The Pagan Development of Christianity
A. The ministry of Jesus the Jewish Reformer and his traditional 11(12) apostles were failures. From the death of Jesus (between 30 -32 CE), it took 30 to 40 years for the first Gospel of Mark to write a life of Jesus. The very limited function of (Saint) Peter the Jew is totally eclipsed by the Hellenistic / Greek Paul (or a school of Pauline thought) wrote half of the New Testament. By Acts chapter 14, the last apostle (Peter who was to have been taught by the master Jesus himself) is totally drop in favor of the Greek Jew, Paul who redefines a limited Jewish Jesus into a universal and gentile "Christ". The rest of Jesus’ Jewish apostles appear only in non-canonical pseudepigraphic and apocryphal literature...
B. Only Christianity as it survived in Greek Asia Minor (the home of Paul or the philosophical east) and Rome (the seat of power) was accepted as orthodox as defined at the Nicaea Council in 325 CE. From 325 CE onwards, Christology is defined by the later church councils directly from the rhetoric and philosophy drawn from Neo-Platonism. This mode of thinking becomes the language to the orthodox Church Fathers and of salvation. This is particularly true in light of the Hebrew Bible’s concept of Sheol or the Land of the Shades where all decent in the after life. Platonic philosophy as found in the Phaedo has the soul returning to above spiritual world of absolute true: The Forms. Thus, eternal life for the righteous soul based on a philosophical understanding of Christ is moved from underground Sheol / the Pit to accent in the heavens / Heaven. Sheol is now Hell (since down is bad, thus the place for the fall of the soul in Plato and the land of the Forms is now Heaven (since up is good and the source of divine light in Plotinus of which we all seek to return to). Paul’s accent into the “third Heaven” (2 Corinthians 12:2) is attested from a structure of the Plotinian Universe. Further, Paul’s exclusive concept of a Jewish midrash reading of the Genesis’ story of Eden and the talking snake (Genesis 3) provided the foundation for what the Church Fathers defined as Original Sin (as derived from Plato’s Phaedrus).
C. The limited anthropomorphic god of Israel is given expanded attributes such as "all knowing", "all loving", "all present", "all powerful", and any and all other positive absolutes are drawn directly from the Classical Greek philosophical traditions of Plato, Aristotle and Plotinus as a ultimate philosophical universality (again note St. Paul’s theology). Little wonder there is no known Greek or Latin manuscript used in the translation of the New Testament where the name of Israel's god Yahweh is recorded. The Hebrew Yahweh as a historical actor is now dead and the Greek philosophical and Classical term theos or “God” is now front and center.
D. In the late Gospel of John, Jesus is the "logos" (Greek for word) pulled by the writer of this gospel directly from Greek philosophy. This logos or word has no birth, but always was from the beginning (John chapter 1). The old Greco-Roman myth where a god impregnates a woman (as record in Mathew and Luke) to make a half man and half god (such as in the case with Heracles and many other Greco-Roman demigods) was rejected as crude myth in the Platonic view. Thus, the Classical myths with their flawed gods and demigods are given the boot in favor of the pure term logos. This logos is now totally identified as God or the Classical Greek generic term for the highest level of pure universal of concept of light and mind (John 1:9). In this Fourth Gospel, Jesus (unlike in Matthew, Mark and Luke) has no parables to tell, but is made to speak as a Greek philosopher. In fact, the word faith used so often in the Synoptic Gospels never occurs in John. The famous statement use by Evangelicals and most likely formed by the writer of John as recorded in John 3:16 (For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that who so ever believes in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life." is a statement where the limited Hebrew god Yahweh and his chosen people (the Israelites) are now cast out being replaced by the universal absolutes of Platonic philosophy. This God of Philo of Alexandria and the Gospel of John have been totally transformed from the God of Noah (Genesis 6 -9) who hated his own creation to universal logos of love.
For those Christians who argue that God never changes need only to study the ancient world of Judaism and Christianity more openly and objectively in dialogue with the text of the ancient Near East and the Classical worlds. (Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever. Hebrews 13:8) Really?
Harry McCall
13 comments:
Welcome Harry! For those who are interested, Harry tells his deconversion story in Edward T. Babinski's book(pp. 329-334).
Superb post, Harry.
Bill Ross
http://bibleshockers.com
"The ministry of Jesus the Jewish Reformer and his traditional 11(12) apostles were failures."
If around 2 billion Christians 2000 years later rates as failure.
