JESUS IN A NEW LIGHT E-Book

Manfred Bauer

• Herausgeber: Books on Demand
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Seitenzahl: 1000

Beschreibung

Biblical statements and beliefs that were shaped by the ancient mindset have been mindlessly repeated for way too long. In the process, some of these ideas were eventually dogmatized. By investigating the historical origin of such dogmas, the author carries out an in-depth analysis of the contents of established Christian doctrines without bothering about political correctness. He is outspoken, but is careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater. This book is therefore especially aimed at people with an interest in theology who are no longer satisfied with the usual clichés. During his research, the author put expert opinions to the test and found out quite frequently that they leave much to be desired. He realized that many a Bible scholar makes his or her point on the basis of a limited and incomplete view of the world that is shaped, as the case may be, by his or her own faith or atheism. As a result of the globalization that has occurred over the past few decades and the greater insight it has afforded us into other religions and worldviews, our perspective on the nature and abilities of spiritual masters such as Jesus has broadened considerably. Since such discoveries have been taken into account only rarely in "biographies" of Jesus, it has been the author's intention to illustrate parallels between the teachings and actions of Jesus and those of spiritual masters from other religions. This book also asks the questions: What message does the Shroud kept in turin Cathedral convey to us? Did Jesus really lie in it? Does the Shroud make it possible for us to see Jesus` face some 2000 years after his death? With forensic meticulousness, the author provides proof that not everything went by the book during the 1988 radiocarbon dating that "exposed" the Shroud as a medieval fake. The role of the Catholic Church leadership comes thereby under intense scrutiny. Hence, the aim of this unconventional book is to invite the reader to accompany the author as he tries, with the help of Jesus' example, to acquire a better understanding of the meaning and purpose of human existence and to show what consequences such a better understanding might have for the way we conduct our lives.

Leseprobe

About the author

Manfred Bauer was born in Sudetenland (a region that is now part of the Czech Republic) in 1944 and grew up in Bavaria (southern Germany). He has been married for 45 years and lives in western Germany.

As a practicing, though not dogmatic Catholic, he has always been deeply interested in finding an answer to people’s fundamental questions about the existence of God and the meaning of life. In his attempt to do so, he has been delving into religion, science, philosophy, and esotericism since his youth. During these researches, he has consistently given central importance to the person of Jesus and his teachings.

Regular yoga exercises and meditation have been conducive to broadening his worldview not only in theory, but also in practice.

He spent his entire professional career in the German income tax administration and worked for many years in the field as an auditor, tax investigator, and head of department. As such, he was in a position to look behind the scenes of our society day in, day out. Over time, this has led him to develop a critical attitude to the statements issued by any type of authority.

About this book

Biblical statements and beliefs that were shaped by the ancient mindset have been mindlessly repeated for way too long. In the process, some of these ideas were eventually dogmatized. By investigating the historical origin of such dogmas, the author carries out an in-depth analysis of the contents of established Christian doctrines without bothering about political correctness. He is outspoken, but is careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater. This book is therefore especially aimed at people with an interest in theology who are no longer satisfied with the usual clichés.

During his research, the author put expert opinions to the test and found out quite frequently that they leave much to be desired. He realized that many a Bible scholar makes his or her point on the basis of a limited and incomplete view of the world that is shaped, as the case may be, by his or her own faith or atheism.

As a result of the globalization that has occurred over the past few decades and the greater insight it has afforded us into other religions and worldviews, our perspective on the nature and abilities of spiritual masters such as Jesus has broadened considerably. Since such discoveries have been taken into account only rarely in “biographies” of Jesus, it has been the author’s intention to illustrate parallels between the teachings and actions of Jesus and those of spiritual masters from other religions.

This book also asks the questions:

What message does the Shroud kept in Turin Cathedral convey to us?

Did Jesus really lie in it?

Does the Shroud make it possible for us to see Jesus’ face some 2000 years after his death?

With forensic meticulousness, the author provides proof that not everything went by the book during the 1988 radiocarbon dating that “exposed” the Shroud as a medieval fake. The role of the Catholic Church leadership comes thereby under intense scrutiny.

Hence, the aim of this unconventional book is to invite the reader to accompany the author as he tries, with the help of Jesus’ example, to acquire a better understanding of the meaning and purpose of human existence and to show what consequences such a better understanding might have for the way we conduct our lives.

So our lives glide on: the river ends we don’t know where, and the sea begins, and then there is no more jumping ashore.

George Eliot,Felix Holt, the Radical

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Biblical texts

Is the Bible the word of God?

The Old Testament

Biblical studies, exegesis

The New Testament, biblical canon

The Gospels

The Acts of the Apostles

The Epistles

The Apocrypha

Other testimonies about Jesus

Exegesis of the New Testament

Chapter 2

History of Judaism

Herod the Great

The Herodian Temple

YHWH’s theocracy

The Temple priesthood

Religious groups and their views

Economic and social conditions

Chapter 3

Jesus’ childhood

His ancestry

His birth

His place of residence

Virgin birth

Was Jesus an illegitimate child?

Was Joseph Jesus’ father?

Family background

The unknown years of Jesus

Jesus’ marital status

Life and work in a village

Jesus and the Essenes

Jesus’ spiritual development and education

Did Jesus live in India?

Chapter 4

He preached the gospel of the kingdom of God (

Narrative

)

The calling of the disciples

Chapter 5

He preached the gospel of the kingdom of God (

Argumentation

)

Jesus’ language

John the Baptist

Temptation in the desert

The kingdom of God—the Messiah

Outer or inner kingdom?

All-encompassing consciousness

The power to perform miracles

Mental or everyday consciousness

Clairvoyance

Exorcism, casting out of demons

Chapter 6

Success and disappointment (

Narrative

)

Who are my relatives?

