Some thoughts on Jesus of Nazareth.
Jesus was a man who, just over two thousand years ago, in a land called Palestine, died at the relatively early age of thirty three. He was condemned, as were thousands of others, by the Roman jurisdiction to brutal torture and death by crucifixion, despite not being a threat to the Roman Empire and charged only with religious crimes by a Jewish establishment. Though not unique as an example of state sponsored miscarriage of justice, the case remains an iconic watershed down the ages. He got crucified not for challenging the prevailing civil power or for committing crimes but because he was seen as a threat to the established religious order and power structure.
Crucially although a Jew himself, familiar with the Hebrew Scriptures, he claimed to be Divine and to fulfil the Messianic prophesies, even supporting them with impressive teachings, life-style and miraculous works. This was too much for the Scribes and Pharisees, who were insistent he, in a modern turn of phrase, be 'neutralised' in the only way possible, for which the Roman authorities duly obliged to keep the peace, however ironic that might sound.
As we still witness today, justice was secondary to political expediency and a life was of little consequence when balanced against potential civil unrest and the cooperation of society in general. It weighed less if societal elites could maintain their power and influence. Little did those largely forgotten men realise the lasting effects of their outrageous behaviour or how the crucifixion would take on lasting spiritual and moral significance for ages to come.
In a relatively small and unimportant region of the globe, now called Palestine and/or Israel, this man who instituted a religion and influencing the world arguably more than any other, remains an enigma - a shadowy figure in the history of the world. His reputation rests on perhaps just three brief years of travelling on foot in the region, interacting with the common people, talking and teaching, showing empathy and emotion, intervening to lesson life's trials and tribulations whenever and wherever he was presented with them, sometimes with claimed miraculous results.
Amazing powers, physical, psychological and philosophical were accorded to him in the four manuscripts, subsequently written and amazingly preserved over the next two thousand years and into the future. We call them 'the Gospels' which form an integral part of the Judeo/Christian scriptures termed the Bible. This ' Good News' was written by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John and remain virtually the only biographic sources for the man, 'Jesus of Nazareth'.
Despite his historical stature and reputational longevity, these are not biographies in the modern sense. Nor do they stand up as historical accounts. Rather they are a collection of anecdotal stories - just snippets of a life - some parts much more detailed than others, depending very much on the memories of the writers. We have got so used to having them, they have achieved an iconic status which may cloud our view of the earthly Jesus character in a fog of religious interpretation and dogma.
Much still depends on how accurate the Gospel accounts are, how reliable the memories of the writers? Although focusing on the same life, and broadly agreeing on main events, they do vary in detail and empathis, some being more comprehensive than others. The texts have been handed down but very little is known about the circumstances of their creation. They are not signed and dated so this day has to be inferred from other facts.
If asked to record an account of our parents lives, how much would we remember? How accurate would it be? How much less, despite the familial link and relative closeness in time, our grandparents? Yet the accounts of the sayings, actions and events of the life of Jesus achieved written form, fifty to a hundred years after the events described. Not surprisingly they differ in detail and emphasis, though broadly agreeing throughout. An identical account would immediately lead to suspicions of collusion and unreliability.
Nothing in them helps us with the process of their creation in the way of a modern foreword, introduction or even sleeve note might do today. The authors emerge almost from nowhere and lack detail although they do pop up briefly in the accounts, enough to get a vague idea how and why they relate to their heroic subject. How helpful it would have been if the writers had said a little about themselves, their personal interaction with and impression of, their subject; of how, why and where they came to put 'quill to papyrus'.
It is fascinating to ponder on how these four men, later lionised as 'Saints' and part of a larger group of twelve followers or disciples, managed to record events and sayings for posterity. None it appears, assumed their present form, until at least a life time after the events described, yet they are full of detail and assurance.
Of course the thrust of the accounts is that the man was not only a unique individual with a unique message but also in some remarkable way, God incarnate! It is this assertion that has both inspired and divided humanity ever since.
