"To seek out that which was lost..."
"To seek out that which was lost..."
We present this Information as a Service to our readers... Its inclusion should not be construed as the Authors' or the Relays' endorsement of our Beliefs... or as our endorsement of theirs.. the Truth will stand on it's own Merit.
By David
Donnini
donnini@dada.it
"First of all I must thank Professor Daniel E. Gershenson (Department of Classical Studies at Tel-Aviv University) for having turned my bad english text into a decent version, and (as a person who has a deep knowledge of Hebrew language and religion) even for his precious advices and suggestions concerning Hebrew words and historical aspects of some Biblical passages". D.D.
_____________________________
We will consider the episode of Jesus'
arrest, and the legal action which was brought against
him by the Jewish authorities. The analysis of texts will
emphasise the differences between the synoptic group
(Gospels according to Matthew, Mark and Lucas) and the
fourth Gospel (according to John). What do these
differences consist of?
First of all we notice that the three synoptic Gospels
agree on the existence of a Jewish trial, and also on the
charges, witnesses, and the final sentence: a death
sentence for the crime of blasphemy, since Jesus declared
himself "son of God", in public. Concerning
this matter we may already raise some objections; in fact
a German author, Dr. Weddig Fricke, has written a whole
book, full of critical remarks, showing the
impossibility, according to ancient Jewish law, of
bringing a legal action under the conditions described by
the synoptic Gospels. Let us look at some of his most
significant assertions:
1 - Legal actions could not be
brought in a private house, but only in the proper place:
in the temple area called the "Beth Din", the
seat of the Great Sanhedrin, for capital offenses.
2 - Legal actions can not be brought at night-time,
3 - Legal actions could not be brought on the eve of a
holiday,
4 - A sentence could not be pronounced on the basis of an
extorted confession,
5 - Death sentences could only be pronounced at least 24
hours after the interrogation...
In addition to all of these important
objections, we must consider that having declared oneself
"son of God" probably was not a crime of
blasphemy nor was it at all a capital offense. The fact
simply is that the expression "son of God" was
very common and could be used to represent all human
beings: all the Jews, according to the Torah, were sons
of God; in another case the title might be used to
characterise a devoted man or somebody who had been
initiated into a condition of holiness and had taken
particular vows (like those called
"Nazirites"). There are many Hebrew expressions
like "son of the truth", meaning a particularly
honest man, "son of the light", meaning someone
who is spiritually enlightened, "son of the
darkness", meaning a hardened sinner, etc...
These and many other considerations seriously cast doubt
on the hypothesis that the synoptic authors, presenting
their version of the trial, testified to a historical
truth and did not rather proffer a personal
interpretation with the specific goal of supporting
particular doctrinaire, ideological and (why not?)
political assumptions.
A definitive blow to the historical credibility of the
synoptic presentation is dealt by the version we
encounter in the Fourth Gospel; let us look at the
differences:
1 - The synoptics say Christ was
arrested by a not well-identified crowd of people who had
been sent there by the High Priest, and they do not
reveal the identity of the one of Jesus' disciples who
offered physical resistance. On the contrary the fourth
Gospel tells of a cohort of soldiers and of a tribune, thus
giving us precise information on there having been
present a Roman military force of 600 men (...!!!...),
and it clearly says that resistance was offered by Peter
who, on that occasion, had his sword drawn, and cut off
the ear of one of the High Priest's guards. From these
circumstances we can easily understand that military
action had been explicitly initiated by Pilate. Otherwise
600 Roman soldiers would never have moved in the depth of
the night, just to arrest an unusual preacher, whose only
crime was having declared himself "son of God".
2 - The synoptics say that as soon as Jesus was arrested,
he was immediately brought to the High Priest Caiaphas'
private house. The fourth Gospel, on the other hand, says
he was brought to the house of Annas, the High Priest's
father-in-law.
