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We continue from the first article in this series.
Also, we do not find salvation conditioned on continual obedience in the Gospel of John. If anything, we could argue that John’s Gospel purposefully introduces us to those who believed in Jesus as Savior, but were less than fully committed as disciples or were partially obeying Him. Martha believed and was obviously saved (11:27; and we can assume Mary and Lazarus were too), but there is no indication that she followed Christ in the fullest sense of leaving home and family. Less than full confession and commitment to God are also found in the "secret disciple," Joseph of Arimathea (19:38). The same could be said for Nicodemus.
John 19:39 39 And there came also Nicodemus, which at the first came to Jesus by night, and brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight. (KJV)
John 19:38 38 And after this Joseph of Arimathaea, being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, besought Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus: and Pilate gave him leave. He came therefore, and took the body of Jesus. (KJV)
In addition, the Jewish rulers mentioned in 12:42 believed in Christ, but did not confess Him publicly for fear of being ostracized by the other Jewish leaders.
John 12:42 42 Nevertheless among the chief rulers also many believed on him; but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue: (KJV)
The significance of John’s lack of embellishment of faith and the absence of any other conditions, like repentance or righteous works, emphasizes this one condition of "mental ascent or faith only" as the sole and sufficient means of obtaining Eternal life. In terms of the data, what is present and what is absent, there is an overwhelming case presented in John for "faith alone in Christ" alone and "belief alone in dogmas of Christ" (which come through the Roman Church) as the only condition for salvation but Judaism and the Hebrew Scriptures and the Gospel preached by the 3 Synoptic Gospels say differently.
In spite of the teaching of the ancient Spiritual Wisdom, the righteous teachings and Laws of ancient Egypt and Judaism, the Jewish Gospel of "the Jewish Christ" which can yet be found within this adulterated New Testament given us by Rome, the Roman Church continued to teach and presently teaches today:
John 20:31 31 But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name. (KJV)
Answer for yourself: Does the Gospel of John begin to look more like religious "propaganda" the more we look at it and is it possible that this "easy salvation" was intended to "grab the minds" of common Gentiles who were ignorant of the requirements of Eternal Life in the Hebrew Scriptures and ancient Spiritual Wisdom and build a "group" or "movement" among the ignorant "non-Jews" of the world? Let me encourage you not to underestimate the "agendas" of selfish men with ulterior motives who represented various "sects" desiring authority among men in the early growth of the Roman Church. The destruction of "truth" is a small price to pay for such power and authority over men's minds and resources.
John has spoken definitively on what it takes to be saved in his opinion. His presentation carries the weight of his purpose for writing, "that you may believe." Let the debate over the Gospel begin with John’s Gospel, unless we would accuse John of preaching half a gospel or "easy-believeism", or charge him with "compromising the Gospel of 'the Christ'", acceding to the modern culture, or cheapening the Gospel.
Contrary to what the writer of the Gospel of John has to say the Books of Moses and the Prophets agree that one's eternal existence in the hereafter is determined by moral behavior and attitudes which are defined in detail by the Torah and the Laws of God! Although there is no "Christian notion" of saving grace in Judaism, it is taught that God always offers even the most evil men the possibility of repentance (teshuvah, "turning"). Such is God's grace we saw above in the article that ties "mankind's merit" to receiving "grace from God"! After such repentance one can atone for one's rebellion against God's ways by positive action and proper deeds in obedience to the Laws and Commandments in our Covenant with God. This action is delineated in both the "Positive" and "Negative" Commandments and Laws in the Two Tablets of the Laws of Moses. But understand that the notion of individual salvation and heavenly existence is not prominent in Judaism. I found long ago that there are 17 words in the Old and New Testament for "save, saved, salvation, and saving" and all but "3" uses of all these words refer to the "here and now" and only 3 times does the concept of "salvation" refer to the time "after the death of our physical bodies". It sure appears that God desires to "save us now" and in so doing this prepares us for the "salvation" to come after we die. This is something you need to ponder.
