Christianity

“Jesus Christ is Lord”

Primary Beliefs

• Born in Original Sin (430 CE)• Jesus is the Son of God who paid

for this Original Sin• Everyone must go through Jesus to

get to God• Everyone must go through the

Church to get to Jesus

Unique Tenents

• Eternal damnation gained popularity in the Middle Ages

• Recruiting is required to be a good Christian

• There is only one way to worship God—through Jesus Christ

The Story of Jesus

His Radical Ethics

• Jesus touched lepers and bleeding women

• He ate with tax collectors and prostitutes

• Sermon on the Mount taught love and forgiveness not revenge

Sermon On The MountMatthew 5-7

3 - "Blessed are the poor in spirit,     For theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

4 - Blessed are those who mourn,     For they shall be comforted.

5 - Blessed are the meek,     For they shall inherit the earth.

9 - Blessed are the peacemakers,     For they shall be called sons of God.

8 - Blessed are the pure in heart,     For they shall see God.

7 - Blessed are the merciful,     For they shall obtain mercy.

44 - …I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you…

1 - "Judge not, that you be not judged.

3 - And why do you look at the speck in your brother's eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye?

2 - For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you.

Key Event:Fall of Jerusalem - 70 CE

A Jewish Movement• Christianity was a Jewish

movement until 70 CE when Romans destroyed the Temple

• Jews lost their physical center• Scattered Jews used the law for a

focal point for next 1900 years• Other Jews used Jesus as a focal

point to survive

The Split – 90CE• Jews created new prayer called

“Shemoneh Esreh” to curse new Christian heretics

• Jews blamed Jesus’ followers for subverting Judaism and brining forth God’s anger by the Romans

• Gospel of John answered Jews and encouraged Jews to follow Jesus and lose nothing in Judaism

Bible Scholarship• Matthew, Mark, and Luke together

are called the Synoptic Gospels• There was a “Q” document that

was the source of all of them• Only Matthew and John of the

Gospels ever knew Jesus• Paul, Mark, and Luke never met

Jesus

The Gospels

• Mark – saw cosmic struggle between demonic forces and God

• Matthew – saw a greater Moses fulfilling the Hebrew scriptures

• Luke – saw a new Elijah reaching everyone

• John – saw a pre-existent deity who was the great I AM

Timeline Leading to English

Bible• Year 36 – Jesus crucified• By 62 – Paul writes Galatians, Acts, etc.• 65 – the Q Document composed• 70 – Mark written based on Q Document• 80 – Matthew written, Q & Mark source• 90 – John written• 100 – Peter written

• 130 – Gospel of Basilaides – 24 books• 150 – Gospel of the Egyptians in Greek• 200 – Latin Bible translation in Carthage• 200 – Sahidic Coptic translation• 254 – Council of Nicea – Jesus & God same• 300 – Bohairic Coptic Bible trans.• 312 – Constantine defeats Maxentius• 321 – Constantine declares Sunday rest• 325 – Nicean Creed• 350 – Codex Sinaiticus early Christian Bible• 384 – Jerome presents Latin Gospels• 400 – Augustine formalizes Christ. Theology

• 400 – Pershitta Bible• 430 – Augustine creates “Original Sin”• 550 – Standard Eastern Bible• 690 – First English Bible• 1095 – first of ten crusades• 1206 – Rosary introduced by Dominic• 1382 – Wycliffe English OT & NT• 1522 – Luther German translation• 1525 – Tyndale translation

• 1537 – Coverdal’s Bible• 1551 – Matthew Bible by Rogers• 1569 – Great Bible by Cromwell• 1560 – Geneva Bible• 1606 – Bishop’s Bible• 1611 – King James Bible• 1718 – Catholic English version• 1815 – Catholic Bible Society NT• 1870 – idea of papal infallibility• 1894 – Church of England revised • 1901 – American Standard Version

• 1924 – James Moffat Bible• 1936 – Westminster NT• 1949 – Basic English Bible• 1950 – Knox Version• 1952 – Revised Standardized Version• 1958 – J.B. Phillip’s NT• 1961 – New English Bible• 1966 – Jerusalem Bible• 1971 – New American Standard Bible• 1978 – New International Version• 1982 – New King James Bible