3 - The synoptics relate that a legal action was brought
against Jesus in Caiaphas' house in regard of which he
maintained an obstinate silence, and did not agree to
answer any questions, but only gave a short affirmation
when asked whether or not he was the "son of
God". At this juncture the trial should have come to
a rapid end and the death sentence pronounced. The Fourth
Gospel, on the contrary, does not mention any Jewish
legal action; instead of being silent Jesus is said to
have answered the questions the people asked him and even
to have participated in a discussion but, since there was
no regular legal action brought against him, no death
sentence should have been pronounced against him, of
course. The whole thing looks like a scene from a waiting
room, before Jesus was consigned to Pilate's care; and we
can deduce from this that the entire action was not
conceived and initiated by the Jews, but rather by the
Romans, possibly with the connivance of the Jewish
authorities.
What have we emphasised so far? Two
things: first that the Synoptics seem to be resolved to
represent all the actions taken against Jesus (his
arrest, trial, and sentencing) as definitely the will of
the Jews. Nevertheless, having described a clearly
impossible trial and an irregular sentence, and having
exerted strong censorship on important issues, which the
fourth Gospel speaks about with no reluctance, they
arouse the reasonable suspicion that their version
purposely changes the meaning of events, in order to have
them conform to some preconceived notions we shall not be
loath to understand: for example, the Jews must appear to
be guilty of hostility against Jesus, and the Romans
exculpated.
The second thing we have emphasised is the indication
that all the action against Jesus was conceived and
instigated primarily by the Romans.
We can consider the way blasphemers were usually treated
by the Jews: were they arrested by Roman soldiers? Were
they consigned to Pilate, so that he might try them
according to Roman Law? Were they whipped by the Romans
and then crucified? Not any of these things! Blasphemers,
recognised as such after a regular Jewish trial, were
stoned to death by the Jews, and the Romans cared not at
all about these affairs.
If we compare the descriptions of the trials, as
presented in the four Gospels, we can find another
significant indication. Pay attention to what the
computer analysis emphasised when the description of the
Jewish trial according to Matthew (the irregular legal
action brought in the house of the High Priest) was
compared with the description of the Roman trial,
according to Mark (the legal action that was brought in
front of Pilate):
J = JEWISH TRIAL, MATTHEW (Mt 26,
62-64)
R = ROMAN TRIAL, MARK (Mk 14, 4-5, 2)
J1 - And the high priest arose, and
said unto him,
R1 - And Pilate asked him again, saying,
J2 - Answerest thou nothing?
R2 - Answerest thou nothing?
J3 - What is it which these witness
against thee?
R3 - Behold how many things they witness against thee.
J4 - But Jesus held his peace,
R4 - But Jesus yet answered nothing,
J5 - And the high priest answered and
said unto him
R5 - And Pilate asked him
J6 - ...tell us whether thou be the
Christ...
R6 - Art thou the King of the Jews?
J7 - Jesus saith unto him, Thou hast
said...
R7 - And he answering said unto them, Thou sayest it...
There can be no doubt about it: the
Jewish trial appears just like a copy of the Roman one,
with exactly the same words pronounced; although the
Fourth Gospel mentions no legal action in the house of
the High Priest, as we have already noted. In short, the
Synoptic authors reveal their need to depict the Jews as
those who wanted Jesus' death, not the Romans, which is
why they invented the existence of a previous legal
action in the house of the High Priest before the later
one in the presence of Pilate.
All these observations give us decisive elements of
interpretation: the starting point of the synoptic
tradition is the explicit need to turn the Romans'
responsibility into that of the Jews, perhaps because
admitting the Romans' responsibility would have had
unacceptable political implications.
Let us consider once again the reason
the Synoptic authors adduce for the death sentence meted
out to Jesus: his having declared himself "son of
God"; this formulation, at this point, is not
free from the suspicion of being but a mere pretext
contrived in order to turn the Romans' responsibility for
the sentence into a Jewish one. Here too we can identify
an important sort of censorship used by the authors; for
the reluctance of those who never explained certain
questions (and maintained a sort of conspiracy of
silence) to do so becomes very significant. Practically,
we now must wonder what terms the High Priest would have
employed in the Aramaic idiom that was spoken in
Palestine at that time to ask Jesus whether he was the
"son of God", in order to trap him and
charge him with blasphemy (according to the synoptic
version, of course).
