The despotism and the cronyism seems to have caught up with the corrupt ruling class of modern Iran. Just as it did a generation ago in the Iranian revolution of 1979, just as it did in November 2008 when Barack Obama threw out the warmongering, murderous, oilmonging Republicans, just as it did in ancient Israel during the time of Jesus and the gnostics.
Gandi said "First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." Obviously, Iran is at the "they fight you" phase of this battle... I'm pulling for them in regards to the next phase: "then you win."
Please forgive my audacity here but this unfolding uprising in Iran has inspired me to re-post my essay on the gnostics, a story of an ancient people who were also fighting against tyranny...
The real story of the Gnostics, and subsequently Jesus, is almost diametrically opposite of what we've all been told.
What we have been witnessing as "christianity" for 1684 years since the infamous edicts of the Council of Nicea of 325AD has all been an intentional falsehood: the Council basically flipped the true story and redid it as the opposite message, of hate and murder of other religious minorities, particularly the Gnostics who were the largest and most influential "original" christian sect, of centralized hierarchy which was the antithesis of Gnosticism which is based on knowledge, or gnosis, and the sharing of that knowledge, with the masters reaching "christhood" per se, or a pure state of gnosis. Yes it's quite influenced by eastern religions, particularly the Buddhist's "nirvana."
You see, the Gnostics were Jesus' contemporaries and the contemporaries of Jesus' revolutionary movement for the poor and downtrodden. The modern version of christianity didn't come about until hundreds of years after Jesus lived (and after reading Princeton's Elaine Pagels books, I believe he lived.)
The real message of Jesus and the original christians was not one of domination and forced religion: how could that be with one of Jesus' most famous acts being one where he derides the temple money changers as crooks?
Entire books have been dedicated to this topic and in fact I totally recommend that people read Elaine Pagels "The Gnostic Gospels."
My essay here is an attempt to tie what I read from Elaine Pagels and from my reading of the Gnostic gospels and dead sea scrolls to passages of the surviving, highly-edited Bible which seem to corroborate the influence of the Gnostics. I believe that these corroborations prove that christianity was hijacked by the Nicean thugs who tyrannically rule the world to this day, see the despotic "drug war" on the poor.
The Gnostics accepted the concept of the feminine, particularly as revealed by the story of Mary Magdalene, who according to the Gnostic gospels was a leader among Jesus' followers. The post-Nicean "orthodox" christians as Pagels calls them (not modern eastern ordodox), with their witch hunts and edited version of the Adam and Eve, were certainly not accepting of women.
This essay is also an expose of St. Stephen, known as the first christian deacon, who protested against organized religion and their physical temples (yes churches). Stephen intentially provoked the authorities of his time. I go into that more later.
Jesus also very publicly provoked the despots and demanded that mankind "Destroy This Temple..." and to rebuilt it via his "body."
St. Stephen similarly said that "The Most High does not live in houses made by men"...
These men were fighting for freedom, not for a centralized church hierarchy.
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Jesus' real story, or any famous person's story for that matter, is always hard to ascertain in retrospect.
The controversy over Jesus' story began about 300 years after he demanded that mankind "destroy this temple" in his famous public display described in the Gospel of John.
Despite the edict to massacre the gnostics and their texts that came out of the Council of Nicea in 325AD, the story of the gnostics has survived to this day.
The gnostics, the original christian sect that inspired Jesus and his movement were banned, persecuted, and murdered by the ancestors of today's modern Church: the martyr-obsessed "Orthodox" Christians (per Pagels) began their subversion of Jesus' story in earnest at the Council of Nicea.
In effect, modern "christians" demanded ignorance from their forced congregants and anyone who sought to attain knowledge or Gnosis was labled as satanic. Sound familiar?
In modern times, the comparisons are many of course, just see the Creationism controversy.
Anyhow, we still live with the same centralized authority today, the same tyrannous so-called "christian" groups who want to convert you or else you are hell-bound and worthy of being construed as sub-human.
In other words, they became in 325AD what Jesus and St. Stephen railed against and died fighting against as rebel leaders.
Education is the way out of this tyranny; that was Jesus' message and his criticism at the city center, railing against the temple people and proclaiming for the people to "Destroy this temple." That was an ingenious means of educating the masses to his message: when he drove the false prophets out of the temple where doves (for women's menstruation) were sold and where money exchanges operated (sound familiar?), he spoke out for liberty from religious-induced tyranny.
If the ancient New Testament texts tell the truth about this public act at the Temple, I think Jesus was publicly espousing "gnosis" (knowledge) with his city-center display of civil disobedience. Ironically, he was fighting against the tyrants who would steal his religion out from under him!
I believe that the US Constitution's First Amendment, which protects our freedom of religious expression, is a reflection of the Gnostics' and Jesus' original vision of peace and fairness and was a dagger in the heart of the forces of tyranny and oppression in the world.
Let's reread what democracy is:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
The First Amendment means that you have freedom to practice your religion free from persecution. It means that you have the right to make up your own religion if you want. If your personal religion is to use God-given plants as part of that expression, the Constitution protects that right, or it's supposed to.
