Excerpts

Revelation, Myths and Theology

Humans of antiquity looked to the heavens for help. Their knowledge was based on solid observations and the answers came in theological form. Thus if we are to understand their life, culture, theology, myths and rituals we must understand their view of the heavens and their expectations of the powers resident there.


Egyptian theology

Crucial to the relationships between the supernatural world and human beings were the God-men, the anointed ones, the messengers. They demonstrated the consistency and the enduring concern of the Gods for human beings. They identified with the experiences of human beings. They brought enlightenment, healing and wholeness.

They experienced death, dissolution or dismemberment at the hands of evil forces. However they were always rescued from the nether world or some form of distress or turbulence. They were reconstituted and resurrected.

Subsequently they returned to the supernatural world where they ushered people through death and guided them through the trials in the hall of judgment. Then as they stood or sat at the right hand of their father they acted as advocates as their human charges sought to become children of God.


Persian theology

The precession of the equinoxes from the house of Taurus to the house of Aries to the house of Pisces was proof positive that the powers which designed the cosmos were in control.

Mithras slaughtered the bull. On the surface it seems to be a drama of ultimate antagonism. But Mithras and the bull are inseparable. It is a unified single event. Mithras the God-man is the incarnation of Sol Invictus, the victorious sun God, the equivalent of Ra in the Egyptian system. Mithras kills the past, spills the blood and thus initiates new life.


Hebrew theology

Abram and his God made an agreement. It was a covenant of affinity and exclusiveness. This God promised to provide a vast range of astounding blessings if Abram recognized him as his exclusive God. Abram had a single obligation. He would appeal to no other God

In these myths Sarah, Rebekah and Rachel, all remarkably beautiful women, have roles identical to those of Isis in Egyptian theology and the mother of Mithras in Persian theology. All of these women produced, as the consequence of God-induced pregnancies, special, select, unique God-men, carriers of special purposes, the hope of the future and saviors from human ills in both this life and the life to come.

This resurrection of Joseph, as the resurrection of every God-man, has a purpose. It demonstrates the power of life over death; this is the hope of salvation. He is resurrected in order to save his people. He saves them from starvation. He provides a renewal of life for the family. He saves the chosen people from social extinction.


Jesus reformation

Jesus and his followers essentially rejected the popular theologies of his day. They paid little attention to myths, doctrines and dogmas. They advocated a life of love and its application to all human relationships.


Saul made Jesus into a Christ

It was clear to Saul that the culture of the followers of Jesus and the Greco-Roman-Jewish culture were antithetical at the deepest level. He could see no point of reconciliation. He feared a breakdown of religion and morality and a subsequent dissolution of the very structures of society if the Jesus way of life became common.

Was it possible that he was mistaken about this Jesus? Was it possible that this peasant storyteller and preacher of a universal ethical way of life was a God-man? Could he be a new messenger, could he be a Messiah.

Suddenly, for Saul, Jesus was a Christ, the current incarnation of the avatars of the past. He was the modern day representative from the supernatural world, as Mithra had been two thousand years before and as Horus had been many centuries earlier.

Very little of Saul's worldview had to change. The only thing that changed was his classification of Jesus. Saul, in his revised system of belief, moved Jesus from the category of man and troublemaker into the category of God-man.


Christians

Their story does not begin with Jesus! It begins a generation after the crucifixion of Jesus. It begins in the seventh decade of the first century as they were converted to the teachings of Paul of Tarsus. Under the impact of the Jesus Christ doctrine preached by Paul, a few Jesus followers and a group of gentiles were transformed into a cult called Christians.

Pauls particular theological views had circulated through the churches. These doctrines had time to mature, crystallize and spread. They had been discussed and finally absorbed into the general thinking of the early Christians. The names, characteristics and functions of the Christs which Paul had imposed on Jesus were widely accepted in the churches as standard theology. Thus the materials written in the decades after Paul were written by people who had been indoctrinated with Pauls theological conceptions.


The Church fathers and the formation of truth

The leaders of the early church had made Jesus Christ into an exclusive Christ. But his characteristics, functions and powers were identical to the Christs of antiquity. In their efforts to distance their religion from its genetic source they developed a remarkable doctrine. They declared Jesus Christ to be real. They declared all the attributes, characteristics and functions also to be real, literal and historical.

The counsel of Nicaea had made two major efforts to unify the church: the creedal formulation of numerous doctrines and the selection of authoritative documents.

In the final analysis the fathers concluded that believing is crucial; not understanding. To be saved and go to heaven one must believe that these theological formulations ensconced in the creeds are literally and historically true.


The New Testament problem

At the root of the problem is the assumption and belief that Jesus, the Jesus Christ of Paul and Jesus the Christ of fourth century Christianity are one and the same. I have hypothesized that these are three distinct entities. They are remarkably different intellectual constructs. They are three separate theological formulations. The New Testament can be understood only if Jesus, Jesus a Christ and Jesus the Christ are differentiated and the distinctions clarified.