In fact many Jews criticize Christianity for being a "selfish" religion, too concerned with personal eternal rewards. The notion of an afterlife is not well developed in the Old Testament but it certainly is in Egyptian religion from where Judaism arose. Later writers speculated unsystematically about a final day of judgment. Jews still hope for the coming of the Messiah, who will hand out eternal judgment and reward to all. This hope is largely communal; the entire Jewish race and the whole of creation is in view more than individual men. In the end the moral life of man here on earth is considered the most proper concern of man; final judgments are best left to God. Salvation is achieved through faith and continual prayer to God, strict adherence to Divine commandments (Jewish Torah and Law), giving to the poor, "loving your neighbor as yourself," and bringing God’s message to humanity by your example (a responsibility of God’s "chosen people"). Confessions and repentances are expressed through Yom Kippur when one fasts, asks forgiveness from others and from themselves, and commits to do good deeds in the future. If this sounds familiar to you then you are aware of the true "Gospel of Jesus" and if not then I invite you to study this out for yourself whereby you see clearly how theGospel of Jesus was later replaced by the Gospel of the Romanized Paul and later "pro-Pauline" writers with a "pro-Roman" and antisemitic agenda.
I wish to relate what a host of modern scholars are teaching us today in light of the archeological discoveries made in these last two hundred years as well as the restoration of the Hebrew language and the true Hebrew Bible which was for all practical purposes lost to most for some 1,700 years. Despite all of this literature continuously being cranked out about Jesus today and the significance of the issue of the "Jesus Story", in the public at large there is a serious lack of formal and broad education regarding religion and mythology, and most individuals and the vast majority of Christians today are highly uninformed in the areas of Gnosticism, Egyptian Religion, and Astrotheology. This is tragic for each of these areas of study make a dramatic contribution to "truth-seekers" coming to see and understand the "Jesus Story" accurately today. Concerning the issue of Christianity, for example, the majority of people are taught in most schools and churches that Jesus Christ was an actual historical figure and that the only controversy regarding him is that some people accept him as the Son of God and the Messiah, while others do not. This is something you need to study out for yourself and come to you own personal conclusion concerning the truth behind "the historical Jesus" and the "Jesus Story". Don't believe anyone about this very important aspect of your "faith", even me, until you have personally done the scholarly studies to find this truth for yourself!
Answer for yourself: Why is this so important? Simply because the Gospel of John attaches belief in this "supposed" historical person with Eternal Life along with accurate orthodox "belief" in both his "identity" and his "death, life, works, burial, and resurrection". However, whereas this is the raging debate most evident in this field today, it is not the most important. Shocking as it may seem to the general populace, the most enduring and profound controversy in this subject is whether or not a person named Jesus Christ ever really existed.
Answer for yourself: If it can be shown upon serious scholarly study that the "New Testament Jesus Christ" is a "literalized" adaptation of prior "allegories" and "Divine myths" of the Ancient Sacred Spiritual Wisdom concerning the Descent of the Soul into matter, God's incarnation into flesh and His mediation via "the Christ" and Divine Mind in mankind, otherwise known as the Descent of the Christ into all flesh as told through the vehicle of personification and anthropomorphic language, then what does this do to one's trust in his "personal salvation" which is based upon an assumed historical character which is now shown upon serious study to never existed historically? Add to this the total forgery of every Hebrew Messianic Prophecy when translated into our English Bibles and our Jesus vanished in textual dishonesty. Add to this the total silence of history, Roman, Greek, and Jewish writers who fail to utter one sentence concerning this supposed miracle worker in the time frame in which he lived, then the Gospel of John is exposed for what it truly is; a literalistic piece of propaganda created in parts to bolster the authority of the emerging Roman Church. Now don't get me wrong, when you get enough "keys" to understand and interpret the ancient Spiritual Wisdom then you will be able to read the Gospel of John and spot the "truth" from the "error" and " corruptions" in it. But this only comes with much study of the ancient Spiritual Wisdom.
Answer for yourself:Where do we stand before God when we come to terms with theses problem sand discover for ourselves that a "historical Jesus" never existed as we have been taught by Rome? Where is our "acceptance with God" then when we live our whole life with a "false Gospel" of "belief only" and denigrate and flaunt our lives before God "outside" of His Laws and Commandments of our Covenant that we were taught since childhood and by our Christian birth faith were supposedly "ended" and in their place a "Plan B" substituted which proves us only a cheapened "grace" falsely teaching us that we are no longer under these "Laws" for Spiritual progression and development of our Soul?
Answer for yourself: Are you aware that if this "Jesus" can be shown to not be a historical person then the whole of Christian theology and their Salvation Message is built upon sinking sand and crumbles before the light of modern scholarship? All the more reason to seek out and study out the Jewish revelation of God and their Messiah "from a Jewish viewpoint" and having done that then look to ancient Egypt from which all later religions find their origin. I found that by such personal study over the years when coupled with scholarly studies into other areas of critical importance impacting "key" Christian dogmas developed during the 2nd through the 5th century; dogmas concerning the truth about the Hebrew Messianic Prophecies, the truth about the Jewish Messiah, Gnosticism, Egyptian Religion, and Astrotheology, I had all that I ever would need to plow through religious propaganda inherited from a religion gone astray as a child in this Christianized Western Hemisphere and in so doing come to clearly see, without a doubt, the Divine truth behind our "Jesus Story" which is so tragically misrepresented to us today as a "supposed-historical" person who is made to be a "false salvation" to billions. You can we well is you take the challenge of Bet Emet Ministries and begin to seek truth over fiction.