"God said, "Behold, I have given you every herb yielding seed, which is on the surface of all the earth, and every tree, which bears fruit yielding seed. It will be your food.
Obviously, we still have work to do. We still have gates to crash and temples to storm.
Maybe the Constitution needs another amendment to re-affirm the 4th amendment because every day that the "drug war" goes on is another day down the dark path of totalitarianism in America.
The trail of modern civil liberties abuses were blazed by the conservative drug warriors who are nothing but neo-fascists.
Anyhow, I digress.
In modern times, religious fundamentalist groups within "Islam" and "Christianity" obsess around the concept of the "end times" ...these groups use fear and guilt as the main tools for brainwashing inductees.
These people have shown themselves as evil in the world, with their domestic terrorist attacks, with their intentional dumbing-down, anti-education, cult-like mentality which seems to have imploded with the election of 2008.
And so... liberals should not be against Jesus, a champion of liberalism and liberty, just because these post Nicea goons have perverted his life and teachings.
The original christians, the gnostics, were much nicer people.
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The most beneficial thing that the crucifixion-obsessed, "orthodox" Christians (as Elaine Pagels calls them her "The Gnostic Gospels") have done is to allow the story of Jesus, as heavily edited as it is, to survive their despotism across two millenia so that the populist message of Jesus can again overcome their own tyranny. These so-called "christians" have committed the same sins with their massive money-changing mega-churches that Jesus was railing against when he said "Destroy this temple..." and their fear, superstition, guilt, and violence.
If you’ve ever wondered why the so-called "moral majority" under Ronald Reagan wanted to destroy the Department of Education, now you know why: Jesus railed against these same forces of ignorance in his most famous act when he declared "Destroy this temple..."
More on that below but first, let me introduce St. Stephen who also demanded the destruction of the false corrupt religous authorities.
Stephen is accused by a planted witness...
"11Then they suborned men, which said, We have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses, and against God.
12And they stirred up the people, and the elders, and the scribes, and came upon him, and caught him, and brought him to the council,
13And set up false witnesses, which said, This man ceaseth not to speak blasphemous words against this holy place, and the law:
14For we have heard him say, that this Jesus of Nazareth shall destroy this place, and shall change the customs which Moses delivered us.(Acts, vi, 12 14).
To which Stephen replied:
44 "Our forefathers had the tabernacle of the Testimony with them in the desert. It had been made as God directed Moses, according to the pattern he had seen. 45 Having received the tabernacle, our fathers under Joshua brought it with them when they took the land from the nations God drove out before them. It remained in the land until the time of David, 46 who enjoyed God's favor and asked that he might provide a dwelling place for the God of Jacob. 47 But it was Solomon who built the house for him.
48 "However, the Most High does not live in houses made by men. As the prophet (Isaiah) says:
49" 'Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build for me? says the Lord. Or where will my resting place be? 50 Has not my hand made all these things?'
51 "You stiff-necked people, with uncircumcised hearts and ears! You are just like your fathers: You always resist the Holy Spirit! 52 Was there ever a prophet your fathers did not persecute? They even killed those who predicted the coming of the Righteous One. And now you have betrayed and murdered him-- 53 you who have received the law that was put into effect through angels but have not obeyed it."
54 When they heard this, they were furious and gnashed their teeth at him. 55 But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. 56 "Look," he said, "I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God."
57 At this they covered their ears and, yelling at the top of their voices, they all rushed at him, 58 dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul. (Acts, vi, 44-58).
Jesus’ famous public statement to "Destroy this temple" preceded Stephens brave stand but I think they were part of the same movement, probably gnostics, who simply wanted freedom.
13 The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.14 In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers at their business. 15 And making a whip of cords, he drove them all, with the sheep and oxen, out of the temple; and he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. 16 And he told those who sold the pigeons, "Take these things away; you shall not make my Father's house a house of trade." 17 His disciples remembered that it was written, "Zeal for thy house will consume me." 18 The Jews then said to him, "What sign have you to show us for doing this?" 19 Jesus answered them, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." 20 The Jews then said, "It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?" 21 But he spoke of the temple of his body. 22 When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word which Jesus had spoken. 23 Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs which he did; 24 but Jesus did not trust himself to them, 25 because he knew all men and needed no one to bear witness of man; for he himself knew what was in man. -- John 2:13-25
As I said previously, the gnostics espoused what I think is the concept of nirvana. The outlawed Gospel of Phillip:
108. Jesus said, "Whoever drinks from my mouth will become like me; I myself shall become that person, and the hidden things will be revealed to him."
That sounds very Buddhist to me.
And here’s Jesus' promise of eternal life through knowledge or gnosis from the Gospel of Thomas:
1 "And he said, "Whoever discovers the interpretation of these sayings will not taste death."
It seems to me that Jesus was referring to "Christhood," something that apparently everyone can attain, not just Jesus. Even if Jesus said "no one approaches the Father but through me," he certainly didn't mean "only through the ecclesiastical hierarchy" that murdered off competing religious sects!
One day, academics will not be able to ignore the true story of Jesus and the original christians. And when that true story gets out, the political landscape will be forever changed... for the better.