The sending out of the twelve Apostles and their return

Preaching the kingdom of God in Phoenicia, Gaulanitis, and the Decapolis

Chapter 7

Success and disappointment (

Argumentation

)

Jesus’ preaching itinerary

Forgiveness of sins

The spiritual eye

Son of God/Son of the Almighty/bar aloho

Abba

God—father to all mankind

Son of man (

bar enash

)

Transformation into divinity

Imminent expectation of the kingdom of God/ Maranatha/Parousia

The gates of hell

Jesus and reincarnation

Transfiguration, multiplication of the loaves, resurrection of the dead, walking on water

Who is my mother, who are my brothers?

If any man will come after me

Except you be converted, and become as little children

[...] (Matt. 18:3)

Non-resistance

Matthew’s ceremonial laws

Chosenness

Teaching and preaching at various levels to various audiences

Chapter 8

Showdown (

Narrative

)

Chapter 9

Showdown (

Argumentation

)

Quarrel about the best seats in God’s kingdom

The disciples’ fear

The Gospel of Thomas

The “way of blood”

The entry into Jerusalem

Simon the Leper

The cleansing of the Temple

The cursing of the fig tree

The destruction of the Temple and its reconstruction within three days

Judas’ betrayal

The women around Jesus

When did Jesus celebrate the Last Supper?

Bread and wine: Jesus’ flesh and blood?

The trial

Jesus’ passion and crucifixion

Jesus’ sacrificial death; the redemption doctrine

Chapter 10

Resurrection and Ascension

Apparitions of dead people

What happened to Jesus’ body?

Spiritual body

Bilocation

Near-death experiences

Jesus’ return as the Messiah

after

his resurrection

Ascension to heaven

Chapter 11

The Shroud of Turin

Type of image

Texture and age of the Shroud

The body of a man who was crucified like Jesus

Is it human blood?

Dead or still alive?

Possible explanations for the formation of the image

Radiocarbon dating

The sampling

Pseudoscientific confusion

Possible or probable sequence of events

Concise summary

Manipulation? Why and how

Further reasons to be suspicious of the result of the radiocarbon dating

Further indications of the authenticity of the Shroud

Restoration of the Shroud

Church secrets

History of the Shroud

Supernatural formation?

Conclusion

Chapter 12

Did Jesus go to India?

Nicolas Notovitch’s journey

The Aquarian Gospel

The Lost Tribes

Jesus in Kashmir

Jesus’ tomb in Srinagar

Yuz Asaf

Barlaam and Josaphat

Chapter 13

Saint Paul

Resurrection from the dead

Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, and the Son of God

Original sin – chosenness

Mission to the Gentiles, circumcision

Brothers and sisters in the Lord

His attitude to women

His attitude to Jews

Hostility toward the body, asceticism

Parousia

What is Paul’s legacy?

Chapter 14

The early church

Who is the most important? Who is right?

United and divided

The role of women

What was it that made this new religion so popular?

Communal life

The crown of martyrdom

Hermits and monasteries

Exoteric and esoteric church

Prospects and dreams

Chapter 15

Mary, mother of the church – Marian apparitions

What is Jesus’ legacy?

Appendix 1: Map of Palestine in Jesus’ lifetime

Appendix 2: The Gospel of Thomas

Illustration credits

Bibliography

Notes

Prologue

“I can’t die yet! There are still so many things I need to find out about Jesus!”

Vladimir Kramarevsky, a neighbor of mine when I was a teenager, was on a brief visit to us when he made that witty remark. A Russian immigrant, Vladimir was a sprightly old man in his 80s back then, i.e. in the 1960s. Having served as an officer in the White Army during the Russian Civil War, he had fled via China to Paris after the victory of the Red Army, i.e. around 1920. In 1945, for fear the French might commit acts of revenge because his wife was a German, he had immigrated with her to Germany. Eventually, he settled down in a two-room shack next to our house.

Even though he did not belong to any denomination, he was passionately interested in anything connected with spirituality. At the time, I showed precious little understanding for his enthusiasm and thought to myself, “What brand new things does he expect to find out about Jesus? For 2000 years, the smartest minds have been making conjectures about him. You would think that, by now, they must have unearthed everything that can be discovered. Moreover, the church is constantly telling us about him. And if the church authorities are not in the know, who else could be?”

Fast-forward twenty years or so. It is my fortieth birthday, and I am about to be given a special kind of present.

On my way back home from work I have just picked up a colleague with whom I have been ride-sharing. At a very busy junction we need to cross in order to get to the expressway, I realize the traffic light is switching to amber, so I step on the gas in order to get through. As we come level with the traffic signal, my colleague shouts, “Watch out! Watch out!”

At that point, my sensory perceptions undergo a sudden change: I see something white drifting toward us as if in slow motion and I hear a siren wailing as if in the far distance. I have a feeling this could be the end. In a moment reminiscent of accounts of near-death experiences, I get the impression that I might hover above the scene of the accident. The following thought occurs to me: “Unless you do more with your life, you are no longer needed here!" This brief and calm message is quite authoritative. There is no doubt about it: it is a kick in the pants.

The banging and crashing noise of the impact jerks me back to the ordinary, real-time unfolding of events: my car is rammed against the guardrail; it jolts to a halt; a sudden silence ensues; my colleague and I are now trapped in a totaled car.

An ambulance has just crashed into the fender on the driver’s side, causing the legroom on my side to shrink by two-thirds. Splinters of the shattered windshield and side window have lodged in my face.

My colleague and I look at each other and, in turn, ask, “Are you OK” Feeling fine, I answer, “Yes”. Finding that the front doors are jammed, we climb over the seat backs and get out through the rear ones.

Only once outside does my bruised left lower leg begin to hurt. It makes me feel faint. Blood is running from the cuts in my face.

Some time later, a replacement ambulance took me to a hospital from which I was discharged after my wounds had been stitched. My colleague went home by train. Luckily, he had suffered only a few bruises. For a while, I felt guilty at having crossed the path of an ambulance, but it turned out that it was its driver who was to blame for the crash: he had crossed the junction on a red light without having first made sure that the path was clear.

