The "Trinity" explained

No one knew about the life of Jesus. The only story we have is in the gospels, and those are clearly fiction, incorporating historical personalities and places into otherwise fictitious narratives recorded even later in history than the Pauline epistles. The Gospel is like the 12 Labors of Hercules, the man & demigod Jesus like the man & demigod Hercules. It's also like many stories in the Old Testament, likewise mytho-historical, also like so many other ancient stories and characters of this nature, such as Romulus and Remus.

Saul/Paul is an interesting character, though. One wonders about the reality of this man also, and the nature of the various claims about him and from him, such as his deeds in Acts and his alleged conversion on the road to Damascus. He's another one who lacks historical corroboration, and of course his own story incorporates clearly false claims, unless we are to accept that he really lost his vision and heard a voice telling him things. He could be another highly fictionalised person who simply came to have an authoritative name and reputation, rather like the character of Jesus himself, such that one could write pseudonymously under Paul's name and have one's words heeded accordingly. In fact, there was evidently some issue with this, because we have epistles in the bible that were penned by a scribe and then signed personally by Paul, or so they claimed. Forgeries, if indeed there were any Pauline epistles that were not forgeries, were evidently around.

 

Tell you what?? This is a waste of my time; I have better things to do....I'm done with this.

 

Most folks do not realize how "acceptable" Pious Fraud was back in the day. So long as it brought folk into the fold/movement much was justified.

What we do know is none of the stories of Jesus in the Bible were written during his time and none were written by folks that actually knew the man.

Mark is the first Gospel (65-80 AD) written at least 3 to 4 decades after the death of Jesus. This is a long time in today's world never mind back then.

The next Gospel - Matt - just takes the previous writings (Mark) and adds to it many years later. Mark is then the primary source.

The Author of Mark is reputed to be a disciple of Peter. The earliest evidence we have for this idea is from "Papias the Elder" writing in 130 AD. This is 100 years after the death of Jesus and some 5 to 7 decades after the writing of Mark. Not exactly compelling in of itself and especially given the want of early writers to commit "Pious Fraud" in hopes of bringing some credibility to Christian belief.

So we have what we have - the life of Jesus written out of oral history from some fellow some 3-4 decades after Christs death and at a time when leaders of the Jerusalem Church (James and Peter) had died.

In Mark's version of the story Jesus is deified as a 30 yr old man at his baptism. We have no clue what Jesus was doing previous to this.

This is typical of Messianic Tradition. A man is chosen by some God after which he undergoes a trial (right after baptism Jesus is tested by Satan in the desert). The Pharaohs in Egypt had to under go a "king making ritual" - a number of them actually and some apparently could be dangerous such as ingestion of certain hallucinogenic concoctions. These rituals were conducted over the course of a year after which the King was officially deified - half man half God and was allowed to wear the crown.

In Mark there is no "virgin birth". The story has no proof of the resurrection - Jesus wandering around after death.
The story has no lineage back to David.

Just the story of a man chosen by God. A man deified by God and thereby made Son of God. Nothing new here.

He then works a few miracles (same as every other Messiah) and has a numerically significant number of followers (12)

Jesus then gets dies a tragic death as a human sacrifice (same as numerous other Messiahs).

There is nothing in this story that would not immediately familiar to the people living at that time. Where Jesus is a bit different is in his message but, this message is not something Jesus came up with.

The rock on which Jesus builds his ministry is the Golden Rule "Do unto others as you would have them do to you".

Rabbi Hillel lived in Palestine and was the spiritual leader of the Jewish people for the last third of his life until his death in 10 CE.

Hillel: "What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow: this is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn"

Jesus: "Do unto others as you would have them do to you: this sums up the law and the Prophets"

This profound message encapsulates the ministry of Jesus. This however, is a message that is already has followers prior to Jesus coming onto the scene.

Jesus ups the game by stating directly that there will be a resurrection and following this rule leads to salvation. This diverges from traditional Judaism which does not comment on "what happens" in the afterlife.

This "do good and be rewarded in the afterlife" theme was however, common to almost every other religion at the time.

The story of Mark ends with an empty tomb and the reader is left to wonder what happened to Jesus.

1-3 decades later (80-100 AD) Christianity is still around but there is not enough certainty in relation to the question of whether or not the resurrection is real.

