View Full Version : Religion - Who Was Jesus?
ben_hutch
15-05-2009, 11:01 PM
Does anyone else think Jesus could have just been a really good magician?
uncia
15-05-2009, 11:35 PM
Does anyone else think Jesus could have just been a really good magician?
Sorcerers were banned in his time (at least amngst the Jews) as against the prevailing religion of Phariseeism. Just as there were no sodomites, so there were no magicians. Amazing what a bit of wholesome law can do for a society if correctly applied.
However the bible does recount the tale of one notable sorcerer, Simon, a Samaritan, who initially tried to purchase the gift of the Holy Spirit with money, and was soundly rebuked by the Apostles. He later founded a heretical gnostic sect. Read about him in Acts 8 and he is also well documented in www articles. Extremely clear distinction between Simon and Jesus which is worth investigating.
ben_hutch
15-05-2009, 11:54 PM
Sorcerers were banned in his time (at least amngst the Jews) as against the prevailing religion of Phariseeism. Just as there were no sodomites, so there were no magicians. Amazing what a bit of wholesome law can do for a society if correctly applied.
However the bible does recount the tale of one notable sorcerer, Simon, a Samaritan, who initially tried to purchase the gift of the Holy Spirit with money, and was soundly rebuked by the Apostles. He later founded a heretical gnostic sect. Read about him in Acts 8 and he is also well documented in www articles. Extremely clear distinction between Simon and Jesus which is worth investigating.
Ah right, that makes sense then, thanks for clearing that one up :)
miracles
16-05-2009, 10:29 AM
Sorcerers were banned in his time (at least amngst the Jews) as against the prevailing religion of Phariseeism. Just as there were no sodomites, so there were no magicians. Amazing what a bit of wholesome law can do for a society if correctly applied.
However the bible does recount the tale of one notable sorcerer, Simon, a Samaritan, who initially tried to purchase the gift of the Holy Spirit with money, and was soundly rebuked by the Apostles. He later founded a heretical gnostic sect. Read about him in Acts 8 and he is also well documented in www articles. Extremely clear distinction between Simon and Jesus which is worth investigating.
Brilliiant answer :)
Sorcerers were banned in his time (at least amngst the Jews) as against the prevailing religion of Phariseeism. Just as there were no sodomites, so there were no magicians. Amazing what a bit of wholesome law can do for a society if correctly applied.
Quite true, and indeed, the Talmud (http://www.gnosis.org/library/grs-mead/jesus_live_100/ch8.html) records that "Jeschu had practised sorcery and had corrupted and misled Israel," for which he was stoned to death. It is undoubtedly this tradition that Celsus makes reference to when he claims that Jesus learned magic in Egypt. To which Origen soundly replied that while Christ had wrought miracles by the power of God, Simon had done so by the power of demons, the veracity of which was proven by the flourishing Christian church in opposition to the dwindling numbers of the Simonians.
uncia
17-05-2009, 01:26 PM
Quite true, and indeed, the .... this tradition ....
Baring Gould points out that learned Jewish writers have [URL="http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=po4EGrhN54cC&pg=PA96&lpg=PA96&dq=Jeschu+had+practised+sorcery+and+had+corrupted+ and+misled+Israel&source=bl&ots=dhWKXSY9fy&sig=-NJ-5SQN6bgSKGZDNweftNJv_no&hl=en&ei=muoPSom-MsnLjAfe7tGeBg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3#PPA96,M1"]emphatically denied (http://www.gnosis.org/library/grs-mead/jesus_live_100/ch8.html) that this Jeschu of the Talmud is the Jesus of the gospels.
Baring Gould points out that learned Jewish writers have emphatically denied (http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=po4EGrhN54cC&pg=PA96&lpg=PA96&dq=Jeschu+had+practised+sorcery+and+had+corrupted+ and+misled+Israel&source=bl&ots=dhWKXSY9fy&sig=-NJ-5SQN6bgSKGZDNweftNJv_no&hl=en&ei=muoPSom-MsnLjAfe7tGeBg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3#PPA96,M1) that this Jeschu of the Talmud is the Jesus of the gospels.
This is based upon the Alexander Jannaeus date, which leads to the question raised in the title of the book, Did Jesus Live 100 BC? (Probably not.) And Cutner writes that "unless there really had been a Jeschu," it "must have been invented early in the history of the Talmud, as it was known in some form, at least, to Celsus in the second century." Which aforementioned notice appears in Contra Celsus (http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/04161.htm) as follows, complete with refutation:
But, moreover, taking the history, contained in the Gospel according to Matthew, of our Lord's descent into Egypt, he refuses to believe the miraculous circumstances attending it, viz., either that the angel gave the divine intimation, or that our Lord's quitting Judea and residing in Egypt was an event of any significance; but he invents something altogether different, admitting somehow the miraculous works done by Jesus, by means of which He induced the multitude to follow Him as the Christ. And yet he desires to throw discredit on them, as being done by help of magic and not by divine power; for he asserts
that he (Jesus), having been brought up as an illegitimate child, and having served for hire in Egypt, and then coming to the knowledge of certain miraculous powers, returned from thence to his own country, and by means of those powers proclaimed himself a god.
Now I do not understand how a magician should exert himself to teach a doctrine which persuades us always to act as if God were to judge every man for his deeds; and should have trained his disciples, whom he was to employ as the ministers of his doctrine, in the same belief. For did the latter make an impression upon their hearers, after they had been so taught to work miracles; or was it without the aid of these? The assertion, therefore, that they did no miracles at all, but that, after yielding their belief to arguments which were not at all convincing, like the wisdom of Grecian dialectics, they gave themselves up to the task of teaching the new doctrine to those persons among whom they happened to take up their abode, is altogether absurd. For in what did they place their confidence when they taught the doctrine and disseminated the new opinions? But if they indeed wrought miracles, then how can it be believed that magicians exposed themselves to such hazards to introduce a doctrine which forbade the practice of magic?
phildee3
17-05-2009, 09:15 PM
Does anyone else think Jesus could have just been a really good magician?
No, he was the best -
the Master!
Sourcery, of course, is an inferior form of magic - one which utilises the power of evil spirits.
The Master was no sorcerer - but worked with nothing but divine spirits!
When the Magi visited him at Bethlehem, they were surely visiting him as one of their kind - as their Master!