During the three weeks I spent on sick leave, I kept thinking about the inner voice that had asked of me more than I had given thus far. It dawned on me that I had lived a spiritual life only in theory, i.e. had been satisfied with reading spiritual books, and that it was now time to get practical. This was a disturbing thought, though. It meant that I would have to change my life: for me as for most people, a difficult decision to make.

As luck would have it, I had just finished reading Autobiography of a Yogi, a book in which an Indian yoga master named Paramahansa Yogananda shows his readers how to achieve spiritual progress through meditation. Having been deeply impressed by examples from his own life, I began to practice meditation on a regular basis with the help of the service readings published by the Self-Realization Fellowship, an organization set up by Yogananda himself.

You may wonder why I have chosen to describe the above personal experience in such detail and what all this has to do with Jesus.

After the aforementioned chat with our Russian neighbor, I had first started to study Jesus from a Christian viewpoint. Then, little by little, I began to consider him from the perspective of the Eastern philosophy of religion. This offered me completely new insights and enabled me to find quite a few parallels to many of Jesus’ mysterious sayings and actions.

I realized that there is no Christian, Hindu, Jewish, Muslim truth (to name but a few of the world religions), but that the wise men and women of all religions, including Jesus, were and are still following different paths to the same truth.

Little by little, I gained a wider view of the founder of Christianity, a view I invite you to discover in this book.

What the Christian Churches’ doctrines tell us about him is based on ancient Scriptures that are suffused with legends and steeped in the beliefs that prevailed at the time they were written.

Although religious scholars have spared no effort in order to extract the truth from the Scriptures and have been discussing that issue for over a century, the church has apprehensively avoided any mention of their findings in its proclamation of faith.

However, I must hasten to add that the said scholars are anything but in agreement about the founder of Christianity. The truth is that everyone views him from his own perspective and judges him according to the rules of his field of expertise. But, to be fair, I must also admit that it is really difficult if not impossible to describe a spiritual master such as Jesus. All the more so because the following reservation applies to just about every quotation of Jesus in the Gospels: we cannot be sure that it faithfully reflects what Jesus actually said.

The Indian philosopher Sri Aurobindo once said:

Nobody except myself can write my life—because it has not been on the surface for man to see.1

The same goes for Jesus, of course.

We could say, “Let’s keep it that way! It does not make any sense to write about Jesus because we will never be able to get the whole picture anyway.”

However, before you close this book and put it aside, please consider this: What if nobody had written about Jesus? What if there weren’t any Gospels at all? No matter how deficient all writings about him are—the same goes for this book—they are pieces of a jigsaw that merely convey a rough, incomplete image of Jesus.

For generations, they have presented the image of a man who did not use his abilities to strive for worldly power, fame, and wealth. His aim went beyond all that: he wanted to give people an understanding of the spiritual world—despite all the mistakes that even he was liable to make. His teachings were mainly about the concept of a God based on his own experience—a God he knew as a loving father. For all that, he never digressed into spiritual discourse nor forgot about his contemporaries’ material hardships and the world’s injustices. He did not just talk the talk; he also walked the walk, i.e. stuck to his conviction to the last.

Unfortunately, it is almost impossible to get a clear image of Jesus. That is not only because the Evangelists were born too late to be personally acquainted with him, but also because they interpolated passages expressing their own views in the accounts of his life that had already assumed legendary characteristics by the time they wrote them down.

For these reasons, any description of Jesus’ life is guesswork to a great extent. This book is therefore just another attempt to get as close to the truth as possible. While trying to do so, the gaps and discrepancies in the Gospel narratives cannot be complemented by facts, but only by possibilities.

When he was still in office, Pope Benedict XVI expressed the following opinion about how one should approach the Gospels:

Naturally this will require of us a readiness not only to form a “critical‛ assessment of the New Testament, but also to learn from it and to let ourselves be led by it: not to dismantle the texts according to our preconceived ideas, but to let our own ideas be purified and deepened by his word.2

Could it be that Pope Benedict XVI suffered from a lack of self-confidence?

Once we have carefully analyzed the texts of the New Testament, why on earth shouldn’t we have the right not only to give credence to what sounds convincing, but also to dismiss what seems dubious either as a misconception or as a view dating from a bygone era?

Not everything is “his word", after all.

As a saying goes, “Today’s truth is tomorrow’s lie!” What used to be considered as the truth at a given time often turns out to have been a misconception or a legend later on. Similarly, what used to be regarded as reality in former times need not be accepted as a signpost written in stone. Human conceptions and customs keep evolving.

We could also turn the aforementioned saying on its head: “Today’s lie is tomorrow’s truth!’ In other words: the narrative elements that the Evangelists made up in order to make Jesus attractive to their contemporaries were later adopted as “dogmatic truth”. To be fair, I should add that it would be wrong to refer to such elements as lies because that is how history used to be written at the time.

Still: does the church really expect us to bring our worldview into line with conceptions that date back 2000 years and were not undisputed, but hotly debated even back then?

As you will realize in the course of reading this book, it is absolutely not my intention to qualify every biblical statement and dismiss it as sheer myth. Rather, I am aiming at a differentiated approach that is free of ideological blinders.

Fortunately, we no longer live in a time when a group of uncritical believers could still impose their views on critical believers. Today, we can even contradict the theological statements of a pope without running any risks.

Unfortunately, that still isn’t true of all religions.

My former neighbor Vladimir Kramarevsky epitomizes the inquisitive researcher whose open-minded worldview keeps evolving as new information comes to light. Mind you, such inquisitive researchers are the exception rather than the rule. Otherwise, the fact that so many serious misconceptions have crept into established religious belief systems and have endured for so long— mainly through dogmatization (i.e. the laying down of Christian doctrines)— would never have been possible.

My aim as a writer— and thus your aim as well, dear reader, if you accept my invitation to accompany me on my quest—is to try to get as close as possible to Jesus as a person by using all the means we have at our disposal.

In order to do so, we can take advantage of globalization because it is a process that has not stopped short of anything, not even the spiritual field. As

I explained above, we can e.g. do so by taking into account knowledge that is peculiar to the Eastern philosophy of religion.