Mark

• Oldest Gospel – 65 CE

• Mark followed Peter

• Never knew Jesus

• Street person, saw only empty tomb

• Knew nothing of a virgin birth

Matthew

• Wrote after Jerusalem destroyed• Trying to rally Jew to survive• Lawyer, conservative• Well educated• Added a star, three wise men,

earthquake, 90% references to hell

Luke• Never knew Jesus• Needed a world context• Gave the Ascension story• No Jewish center anymore and

Christianity began to spread to gentiles

• Mark suggests Christianity naturally grew past Judaism

John

• A disciple of Jesus• Written at start of next century• John makes Jesus divine• Jews began cursing Christians in

90 CE• Jews forced to choose between

Judaism and Jewish Christianity

Paul• Kicked out of early

Church twice• Roman citizen and

thought a spy• Self-mutilator, women

inferior, admitted self-loathing, anti-flesh

• His Christ offered unconditional love and forgiveness

The EssenesJosephus, the 1rst century historian, tell us in The Jewish War the Essenes taught the soul’s pre-existence which is the foundation of reincarnation theory.

Another 1rst century historian Philo Judaeus said the Essenes believe, “…the air is full of souls; those nearest to earth descending to be tied to mortal bodies, return to other bodies, desiring to live in them.” Philo

The Dead Sea Scrolls

What they found… 1947

• 7 complete scrolls

• Many fragments

• Book of Isaiah

• Genesis Apocryphon

• Book of Habakkuk

• Community Rule

James, The Righteous

Interesting Information…

• James the Righteous – the brother of Jesus and leader of the early church, the Law is important

• The Wicked Priest – Ananas is priest in Jerusalem, Roman collaborator, had James killed

• The Liar – Paul, appealed to the unfaithful, hijacked part of the community doctrine, Roman agent, faith is important

Jewish Rebellion put down by Rome 66-73 CE• The key is the murder of James the

Righteous by High Priest Ananas

• The Essenes at Qumran and Masada plus most of Judea revolt

• Emperor Vespasian commanded the Roman army to invade Judea and put down the rebellion

The Catholic Scandal

• Scrolls discovered in 1947

• Never released to the public

• Why?

Modern day Inquisition

• Pope Leo XIII sets up Pontifical Biblical Commission in 1907 to

“…safeguard the authority of the scriptures and to promote their right interpretation.”

Dead Sea Scrolls Deception – page 118

Every director of the Ecole Biblique that has controlled the Dead Sea Scrolls has also been a member of the the Pontifical Biblical Commission.

“…at all times the interpreter must cherish a spirit of ready obedience to the Church’s teaching authority.”

In 1964 the Commission decreed regarding Bible scholarship…

Position of Catholic Church

According to the 1990 updated Catechism titled Universal Catechism of the Catholic Church:

“…the task of giving an authentic interpretation of the Word of God… has been entrusted to the living teaching office of the Church alone.”

Observer, 1990

The Hero…

• The scrolls belong to humanity

• 1991 made copies public

Marcion• Second century - 160 CE• First to compile writings• Chose letters by Paul• Many gospels but only chose four• Thus, he was the first to form a

New Testament canon• Eventually 27 books

Origen A.D. 185 to 254

Origen was “…the most distinguished and most influential of all the theologians of the ancient church, with the possible exception of Augustine,” says the Britannica. He is also referred to as the father of the church’s science and the founder of its theology. What were his views?

Origen Taught…• The soul has neither beginning nor end

and pre-exists the body

• The soul is on a constant upward progress in cosmic life

• All spirits were created blameless, all must at last return to their original perfection

Many manuscripts…

Origen wrote,

“The differences among the manuscripts have become great, either through the negligence of some copyists or through the perverse audacity of others…they make additions or deletions as they please,,,”

Scholar John Mill - 1700

John Mill compared one hundred Greek manuscripts of the New Testament in the King James Bible and found 30,000 variations.

Today scholars say there are more than 300,000 variations in translations, additions, and deletions.

Some Known Additions…

• The woman caught in adultery and Jesus says, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.”

• References to the divinity of Jesus is absent in earlier texts.

• The last supper of sharing his body and blood as the new covenant was not in earlier versions.

Writings of Justin Martyr

Founded the First Christian Church in Rome – A. D. 100

In his Dialogue with Trypho Justin speaks of the soul’s inhabiting more than once a human body but that it cannot remember previous experiences.

The Gnostics Teachings

Jesus had a secret doctrine. In Mark 4:11 he says,

“Unto you it is given to know the mystery of the Kingdom of God; but unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables.”

