeptical pride.

5- Sensuous lust

When this is followed with devotion and dedication, we achieve a state of grace, which we call the “Ten Perfection’s,” as opposed to the “Ten Fetters.”
“Ten Perfection’s” “Ten Fetters to Existence”

1. Generosity 1. Self-delusion

2. Morality 2. Doubt

3. Renunciation 3. Clinging to Ritual

4. Wisdom 4. Sensuous Lust

5. Energy 5. Ill Will

6. Patience 6. Greed-for material existence

7. Truthfulness 7. Greed-for immaterial existence

8. Resolution 8. Conceit

9. Loving-Kindness 9. Restlessness

10. Equanimity 10. Ignorance

Just as in Zen Buddhism, when all these practices are followed the enlightenment that comes might not do much for the next life but it sure will make the adherent grounded and stable in this existence.

Probably one of the best examples of this way of life is the serenity and peace that surrounds the “Dali Lama” of Tibet.

A few brief notes on Sikhism, Taoism, and Confucianism:

**Historians and specialist in Eastern religions believe Sikhism is a syncretistic religion, taking its roots from not only Hinduism, but also the Sufi movement of Islam.

The Sikh Holy Texts consist of hymns and writings by the 10 Gurus (all regarded as re-incarnations of the first, Guru Nanak) attempting to build a close, loving relationship with God, who is a single formless God with many names.

This belief is similar to the followers of Islam who also believe in a single God with 99 names, and only He can be worshipped.

They follow the Hindu religion in the belief of re-incarnation but at the same time reject the “caste system” and regard everyone as having equal status.

Devout Sikhs, aside from not cutting their hair and wearing it rolled up and covered on their head, wear the ceremonial dagger called the “Kirpan.”

**Back around 500 BCE the Chinese philosopher “Lao-Tzu” wrote the “Tao Te Ching” (or “The Way and its Power” / I-Ching) and laid the groundwork for Taoism in the Far East.

This is a philosophy and religion that must have inspired filmmaker George Lucas since “The Way” is the natural order of the universe, or the “Force” that flows through all living things.

*Duct Tape: It’s like the force, one side is dark, the other light, but together, they bind the universe. - Lao-Red Green

“Tao” is less a Deity than a transcendent reality however, since Taoists seek equilibrium above all else.

Many traditional practices such as acupuncture and “Chinese Medicine” are founded on this principal.

It is no wonder the Tao symbol is the Yin/Yang circle divided into equal areas of light and darkness, symbolizing equilibrium and the harmony of opposites.

**Although Confucianism is more of a philosophy than a religion, to many people, Confucius (or Kung-fu-tzu) is no more than a one-line joke.

Few have heard or read any of his teachings yet the truth and importance of his words still resonate today.

Confucius’ teachings developed according to times that are common to us all.
According to his writings, the days in which he lived were a time of moral chaos in which common values were widely rejected or simply disregarded.

Crime was on the rise, the gulf between rich and poor was broad and growing. Government was corrupt and distrusted by the people and a general feeling of apathy and suspicion pervaded society.

Confucius can perhaps best be termed the greatest “poet” of all time since his sayings and gems of wisdom not only caught on, but have been passed on to us over these thousands of years!

**Baha’i

Our newest, and by far the most progressive of the major world religions, started in Persia/Iran when Siyyid Ali-Muhammad (1819-1850 C.E.) assumed the title Bab, which means the Gate.

In May 1844, he announced the “Declaration of the Bab.” He explained that the purpose of his mission was to herald the arrival of “One greater than himself,” who would fulfill the prophetic expectations of all the great religions.

This date is regarded as the founding of the Baha’i Faith. His followers became known as Babis and right from the start, 20,000 were martyred for their beliefs.

His movement caused religious unrest and led to his execution in 1850 by order of the Shah’s chief minister and at the instigation of Muslim clerics.