We can draw parallels between ...

■the teachings and extraordinary events that are recorded in the Gospels

■and accounts of the lives of former outstanding spiritual figures, no matter which religion they belonged to.

This approach will allow us to see Jesus in the context of what should be—according to God’s plans—man’s overall spiritual development.

As far as I know, such a comparative method has not yet been used in conventional Bible science. I think this may be one of the reasons why scholarly views of the Jewish itinerant preacher and miracle worker that Jesus was are often very one-sided and narrow.

As a consequence of the method I have used in my research, this book is more than just a description of Jesus’ life. It intends to point out spiritual connections that can give us an insight not only into man’s enormous God-given potential and endless possibilities, but also into the meaning of our lives.

Let me conclude this introduction with a brief overview of the contents of this book:

■I have considered it necessary to begin by making my readers familiar with the existing biblical texts and with the views prevailing among Bible scholars.

■Before we study and discuss Jesus himself, it is also indispensable, in order to be able to understand his motives, to delve into the history of his people, i.e. Israel. That is why I have devoted much space to this topic in

Chapter 2

.

■As you will notice, there are three chapters in which I have related Jesus’ public ministry in a narrative form. Each of these narrative chapters is followed by a justificatory chapter in which I present arguments supporting the plausibility of each narrative I wrote.

■Did Jesus leave behind his image on the Turin Shroud? The comprehensive chapter addressing this question (

Chapter 11

) may have a few surprises in store for you.

■The final part of this book deals with the time after Jesus and includes chapters about St. Paul, the early church, and Marian devotions and apparitions.

I have tried to use easily comprehensible language and have avoided theological and scientific terms as far as possible. In my experience, specialist terminology waters down the message and makes it less clear and convincing.

I hope that I have found in you, dear reader, a discerning, but unbiased and open-minded critic.

With this in mind, I wish you interesting hours of reading during which you may hopefully gain new insights that will broaden your view of the world.

Chapter 1

Biblical texts

Is the Bible the word of God?

After reading out a passage from the Old Testament or from the Pauline Epistles during a Catholic Mass or during a Protestant or Anglican service, the lector standing at the altar usually says, “The word of the Lord1”, and the members of the congregation dutifully reply, “Thanks be to God!”

Whenever that happens, I feel the need to apologize to the Almighty, “Dear God, please don’t take it personally that such texts are attributed to you! The lector is not to blame, he has to comply with the order of service and has to stick to that wording.”

I really cannot understand how anyone who has studied the Scriptures could ever hit on the idea of referring to the aforementioned texts as “the word of the Lord”. They are an inextricable mixture of ancient conceptions based on ...

■facts;

■legends;

■errors;

■later insertions or omissions;

■and contradictory statements.

The Jewish religious scholar Pinchas Lapide puts it in a nutshell:

Basically, there are only two ways to deal with the Bible: you can take it literally, or you take it seriously. These two approaches are hardly reconcilable.2

If, as the church teaches us, the New Testament owes its inspiration to the Holy Spirit, he must have suffered from Alzheimer’s disease because every Evangelist and Epistle writer has written a more or less different version of Jesus’ teachings and actions.

The Bible covers a vast field, both temporally and ideologically.

Deuteronomy, for instance, mentions a piece of over 3000-year-old legislation in which YHWH

orders

the Israelites who are taking part in campaigns of conquest in the Holy Land to slay all the male inhabitants of the conquered cities that do not surrender voluntarily and are located within the planned settlement area. In all the conquered cities within that area, women and children are to be killed as well (cf. Deut. 20:10–17). In

Chapter 2

(

History of Judaism

), I shall address the question to what extent that extermination strategy was realistic or just wishful thinking.

On the other hand, Jesus on the cross forgives his executioners:

[...] Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do. [...]

(Luke 23:34)

The Bible also spans a great variety of texts: from psalms praising God to angry outbursts by St. Paul against his opponents.

According to our current perception of God, it is no longer conceivable that he could ever have chosen a specific people, preferred them to all others, and not just allowed, but even ordered them to exterminate other peoples. According to self-centered conceptions dating from before antiquity however, tribal deities were responsible only for their own people.

As we will discover later (cf. Biblical studies, exegesis), it was the priests and secular leaders of the people who saw to it that various texts (i.e. not only pieces of legislation such as the aforementioned one, but also instructions and stories) were inserted in the Scriptures. When St. Paul gives vent to his anger against the conservative Jewish Christians, who wanted the Gentile Christians to undergo Jewish circumcision, by expressing the wish that the former be simply emasculated (cf. Gal. 5:12), his statement is nothing but his anger and his words.

Just as this book you are reading now, the Bible—no matter whether it is the Old Testament or the New Testament—was written by humans from beginning to end.

Who was it then who concocted the texts of the Bible?

What are they about?

And for what purpose was the Bible written?

Let us first turn our attention to the Jewish Scriptures.

The Old Testament

The Jewish Scriptures (hence the Old Testament as well) are based on the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh). The Tanakh includes ...

the Torah (Hebrew for

instruction, law

, that law being mainly spelled out in five books attributed to Moses);

books about prophets;

and other texts such as psalms or the Song of Solomon or the Book of Proverbs.

Legends of a few scattered tribes dating back to pre-antiquity were passed on by word of mouth and later recorded and amalgamated into a salvation history under the tribal God YHWH. Apart from the Creation story, the Tanakh covers a period of about 1300 years.

Some of the “Divine Commands” that it contains (such as the aforementioned rule concerning the procedure after taking a city by storm or the legal relationship between a slave and his master) refer to the living conditions of a bygone era, i.e. pre-antiquity. Such statements are difficult to understand today and have to be considered in the light of the circumstances obtaining at the time.

As we will see in the next section (cf. Biblical studies, exegesis), the Tanakh was repeatedly revised by various authors over the centuries and, each time, it was adapted to the new circumstances.