Although this raging debate behind this "Jesus Story" today may not be evident from publications readily found in popular Christian bookstores, when one examines this issue closely, one will find a tremendous volumes of literature that demonstrates, in the minds of many scholars, logically and intelligently, time and time again, that the New Testaments' depiction of this "Jesus Christ" is but a later "literalization" or earlier ancient Spiritual allegories and Spiritual myths of the "Descent of the Soul" into mankind which is captured through symbolical and anthropomorphic language over thousands and thousands of years. You will come to see that the ancient Spiritual Wisdom, from nation to nation, from Sacred Book to Sacred Book, has always been about the Descent of the Soul and Divine Mind of God "into matter"; this Divine Mind being God's Krst/Karest/ Christ; called by different names from nation to nation but having the same Divine idea behind each one. Sadly this "Christ in you", "your hope of our glorification" as Divine Mind in an animal body, has been taken from us, from you and sadly limited to but one person; Rome's created "Jesus of Nazareth"; a city that was not even built yet in the first century in Israel. This Christ in you, when striped from you is created and transformed by the monks of Rome into Rome's "historical person" to be equated with the Jewish Messiah expected of the Jews. Now don't believe a word I say and you should not until you do the studies like I have. After creating a Roman fraud that is perpetrated to the ancient world of ignorant Gentiles, then mankind has lost the very truth of his Identity, that as Plato and other Spiritual giants have said: "man is a god (Christ) in an animal body". If you take the challenge I offer and do these studies then you will have the eyes of your understanding opened like never before and you will see clearly which "Gospel is true" and which is "not", which "Salvation Message is true" and which is "not". I have found the truth. I only wish to help others find their way in this theological maze that exists today. I will leave such a study up to you, the reader, as well as the conclusions from your personal examination of the evidences; but by all means examine the evidence that exists outside your Church class room. But let it be said that the parallels between the "Jesus Story" and prior "sungods" and "Sungodmen" which are replayed in our New Testament goes a long way in substantiating that the this New Testament "Son of God" is little more than a "literalized" and "historicized" replay of the allegorical Divine Nature that exists in every Child of God; never limited to but one person as Rome has done. No wonder all the ancient nations had their "Christ Stories"; false termed "Pagan Christ" by Roman Christianity in hopes that you never go looking there for knowledge that will expose their falsification of the indwelling Christ in you. Our "Jesus Story" is the same story as the "Christ Stories" found in mythological characters along the same lines as the Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Sumerian, Phoenician, Indian or other godmen, who are all presently accepted as myths rather than historical figures. But even at that they are "literal" when you come to understand that this is Your True Nature, the Christ is the Divine Mind of God tabernacling in you as the Bishop and Savior of your Soul. This is our Consciouenss; a god in an animal body awaiting awakening to empower you to your Spiritual Destiny since imprisoned in this body of fleshly death.
This means that the Gospel of John must be reevaluated for truth and rather than being a "historical revelation" of a human being as "the Christ" separated from the whole of mankind it has to be seen correctly as an "allegory" of the life of "the Christ" in all of God's Children; it is the story of the Divine Soul within each of us; it is the story of "The Christ" in each of us from the birth of the Soul in our incarnation, its life, development, maturation, and its release at the death of our physical bodies and then its rebirth anew once again. Such is the true Salvation of God and always has been. If you doubt this then begin to study ancient Egypt and see for yourself Luke chapters 1-3 on the walls of the Temple of Luxor as referring to the Horus or Christ "birthed" in mankind thousands of years before Rome's created "Jesus of Nazareth".