In 1863, one of the Bab’s followers, Mirza Husayn-‘Ali-i-Nuri (18171892), a prominent follower of the Bab to whom he had given several indications of his future station, confided to some of his followers that he was the manifestation predicted.

In April 1863, he began proclaiming his station openly and publicly to the world at large. He assumed title became Baha’u’llah by which he was generally known.

Baha’i beliefs promoted major social changes when originated in the 19th century. They supported gender and race equality, world government, freedom of expression and assembly and world peace. In many ways, they were a century of more ahead of many other faiths and followers are heavily involved in promoting theses concepts today.

In addition, unlike many other religions, Baha’i views scientific inquiry as essential to expand human knowledge and deepen their member’s faith. They do feel that science needs to be guided by spiritual principles so that its applications are beneficial to all of humanity.

The Baha’i teachings promote the elimination of all forms of prejudice and uphold equal dignity and respect for all peoples. This, regardless of their racial, religious or national background.

It advocates the equality of men and women, the elimination of extremes of poverty and wealth and economic justice for all peoples. Universal education and the dignity of the individual are also central Baha’i principals.

Allan W Janssen is the author of the book The Plain Truth About God (What the mainstream religions don't want you to know!) and is available at the web site www.God-101.com

Visit the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

The Church of Allan - The Plain Truth About God

A serialization of the book, The Plain Truth About God.

Chapter 7. Have I got a deal for you!

When we concern ourselves with the study of Asian religions in world history, we are into a completely new ball game from what we know of European and North American beliefs.

What we believe to be the world’s oldest major religion, Hinduism, begins with the Vedic scriptures called the “Forest Books” (Aranyakas).

Sages, who naturally lived in the forest, wrote these texts.

The culture of the forest was the fuel that started the culture of India some ten to twenty thousand years ago. This philosophy eventually spread to the developing urban areas and flourished in the vast river plains and adjacent regions of what are now Pakistan and Western India.

The earliest villages, and then cities, became part of an extensive urban culture that had its beginnings about 5000 B.C.E. (you will notice that this was about the same time as our first religions claimed God created the world) and reached its height between 2600 to 1900 BCE.

This “Harappan” or “Indus Valley” civilization developed at about the same time as the early City-States of Egypt and Mesopotamia.

The ruling communities of the area were located at the major crossroads of trade routes and in rich agricultural regions. They appear to have controlled a vast area of some half a million square kilometers, which is an area twice as large as that of the Mesopotamian or Egyptian cultures.

One of the main misconceptions of this early period is the notion of the so-called “Aryan or Hittite” invasions destroying the Indus cities and establishing a very new culture and language on the sub-continent.

In fact, these “outsiders” were very nicely integrated into the Harappan culture.

There was a fusion of ideas and beliefs that not only strengthened local rituals, but also helped them to flourish and grow through the years.

The Aryans themselves were part of a great migratory movement of people from the Russian steppes and the land between the Black and Caspian Sea.

They were the descendants of a still earlier people who had lived in caves in the Dorgeone region of central France many thousands of years before that and had spread to the British Isles on the west, to the Bay of Bengal in the east.

They also went to the Scandinavian countries in the north where they then moved out again ahead of the advancing white wall of the last great ice age to the warmer Mediterranean climates in the south.

Although these Indo-European people possessed many common cultural traits found in Europe and the West, they had closer similarities to the culture of Persia and points East.

They were a branch of the many migrations that came and went and eventually crossed over the Khyber Pass and entered the land of India.

Without the aid of written texts, it is difficult to reconstruct the very early Indus religion, but it is known they made clay figurines of animals that were probably brought with them from their previous homes in France (Dorgeone region) and used in special rituals.

The Indus people had quite elaborate ceremonies for the dearly departed and they buried their dead in wooden coffins, along with pottery vessels filled with food for the afterlife.

Most individuals were also buried with some simple ornaments such as copper bangles and agate beads. It is interesting to note that elaborate ornaments of gold, silver, and precious stones were never included in the burials.