The relationship between Israel and their God YHWH is the major thread running through the Jewish Scriptures. Some historians assume that YHWH was originally a volcanic or thunder-and-lightning deity of the Midianites, a people who lived on the Arabian peninsula. The Israelites adopted their cult. The nomads regarded the volcanoes that were active in the area across which they wandered as the seat of their god.

During the immigration of various nomadic tribes to the ancient civilized land of Canaan (present-day Palestine), every tribe took along their own tribal god. These gods were blended first with each other, then with the religious beliefs of the Hebrews who came from Egypt. Some of the gods, however, were also worshipped alongside the deities of the Canaanites. The Canaanite god of creation, El, for instance, could easily be equated with YHWH. For a while, the people also worshipped fertility and astral deities such as Baal, Astarte, and Marduk. The priests and prophets, however, prevented such practices with drastic measures, which included the death penalty.

Nevertheless, monotheism gained acceptance only gradually in Israel.

In 597BC, following the conquest of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar II, King of Babylon, a many of its Jewish inhabitants—members of the upper class in particular—were deported to Babylon and resettled there. Only in 539BC, i.e. after the Persians conquered Babylon, were the Jewish captives allowed to go back home. Jewish Scriptures that date from after their return from the Babylonian exile are the first documents to refer to YHWH as the creator of heaven and earth. But even though this made him the God of all mankind, his exclusive covenant with Israel was given prime importance.

In those days, uttering God’s name was tabooed out of respect for his holiness, a circumstance that was probably partly influenced by the fact that anyone who uttered God’s name in a negative manner by accident ran the risk of being punished.

You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that takes his name in vain.

(Exod. 20:7)

In extreme cases, blasphemers could be sentenced to death. From then on, God’s name existed only in writing, i.e. as YHWH. And, because of the absence of vowels in written Hebrew, the knowledge of the original pronunciation gradually slid into obscurity. It may have been [jahwe], [jabe], or [jauwe].

Henceforth, paraphrases were used whenever people talked about God or to God: for instance, Adonai, a very respectful way of saying “my Lord”. Ja or HaShem, which means “the name”, were common terms as well.

The Hebrew Scriptures provided important impulses that have influenced the life of the people beyond Judaism all over the world up to the present day, for example the notion that man is made in the image of God.

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

(Gen. 1:27)

This is where the principle found in all modern constitutions that all men are basically equal stems from.

The Ten Commandments are norms that are easy to understand and still of importance to the social coexistence of people. The division of the week into seven days as well as the Jewish Sabbath and our Sunday are all derived from the notion that God rested on the seventh day after creating the world.

Incidentally, the word Jew comes from the expression Jehuda, which means “I want to praise God”.

But how did the Jewish Scriptures come into being?

In order to find out, let us look Bible scholars over the shoulder.

Biblical studies, exegesis

The method employed by Bible scholars is called exegesis. This Greek word is used to refer to the interpretation of the texts of the Old and New Testament. Exegesis is the attempt to make the statements and meanings of the Bible as well as the historical and textual connections of biblical texts comprehensible to both professionally qualified and unqualified readers. For that reason, the challenge for the scientists is to find out by whom, when and where the texts were written.

Right up into the 18th century, Bible scholarship was dominated by the dogmatic teachings of the Christian Churches. The Old and the New Testament were divine revelations. Doubting their origin used to be a grievous sin that deserved to be punished by hellfire. In the Middle Ages, such skeptics were still tortured for their own good in order to make them retract. Sometimes, when all attempts had been in vain, they were even burned at the stake to save them from everlasting fire. As you can see, back then, people were deeply concerned about the salvation of their poor erring contemporaries.

Later, it was only the skeptics’ books that were burned, or they were silenced by other methods, such as the revocation of their teaching license, excommunication, or verbal attacks by opportunistic, sycophantic fellow scholars who ridiculed their way of thinking. Only in the 19th century did some form of critical Bible scholarship emerge, mainly within the Protestant Churches.

The Catholic Church took its time and eventually cleared the way for freer research in 1943, when Pope Pius XII released his encyclical Divino afflante Spiritu [Inspired by the Holy Spirit]:

Let the interpreter then, with all care and without neglecting any light derived from recent research, endeavor to determine the peculiar character and circumstances of the sacred writer, the age in which he lived, the sources written or oral to which he had recourse and the forms of expression he employed.3

Pope Pius XII, however, still stuck to his opinion that the Holy Spirit had spoken through the biblical authors and that it had not been his intention to enlighten man about processes in the physical world. Pope Pius clearly did not expect the Holy Spirit’s knowledge to extend beyond the usual boundaries of his time.

The expression The LORD/God said occurs many times in the Old Testament and implies that YHWH talked to his people or to his prophet in person.

But where does it come from?

By way of example, let me quote the passage in which Abraham is asked to sacrifice his son Isaac as a burnt offering:

And it came to pass after these things, that God did tempt Abraham, and said to him, “Abraham”: and he said, “Behold, here I am.”

And he said, “Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and get you into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering on one of the mountains which I will tell you of.”

And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and saddled his ass, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son, and split the wood for the burnt offering, and rose up, and went to the place of which God had told him.

Then on the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes, and saw the place afar off.

And Abraham said to his young men, “Abide you here with the ass; and I and the lad will go yonder and worship, and come again to you.”

And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering, and laid it on Isaac his son; and he took the fire in his hand, and a knife; and they went both of them together.

And Isaac spoke to Abraham his father, and said, “My father”: and he said, “Here am I, my son.” And he said, “Behold the fire and the wood: but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?”

And Abraham said, “My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering”: so they went both of them together.

And they came to the place which God had told him of; and Abraham built an altar there, and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar on the wood.

And Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to slay his son.

And the angel of the LORD called to him out of heaven, and said, “Abraham, Abraham”: and he said, “Here am I.”

And he said, “Lay not your hand on the lad, neither do you any thing to him: for now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son from me.”

And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son.