The Gnostics

Basilades, who taught in Alexandria about A.D. 125, and around whom the founders of the various Gnostic schools grouped themselves, maintained that he had all his doctrines from the Apostle Matthew and from Peter, through Glaucus, his disciple. It is reported that all Christian Gnostics were reincarnationists.

Gnostic Philosophy

“The whole of Gnosticism revolved round the conception of cycles law for both the universal and individual soul. Thus we find the Gnostics invariably teaching the doct4rine not only of the pre-existence but also of the rebirth of human souls…”

G.S. Mead, Fragments of a Faith Forgotten

Gnostic Christians – 200 A.D.

“To become enlightened…

Remove physical desires,

Reduce chaos in the mind,

Open to internal visions,

Ponder what is seen,

Become troubled,

Go into isolation in the desert,

And receive the messenger of the light.”

The Enlightenment of Zostrianos, From the Gnostic Gospels

Emperor Constantine

United what was left of the Roman Empire in 315 A.D.

Made Christianity the state religion.

Chose the books that would be included in the Bible.

Blavatsky on Constantine

Constantine, “…who drowned his wife in boiling water, butchered his little nephew, murdered with his own pious hand two of his brothers-in-law, killed his own son Crispus, bled to death several men and women, and smothered in a well an old monk. However, we are told by Eusebius that this Christian Emperor was rewarded by a vision of Christ himself…”

Isis Unveiled, page 304

The“Divine Selection” That Determined the

BibleAt the Council of Nicea: “…except Constantine the emperor, and Eusebius, these bishops were a set of illiterate, simple creatures…fools…(they) put all the books that were referred to the Council for determination under a communion table …sought the Lord that the inspired writings might get upon the table…and it happened accordingly.” We are not told who kept the keys of the council chamber overnight.

Isis Unveiled, page 251

Council of Nicea

325 A.D.We believe in one God, the Father All-sovereign, maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible;

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, and the only-begotten Son of God, Begotten of the Father before all the ages, Light of Light, true God of true God, begotten not made, of one substance with the Father…

Emperor Justinian

Pope Vigilus his prisoner 8 years and finally murdered.

Curses from the Fifth Ecumenical Council

#1 - “If anyone assert the fabulous pre-existence of souls, and shall assert the monstrous restoration which follows from it: let them be anathema.”

#15 - “If anyone shall say that the life of the spirits shall be like to the life which as in the beginning while as yet the spirits had not come down or fallen, so that the end and the beginning shall be alike, and that the end shall be the true measure of the beginning: let him be anathema.”

Taken from A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, XIV, p 318-20

Reincarnation & Christianity

Old Testament

New Testament

The Old and New Testaments is glued together by reincarnation.

King Solomon

“Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth: While as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the dust of the world. When he prepared the heavens, I was there…”

Proverbs 8:22-31

Malachi 4:5 (500 years B.C.)

“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and dreadful day of the Lord.”

From the Hebrews to the Christians

“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and dreadful day of the Lord.” Malachi 4:5

Jesus states ten times in the New Testament that John the Baptist is the reincarnation of Elijah.

Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee. Verily I say unto you, Among them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist. And if ye will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.

Matthew 11:7

Jesus To The Multitudes

Go No More Out…

“Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go nor more out.”

Revelation 3:12

Lost Years of Jesus?

Two Big Questions:

1 - Did Jesus stay in Israel

from ages 13-29?

2 - Or did he travel to

India?

Three Main Sources

• Master teachers today

• The Bible

• Tibetan manuscripts

Paramahansa Yogananda

“It is true that Christ lived in India during most of the eighteen unaccounted for years of his life…”

Sai Baba

“Jesus attained Christ consciousness at the age of twenty-five while in India. Thereafter, he returned to Palestine through Tibet, Afghanistan, Persia and areas we now know as Russia.”

“Few realize Jesus’ most important message to mankind. God is your own basic nature—your true self.”

Sai Baba

The Discovery of Tibetan Manuscripts…116 years

later.

1887

1922

1939

1984

Mulbekh

A lama at Mulbekh Gompa told Notovitch…

“Issa is a great prophet, one of the first after the twenty-two Buddhas. He is greater than any one of all the Dalia Lamas…His name and his acts are recorded in our sacred writings.”

“The Life of Saint

IssaBest of

the Sons of Men”

Translation by

Nicholas Notovitch

Eye Witnesses…?