Hey Akiwibear - I think what he is saying is that it wasn't Jesus' ministry per se, but the Pauline Platonic synthesis that was the victor. No doubt it's "popular," albeit geographically so, but if you add "thought" to your process of working out your salvation with fear and trembling, you deconvert. The synthesis shines through like the sun. Harry, this was a wonderful read, by the way.
An excellent piece as well as a very good read. I just want to add one other stream that fed into Christianity's 'river' that gets ignored, and this is Zoroastrianism. (Remember that Persia controlled this area for hundreds of years, and there seems little doubt that Persian ideas entered into 'folk Judaism' if not into the OT. Even the language Jesus spoke was Aramaic -- a dialect of Persian.)
I'd definitely include the following as Zoroastrian borrowings:
a) hell -- which is closer to the Zoroastrian idea -- except that in Z'ism it is temporary, lasting until the 'redemption' rather than permanent -- than it is to the Greeks you trace it to;
b) the devil and the 'war in Heaven' -- which are totally absent from the OT (the whole idea of Lucifer being 'cast from heaven' traces in the OT to a couple of verses from Isaiah that -- in context -- refer to the King of Babylon, not to a 'fallen angel'); and,
c) the whole idea of the 'redeemer Son of God' which again does not appear in the OT. (The only mention of the 'Sons of God' there is in the opening to Job, and it is definitely plural, even Darby translates it as such.)
(The following is pure speculation, but worth thinking about, I'd argue.)
This would also explain the use of the 'Magi' in the birth story -- since Magi were Zoroastrian priests. It might even explain yet another mystery, why the Romans -- who, at this time generally ignored the variants of Judaism -- thought it necessary to crucify this one particular Jewish reformer. If they saw him as a possible focal point who could strengthen the Persian influence -- the Persians may have been defeated but they were not extinct and the Romans couldn't be sure that they wouldn't again challenge the Empire -- they might have been more afraid of him, and a religion in his name, than they would have of the Essenes, or of John the Baptist or other 'Messianic' or reforming characters.
I'd be curious as to your thoughts on this.
liniasmax, I understand why you may choose to look at the evolution of Christianity and detach it from its root.
It suits the emotive base of atheism to establish Christ as a failure, and if you apply a little critical thought you will see why.
It would be irrational to expect there to have been no development (call it evolution or synthesis if you like)in Christianity especially during its formative years.
Yet you and Harry see that as a failure in the founding figure! ...
...well I suppose 2000 years on 2 billion or so still see a link in Christianity to Christ.
Come on guys, you clearly fool some of the people all of the time but you will have to do better than that to fool all of the people, even some of the time.
Prup I have done a fair amount of reading on the subject of Zorastrianism and Post-exilic Judaism and, to my knowledge, more and more scholars over time have recognized that the issue isnt even nearly as clean cut as your suggesting. For example, last I read scholars are beginning to doubt that Zoroastrianism was even a major religion at the time of the exile (Cyrus for example is now generally regarded as a polytheist who worshipped all sorts of different Gods, it was on his belief that we based the Persians as a whole being Zoroastrians. We also know that the people at the time, if they were Zoroastrians, definately didnt practice the type of Zoroastrianism we know of today. Most scholarship as far as i can tell is far slower to make statements about Judaism being influenced (something that was done to the point of nonsense by Mary Boyce). Probly the big one here is the Zoroastrian Ahriman(I forget the name). Most Jewish scholars are now fairly quick to recognize that Satan is much better explained as a result of increased reflection on the nature of evil and the implications that had, as has been said the early zoroastrian tradition is not really known well at all (our earliest sources are rediculously old to the original material) and the notion of a surpreme evil isnt very clear at all in the material that is oldest. It is not hard to imagine that this would be an independent development, all one need do is consider the essenes who were rediculously into this kind of thing. Thats just a short dealing with zoroastrianism and Judaism but it certainly is an interesting topic. But yes, certainly to say dogmatically that the Jews inherited those ideas from Zoroastrianism as fact is certainly contentious, to say the least. As for your last thoughts Prup I think thats just you letting your normally fine and critical mind go through some imaginary loops. Now with all this said is there a probability that certain notions about these issues appeared into Judaism? Yeah sure. But that doesnt mean a whole lot if the bones of the doctrines are Jewish which they certainly seem to be.