THE FACE OF CHRIST? (THE TURIN SHROUD)
(Subject to its own intense scrutiny and controversy)
Of the Gospels, Mark is the earliest, probably written between 70 and 75. Matthew is next - written somewhere between 75 and about 85, maybe even a little later than that. Luke is a little later still, being written between 80 and maybe 90 or 95. And, John's gospel is the latest, usually dated around 95, although it may have been completed slightly later than that, as well. All four then, were written by people contemporaneous to the events described and within a century of them.
In comparison to modern works of history, they have no bibliography or list of sources and cannot refer to photographs, tape recordings of interviews or filmed events. They are even free of images or maps so we are reliant wholly and solely on words, words that have had to be translated from their original Arabic, Greek and Latin to one that has meaning to English speakers - not to mention all the other languages into which it has been translated! While Jesus probably spoke Aramaic, the New Testament was written in Greek. The English term gospel comes from the Old English godspell, a translation of the Greek noun euangelion.
It is hard now to detach Jesus of Nazareth from the iconic cultural and religious status that has been established over two thousand years, particularly in the post-Roman European arena. With time, emigration and empire, it spread to other continents with only those in the far east, largely unaffected. For fifteen hundred years of that, Christ was viewed and interpreted through the prism of the huge and influential bureaucracy called the Roman Catholic Church, essentially a creation of Constantine, a Roman Emperor. With decline and fall of the Roman Empire and civilization, the Church in large measure took its place, challenged only from the 16th Century onwards with emergence of North European Protestantism. The Eastern Churches flowed from the separation of the Roman Empire and its establishment in Constantinople, named after the Emperor Constantine, and the Byzantine or Eastern Empire that lasted from 330 to 1204 (or thereabouts!)
The protestant revolution or evolution undermined the power of the Western Catholic Church and involved a demystification of the Jesus story and making him and his death more personal to the individual as the guarantor of life after death. The role of the Catholic Church and Priestly office was effectively down-graded and became no longer essential for salvation. It also modified the persona of Jesus, making him more human, insofar the Bible now became more accessible in the native language rather than Latin and in every home rather than just chained to a church lectern or monastery library.
It had a profound effect on the spirit of independance and enquiry that fuelled the scientific and cultural revolution that followed, ironically used to undermine all the tenets of the Christian faith and dogma.
The Bible has longevity for a reason, the reason being it is foundational to our society and psychological existence. It operates on many levels and it has to be read with reasoned interpretation. Is it the word of God or is it Man's concept of what it might be? It is both. Is it historical fact or mystical belief? It is both.
The reading is only the first stage of a process; it is the interaction that is important. It speaks to the mind, to the body and to the soul, depending on what you want from it. It can be objective. It can be subjective. Start at the beginning and work to the end, or dip in as the mood takes you. Even the lists of 'begats' are not without their purpose: they put us in our place and remind us of the inumerable number of persons who have gone before and how insignificant we are.
Every sort of person and behaviour is represented over thousands of years of human development, all thousands of years ago, but influencing the ones in between. Being reviled and adored in equal and opposite measure. Its stories are apocryphal, tragic and inspiring. Its descriptions of despair and longing unequalled. Its prophesies inexplicable and mesmerising. It is a work of literary genius that has a spiritual and moral dimension that aims towards human fulfillment and virtue. It help us cope with the real world and with our real selves. Jesus of Nazareth is represented to be pivotal in human history, a fulfillment of all that is divine in man, indeed God in human form, through which by faith and belief, the inner man can be transformed and renewed, requiring no human intervention or intercesstion.
What does the Bible have it say about it all?
"Guard your steps when you go to the house of God. To draw near to listen is better than to offer the sacrifice of fools, for they do not know that they are doing evil. Be not rash with your mouth, nor let your heart be hasty to utter a word before God, for God is in heaven and you are on earth. Therefore let your words be few. For a dream comes with much business, and a fool's voice with many words. When you vow a vow to God, do not delay paying it, for he has no pleasure in fools. Pay what you vow. It is better that you should not vow than that you should vow and not pay."
And then there is: "For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account."
And then again, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."