A revered lama told Swami Abhedananda, “…three or four years after he (Jesus) left his body, the original manuscript was compiled in Pali from descriptions of all those Tibetans who met him at that time, as well as from descriptions of the traders who, with their own eyes witnessed his crucifixion by the king of his country.”

Libraries in Tibet

The Manuscript Begins…

“The earth trembled and the heavens wept, because of the great crime committed in the land of Israel.

For there was tortured and murdered the great and just Issa, in whom was manifest the soul of the Universe.”

Notovitch translation

The Outward & Return Journey

OutwardReturn

The Trouble Begins…

“Those who deprive their brothers of divine happiness will themselves be deprived of it; and the Brahmins and the Kshstriyas shall become the Sudras of the Sudras…”

“But they who deprive their brothers of the common blessings shall be themselves st5ripped of them. And Brahmins and Kshatriyas shall become the Sudras of the Sudras…”

Roerich translationNotovitch translation

Jesus makes

trouble in the Bible…

“Alas for you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You who are like whitewashed tombs that look handsome on the outside, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and every kind of corruption. In the same way you appear to people from the outside like good honest men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.”

Notovitch

Returns to Paris

Paris 1889

A Catholic Cardinal told Notovitch in Paris, “…the Vatican Library possesses sixty-three complete or incomplete manuscripts in various Oriental languages referring to this matter, which have been brought to Rome by missionaries from India, China, Egypt and Arabia.”

The Vatica

n Librar

y

Elisabeth Caspari

• Takes photos of Tibetan manuscript

• Trapped in India during the war

• Learned Montessori Method

• Brought Montessori Method to America

Luke 20:35-36

“They who are accounted worthy to obtain that world…neither marry…neither can they die any more.”

Paul to the Galatians

“My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you, I desire to be present with you now, and to change my voice; for I stand in doubt of you.”

Galatians 4:19

The Dark Ages (in the west)

Why did the Church oppose Reincarnation

so Ruthlessly?“The believer in this teaching (reincarnation) tends to hold himself responsible for his own progress and salvation. Such a person has no need of priests and little regard for external dead-letter observance, rite, or conformity. The devices such as the confessional of a redemption conferred by institutional authority were to believers in evolution through rebirth transparently fraudulent or false. Hence their persecution over the many centuries while dogmatic religion remained in power.”

Head & Cranston, The Phoenix Fire Mystery, page 164.

Ancient Baghdad

Science Philosophy Medicine Art Literature Freedom

The Crusades

Secret Societies that Protected

Reincarnation• Knights Templar

• Christian Kabbalists

• Albigenses

• Gnostics

• Rosicrucians

• Cathari

Reincarnation Today

Interesting Events in Christian History

• 30 CE – Jesus is crucified and James becomes the leader

• 40 CE – Paul declares Christianity a universal religion

• 70 CE – Roman Titus destroys the temple

• 70 CE – Pharisees expel Christians from their institutions

• 136 – bishop of Rome assumes the title of “Pope”

• 230 – Pope Urban justifies ownership of property by church

• 312 - Roman emperor Constantine converts to Christianity

• 431 – 3rd Ecumenical Council declares Jesus is divine

• 445 emperor Valentinian III decrees all bishops must obey Pope

• 451 – 4th Ecumenical Council declares Jesus is both human and divine

• 537 - Emperor Justinian murders Pope Solverius and installs Vigilius

• 636 – Arabs capture Jerusalem and allow Jews to return

• 680 – emperor Constantine IV says Pope is head of all Christianity

• 1054 – patriarch of Constantinople and the Pope in Rome excommunicate each other

• 1095 – Pope Urban II calls for a crusade against the Muslims

• 1189 – the third crusade is led by Richard the Lion-Hearted

• 1212 – Jews of Toledo massacred by crusaders

• 1233 – Pope Gregory IX institutes the Inquisition

• 1321 – Franciscan monk Marsilio da Padova is excommunicated for preaching democracy in the Church

• 1517 – Luther prints his translation of the Bible

• 1536 – Tyndale burned at the stake for translating the Bible into English

• 1909 – Tel Aviv is founded as a Hebrew speaking Jewish city

• 1947 – Dead Seal scrolls found near Qumran

Forms of Christianity

• Baptist

• Congregationalist

• Lutheran

• Methodist

• Presbyterian

• Salvationist

• Anglican

• Catholic

• Pentecostal

• Gnostic

• Russian Orthodox

• Mormon