Now onto Harry's writings. Harry, you do realize that it is a truism that different cultures and different times will have, at times substantially, different views of God. I mean this seems such a fact that any Christian wanting to disagree is going to have atough time. Now sometimes platonism has proved helpful in describing Christian notions, other times its been devastating (such as Genesis 3). The same is true with aristotle. However, to suggest that Paul invented Christianity as we know it today is silly for a 21st century historian to suggest. While it is true that the Gospel of Mark as we have it now is about 30-40 (I tend to lean to the earlier period but that is erroneous) years after the events it pertains massive amounts of work has been done to make it clear that there is almost certainly a strong oral tradition behind it (James Dunn has worked like mad to make this point).
Gordon: My argument for the likely influence of Zoroastrianism on Christianity (and, possibly, on 'folk Judaism) is theological rather than historical. You say "But that doesnt mean a whole lot if the bones of the doctrines are Jewish which they certainly seem to be."
But the bones aren't Jewish, or, again, if they are they come from a 'folk Judaism' and not from the OT.
Let's pick over the bones in good Thanksgiving fashion:
The Devil/Satan/demonology. This is entirely foreign to the OT, which contains no demonology whatsoever. (I recently researched this, expecting to find it a minor thread, but found it was entirely lacking.) There are a few mentions of "Satan." He appears in Job but comes across -- in modern terms -- as the 'friendly neighbor from down the block' who appears at a barbecue God and his Sons are holding. There is no hatred or even dislike shown to him in the book. His other appearances in the Prophets are as 'God's Prosecuting Attorney,' the one who accuses man at a judgment.
Everything else in the Christian concept of demonology is absent from the OT, or a misreading of it. "Lucifer" is a term Isaiah uses for the King of Babylon, Beelzebub is a false God of a neighboring tribe who a King of israel asks to cure him and is punished for so asking, etc.
The "Son of God." Again, the only mention of God's 'Sons' is in the first two chapters of Job, and the phrase is in the plural. (Even the NIV which uses 'angels' says in a footnote that the Hebrew is 'Sons of God.')
The 'Redeemer,' the spiritual figure who comes to Earth to initiate the coming of a 'new heaven and a new Earth' is also strictly Zoroastrian. In Judaism, the Messiah is a political figure coming to reestablish the Kingdom of Israel, the 'new David.' (There seems to have been a certain assumption that, when this happened, YHWH would resume 'active intervention' in the world as he was supposed to have done in the Pentateuch.)
If the Jews had expected the Messiah to have been a religious figure -- rather than a political figure accompanied by a rabbi who would testify to his Messiahship -- they would never have followed such a figure as Bar Kochba who was seen as a Messiah but who was also almost scornful of religion.
Hell. Again, not Jewish -- at least as a 'place of punishment or torment.' Rather, not Biblical. The 'resurrection of the body' was accepted by the Pharisees -- and rejected as non-Scriptural by the Saduccees -- but it entered Judaism in the second century B.C. -- interestingly enough, after the Persian influence I propose. Scripturally the Jews did not hold to an afterlife.
The 'new heaven and new Earth' idea -- also unscriptural, but Zoroastrian.
The 'general judgment.' I know not all Christians believe in this, but it was always a 'head-scratcher' during my Catholic days. If God judges everybody at death, why have this great assembly and a further judgment -- especially since the world, supposedly, has already ended and no one will 'learn' from this Judgment. (Those who see their God as an insecure egomaniac -- we've had our share here -- claim that he needs this to 'manifest' his justice, his goodness, or whatever.)
But it makes sense in a Zoroastrian context, where hell is not an eternity, but lasts only until the 'coming of the New Age,' at which time there is a new judgment -- apparently made after people have gone through hell though I don't understand the details.
There are others. I can't see any better explanation than a Zoroastrian influence, but I am very curious to take a look at some of the books you used in your research. Please e-mail me the list I asked for in the other thread.
A decent list can be found here
://www.tektonics.org/guest/antzoro.htm
(I recognize that tektonics is to be taken with a grain of salt, but this seems to give the standard arguments against serious borrowing (as opposed to notions, which one would expect to come in)
Il agree that not all these things come from the Old Testament, indeed most scholars take for granted that there were major elaborations during the post-exilic tradition. However, to say any of these required Zoroastrianism seems to me unwarranted, the essay I copied/pasted gives some reasons for that contention. While you are partially correct in stating that ancient israel didnt have a established demonology we know for a fact that they certainly recognized the existence of evil spirits and the like. Many scholars have long recognized (I dont believe the essay goes into this but I remember reading it elsewhere) that Zoroastrianism as we can observe today roughly appeared in the 3rd century AD, under the sassanians. Because of this it is quite impossible to say very much about this religion as it existed at the time. While looking around abit more I also found this little blurb
"Mythology of Ancient Persia", page 322.