These people were obviously practical in their outlook and anything of intrinsic values was “inherited” by living relatives. It should also be noted that no “Royal” burials were ever performed. Everyone was treated equally in death.

Animal sacrifice was a common practice amongst the Indus people from the earliest of times.

When we talk about animal sacrifice in its simplest form, we have to remember that humans were, and are, meat-eaters.

Aside from the rise of Jainism and Buddhism in the sixth century B.C.E., humans were for the most part carnivorous.

If we are to eat animals, they also have to be killed, this is fact.

When we talk of the ancient Romans, or Aryans of India, or Jews, or any other religious group offering a sacrifice to the gods, this is only another way of saying;

“They threw a big feast for the people!”

That a wide variety of spiritual meanings was attached to animal sacrifice in olden days is evident from the biblical books of Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers.

These various rites are seen as different facets of the death of Christ, and are now expressed in the modern Communion Service.

In the old days, the head of the household, or the tribe, usually conducted the sacrificial worship.

In more settled conditions, and with the passage of time, the advent of a regular priesthood was inevitable, especially with the growth of villages and the increasing pomp and circumstance of the local shaman or “witch doctor.”

This lead to the development of the first priests who became full-time attendants in the service of God, and they were supported by the tithes of the other people and tribes.

After all, there was always a need for appeasement of the gods when a sin was committed, or a flagrant breaking of the moral order or any other transgression of village and family life was in evidence.

That was the time to call in the local priest and set things right again.

A good job if you could get it, especially since it was often hereditary. Your kids would then have job security and tenure as well!

(The Prophets of old had to constantly fight priestly rapacity and misconceptions of the people in general. Where there were no Prophets, the priesthood, and temple worship in general, always degenerated into the ugliness of “priest-craft.”)

This was very evident even in this “first of the major religions” with the history of the Brahmin Priesthood of India.

They pretty well controlled things and could set the tone and direction of their “religion” to whatever was most opportune at the time. They were also the ones who composed the hymns and chants.

The earliest group of Vedic hymns, called the Rig-Veda, (Verse wisdom) was first collected in oral form as the Aryan tribes were migrating to India about 2000-1500 B.C.E.

This collection of songs must have been the work of the first regular priests, because at that time a sacrifice could still be offered by anyone.

The priesthood was by necessity in these early stages, only a part-time position, but as villages and then towns proliferated, the priests had what could be called a “captive” audience and they began to exert more influence.

They suggested that unless the correct sacrifices were offered, the gods would be displeased and therefore only the highly trained priests could learn and perform the rituals and prayers that were necessary.

This is where specialization began, and a school of “singing” priests arose who chanted the special hymns for each sacrificial occasion. Their collections of 1,225 hymns, (with the exception of about 75) were all from the Rig Veda.

Then a class of priests who did the actual offering of sacrifice produced a third book called the Yajur Veda. Their collections were mainly ritualistic formulas muttered in low voices during the various stage of the sacrifice.

By about 900 B.C.E., there were at least three groups of priest, each with their own special duties and training schools. The priests were the ones who had the leisure time to study and teach, and do not forget, with knowledge comes power!

It was only natural that the priestly schools should produce notes and commentaries on their duties and this became known as the Brahmans, which included explanation of the hymns, the rituals of sacrifice, and the duties of the priests, etc.

The study of this material produced an elaborate scholasticism, and was referred to as the first “University.”

By 800 to 700, B.C.E. there developed a hereditary priesthood in charge of all sacrificial duties. (For which they were paid quite well by the people)

The Brahmins were now suggesting that by giving the right sacrifices, which they alone could offer, they could procure the favor of the gods. This put them in charge of various temporal blessings and a good place in heaven too!

Thus, gods, men, and governments were all very quickly under priestly control!

Although there was a definite “Priesthood,” Hinduism as such, does not have any one founder, or any single doctrine to which controversies can be refereed to for resolution.