Now then, everybody knows that the name of God could
absolutely not be pronounced by the Jews, as to do so
was, and still is, a substantial sacrilege. Nobody, but
the High Priest on the Day of Atonmement could pronounce
the name Yahweh; therefore, every time there was the
necessity of addressing God or referring to Him, the Jews
substituted terms like Adonai, Eloah, Supreme, Lord,
Father, etc... Just the last one, "Father",
which in Aramaic is "Abba", was the most
commonly spoken by Jesus and it is commonly used in the
Gospel texts. We can inspect these sentences: "...And
he said, Abba, Father,
all things are possible unto thee..." (Mk 14,
36), "...when he cometh in the glory of his Father
with the holy angels..." (Mk 8, 38), "...that
your Father also which is in heaven
may forgive you your trespasses..." (Mk 11, 25),
"...I thank thee, O Father,
Lord of heaven and earth..." (Mt 11. 25). Such
examples are very numerous in the Gospels.
Hence, both Jesus and the High Priest, instead of saying
"son of God", would have certainly used
the expression "son of the Father", that
has been kept in Latin as the regular "filius
Patris", which in the Aramaic idiom is rendered
by the words "bar", that means "son",
and "Abba", that means "father";
namely the entire expression is "bar Abba",
which can even be pronounced with no pause and so sounds
like the word "Barabbas" (there are
numerous similar cases: Barnabas means "son of the
master", Bartholomew means "son of
Ptolemy". etc...). Therefore the whole expression
we know as "Jesus, the son of God"
may appear in Aramaic as "Jeshu bar-Abba".
I am sure that any reader, at this point, coming to learn
of such an odd coincidence, will be somewhat surprised.
Of course I am referring to the similarity (we might even
say equality) between the expression "son of God",
as it sounds in Aramaic, and the name of the prisoner who
was liberated in the place of Jesus, that is Barabbas.
All the more so as that lucky fellow's name wasn't really
Barabbas: for the Gospels affirm he was nicknamed
Barabbas. What does this mean? Should we believe he was
"son of God" too? However, what was his
real name?
In order to be able to answer this question we must know
that some old manuscripts of the Gospel according to
Matthew, dating back to the fourth century, call this
fellow not only by his nickname but even give his real
name as "Jesous Barabbas"
(the manuscript having been written in ancient Greek). In
actuality the authors did nothing but transcribe in Greek
characters the Hebrew expression "Jeshu bar Abba",
whose meaning we already know: "Jesus the son of
God" [let all those who are reluctant to believe
this see the "Novum Testamentum Graece et
Latine", by Augustinus Merk, edited in 1933 by the
Istituto Biblico Pontificio, page 101, where the sentence
that is commonly rendered "...And they had then a
notable prisoner, called Barabbas..." (Mt 27,
16) is written "...And they had then a notable
prisoner, Jesus called Barabbas..."].
What are we to say to this?
Why have translators made Barabbas anonymous from the
fourth century on?
Indeed, why have they let us believe that Barabbas is his
real name?
What the deuce is hidden behind the curious
circumstance that during the action brought by the
Romans, two persons were brought into the presence of
Pilate: Jesus the son of God (that is Jeshu bar-Abba),
who was sentenced to death, and Jesus Barabbas (that is
exactly the same), who was liberated?
Why the Christians have always been kept in the dark
about the fact that the Aramaic "Barabbas" is
not a name but the equivalent of the modern expression
"son of God"?