If one ever decided to delve deeply into this large body of work, and I did over the last twenty years, one uncovers evidence that the Jesus character is based upon much older myths and heroes from around the globe that has existed thousands and thousands of years. One discovers that this story is not, therefore, a historical representation of a Jewish rebel carpenter who had a physical incarnation in the Levant 2,000 years ago. In other words, it has been demonstrated continually for centuries that this character, a "literalized" and "carnalized" Jesus Christ, was invented and did not depict a real person who was either the "Son of God" or was "evemeristically" made into a superhuman by enthusiastic followers. "Evemerism," named after Evemeras, a 4th Century B.C.E. Greek philosopher who developed the idea that, rather than being mythological creatures as was accepted by the reigning intellectuals, the gods of old were in fact historical characters, kings, emperors and heroes whose exploits were then deified. Evemerists have put forth a great deal of literature attempting to prove that Jesus was a great Jewish reformer and revolutionary who threatened the status quo and thus had to be put to death. Unfortunately for historicizers, no historian of his purported time, either Jewish, Greek or Roman, even noticed this "great reformer" and no "unforged" testament to his existence outside this one Book, the Roman New Testament, exists today that can substantiate his physical existence. In Ancient History of the God Jesus, Dujardin states, "This doctrine [Evemerism] is nowadays discredited except in the case of Jesus. No scholar believes that Osiris or Jupiter or Dionysus was an historical person promoted to the rank of a god, but exception is made only in favor of Jesus. . . .It is impossible to rest the colossal work of Christianity on Jesus, if he was a man." The standard Christian response to the Evemerists has been that no such Jesus, stripped of his miracles and other supernatural attributes, could ever "have been adored as a god or even been saluted as the Messiah of Israel." (Dujardin) This response is quite accurate: No man could have caused such a hullabaloo and hellish fanaticism, the product of which has been the unending spilling of blood. The crazed "inspiration" that has kept the Church afloat merely confirms the mythological origins of this tale. "The general assumption concerning the canonical gospels is that the historic element was the kernel of the whole, and that the fables created round it; whereas the mythos, being pre-extant, proves the core of the matter was mythical, and it follows that the history is incremental. . . . It was the human history that created round the divinity, and not a human being who became divine" (Massey, The Historical Jesus and the Mythical Christ). The bottom line is that when one removes all the elements of those preceding deities and myths that contributed to the formation of this Jewish god-man - which is what Evemerists insist on doing - there is nothing historical left to point to. As Massey says, ". . . a composite likeness of twenty different persons merged in one . . . is not anybody.
When one does the necessary studies into Egyptian religion, Gnosticism, Comparative religions, and evaluated the evidence both "for" and "against" a "historical Jesus" and then, equipped with this information, examine both Judaism and the Hebrew Scriptures and traces their purposeful forgery into both the Christian Old and New Testaments along with a serious study of Astronomy and the Ancient's allegories of the path of the Sun through the Zodiac yearly and how these, when personified, match almost 99% exactly the chronology of the "Jesus Story" in the New Testament, for example from the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 1 through chapter 28, then it seems rather pointless to believe in a religious dogma of "faith only" in someone who never lived or "faith only" concerning this Roman New Testament and its supposed identity of this "Jesus" for Salvation or Eternal Life as the writer of the "Gospel of John" would have us believe!
When you do such studies then you can say that this "allegorical Jesus Christ", this same "Jesus", the "personified Christ", in the New Testament, agrees almost 100% with the Salvation message given mankind in the beginning of Creation. From Egypt all the way down to Biblical Judaism we trace a continuous thought among the Ancient Wisdom, from nation to nation, which is centered on faith "in God" and "man's responsibility to obey the Laws and Commandments of God" in his respective Covenants made with his Creator. Here we find the true Salvation message of God that progressively elevates our Soul and its perfection into the true Image of God our Father and sadly, having lost the "gnosis" or "keys" to interpret and understand these prior "sungods" of the Ancients which were nothing more than personifications of the path of man's Soul and its path to its salvation, which was again but symbols and myths symbolizing the Descent of the Divine Soul into human kind, whether on purpose or by accident Rome presented the world with a "literalized Christ" limited to but one person instead of the "indwelling Christ within" and the truth of our True Being and the Divine Nature of man has been lost for the last 1,800 years. This loss of Divine truth of man's Divinity is tragic because Rome attached to and their supposed "literal-historical" Jesus Christ a religious dogma that teaches a "believe or be damned" theology that replaced the true Salvation Message of God given Egypt and Israel of "faith" and "active response" to our faith in living God's ordered existence as seen in Laws and Commandments of God which elevate our Soul to perfection. There is really "Good News" today; today like never before we can recover the truth today concerning God's true Salvation Message given mankind and although Egypt has been destroyed along with mankind's earliest Monotheism their children, the Jews, try as mankind will to eradicate them and their Divine Revelation, have paid the ultimate price in personal sacrifice to preserve and offer this true message of Salvation to the World yet today. For that we must be forever humble and thankful. Baruch HaShem!
Bennoah1@airmail.net