There is also no definite time when it could be said to have begun.

It also did not require its adherents to blindly accept any one creed, so it could be refereed to as cultural, not creedal.

However, it was due to the influence of the priesthood (and their various interpretations of the faith,) that Hinduism was marked.

It’s also an attitude that seemed to envelope religious and cultural perspectives of a great many different points of view.

Hinduism is perhaps the only religious tradition that is so diverse in its theoretical premises and practical expressions that it is more like a compilation of religions.

It could be said that Hinduism can never be pinned down into monism, monotheism, polytheism, or pantheism, --- for all these systems are reflected.

The gods and goddesses of Hinduism amount to many thousands, all representing the many facets of the one supreme ruler “The Brahman.”

BUT! Hinduism, like Christianity, is composed of a Trinity. “The Brahman” is in fact made up of Brahma - the Creator, who continues to create new realities. Vishnu - the Preserver, who preserves these new creations, and Shiva - the Destroyer, compassionate, erotic, and at times, destructive.

(Especially the erotic part – remember, they invented the Karma-Sutra!)

It is difficult to assign any specific dogmatic orthodoxy to Hinduism since one of the oldest aspects of Hinduism is as much social as it is religious.

By this, we mean the practice of the caste system.

According to Hindu teaching, especially from the Bhagavad-Gita, (song of the blessed one!) each of the four castes or social classes (as well as their sub-castes and the untouchables) are paramount to maintaining order in society.

They serve as a guide to how adherents are progressing in their search for release from the “Cycle of Life.”

A persons “Karma” (every action, thought, or decision one makes has consequences-good or bad) determines how he or she will progress in the search for reincarnation into a higher caste.

Of course, bad “Karma” through improper thinking or actions, can also lead to the next life being of a much lower caste or even reverting to an animal existence!

The ultimate aim of these re-births is to reach a state of grace so high that a person “eats the fruits of his deeds,” and is released from the cycle of reincarnation and pain to a state of “nothingness” or “Nirvana.”

The basic tenet of Hinduism is the oneness of all things.

There is only one ultimate reality - Brahman.

Brahman is pure, unchanging, eternal and impersonal. From Brahman comes “Maya.” (Which has connotations of illusion and deception?)

Maya is the reality of the dream world, which means this existence is actually insubstantial and transitory.

This implies that man’s existence is just an illusion and the only worthwhile objective that a person can have is to escape from the perception of existence and be swallowed up in the “Oneness of Brahman,” just as the river returns to the sea!

Whether this is accomplished through the practice of yogic meditation and/or the observance of “right” and “wrong” conduct, the result is a means of finding God within ourselves.

All ethics are a way of finding the “Right” action, which brings us nearer to the knowledge of God, while “Wrong” action leads us away from that knowledge.

For the same reason, in Christianity, our path to a state of grace leads us “inward.”

Expressing ourselves “outwardly” to bring others around to our way of thinking leads away from a state of grace.

Our ideas of “Good” (right or inward) and “Evil” (wrong or away) are therefore relative values that must not be used as an absolute standard by which we judge others.

Each of us has an individual problem and an individual path of development. In the end, the goal is the same for all!

Here we come to one of the greatest differences in the philosophy of two major world religions.

For better or worse, Christianity can be summarized by saying that it affirms life, while Hinduism denies it!

Christianity holds out the hope of survival of the individual after death, where in Hinduism the goal is to escape from the “wheel of existence,” and the final loss of the “illusion” of personal identity!

**”I don’t want to achieve immortality through my work; I want to achieve immortality through not dying.” - Woody Allen (1935- )

The “people of the book” (Christians, Jews, and Muslims) reach out in compassion to the poor and hungry, and say they are special in the eyes of God.

Hinduism teaches that they are merely getting their just desserts!

Although it might seem harsh by western eyes, this doctrine provides Hinduism with a ready explanation for all inequality and human suffering.