As we can see, the subject begins to raise some curious
enigmas. Even so, among the many questions we cannot
answer, one, on the contrary, it appears we can: we can
be sure the Gospel narration of Christ's Passion has been
censored and is full of literary tricks contrived on
purpose so as to thoroughly distort some important
aspects of the historical truth about the way Jesus was
arrested, tried, sentenced, and executed; and about the
reasons why all of these things happened.
Please do not think there is some conjuring trick lurking
behind what we have said so far, based on plays upon
words because, if such word plays really do exist, it is
not we who are to blame, but those who wrote the Gospels
or, in any case, retouched them later.
Some other important indications, which turn out badly for the historicity of the Gospel narration of Jesus' Passion, concern the traditional explanation of the presumed necessity of the Jews' having consigned Jesus into Pilate's hands. Usually it is said that the Jews had no right to execute any death sentence. How has it been possible to affirm such a blunder? The same Gospels show it is but a botched trick; for we know that
1. Herod executed hundreds of Jews;
2. the famous adulteress who was about to be stoned by
the Jews survived thanks to Jesus who said: "...He
that is without sin among you, let him cast the first
stone at her...";
3. Saint Paul was present at the stoning of the first
Christian martyr, Stephen;
4. John the Baptist was executed by the Jews;
5. after Jesus' death the Synedrion threatened the
apostles with the death sentence;
6. James the apostle was stoned by the Jews in Jerusalem;
7. the same Jesus, according to what the Gospels affirm
in many different circumstances, ran the risk of being
stoned by the Jews...
Need we go on? There is more than
enough evidence for executions of Jews, by Jews, in the
same Gospels. Nevertheless, in Jesus' case, it is
surprisingly said that the Jews had no right to execute a
death sentence and had to put Jesus the blasphemer into
Pilate's hands.
All these things testify to one simple truth: the
desperate and unescapable necessity for the Gospels'
authors to demonstrate that, in spite of the form of a
typical Roman execution (the crucifixion), the Romans
were completely innocent of Jesus' death since only the
Jews were guilty of it, as they were his real enemies.
That is why the historical absurdity of a Roman
procurator imploring the Jewish people to liberate the
preacher was invented.
According to the Christian
"historical" version, the "praefectus
Iudaeae Pontius Pilatus" (the prefect of Judea, P.
Pilate) was compelled to liberate an outlaw, perhaps a
revolutionary, as the Gospels depict him, instead of the
preacher, because the people preferred Barabbas to Jesus.
He even tried to implore the Jews, but they insisted
crying: "Crucify him! Crucify him!" and
were resolute in their decision to liberate the outlaw
(the Fourth Gospel says the "robber")
and to let Romans execute the man who is said to have
cured blind people and lepers. It is, of course, a
topsy-turvy absurdity: reasonable persons would find it
much more logical for the robber to be executed, and a
stay of execution granted the preacher, instead of the
other way around; also for an authoritarian stance to
have been taken by the procurator instead of by the
suppliants; also for the people to have desired to set
the healer and the preacher free, rather than the
thief... Something fraudulent is hidden behind this
presentation!
How many Christians have undertaken to study that
historical period closely? How many have asked themselves
whether the presumed custom of liberating a prisoner on
the occasion of the Jewish holiday of Passover really
existed or not? How many have read the works of the
Jewish authors Philo and Josephus Flavius, Jesus' near
contemporaries, or even know they exist? These two
authors, who describe in detail customs and events in
ancient Palestine, never mention such a custom and always
depict Pilate as a cynical and hard procurator who never
asked permission of anybody and who, even less, ever
submitted himself to the popular will of the Jews but, on
the contrary, always ruled with a strong hand and
atrocious cruelty. The Pilate of the Gospels, in front of
the shouting crowd, declares himself defeated and
announces blamelessly: "I'll wash my hands, you
are responsible for this innocent blood, not I!"
and then sets free a man many theologians want to
identify as a revolutionary, one who fought the might of
the Roman invaders.
At this point, into the mouth of the Jews there has
been put a sentence that is a real ideological manifesto:
"...Then answered all the people, and
said: - His blood be on us and on our children..."