Make of it what you will and good luck! Remember, "Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent." END.
Easter '23: Yesterday was just another boring day in my uneventful life. I am in awe of everyone on here who seem to have such exciting lives, so full of skips, hops and jumps, although today I think it's just called 'the Triple'. I suppose it saves on characters? Easter is nevertheless a special sort of time with its religious connotations. I always feel a spiritual pull towards the events of that time, encapsulating the best and worst aspects of human nature, interwoven into people and the past. The world would still exist without people but history could not. However we interpret life or try to give meaning to our existence, it is a journey or even a pilgrimage to wisdom and enlightenment - or should be. Everyone has the ability to be inspired and inspiring - the 'light' that shines in every person as Quakers believe. I think there is something in that. Jesus said don't put it under a 'bushel' - apparently a wooden bucket of eight gallons! - but let it shine forth and be a light unto men. So I made my weary way to Ludgvan Church across the fields and met two tired walkers on the St Michael's way resting on a bench outside it: modern day pilgrims. The church was dark and empty and silent, an anachronistic structure taking us almost half way back to those events in Jerusalem two milenia ago, that have reverberated down the centuries. They test our powers of belief. They shock our modern sensibilities. They challenge the view of ourselves - our sophisticated, self-satisfied complacency. I walked back in a gentle rain, the sea on my left, St Michael's Mount arising out of. and surrounded by the restless waves, and I thought of those Phoenician traders from Tyre who came for the tin, and wondered if indeed, as the mythology holds, that that Man of Destiny came with them, and perhaps even took in the same view?
The following are relevant straight lifts from Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_reliability_of_the_Gospels#:~:text=The%20scholarly%20consensus%20is%20that,than%20the%20testimony%20of%20eyewitnesses.
The four canonical gospels were first mentioned between 120 and 150 by Justin Martyr, who lived c.100-185. Justin had no titles for them and simply called them the "memoirs of the Apostles", but around 185 Iraneus, a bishop of Lyon who lived c.130–c.202, attributed them to: 1) Matthew, an apostle who followed Jesus in his earthly career; 2) Mark, who while himself not a disciple was the companion of Peter, who was; 3) Luke, the companion of Paul, the author of the Pauline epistles; and 4) John, who like Matthew was an apostle who had known Jesus. The scholarly consensus is that they are the work of unknown Christians and were composed c.68-110 AD. The majority of New Testament scholars agree that the Gospels do not contain eyewitness accounts; but that they present the theologies of their communities rather than the testimony of eyewitnesses.
Matthew and Luke also share a large amount of material which is not found in Mark; this appears in the same order in each, although not always in the same contexts, leading scholars to the conclusion that in addition to Mark they also shared a lost source called the Q document (from "Quelle", the German word for "source); its existence and use alongside Mark by the authors of Matthew and Luke seems the most convincing solution to the synoptic problem.
Matthew and Luke contain some material unique to each, called the M source (or Special Matthew) for Matthew and the L source (Special Luke) for Luke. This includes some of the best-known stories in the gospels, such as the birth of Christ and the parables of the good Samaritan (apparently an invention by the author of Luke) and the "pearl of great price".
The Hebrew scriptures were also an important source for all three, and for John. Direct quotations number 27 in Mark, 54 in Matthew, 24 in Luke, and 14 in John, and the influence of the scriptures is vastly increased when allusions and echoes are included. Half of Mark's gospel, for example, is made up of allusions to and citations of the scriptures, which he uses to structure his narrative and to present his understanding of the ministry, passion, death and resurrection of Jesus (for example, the final cry from the cross, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" is an exact quotation from Psalm 22:1). Matthew contains all Mark's quotations and introduces around 30 more, sometimes in the mouth of Jesus, sometimes as his own commentary on the narrative, and Luke makes allusions to all but three of the Old Testament books.