The leader of the Church just prior to the turn of the century (95 AD) is 1 Clement.
http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/1clement-lightfoot.html

He writes a letter to the Church in Corinth- Corinthians. In this letter he argues for the resurrection.

Clement has no knowledge of any physical resurrection (Jesus wandering around in the flesh after death). He points to evidence in nature. He talks about how in Egypt there is a bird called a Phoenix which is said to be resurrected.

Clement quotes from the OT and from some unknown scripture but, he knows nothing of that actual "Proof" of resurrection - Jesus wandering around in the flesh after death.

All this "doubting" will not do.

Author of Matt to the rescue. This author uses Mark as a source document but makes a few changes.

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10057a.htm

This is not from some Jesus is myth website. It is directly from the Catholic Encyclopedia.

This author has no qualms about changing the text to make Jesus look better so he omits or alters things that present Jesus in a way he does not want Jesus presented. This author is on a mission. He is trying to beef up the image of Jesus for the good of Christianity. Pious Fraud

Matt adds a virgin birth. Jesus is no longer a man who becomes God but a God incarnate at birth.
This story also is added to make Jesus conform to what Matt mistakes as messianic tradition. The passage in Isaiah had been mistranslated from Hebrew to Greek (young woman to virgin)

Matt also adds a lineage to make Jesus better conform to Jewish messianic tradition. Linking Jesus back to David.
Matt adds a story about Jesus going to Egypt to fulfill Jewish prophecy about the Messiah coming out of Egypt.

Most importantly though ... the author of Matt adds the smoking gun. The "Proof" of resurrection. No more questioning of whether or not the resurrection is real. We know there is a resurrection because Jesus actually returned from death in the flesh.

We do not know whether or not the Physical Resurrection story was included in Matt or exactly when the story became part of Christian dogma. We do know that this was not part of Christian dogma prior to Clement - prior to the 2cnd century.

We also know that Paul has no knowledge of any Physical Resurrection. Paul likens stories of the appearance of Jesus after death to his vision. - like when folks today see the virgin mary in the clouds.

 

Did you not think I would expect you to run away as fast as you could to stick head in sand of denial ?

Yea of little faith

 

You sound like you might be familiar with the work of Richard Carrier. If not, I'd definitely suggest checking him out! He argues that Paul's Christ was never an earthly figure, not even before his death. He argues that this pre-gospel Jesus, this Pauline Jesus, is a celestial figure who in fact was killed and resurrected one of the heavenly planes or levels (not that he actually believes that himself, but rather that this was the view of Paul and those like him at the time).

Of course, as far as I'm concerned Jesus is absolutely a solar allegory, with the most obvious clues being the three days of death followed by rebirth, as the sun is seen to do at Winter Solstice, the various claims about Jesus being the light and other such motifs, and Jesus oddly being represented by a fish, which is best explained by the fact that the astrological Age of Pisces was beginning right around that time (and fish also factor into the gospels). His birth narratives in Matt and Luke likewise appear to have that kind of origin; the story is beautifully and succinctly told in astrological imagery at the beginning of Revelation 12, where instead of King Herod we have an actual dragon (or serpent), and the constellations of Virgo, Bootes and Serpens are visible at night in the northern hemisphere during December, as is Sirius, arguably the star followed by the *ahem* Persian astrologers (which is what "magi" means) in the story. I won't go into further detail about that here; I've elaborated on that in other threads anyway.

That, to me, is Jesus. Whatever reality may have existed behind that particular first name is long, long gone, replaced by a mythical and celestial dying and rising god, the sort of character worshipped by cults all over the place at that time and popular among the Roman legionaries. I think these ideas were mixed with Hebrew messianic ideas in the midst of the rebellion and war and destruction of that terribly important temple in Jerusalem, and out of that milieu a new cult (or rather, series of cults) was established that led eventually to what we have now, which of course was born of that original cult tradition and its myriad writings being adopted by the Roman Empire and, in the process, transformed into what we now know as the Catholic church. I suppose the Orthodox churches must also be counted as a close descendant of that, having split off from the imperial Catholic church as the empire was in decline.

 

I agree. The infusions of pre-existing pagan belief into the character if Jesus are almost too numerous to count. Far beyond what any objective rational thinker could attribute to an occasional coincidence.

Religion has always been a tool that the State uses to control the masses. To have Christianity come to power under Constantine and not expect that there would be manipulation is a function of ignorance and naivety. http://www.simchajtv.com/how-constantine-sold-christianity-to-the-world/