(Gen. 22:1–13)

In the lifetime of Abraham, the mythical progenitor of the Jews and Arabs, people traditionally offered human sacrifices (even their own children, their firstborn son in particular) to the gods. In order to justify such a practice, in pre-antiquity the Jews imputed it to YHWH:

[...] the firstborn of your sons shall you give to me.

(Exod. 22:29)

✓But perhaps there came a time when the priestly caste felt that such sacrifices were inhuman and no longer appropriate. What could they do? Since the custom was YHWH’s express wish, they could not simply forbid it. That would explain why a new story was circulated: the one about Abraham and Isaac, in which YHWH refrained from demanding human sacrifices.

Nevertheless, in the hope of obtaining God’s help, children were still sacrificed now and then. Judge Jephtha, for example, sacrificed his only daughter because God had helped him to victory in the war against the Ammonites (cf. Judg. 11:30–40).

Something similar is recorded about the king of the Moabites:

And when the king of Moab saw that the battle was too sore for him, he took with him seven hundred men that drew swords, to break through even to the king of Edom: but they could not.

Then he took his oldest son that should have reigned in his stead, and offered him for a burnt offering on the wall. And there was great indignation against Israel: and they departed from him, and returned to their own land.

(2 Kgs. 3:26–27)

So, if it was not God who provided the Jewish Scriptures, who else did?

Let’s take the origin of the Five Books of Moses (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy) as an example.

As is always the case with Jewish or Middle Eastern history, the task is rather complicated because every group did its own thing. They pursued their own interests with lots of fantasy and swagger. Let’s begin with the kingdom of David.

About 1000BC, David created a kingdom that reached from the border to Egypt in the south to Phoenicia in the north, including the areas of Edom, Moab, and Ammon on the other side of the River Jordan. This event is recorded in the Second Book of Samuel (cf. 2 Sam. 8:2–10).

But that passage is clearly an idealized account that was added by its author!

According to the latest research, David was originally a gang leader who became king of a few of the Jewish tribes in what was later known as Judaea. Due to his victory over King Saul, who ruled over the other tribes in the north, he could establish a Jewish kingdom. It was divided into the southern kingdom of Judah with Jerusalem as its capital and the northern kingdom of Israel with Shechem as its central city. The latter kingdom roughly covered the territory of what later became known as Samaria and Galilee.

The territory of these two kingdoms was inhabited by about 55,000 people. Hence, it was much too weak to attack the cities of the Philistines on the Mediterranean or the areas on the other side of the Jordan.

Contrary to David, who paid attention that both kingdoms enjoyed equal rights, his son Solomon—who was not as wise as he is portrayed— discriminated against the northern kingdom, i.e. Israel, to such an extent that it reasserted its independence after his death. Even though the tribes in both kingdoms shared the same roots, the same religion, and the same history, they were now competing against each other. As a result, the stories they had passed on from generation to generation were edited or rewritten by each side according to their own interests.

In Jerusalem the priests traced back their descent to Aaron, but in the northern kingdom their colleagues claimed they were the sons of Moses. As a result, the role of Moses was understated in the southern Scriptures, whereas the northern ones misrepresented Aaron to Moses’ benefit.

Bible scholars use the letter J (short for Jehovah) to designate the Scriptures of the southern kingdom of Judah because these texts refer to God as YHWH; the Scriptures of the northern kingdom, on the other hand, are designated by the letter E because they use the name Elohim for God.

When, in 722BC, the Assyrians—a people from Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq)—destroyed the northern kingdom, its population was deported or fled to the southern kingdom, i.e. Judah, and took along their Scriptures. In Judah, the two Scriptures J and E were then cobbled together into a single Torah.

During that process, it happened quite often that two stories were combined to a single one, even though each of the original accounts still survived almost completely. This is exemplified by the Creation story or the story of Noah.

After J and E had been mixed together, new stories were added. These new stories are designated by a P because they predominantly represent the point of view of the Aaronic priestly caste. They are mainly about the principle that the consecrated priests are the only intermediaries between man and God. Only Aaron’s progeny was regarded as having a rightful claim to that level of priesthood. Nobody else was authorized to make sacrifices to YHWH, and sacrifices could only be made at a central place, i.e. the Temple in Jerusalem. The priests of Moses’s progeny were reduced to the level of subordinate assistants, the so-called Levites. Today, we would call the Aaronic priesthood’s status a “monopoly position”. And an especially lucrative one at that.

Let’s consider an example from Numbers 25 (“The heresy of Peor”).4

This story is made up ...

of elements from

J

and

E

(the amalgamated Scriptures of the northern and southern kingdoms);

and of elements taken from

P

(the priestly caste’s insertions).

The first five sentences of the text come from JE; the following ones from P. In the quotation below, the passage from JE is italicized; that from P is in roman type.

And Israel stayed in Shittim, and the people began to commit prostitution with the daughters of Moab.

And they called the people to the sacrifices of their gods: and the people did eat, and bowed down to their gods.

And Israel joined himself to Baalpeor: and the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel.

And the LORD said to Moses, “Take all the heads of the people, and hang them up before the LORD against the sun, that the fierce anger of the LORD may be turned away from Israel.”

And Moses said to the judges of Israel, “Slay you every one his men that were joined to Baalpeor.”

And, behold, one of the children of Israel came and brought to his brothers a Midianitish woman in the sight of Moses, and in the sight of all the congregation of the children of Israel, who were weeping before the door of the tabernacle of the congregation.

And when Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he rose up from among the congregation, and took a javelin in his hand;

And he went after the man of Israel into the tent, and thrust both of them through, the man of Israel, and the woman through her belly. So the plague was stayed from the children of Israel.

And those that died in the plague were twenty and four thousand.

And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying,

“Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, has turned my wrath away from the children of Israel, while he was zealous for my sake among them, that I consumed not the children of Israel in my jealousy.

Why say, Behold, I give to him my covenant of peace:

And he shall have it, and his seed after him, even the covenant of an everlasting priesthood; because he was zealous for his God, and made an atonement for the children of Israel.”