The New Testament has been preserved in more than 5,800 fragmentary Greek manuscripts, 10,000 Latin manuscripts and 9,300 manuscripts in various other ancient languages including Syriac, Slavic, Ethiopic and Armenian. Not all biblical manuscripts come from orthodox Christian writers. For example, the Gnostic writings of Valentinus come from the 2nd century AD, and these Christians were regarded as heretics by the mainstream church.[111] The sheer number of witnesses presents unique difficulties, although it gives scholars a better idea of how close modern bibles are to the original versions.[111] Bruce Metzger says "The more often you have copies that agree with each other, especially if they emerge from different geographical areas, the more you can cross-check them to figure out what the original document was like. The only way they'd agree would be where they went back genealogically in a family tree that represents the descent of the manuscripts.[102]
In "The Text Of The New Testament", Kurt Aland and Barbara Aland compare the total number of variant-free verses, and the number of variants per page (excluding spelling errors), among the seven major editions of the Greek NT (Tischendorf, Westcott-Hort, von Soden, Vogels, Merk, Bover and Nestle-Aland), concluding that 62.9%, or 4,999/7,947, are in agreement.[112] They concluded, "Thus in nearly two-thirds of the New Testament text, the seven editions of the Greek New Testament which we have reviewed are in complete accord, with no differences other than in orthographical details (e.g., the spelling of names). Verses in which any one of the seven editions differs by a single word are not counted. ... In the Gospels, Acts, and Revelation the agreement is less, while in the letters it is much greater"[112] Per Aland and Aland, the total consistency achieved in the Gospel of Matthew was 60% (642 verses out of 1,071), the total consistency achieved in the Gospel of Mark was 45% (306 verses out of 678), the total consistency achieved in the Gospel of Luke was 57% (658 verses out of 1,151), and the total consistency achieved in the Gospel of John was 52% (450 verses out of 869).[112] Almost all of these variants are minor, and most of them are spelling or grammatical errors. Almost all can be explained by some type of unintentional scribal mistake, such as poor eyesight. Very few variants are contested among scholars, and few or none of the contested variants carry any theological significance. Modern biblical translations reflect this scholarly consensus where the variants exist, while the disputed variants are typically noted as such in the translations.[113]
A quantitative study on the stability of the New Testament compared early manuscripts to later manuscripts, up to the Middle Ages, with the Byzantine manuscripts, and concluded that the text had more than 90% stability over this time period.[114] It has been estimated that only 0.1% to 0.2% of the New Testament variants impact the meaning of the texts in any significant fashion.[114]
An illustration of a European
scribe at work
The original manuscripts of the New Testament books are not known to have survived. The autographs are believed to have been lost or destroyed a long time ago. What survives are copies of the original. Generally speaking, these copies were made centuries after the originals from other copies rather than from the autograph. Paleography, a science of dating manuscripts by typological analysis of their scripts, is the most precise and objective means known for determining the age of a manuscript. Script groups belong typologically to their generation; and changes can be noted with great accuracy over relatively short periods of time. Dating of manuscript material by a radiocarbon dating test requires that a small part of the material be destroyed in the process.[23] Both radiocarbon and paleographical dating only give a range of possible dates, and it is still debated just how narrow this range might be. Dates established by radiocarbon dating can present a range of 10 to over 100 years. Similarly, dates established by paleography can present a range of 25 to over 125 years.[24]
Earliest extant manuscripts[edit]
The earliest manuscript of a New Testament text is a business-card-sized fragment from the Gospel of John, Rylands Library Papyrus P52, which may be as early as the first half of the 2nd century. The first complete copies of single New Testament books appear around 200, and the earliest complete copy of the New Testament, the Codex Sinaiticus dates to the 4th century. The following table lists the earliest extant manuscript witnesses for the books of the New Testament.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sources_for_the_historicity_of_Jesus#:~:text=Non%2DChristian%20sources%20that%20are,Epistles%20and%20the%20Synoptic%20Gospels.
Euangelion soon became a technical term for the good news about Jesus Christ. In 1 Thessalonians 1:5, Paul writes that “our gospel came to you not simply with words, but also with power, with the Holy Spirit and with deep conviction.” This is one of the earliest New Testament letters, and Paul uses euangelion for the oral proclamation of the good news about Jesus Christ.