(Matt. 27, 25). This is the starting point of a
two-thousand years old anti-Semitism. The Jews of
Jesus' days seem aware of their fate and, what is more
curious, ready to accept it: the terrible war against the
Romans, the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple, the
massacre of hundreds of thousands of them, the Diaspora,
the persecutions perpetrated by the Christians, the
Inquisition, the infamous name
"perfidious Jews", two thousand
years of oppression and extermination...
Well then, here is a dramatic confirmation; the authors
who composed the four Gospel texts called canonical by
the Church (meaning they are the only ones that evidence
the truth) had without a doubt a fixed idea: they had
to discredit the Hebrew race and cover it with shame for
having wanted the death of the "son of God"; so
sanctifying and excusing Christianity's historically
hostile attitude towards Judaism.
Racism was generated and nourished by this inexpedient
affirmation of the Gospel according to Matthew.
Nevertheless, if the infamy of having killed the Lord
belongs to anyone, it is not the Jews but the Romans, of
that we can be sure. In fact they had invaded Palestine,
incorporated it into their empire, and made its
inhabitants subjects of the emperor; they painstakingly
repressed every national-religious rising, especially one
in a country very difficult to subdue; a country where,
for many centuries, prophecies had spoken of a
Messiah-king, son of David, who should repeat the deeds
of the ancient sovereign who had created the united
kingdom of the twelve tribes of Israel; a country where
messianic movements (Essenes and Zealots) had arisen and
grown strong as never before.
What on earth were the Gospel authors
interested in hiding with their adulteration of the
historical truth? That is exactly what we are looking
for. The trouble is that the man Pilate's soldiers had
arrested never wanted to found a new non-Judaic religion;
he never thought of considering the ancient agreement
between Yahweh and his people cancelled; nor did he ever
preach to the non- circumcised; there are different
explicit occasions in the New Testament in which Jesus
speaks of his unequivocal resolve not to preach to
non-Jews, but only "...rather to the lost sheep of
the house of Israel" (Mt 10, 6) [see also: Mt 15,
21-28]; he was born and grew up a Hebrew, and as a
Hebrew he lived and died, absolutely determined to remain
such.
"Christ" (Christos = anointed, a term that
translates the Aramaic word Mashiha = Messiah = anointed
into Greek) has been made the Romans' butt on purpose,
and the Romans tried and executed one so named because one
of the messianic movements of Jesus' days (which were
similar to the Essenic ones, if not identical to those of
the Essenes who were installed at Kirbeth Qumran, the
authors of the famous and comtroversial Dead Sea Scrolls)
identified in his person the fated one of whom the
messianic prophecies spoke: the chosen of God, the son of
David, the anointed of Yahweh, who was to return the
house of Israel to its sons, taking it away from the
pagan usurpers, away from the hated family of the
Herodian monarchs, and away from the corrupt priestly
caste of the Sadducees.
Such a man could not end his days but on the Roman
gallows, the cross, with a tri-lingual inscription on it:
"Melek hay-Yehudim - Basileus ton Ioudaion - Rex
Iudaeorum (= King of the Jews)", whose meaning is
more than evident: sentenced to death because he was
recognised guilty of rebellion against the imperial
authority, since he attempted to re-establish David's
crown on the throne of Israel.
In fact, one thousand years before, the first man to
reign over the united twelve tribes of Israel was David,
and he also made Jerusalem his capital city,and there he
wanted to build a huge temple to the Lord (not that he
brought this project into being, but rather his son
Solomon). David was the first Messiah (anointed King) of
Israel, and to the Jews the idea that the Messiah united
spiritual with political power causes no repugnance
(exactly like to the Hindus the idea that the Mahatma
Ghandi united spiritual with political power causes no
repugnance); on the contrary, they have no problem
accepting that he even be a warrior who fights and
defeats all the enemies of God's nation.