Now the name of the Israelite that was slain, even that was slain with the Midianitish woman, was Zimri, the son of Salu, a prince of a chief house among the Simeonites.

And the name of the Midianitish woman that was slain was Cozbi, the daughter of Zur; he was head over a people, and of a chief house in Midian.

And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying,

“Vex the Midianites, and smite them:

For they vex you with their wiles, with which they have beguiled you in the matter of Peor, and in the matter of Cozbi, the daughter of a prince of Midian, their sister, which was slain in the day of the plague for Peor’s sake”.

(Num. 25:1–18)

If we take a closer look at the text, we can see the intention behind it very clearly. Both parts of the text are incomplete. In the JE section, Moses initially gives the order to kill everyone who has turned to Baalpeor, a god of the Moabites. Here, the text breaks off without providing any detailed information on the execution of his command.

Next comes a switch to the P section, which describes how an Israelite arrives in the company of a Midianitish woman in plain view of Moses and the people. The man and the woman obviously enter a house to enjoy a “lovers’ tryst” there. Phinehas, one of Aaron’s grandchildren, follows the lovers and kills them both with a single javelin thrust. Phinehas and his descendants, the Aaronites, are rewarded for that deed by YHWH with the covenant of an everlasting priesthood.

According to the priestly part of the story, the authority to offer sacrifices to YHWH rested exclusively with the Aaronites for all times. After all, Moses had merely watched from the sidelines.

It is not clear what is meant by the “plague” Israel’s children died of. Presumably, it was an epidemic that YHWH sent to the people of Israel as punishment for their idolatry.

The whole passage is also noteworthy for the following peculiarity: in the P section of the story, the Moabites from the JE text suddenly turn into Midianites. Moses’s wife was a Midianite. Hence, he was discredited. And his descendants were no longer pure-blooded Israelites.

But even that is only a half-truth. In fact, the “Moses” mentioned in that story was a legendary figure. If he really existed, by the time the stories about him were written, hardly any facts (including, of course, the identity of his wife or wives) were still known about his life.

The most likely hypothesis is that the Midianites were initially a befriended people and that this circumstance was emphasized by claiming that Moses had a wife who came from there.

Presumably, by the time the story quoted above was recorded, the friendly relationship between both peoples had become a thorn in the priests’ side. Maintaining the purity of the bloodline was more important to them. So, with this story, they killed two birds with one stone: for one thing, the Midianites were declared enemies, and for another, Moses and his descendants were discredited in a manner that was reason enough for them to be considered no longer worthy to offer sacrifices to YHWH.

This example shows how, in those days, you could establish a lucrative monopoly position with relatively little effort: power politics by means of historical misrepresentation!

The above P story is by no means the only one of its kind. As an antithesis to it, someone (probably Jeremiah, a priest of Mosaic descent) wrote Deuteronomy (named D text in exegesis).

Furthermore, in Bible science, the letter R stands for the reviser who pieced together all of those partially contradicting texts to what is now known as the Old Testament. This was probably done by the Aaronic priest Ezra during the years of the Babylonian exile (587–539BC).

Every biblical story reflects something that was of importance to its author. And, due to the circumstance that the Aaronic and the Mosaic priests were competing against each other for power and influence, this fact is noticeable in the Mosaic Scriptures as well. In the following quotation, for example, the Mosaic prophet Jeremiah gives vent to his anger toward the Aaronites:

“How do you say, ‘We are wise, and the law of the LORD is with us?’ See, certainly in vain made he it; the pen of the scribes is in vain.

[...]5

[...] from the prophet even to the priest every one deals falsely.”

(Jer. 8:8–10)

The God of the Old Testament is often described as wrathful and punishing. This image, however, is too one-sided. It is mainly due to the Scriptures of the priestly caste (P): they claim that man can only meet YHWH’s standards by adhering to the laws and they threaten him with horrible punishments if he fails to do so.

By contrast, the authors of J (YHWH, southern kingdom), E (El, northern kingdom) and D (Deuteronomy) depict a rather humane God who can be persuaded to change his mind and shows mercy whenever a sinner repents. The emphasis in these texts is not so much on complying with laws, but rather on loving God and acting righteously, the latter behavior being dictated by man’s inborn knowledge of good and evil.

For this commandment which I command you this day, it is not hidden from you, neither is it far off.

[...]

But the word is very near to you, in your mouth, and in your heart, that you may do it.

See, I have set before you this day life and good, and death and evil;

In that I command you this day to love the LORD your God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commandments and his statutes and his judgments, that you may live and multiply: and the LORD your God shall bless you in the land where you go to possess it.

(Deut. 30:11–16)

Sometimes, however, the priestly authors (P) also emphasized God’s mercy; just as the author of Deuteronomy (D) could issue horrible threats in case of disobedience:

But it shall come to pass, if you will not listen to the voice of the LORD your God, [...] that all these curses shall come on you, and overtake you:

Cursed shall you be in the city, and cursed shall you be in the field.

Cursed shall be your basket and your store.

Cursed shall be the fruit of your body, and the fruit of your land, the increase of your cows, and the flocks of your sheep.

Cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out.

The LORD shall send on you cursing, vexation, and rebuke, in all that you set your hand to for to do, until you be destroyed, and until you perish quickly; because of the wickedness of your doings, whereby you have forsaken me.

The LORD shall make the pestilence stick to you, until he have consumed you from off the land, where you go to possess it.

The LORD shall smite you with a consumption, and with a fever, and with an inflammation [...].

[...]

The LORD shall smite you with madness, and blindness, and astonishment of heart:

[And so on].

(Deut. 28:15–28)

Is that the word of God?

✓ Certainly not!

But perhaps there was no other way back then to discipline people into living together peacefully. Since no concrete idea of the afterworld existed in Judaism at that time, God’s curses applied exclusively to the here and now.

On the basis of the experience that evil generally thrives despite such curses, Christianity later shifted the time of punishment to the afterlife and threatened recusants with everlasting hellfire.