Eventually, euangelion was used to describe the written versions of the good news about Jesus Christ. Mark introduces his work with the words, “The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God” (Mark 1:1, emphasis added). The church eventually came to call all four of these accounts gospels.
Planet Earth
12 May 2004
An Open Letter
PERSONAL
God, Almighty
Everywhere
All the time
For all time
Attention: 6.4 billion souls and counting
An Open Letter To The Creator
Subject: A quick résumé of present situation
I hope you do not mind the intrusion, but I would just like to make you aware of just how wrong, things are going down here on your creation.
As it stands, we haven’t got a prayer, if you still insist on doing nothing.
Evil is prevalent here, child abuse : infants working in sweat shops, child prostitution, open slavery, civil wars, terrorists killing in your good name, millions of refugees displaced and scattered beyond belief, famines ravage huge populations, wars rage all over the globe, in fact since we began to worship you as the one true God, there has never been a time where conflicts didn’t exist, racism at local, national and international levels, corruption within and throughout all forms of government, all because they could base their laws loosely upon yours.
Child abuse is prevalent throughout the clergy, your humble servants here on earth, your spokesmen so to speak, abuse your worshippers, the very children you have said shall come to you unhindered, yet you stay silent ! Your senior representative here, is an old frail man, who has dedicated his life to you. He is paraded around as you would a prize animal. He has served you faithfully, yet you give him no peace.
The power of money has corrupted all global societies to such a level, it has become an icon equal to you in millions of peoples eyes. There are so many generations growing up now, who pray to the lotto icon more often than they pray to you.
The upper levels of hierarchy within your church adore themselves with robes of fine materials and woven gold, they remind you of the Pharisees of old. The majority of your churches around the world have fallen into disrepair.
The birthplace of your religion, is an area known globally as an area only associated with war and destruction. Your followers are arguing amongst themselves, on just how much they love you. So much so that they are willing to bomb, kill and maim, total strangers on the other side of the earth (you conveniently forgot to mention in your book even existed) just how good it is to understand, love and respect you in their own unique way.
In some countries, they don’t even believe in you, and never have. Some civilisations have existed far longer than religious teachings would have us believe, and it hasn’t killed them off ….. yet. I don’t know if your plan was to keep Christianity a secret, but because we are just mortals, we thought it would be a great idea if everyone knew about it, because we didn’t know about them.
That’s when a lot of things started to go terribly wrong down here. Just think, they were not only against Christianity, they thought it was an insult to their own traditional ways. Rest assured, as good Christians, we certainly changed their minds. We invented weapons of destruction, which we know are evil but we found out if we made and used them in your name, then they could become holy messengers from the skies, just like in your book.
It took some time, but within two thousand years, we managed to wipe out quite a decent number of those heathens you dislike so much, but created anyway. Humans are presently trying to get points of view across to each other, in the only way you obviously want us to, in your big mysterious plan.
Each day, huge amounts of money change hands, if pictures or footage of war-crimes can be found. The gorier the detail, the higher the price, the more important a person is, yet again, the higher the price. Is this really part of your plan ? Or is it history repeating itself on a global scale ?
Isn’t it weird, the same problems that have faced societies before their eventual downfall, are being repeated all over the world because for the first time, we actually all know about the rest of the world. Every single day, thousands of people around the globe die unnecessarily due to conflicts, and millions are affected both directly and indirectly. People are being hunted down and killed for nothing more than pride. Gang warfare tears communities apart, drugs have taken over the streets in so many countries as they are better structured to run, than the social system in the same area.
Recently a country here in Europe, deposed a dictator, they held a “kangaroo court” and executed him and other members of his family. This wasn’t the end of the story though, since then the country has been torn asunder with civil unrest.
Even more recently a deposed dictator was hunted to his hiding place, a hole in the ground. This came at a price though ; thousands killed and injured, lots of civilians of course, don’t worry they weren’t Christians, but hey, great plan. They are still fighting in his country, funnily enough they haven’t understood that they are no longer under a dictatorship and should just be glad that the soldiers are there to help them. You cant expect everyone to be winners in a war can you ? That would be impossible wouldn’t it ? But not for you.