It enables devout upper-class Hindus to shrug off the misery of the Indian masses, who because of the caste system, are pre-destined to a certain kind of work, how much education they will get, where they will live, and how far they can expect to go in life.

Allan W Janssen is the author of the book The Plain Truth About God (What the mainstream religions don't want you to know!) and is available at the web site www.God-101.com

Visit the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

The Church of Allan - The Plain Truth About God.

A serialization of the book The Plain Truth About God (Chapter 4 Stairway to Heaven-Part 2)

The Dream Time was a very common belief amongst not only the aboriginals of Australia, but also North and South America and, to some extent, both the Neanderthals and the Humans of Central Europe.

It gave people a view of life in which they believed that ancestral spirits were not only involved in creation, but also remained in the tribal land after death.

The ancestors’ played and active role in the life of each succeeding generation!

Religious leaders led each tribe, (of which there were about 500 in Australia) with no political chief or formal government.

They were broken down into hunting groups and family units and these units were vitally important as all members of the tribe were related!

The territory of the tribe was centered on the place where its ancestors had originally settled. It was believed that the spirits of these ancestors remained at the watering place at the center of the territory awaiting re-incarnation.

None of them ever really died, but rather merged with the natural world and so remained a part of the present and of the tribe.

This was one of the plainest and simplest methods of avoiding the pain of death and separation, since the departed had not really gone anywhere!

These myths and rituals, signifying communion with nature, and the past, were known as the “Dreaming” or “Dream-Time.” They reflected a belief in the continuity of existence and harmony with the world!

They were also a source of inspiration for aboriginal art, including paintings, carved objects, symbolic weapons, and poetic chants. (Similar to the Vedic chants of the Indus Valley Culture thousands of years later.)

For the Aboriginals the “Dream-Time” is the period in which the original ancestors were thought of as heroes and spirits. They took a variety of forms, both animal and human, and created a pattern for the very existence of these people.

It was a great comfort for early people to think that death did not separate them from their loved ones!

Aboriginal people believed that the land was their mother, and their dreaming had answers to life’s mysteries. The forces - the heroes and spirits - of the “Dream-Time” were all the creative ancestors of the tribe.

It is through their traditional art forms, especially rock carvings, (Some as old as the original settlement of Australia) that the past is realized.

The “Dream-Time” existed as long as the people exist. They re-create it with their rituals, their arts, their life, and their stewardship of the land.

That is why when a Christian kneels down in Church, or when a Neanderthal or Aboriginal bows down in fetish, it is done with the same purpose, submission!

Also, Australian Aborigines, who have been virtually untouched by either Western or Eastern religions for the past fifty thousand years, show God did not sent prophets or emissaries with warnings of a final judgment.

It did not make them aware of a negative force we choose to call the “devil,” or Satan. This is a factor only in the religions that have developed a “priestly” or privileged class, so that they had something to protect you from!!!

It turned out that the progressive increase in the availability of free time for socializing and leisure amongst the members of an agricultural society, brought about a corresponding increase in a priestly hierarchy.

Anyone who was a bit on the lazy side but was creative and ambitious enough could proclaim themselves a “shaman” or priest.

This automatically conferred upon them the duty to attend to “priestly” tasks and left the hunting and manual labor up to others.

Among the ancients, the mutual interdependence of people in a tribe or group meant they more common beliefs to tie the members of a society together.

After all, if you spent every waking hour with other members of your tribe, it also followed that you were all anchored in common sets of representations and assumptions about the world around you.

This led to a natural “moral unity” amongst the tribe members.

BUT! Once we get beyond the 25-30 member size of a tribe and the population goes into the hundreds, as it did in the four early “River Valley Cultures,” we see a marked change in morality.

When the hunters were replaced by an agricultural society, a profound change occurred in their religious life as well. People remained in one place and settled into a more structured and organized way of life.