As a result of the aforementioned different viewpoints in early Judaism, everyone could pick his God from the Scriptures. Unsurprisingly, this translated into perpetual discussions and quarrels. Some people even adopted standpoints directly opposed to some of the demands contained in the Scriptures. For example, there were a few rabbis who criticized (just as Jesus did later on) the immense number of priestly regulations concerning the Sabbath because, in their opinion, they imposed unnecessary burdens on the people.

A couple of decades before Jesus began his public ministry, a non-Jew asked the famous rabbi Hillel (♰ 7AD) about the essence of the Jewish Scriptures, “I will convert to Judaism, on condition that you teach me the whole Torah while I stand on one foot.” The rabbi answered, “What is hateful to you, do not do onto others: that is the whole Torah. The rest is commentary; go and learn it.”6

Did anything attract your attention in this anecdote?

During the short period of time he had at his disposal, the rabbi forgot to mention the passage from Deuteronomy that Jesus later described as the most important Commandment:

And you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.

(Deut. 6:5)

Maybe the inquirer, who was standing on one foot, was already swaying so much that Rabbi Hillel no longer had the time to add that sentence. He knew that Commandment for a certainty, but—as this example confirms—quick answers are not always the best ones.

The texts of the Old Testament are like human life; a conglomeration of nonsense and wisdom, of egocentric thirst for power, of a sense of justice and, last but not least, of the desire for God’s kingdom on earth, where all good things will come true and evil will be eradicated. For that reason, we should not assume that the Jewish Scriptures mirror God’s attributes. Rather, they reflect the expectations that the author set on YHWH. God’s real disposition is beyond human description. He can only be experienced in person.

Christianity adopted the books of the Tanakh and canonized them as the Old Testament; that is to say, they were specified as a standard of belief. Christianity, which was originally a Jewish sect, laid claim to the biblical tradition as well as to Jewish history and regarded itself as the “New Israel”.

Thus, Christianity did not actually steal the Scriptures from Judaism, which still possesses them. In today’s language, you could refer to the Christian Scriptures as a pirate copy of the Jewish ones.

At any rate, the Old Testament brought about a positive, cultural impetus in terms of religion in the Roman Empire and beyond; in particular in comparison to Germanic lore such as the Nordic heroic Edda saga or the Nibelungen saga, which are almost only about quarrels, fights, destruction, and heroism.

But let’s now turn our attention to the texts that are dedicated to a Jewish building craftsman, miracle worker, and doomsday preacher.

The New Testament, biblical canon

The New Testament is a collection of 27 writings about the life and death of Jesus of Nazareth, proclaiming him as the Son of God and the Messiah who has come to save the world.

After a lengthy process that lasted until the end of the 4th century, various doctors of the church regarded these texts as authentic records among a great amount of writings about Jesus. In the 4th century, they were declared obligatory basis of the Christian faith (i.e. canonized).

They are based not only on Jesus’ teachings, but also on the Jewish Scriptures, i.e. the Old Testament. The term Testament originates from a Hebrew, or rather Greek word whose actual meaning was covenant. Later, that Greek word was translated into Latin as Testamentum.

According to the texts of the Tanakh, YHWH, the God of Israel, entered into a covenant with his people. From a Christian viewpoint, this agreement was superseded by a New Covenant with Jesus in which not just Israel, but all humankind is included.

The New Testament consists of the four Gospels (which tell about Jesus’ life), the Acts of the Apostles, 21 Epistles (mainly from Paul) to Christian communities, and the Apocalypse or Revelation.

The Gospels

The first four books of the New Testament were written in Greek in the Greco- Roman cultural area long after Jesus’ crucifixion. The writers— commonly referred to as Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—are actually unknown. None of them was acquainted with Jesus.

Except for the Gospel of Luke, the Acts of the Apostles, and the genuine Pauline Epistles, the texts of the New Testament were not written by the people they are named after.

Bible researchers assume that the first Gospel to be written was that of Mark (it is dated about 70AD). The Gospels of Matthew and Luke followed about ten to twenty years later. The Gospel of John was the last to be compiled; it was written after 100AD, i.e. more than 70 years after Jesus began his public ministry.

Whilst staying true to the Gospel of Mark, Matthew and Luke added sayings and parables of Jesus they borrowed from a no longer existing so-called “Q source”. Because the structure of these three Gospels is similar, they are called “Synoptic Gospels” (from synopsis, which means summary, abstract).

The Gospel of John, the latest of the four Gospels, is very much the odd one out, with regard to the storyline as well as to Jesus’ statements. There is widespread consensus among Bible scholars that it does not describe the historical Jesus. Rather, the aim of that Gospel is to defend and spread a doctrine that was controversial among Christians at that time, i.e. that Jesus is the Son of God.

Mark’s target readers were mostly Gentile Christians; Matthew’s were Jewish Christians with a good knowledge of the Jewish Scriptures; Luke’s were educated Gentile Christians; and John’s were Christians in general whose belief in Jesus’ divine sonship he wanted to strengthen.

In those days, the word gospel meant good news given by a ruler, e.g. the Roman emperor. Therefore, almost right at the beginning, the Gospel of Mark reads:

Now after that John was put in prison, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God, [Emphasis added]

(Mark 1:14)

The imminent expectation of the kingdom of God, also called Parousia (a Greek word meaning “being present”) or Second Coming, is the central message of the Gospels. The attempt to clarify what Jesus could have meant by that message will cover many pages in this book.

The Acts of the Apostles

It is generally accepted that both the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles were written by Luke. Acts is dated shortly after the Gospel of Luke, i.e. about 80 to 90AD. It begins with the time after Jesus’ resurrection and describes how the first Christians lived and what the Apostles did. A large section of Acts deals with Paul’s conversion and his travels. Contrary to their predecessors, today’s Bible scholars no longer assume that Luke was Paul’s companion, since pivotal topics of Pauline theology are missing from Acts and details about his missionary activities are vague or misrepresented.

The Epistles