The term Messiah comes from the typical ceremony of
regal investiture: unction or anointing (Mashiha =
anointed). The king of Israel had not only political
dignity, he was also to be the favourite of God, as he
had particular faith and devotion to the Lord of Israel;
he received from the hands of the High Priest the
ointment of myrrh, sweet cinnamon, spikenard, cassia, and
olive oil (Exodus 30, 23-24) and with it he was declared
"anointed of the Lord", that means
earthly representative of that sovereignty over the
Jewish nation which is due only to Yahweh.
Let us consider a famous episode in the
Gospel story, from which the typical Christian feast
called Palm Sunday is derived: on the Sunday before
Easter the whole Christian world celebrates Jesus' entry
into Jerusalem, when he, riding on an ass, was welcomed
by an applauding crowd and by a chorus of hosanna. The
episode is called the Messianic Entry, and this name
could not be more appropriate: "...Blessed be the
KINGDOM OF OUR FATHER DAVID, that cometh in the name of
the Lord..." (Mk 11, 10). "...Blessed be
THE KING THAT COMETH IN THE NAME OF THE LORD..."
(Lk 19, 38). "...On the next day much people that
were come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was
coming to Jerusalem, took branches of palm trees, and
went forth to meet him, and cried, Hosanna: BLESSED IS
THE KING OF ISRAEL THAT COMETH IN THE NAME OF THE LORD.
And Jesus, when he had found a young ass, sat thereon; as
it is written, fear not, daughter of Sion
(=Jerusalem): behold, THY KING COMETH, sitting on an
ass's colt..." (John 12, 12-15).
The evangelist John makes an explicit reference to a
Biblical prophecy in which a messianic liberator is
spoken of; the prophet Zechariah says that conquered
Jerusalem can exult because its King, riding an ass, is
coming to turn out all the foreign oppressors: "...Rejoice
greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of
Jerusalem: behold, thy King cometh unto thee: he is just,
and having salvation; lowly, and riding upon an ass, and
upon a colt the foal of an ass...." (Zechariah
9, 9).
As we see, Jesus was welcomed by everybody as the
awaited liberator, as the son of David, as the King of
Israel; reading the episodes we can easily deduce not
only Jesus' religious worth, but his political worth as
well. Both Jesus and the evangelists could have denied
the interpretation offered by the people, had only they
wanted to (I mean they could have, had Jesus or the
evangelists had the specific intention of specifying that
his mission was not political but only spiritual). Why
then should they have told us that Jesus' entry into
Jerusalem was the very fulfilment of the messianic
prophecy, if they had truly meant to distinguish between
the spiritual mission of Jesus and the political mission
of the awaited Messiah? Why should they have insisted
on calling him "son of David" so many times
(twelve times in the Gospels), thus attesting his full
right to the crown of Israel, as a descendant of the
dynasty of the ancient founder of the kingdom?
The synoptic Gospels tell of another famous episode:
Jesus' anointing in the village of Bethany. What is very
curious is that the synoptic authors seem determined to
disguise the true meaning of the episode. Let us consider
the following elements:
1. the protagonists are all anonymous,
but for the host, who is identified as a Pharisee named
Simon, and the star of the scene is just simply "a
woman": "...there came a woman having an
alabaster box of ointment of spikenard very precious; and
she brake the box, and poured it on his head..."
(Mk 14, 3);
2. the time is after the messianic entry, for Mark and
Matthew, or long before it, for Luke;
3. Luke doesn't name the village: "...a woman in
the city, which was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus
sat at meat in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster
box of ointment...began to wash his feet with tears, and
did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his
feet, and anointed them with the ointment" (Lk
7, 37).
Many theologians even try to minimise
the differences by proposing the lame excuse that the
episode in Luke is not the same. As in many other cases,
the synoptic authors submit the events to heavy
censorship; in fact if we read John's version of the
episode something surprising happens: all the
protagonists have names and the time is just before the
messianic entry: "...Martha served: but Lazarus
was one of them that sat at the table with him. Then took
Mary a pound of ointment of spikenard, very costly, and
anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped his feet with her
hair..." (John 12, 2-3).