The fertility of the crops, animals and even the tribe itself became of paramount importance and became the new focus of social interaction and planning.

Fertility was obviously feminine by its very nature as only females could produce offspring so here the group’s religion tended toward the Earth Mother, Great Mother, or Matriarchal goddess.

(Today we still have followers of this ancient Pagan ritual in the form of Wicca’s, who derive their beliefs from the ancient Celtic people and Druids. Much as their forbearers, they also follow many aspects of early fertility religions.)

The beliefs of early fertility religions were to fulfill a very early human and societal need. That was the guarantee of high fertility rates for their crops, animals and other tribal members.

As far as we know there was an ancient fertility culture about thirty thousand years ago, that made the first clay representations of the female nude.

These fertility idols, made by the “Gravettian” or ancient Aryan people, were the first manufactured pieces of art and were a talisman to guard against the extinction of humankind by representing a perpetuator of the species.

This fertility cult was widespread, and one of the areas that were inhabited by the Gravettian people is in an area of France known as the Dordogne region.

Here we have a series of caves that has been continuously occupied for almost all of the last 100,000 years, first by Neanderthals and then our own ancestors.

(In other words since the dawn of our own awareness.)

To understand the advantages and disadvantages that humanity faced over the millennia, it is important to realize that man alone emerged from the early primates as a change maker.

We spent a long, long infancy living much the same as the rest of the inhabitants of this planet. Then, about 12,000 years ago, we began the momentous journey that was to take us from the Stone Age to the beginnings of recorded history 5,000 years later.

It was the first vague awakenings of wonder and terror about the world around us that provoked early feelings of religion and art that is evident today in ancient cave dwellings and pottery.

By about 7000 B.C.E. the Indo-European cultures centered around what is now modern day central Turkey and Iraq had been in one place long enough that they took on their own distinct culture and language.

Then, after the retreat of the ice fields those many thousands of years ago, various migrations of light skinned, partly nomadic “Aryan” Indo-European tribes left their homeland in what was to become the Middle–East and advanced east into the Indus Valley of India and also back over the Black Sea and into Europe.

With them, they brought their religion called Vedism. This religion had such innovations as the practice of war, belief in male gods, exploitation of the land and knowledge of the male role in pro-creation.

Goddess worship had been augmented and combined with the worship of male gods.
The Sun was viewed as a male entity by this time because it encouraged the crops to grow, just as rain was also a male energy.

These beliefs mingled with an equal or even more advanced Indian native belief is often referred to as the “Indus Valley Culture.”

Although the people around the Indus Valley began a decline in about 1600 B.C.E. that led to a gradual fragmentation of the area, its religion continued to flourish and grow through the centuries.

This Indus, or Indian culture, underwent a renaissance of change that would ultimately lead to the establishment of the first of the great religions.

------Hinduism

Allan W Janssen is the author of the book The Plain Truth About God (What the mainstream religions don't want you to know!) and is available at the web site www.God-101.com

Visit the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

The Church of Allan. The evolution of religion. Part 3

A serialization of the Book; The Plain Truth About God! @2002

We now believe that cultural and sociological factors play a much bigger role in defining who we are, and where we are headed, than any other single factor.

For example, Tarzan was the king of the jungle. Unfortunately that was the only place he could have been anything since he was raised without any human contact or guidance.

The movies are fine for entertainment. In real life, sociologists tell us that a person growing up without the social and cultural interaction of other human beings would be more animal-like than human in spite of their modern brain.

The process for which we are biologically programmed by nature cannot take place unless subjected to the social and linguistic forces of human culture. Thus, the lack of contact with other members of our species prohibits the onset of logical thinking and reasoning.

It is a widely accepted fact that infants depend on the care and example of adults much more, and for a longer period than any other species. Without the influence of other human beings to help them form a coherent thought processes and personality development in the early stages of life, these children are unable to relate to anyone at all.

They will always behave in a sub-human way.