I mean lets get a little personal here for a second, you have been around since, well since time began, haven’t we suffered enough yet ? You could do something couldn’t you ?
How many parents have to send their children off to a foreign country, they know little about, for a reason they don’t quite understand ?
How many world wars do we have to endure ? We got really “intelligent” last time round, really fast, and we gave birth to a new wonder called atomic energy. It must have been a part of your great plan, although I must admit I have to question your methods. The plan must have included us developing this technology. It must have been absolutely correct to test and drop these devices, not only in deserts and tundra’s, but in the oceans and finally onto fellow non-Christian human beings.
Thanks to technology, we are developing at this moment in time, devices that can achieve the same amount of human casualties, but not structural damage. We have understood the folly of wasting precious buildings, wanting only to get rid of the non-Christian human infestation, and we can do this with bacteria. We don’t quite know what the full consequence of such a device would have and how long a period the area would be inhabitable, but I am sure its safe to do this as long as they are used in your name.
We have stopped waiting for those politicians to find peaceful methods, the largest organisation in the world accepts a small war or two, as long as they are recorded as saying they were against it from the start. They call it the United Nations but we know its just a name.
The world seems to be run on money which doesn’t exist, it has a temporary worth which fluctuates as and when needed, and the entire globe is lubricated by a fluid called oil. It comes from the depths of the oceans and is the remains of what used to live here hundreds of millions of years ago. That part was never mentioned either, but then again I am sure you had your reasons.
I cannot fathom why you actually put the things we need to burn and pollute the environment with in such hard to reach places, I mean it must essential to rid the planet of all that tropical rain forest for oil exploration. Why worry about all those animals who live there ? They only get in the way and some of them are downright dangerous to us humans, Christian and non-Christians alike. So deforestation must be a major point in your agenda. Now then, what about that oil under the sea bed. It certainly took us quite some time to find it, but we persevered, lost a few hundred lives or so, but we did it.
In doing so we have been able to achieve a vast amount of great things, we can poison huge areas of sea water when we dump the crude excess, but with so much water, who is going to notice ? Don’t worry, people haven’t noticed the dwindling fish populations, and dumping petrochemical wastes thousands of miles away from our own shores isn’t going to affect us in any way is it ? We uprooted and relocated thousands of people, heathens mostly, but was it necessary to put such large deposits of the stuff in the lands owned by these people ? They have become very rich and powerful, but then again I suppose you know what you are doing.
By the way, this plan, how many species can we directly be responsible for their extinction before you do something, because we are doing it at a vast rate and wont stop until you intervene.
As you can see, its quite the living hell down here (and has been for a long, long time) for the majority of the human species, who live a daily life, where the threat of armed conflict arriving on their doorstep is just a matter of when, not if it will come.
How many of these heathens and non-believers do we have to kill in your name, before they stop killing us in your name ?
Let me tell you how shocked I was, when I found out there are more non-Christian believers in this world than Christians. You did leave out quite a bit of essential facts in that book of yours. Thankfully though, their religion teaches them tolerance, and they have been living relatively peacefully for a lot longer than we Christians have existed, so they haven’t had to invent all this technological war hardware, as quickly as we had to, so we do still have the upper hand. Well sort of.
But this darned plan of yours, it must be so complex, with the entire universe to contend with. We are only just finding out how big this universe of yours is. So we are also just beginning to understand why you haven’t had the time, to drop in on us and sort out all of our problems with these non-believer types.
I hope you don’t mind me giving you this updated report, you having been away for so long and all.
The Christian faith isn’t doing as well as it could do. You see, after all that business with your son, the faith headed north. You will never guess where to ? Oh sorry, of course you do. It landed right in the very same place where those Romans who executed him live. They liked it so much, (well they were searching for something new as their “old faith” of “lots-a-gods” wasn’t working for them anymore ) they decided to call it their own ! You are one for irony aren't you ? Then they refused to accept where it really came from and in the short space of approximately six hundred years, they severed all ties.