We even note that this poor woman, whom Luke calls "a
sinner", had in her hands an alabaster box full
of a whole pound of very precious spikenard. It may be
that today many readers have not the slightest idea what
that means: do poor women usually have large amounts of
the most expensive perfumes at hand? The evangelist John
avers it cost three hundred pence, that is... sort of
thousands of dollars!
Well, then she broke the alabaster box and poured the
spikenard on Jesus' head, or on his feet. And here is the
clue to the circumstance: "...And there were some
that had indignation within themselves, and said, why was
this waste of the ointment made? For it might have been
sold for more than three hundred pence, and have been
given to the poor. And they murmured against her...And
Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve, went unto the chief
priests, to betray him unto them. And when they heard it,
they were glad, and promised to give him money. And he
sought how he might conveniently betray him" (Mk
14, 4-11).
What on earth did she do to stir up everybody's wrath?
How could she have induced that reaction in Judas? Are we
to believe that the waste of perfume was truly the reason
Judas convinced himself that it was better to betray his
Lord Jesus? Or should we rather believe that somebody has
been trying to tease us, and to take from us any
understanding of the real meaning of the episode?
I am sure many readers, at this point, have noticed the
succession of events:
1. Jesus Christ is anointed with
spikenard, like a new Messiah;
2. somebody is disappointed at that public anointment;
3. Judas the betrayer runs to the chief priests;
4 the next day Jesus Christ makes a messianic entry into
Jerusalem, during which the people welcome him as the
King of Israel;
5. on the eve of the holiday, in the night-time, Jesus
gathers his disciples, fitted out with swords, on the
Mount of Olives. They hope their action will be followed
by the many thousands of people come to Jerusalem for the
great Passover of the Jews;
6. six hundred Roman soldiers, informed by Judas of the
place and time of the revolutionary assembly, come, and,
after a short fight, arrest Jesus;
7. the man is tried by Romans and sentenced to death;
8. he is crucified as a rebel.
So, what about Mary's deed?
Now the answer is very simple: it was a mock Messianic
anointing, a public declaration of the arrival of the
Messiah of Israel, the King of the Jews. That is the
reason for the reactions of those who did not agree with
the views and opinions of Messianic movements, like
Essenes and Zealots. Many people, in the Palestine of
Jesus' days, thought the ideas of the Messianic movements
too dangerous:
"...If we let him thus alone, all men will
believe on him: and the Romans shall come and take away
both our place and nation..." says one of the
chief priests, and the High Priest goes on: "...consider
that it is expedient for us, that one man should die for
the people,and that the whole nation perish not..."
(John 11, 48-50).
And what about Judas?
What is more logical than to understand how troubled he
was when he realised that not everybody in Jerusalem
agreed with the revolutionary plans of the partisans of
Yahweh? On the occasion of the banquet in the house of
Simon, when Jesus was anointed in the presence of priests
and Pharisees, he saw how much political resistance there
was to the idea of a Messianic revolution.
That is why he seriously began to believe the exploit to
have no hope of success, and the danger of being arrested
and crucified by the Romans to be very real and present.
He did not succeed in saving his life anyway: the other
partisans who could escape the arrest set him a trap; and
a few hours later he was killed and his bowels spread on
the ground as a warning to all betrayers.
Shortly after the execution of the
aspirant-Messiah, a certain Shaul, a Hebrew who was born
and grew up in Anatolia, and was accustomed to living
together with heathens, and who would rather compromise
with the non- circumcised than clash with them, perceived
the insane dangerousness of the traditional and radical
interpretation that Essenes and Zealots put upon the
Messianic prophecies; according to them direct conflict
with the enormous power of Rome and her Hebrew footmen
(the Sadducean caste and the Herodian family) would lead
to victory because of the support of Yahweh himself.