There are documented cases, some quite recently, where these “feral children,” who had been bereft of any human contact, used primarily the right half of their brains to function. The lack of interaction with other people and the development of language was necessary for the left (or logical) side of the brain to develop.

Early man had a much simpler way of life than that of people living today.

Modern relationships are more complex than those of thousands, or even hundreds of years ago. Our ancestors lived much as their forbearers did through many generations. Things did not change appreciably over the years and certain rules of conduct were worked out that slowly formed the basis for social interaction.

It was only the increasing rate of change over the last few millennia that started us on the road to being fully human in action as well as appearance.

There are many and varied characteristics that have been proposed over the years for the difference between humankind and the other species. Some might argue it is the use of fire, which separates us from our worldly co-inhabitants.

Others propose the influence of religion in our lives, and still more say it is almost certainly the fact that we have a soul and none of the other living things on this earth are so endowed.

Although the reasons for our differentiation from the “lower” animals are varied, we can go by some basic guidelines. One of the things that seem to be unique among humans is the ability to mentally travel outside of ourselves. To view our surroundings from a perspective other that what we actually see with our eyes.

We seem able to mentally check-up on others and ourselves.

We are not only the product of our feelings, moods and thoughts, but to a great degree we constantly do a “reality check” on how we present ourselves to others.

Then, (here is the good part) how they might see and think of us!

Actually, unless we take “how” we see ourselves into account, we are unable to understand how others see and feel about themselves, or even more importantly, how they feel about us!

Because of our unique human capacity for self-awareness, we not only live in this world, but can also transcend it!

The nature of humans seems to be controlled by three social factors. Independently or in combination, they explain how we relate to the world.

1. Genetic determinism holds that the actions and ways of our ancestors influence our behavior to a large extent.

In other words, if I have a temper, and also my great grandfather, my grandfather and my father all had a temper; it must be hereditary and passed down through the generations.

2. Psychic determinism is based loosely on the theories of Freud, in that “what we are” has a lot to do with how we were brought up.

Whatever happens to you in infancy and childhood governs your personality and character from then on. It regulates things such as our value systems, judgment, and work ethic, or lack thereof!

3. Environmental determinism is the effect of the world around us on our psyche!
What sort of day you will have is a result of the everyday joys and aggravations of living!

The three factors of Genetic, Psychic, and Environmental determinism are the stimuli that govern how we respond to the world.

The lower animals will almost always have the exact same response to certain stimuli.

It is the human trait of having the freedom to choose our response to it by the use of self-awareness that makes people more flexible and unpredictable. Here within this freedom of choice are the endowments that make us uniquely human.

We judge and shade our response to life and living with the implementation of a “conscience.” A sense of right and wrong governed by the principals that shape our behavior.

We also employ “imagination” to step outside the confines of here and now, and a healthy dose of “independent will” so that we can act free of outside influences.

Animals have none of these parameters. Their response to outside stimuli is on a basic level. They are like a pre-programmed computer that relies on instinct and training. They cannot change their programming to any degree because they are not even aware of it.

At the same time, history shows the greatest influences on us are the events and forces that have produced the ever-increasing complexity of modern society. This ability to make change occur is at the heart of humanities long struggle up the evolutionary ladder.

The recent leap to a new and different kind of evolution, life and intelligence, is a road that began many thousands of years ago. It has now turned into something of which our distant ancestors were only dimly aware!

The mere fact that evolution favors the many and is hard on the individual also led to the first human cries of Lebenschmerz…………. or why me!

Since the dawn of our existence, it is this cry in the wilderness and the wonder and mystery of the human condition that eventually led to the advent of self-awareness and free will!

It is no wonder humanity’s united cry is; “Why me!”

To which God answers:

“Because!”

Allan W Janssen is the author of the book The Plain Truth About God (What the mainstream religions don't want you to know!) and is available at the web site www.God-101.com

Visit the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com