Those back in the desert made up their own version of your teachings, but with far more discipline involved. They called themselves Muslims, but both you and I know they are just frustrated Christians. Their book is incredibly like your first book. Lots of rules etc.. damnation of others etc.. They really do take their faith seriously. Far more seriously than we Christians have to. They are almost as pedantic as your chosen race, remember the Jews ? Now they take your first book seriously, we are talking, to the letter here ! They didn’t quite make it over to the revised and better version we Christians use, but what do you expect, humans through and through. I mean with all that persecution, the exodus from slavery in Egypt, wait a second, we found out that was bluff, the Egyptians built their own, but that isn’t global common knowledge yet, they have time to run on that old excuse. I digress.
Back to us Christians again, as I was saying, it isn’t looking too good for us at the moment. There are still Christians on the African continent, they are faithful but they have huge problems with their neighbouring nations, it leads to huge displacements of people, civil unrest and they are prone to famines on almost a regular basis.
I have to go back to this Christian, Muslim problem for a second, I hope you don’t mind. You see, they for some strange reason, don’t understand our way of thinking. They think we lack discipline, thus they have distanced themselves from us, so much so, there is no going back, believe me. I don’t know if you see them as better followers of faith, but they certainly do. They call us weak willed because we have adopted your teaching of worshipping you once a week at your house. These Muslims pray to you five times a day, starting at five o’clock in the morning, we don’t, they sing your name every single day, we don’t, they praise you in private prayer every single day, there are hardly any Christians left who do that.
They like to call you Allah, don’t worry, roughly translated it means God, but they don’t speak English, funny thing language. They say Allah, we say God. The Danes say blå we say blue, same thing really, but it would be silly to start a war over saying the same thing but with different words now wouldn’t it ?
I could write a thousand pages or so, stating the grievances of this species you created, but it still ends up with the same old story of your mysterious plan. As far as plans go, it isn't a very good one is it ?
Everybody is killing everybody else and anything else along the way, because you are not stopping them. Everyone is hanging around waiting for you to crush their enemies, whoever they may be, because all of their lives, you have promised that you would. They all faithfully worship you everyday, and thanks to international timelines you are worshipped almost twenty four hours a day somewhere here on earth.
So my open question to you is as follows : When do you start keeping your side of the bargain ?
Where does all the love of worship go and do you actually hear it ? Did you weep when we Christians bombed Nagasaki and Hiroshima ? No of course not, they aren’t part of a Christian nation. Why did you create these two cities ? To give us target practice ? Hey, don’t get angry God, these are valid questions !
I was taught to believe, you think of everything, and know everything, past, present and future. What does it feel like to create a small race of people and then make them suffer terribly in your name. Make them persecuted beyond belief and butchered, just because they work hard and became affluent in whatever nation they were scattered to. I am talking about your followers of the Jewish faith. You remember, the ones you created before Christians. How many of them did you allow a single racist megalomaniac : torture, beat, maim, starve, turn into laboratory experiments for amusement in the pursuit of better torture methods, rape… the list of atrocities is too much to write : how many was it ? Six million ? How many before this idiot had his way ? Another one or two million over a two thousand year period ?
You must have nerves of steel ! when it comes to sacrificing your children !
The first rule of management is : Everything is your fault ! Well, God I am sorry to be the one to put things the way I do, but, this rule applies to you too.
You know what I am about to ask of you, and you also know that it doesn’t mean your reign as the guiding light of the world is coming to an end, the way we as a species perceive you will.
The reason, you might ask is a simple one. You forgot to teach men to respect women. This is one of the main faults within your plan, if not THE largest single fault. You gave any man the right to strike a woman purely because she is not a man. She could be sold, raped, tortured and deprived of a personal opinion and worst of all, you created something that has to give birth to your image and then as soon as they find out you exist they no longer have to respect her.
You made man in your own image, and it is a postulate that has gotten out of hand down here. No where on this earth can a woman say, she has the exact same rights as a man. No woman, nowhere. All because this is a man's world.