Shaul, whom we call St. Paul, was fully aware of the
possibility that the Romans might soon have enough of
this small but indomitable province of their empire, and
might decide to have done with it.
Even the Sadducees shared that opinion, since they were
in a very comfortable position: protected by the Romans,
as well as being rich and having great influence and
prestige in Judean society. We have already quoted the
words of the High Priest who spoke of his fear for the
possible reaction of the Romans against Jewish
fundamentalism. He was right: what the Sadducees and Paul
and the Pharisees were afraid of, came literally true
when, in the year 70, the Romans really decided to have
done with Judea. They massacred thousands and thousands
of Jews, destroyed Jerusalem and sacked the temple and
put it to the torch.
At first, sharing the views of the Hebrew conservatives,
Shaul the Pharisee was an obstinate persecutor of the
dangerous adherents of the Messianic sects (alias the
Christians; please note that the word
"christian" is simply the translation into
Greek of the Hebrew word "messianic"); then, as
time passed, he was to realise that this way the
national-religious fanaticism of the Essene and Zealotic
sects would not dampen. Unfortunately even nowadays we
see that there is no weapon that can get the better of
ethnic-religious fundamentalism.
Therefore Shaul convinced himself that opposing arms to
ethnic-religious purity is of no use; you only risk
getting the opposite effect; ideas must be fought with
ideas. In fact ethnic-religious fanaticism satisfies a
psychological need that is closely connected with
unconscious feelings of identity and popular pride; the
only thing which can compete with that is another
psychological image, another idea tailored to the need to
satisfy people's unconscious needs, to give them an
identity and a self-respect that is more than the tribal
feeling of being part of a given group.
Well then, the only way to fight the dangerous messianic
hope of Israel's national-religious salvation was to
create a new messianic hope of salvation, still greater,
still more responsive to the psychological needs of the
people: the idea of a universal spiritual salvation, of a
Messiah who was not to rescue the small house of Israel
but all of mankind, especially the poor, the humble, the
oppressed, the weak, the sick, the suffering, from their
subjection to evil.
Thus Shaul invented the new image of the Messiah
(fictitious but winning): Jesus Christ the risen from the
dead. He composed this image by grafting onto the remains
of the old Messiah (real but politically unsuccessful),
who continued to stir up the ardour and the hope of his
irreducible followers, the character of the oriental
spiritual Saviours, like the Greek Soter, the Persian
Saoshyant, and the Indian Buddha.
It was the most genial theological composition ever put
into practice from the time that history began. It was
the syncretistic meeting of a number of religious
components: Hebrew, Egyptian, Hellenic, Persian, and
Indian. Destined to become the spiritual guide to the
subsequent development of all the western civilisation.
It was really able to knock down the pagan Roman Empire
(unlike its historical counterpart).
Not that Shaul converted himself on his way to
Damascus, but the Christian idea revealed a new
dimension, not just right for the future of Israel, but
for the future of all of mankind.
When this theological and ideological revision was made,
it elicited much more popular response than the original
faith in the aspiring Messiah of Israel and his
followers; and the Hebrew traditionalists (devoted to
their national-religious idea) were seen as an obstacle
to the development of the new supra-national idea. Not
this alone, but the image of the historical aspiring
Messiah of the Jews and his patriotic immolation became
an obstacle to the image of the universal Messiah, the
apolitical one, solely spiritual, who promised salvation
in the kingdom of Heaven, not on earth.
The new Christians were also persecuted by the Romans
because they could not forget that the original Messiah
was a dangerous martyr of the liberation movement, who
could even infect other subject nations of their Empire
with his ideas.
That is why the Evangelists were absolutely compelled
to distance themselves from the Jews and to turn the
Romans' responsibility into the responsibility of the
Jews.
That is why the Gospel stories are filled with tricks,
with the purpose of readjusting the image of the Messiah
to the new theology.
That is how the Gospels were conceived and written.
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