"Eschatology.
"The Iranians, who held that the human soul was igneous or luminous, believed that the dead continued to exist. The idea, widespread among Indo-European peoples, of an underground abode of the dead gave them their conception of a var of Jam. Nevertheless the normal destiny of souls was the Light from which they came - hence a celestial abode. This integration with the Ahura, however, was not instantaneous. THE PERSIANS NO DOUBT RECEIVED FROM THE SEMITES THE NOTION OF A LAST JUDGMENT AND TOGETHER WITH RELATED IDEAS: PROPHETS AND WORLD SALVATION PREPARED BY A MESSIAH. Just because its in an encyclopedia doesnt make it at all true, however it illustrates my point that this isnt nearly as simple an issue as some of the more popular atheist websites try to make it.
gordonblod, you stated: A: Now onto Harry's writings. Harry, you do realize that it is a truism that different cultures and different times will have, at times substantially, different views of God. I mean this seems such a fact that any Christian wanting to disagree is going to have atough time.... B: However, to suggest that Paul invented Christianity as we know it today is silly for a 21st century historian to suggest....C: Most scholarship as far as i can tell is far slower to make statements about Judaism being influenced (something that was done to the point of nonsense by Mary Boyce).
So gordonblood,as to point A: where does these "different views of God" become heretical and condemed by Orthodoxy? I noticed you used the Greek term "God" and not the Semitic term Yahweh here.
B: Paul invented Christianity ... silly for a 21st century historian to suggest. Fact is that Arthur J. Dorge (Former professor of New Testament at the Divinity School, at the University of Chicago and now at the University of Calf.) offered a course just overf a decade ago there entitled "Paul and the Invention of Chrostianity".
C: "nonsense by Mary Boyce" how quickly you write off a major scholar! Are you aware that she is the author of the four volume series "History of Zoroastrianism" in the prestigious series "Handbuch Der Orientalistik Series" published by E.J Brill? Her inclusion in this series was by careful selection by the major scholars/editors.
Gordon:
When I asked for a list of books, I wanted to know ones you had studied, since you said you had researched the question. Instead you gave me one article, and, I'm afraid, a very unsatisfactory one.
I describe it as such because, first, it uses its discussion as a way of defending a totally untenable position, the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch. Second, it implies that it is only skeptics who hold the two positions that it discusses, the non-Mosaic authorship -- which is held, universally, by all but the most fundamentalist scholars, and the connection between Zoroastrianism and Judaism, which has been suggested by many Christian as well as skeptical scholars.
I also worry because the tone and approach is something I've seen in many creationist articles, both an implication that scholars have never bothered to investigate the obvious and an implication of a conspiracy of scholars to put forth an argument merely to attack Christianity. This is coupled with a refusal to specifically address points scholars of scientists have in fact made, but rather to find supposed holes in their thinking that 'no one but me' has ever found before.
None of which proves the article false, but it will make me look very closely at the points it makes.
But I wish you had taken my invitation to discuss this by e-mail since it is a topic that fascinates us, but not the other posters here.
I will ask one final question, and again, hope this gets moved to e-mail.
You state 'we know for a fact that [Ancient Israel] certainly recognized the existence of evil spirits and the like.' At what point can you say this, and what evidence do you have for this?
gordonblood: "You state 'we know for a fact that [Ancient Israel] certainly recognized the existence of evil spirits and the like.' At what point can you say this, and what evidence do you have for this?"
Hold on! You've got me out in left field without a glove on. Where and at which Post or comment did I make the above quote referenced to me?
I do have Mary Boyce’s Vol. I in the Brill series, but at $180.00 for an academic paper back, I chose not to by the entire 4 volume set (about $800.00).
As for as private emails apart from this site, I prefer not to. I did it over a number of months with aka Bob Holding of the Tektonic Apologetic Ministry. It ended when he threaten to get me fired from my job and have me arrested (I simply found out his real name and where he was located). I told him to knock himself out and that this would be a good secular test of his logic. Nothing happen and I still here almost 2 years later. However, he will not respond to any emails I send him.
Moreover, due to time restraints, this blog is just the amount of time I want to put into discussions on Christianity since it’s a hobby with me..
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