Here in the twenty-first century, have had to give in to a lot of women’s protests and now they can actually teach in your houses of prayer. We know this is blasphemous according to your book, but have revised and rewritten your book so many times to make it suit our purposes, so we got around this problem too.
Our problem has always been this inquisitive nature you installed in us. We explore everything, and it gets the better of us sometimes. It makes us doubt even your words. I was under the impression that any opposing force to Christianity would be lead by devils and demons, but looking at the last two thousand years, any opposition to Christianity was given by humans. Granted they have a different skin tone and some of them have different facial traits, but they walk, talk, and live almost exactly the same way as we do, and I am pretty sure they are human too.
I wouldn’t mind fighting devils and demons as they stand out in a crown. Its when you say another human being is a devil or a demon, so I choose to find another way. No matter how you, or anyone else puts it, the way the world is today is your fault. You allow it, and that’s your fault.
Everyone is praying for your intervention, you will come with your angel army and vanquish the foes from hell. When God ? When ? Do we really need world war three ? Or do you want to wait until there are only a handful of humans left so you can call them your chosen few ? Whatever your plan may be, its about to change.
The entire human race cannot wait around forever for you to arrive. I’m not willing to wait until I am dead to go to hell, as I am living it here, every single day. I am going to give the human species something you cannot.
You cannot do a damn thing down here without somebody getting over zealous and kill in your name. It seems that every plan you have demands human sacrifice. Well, NO MORE. The time for humans to excuse the death of another human, based upon a religious difference is over.
You can complain all you like, I don’t know quite who to, but you will have to face defeat for the first time. You are to be replaced, by your own words. The man behind the father, son and holy spirit must be sacrificed. NOTHING ELSE. Everything else you stand for will remain intact. This way you can rectify your biggest mistake. The one about forgetting the rights of women. This way women get exactly what they deserve. Equality. Never again will women be ranked lower than men in a human eye.
You are so used to having sacrificial rites performed in your name, so for the first time, humans are going to ask you to sacrifice something. It doesn’t mean you die and fade away, as it always meant for us humans. We have thanks to you learned compassion for our fellow humans, and we extend this compassion to you. Your sacrifice is your gender, alone.
One thing you have to realise God, the fact you exist in this guise means the human species is almost certain to carry on towards a future of war. The likelihood of every nation uniting is almost zero, while you go around with different names, demanding worship by us all, but only willing to sit on the sidelines and watch the bloodbath.
I have to turn this negativity around. In finding answers, I concentrated upon the negative sides of the fact you exist as you do. Forgive me God, this is a necessary process. Humans have to survive this period. We have to get off of our knees and you keep us down on them. I have no idea anymore if this is my plan or yours. I would have preferred you came down from heaven and sorted out all of our problems, but it just isn't going to happen. Not in my lifetime anyway. I have three children, you have over six billion.
So from one father to another I ask you to step down, allow your words to speak for you. I will do the same. I cannot ask you to do something and not do the same myself. My plan will be in words alone and I will step down when its completed. There is no need for a replacement. We have everything we need already, we just have to have a little time to work it all out. My plan is very similar to yours, but no one has to die. I like this fact, sorry, but I do. This will bring about a new type of thinking, global thinking and even though the idea scares the living daylights out of us, it’s a beautiful thought.
I can no longer call it my plan, if this is to succeed then it has to be referred to as “Our Plan”. Our refers to the entire human species, it has to be established and accepted as being a collective plan.
My part in all this is being the key that unlocks a door. The door has always been there, but we never saw it. Now that it has come into sight, we will collectively pass through it. Heaven will be a place called Earth, to be lived and cherished as such. What happens to us when we die is still left to the imagination of the individual, but now we have a chance to hope it’s a positive thing and stop fearing the unknown. We hate the idea of dying and not being around our loved ones anymore, but in our plan, we can think what we will, and thinking we can always be a part of our loved ones lives, even when we pass over to the other side, isn't a bad one, now is it ?
Respectfully yours,
-----J-----
Free thinker
Peaceful Solutions
-J-
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