Heretical Jesus Research Page
[ Christ the Jew |
Saints' Lives | Apocrypha |
Historical Jesus ]
By way of starting off with an apology, I would like to state that my
intention with this page is not to offend anyone. Basically, although I began
practicing Tibetan Buddhism several years ago, but I cannot seem to leave my
interest in Jesus Christ behind. Every once in awhile, I find something which
renews my interest in him, and in the truths that I believe are contained in the
Bible (also, His Holiness the Dalai Lama teaches us explicitly that in giving up one
religious tradition for another we must never fall into the trap of disparaging
other traditions).
Christ the Jew
By way of example, the following is excerpted from a recent interview I read
on Beliefnet with James Carroll, author of
Constantine's Sword (a book about Pious XII's involvement in the
Holocaust). Emphasis is mine:
Unlike Cornwell, who focuses on the WWII era, you're urging a broader
reconsideration of Christianity.
An apology for the Holocaust, an apology even for centuries of anti-Semitism, is
not enough. We have to look at very, very basic questions. We have to ask if the
way Christians have read the Scripture has been in some fundamental way flawed
in casting Jesus against the Jews, in forgetting that Jesus was profoundly
Jewish, in forgetting that the Christian message can only be understood in the
context of Israel. Until we recover that basic sense of our origins, we won't
leave anti-Judaism behind.
And that effort includes a look at the Gospels.
The mistake is embedded in the way the Gospels portray Jews, not only as the
perpetrators of the crucifixion, but as the ontological opposite of Jesus, and
of God. That problem cries out to be confronted more directly than we have.
I don't advocate rewriting the Gospels. I believe the fact that the Gospels
are flawed is part of the Good News. It suggests that God comes to the earth
through the contingencies and the finitude of all creatures, including the
Church. I don't think that's a scandal at all. There's some basic questions like
this we have to ask, how we read our Scriptures, how we proclaim Jesus, how we
understand Jesus and so forth.
The
Shadow of the Cross
I know this gets me into trouble, but, like Carroll, I really feel that there
are (and have been for quite a long time) deep misconceptions about Jesus'
message, which have (necessarily) warped our interpretation of the Gospels.
Also, like Carroll, I feel we can ask these "basic questions" without
necessarily creating controversy or scandal, or having to resort to an attempt
to rewrite the Bible (as some of the more extreme proponents of Q theory would
have us do).
The Lives of the Saints
What I would like to see happen (in my own little dream world
:-) is an apolitical, nonobjective-oriented re-reading of the Bible, based more on the
teachings of Jesus than on the dogma of the historical church. This does not
mean, however, that like the Protestant revolution, that I am willing to throw away
2,000 years worth of religious thought and analysis. On the contrary, I am
loath, in my quest to rediscover Christ, to throw out Thomas A Kempis' Imitation
of Christ (for more inspiration to give it a re-look, read Eknath Easwaran's
commentary on it,
Seeing
with the Eyes of Love) or what I know of the lives of the saints (Francis
and Martin of Tours, in
particular). For me, perhaps do to my Catholic upbringing, or perhaps more due
to my current Buddhist ideas, the lives of the saints are the best sign posts on
the path to rediscover Christ. I often say that I am currently practicing
Buddhism due to the present example of the efficacy of its methods, incarnate in
His Holiness the Dalai Lama. So to be fair then, where examples exist to provide
the proof in the pudding for other traditions, I think we owe to ourselves to
study their examples.
St.
Francis
St. Martin of Tours
Mother Teresa
St. Hildegard
Apocrypha
Some of the more radical points of interest for me have been
researching other texts, left out of the "Bible", that seem to have clues about
Christ and what he taught. The Tomb of
Christ web site documents a Russian man who claimed to have recovered a
text, held by Tibetan Buddhists, that is a teaching of Christ. The Gospel of
Thomas is perhaps my favorite Gospel, beloved among Gnostics, and tells quite a
different sort of tale that your regular Gospels...
The Tomb of Jesus
Christ
The Gospel of Thomas
Historical Jesus
I was recently encouraged by one of my Buddhist teachers not to focus on
doctrine; it's always when we narrow our vision to doctrine and dogma that we
get into trouble. Which I completely agree with. Nevertheless, there are two
doctrines that are taught today in many Christian churches that really bother
me. One is the belief that all non-Christians go to Hell. The second has to do
with the Book of Revelations.
Now I've read critical inquiries, counter-arguments to critics of the
Apocalyptic literature that state that merely the reason why such beliefs have
fallen out of favor is that they do not fit in with our feel-good, "he's okay,
she's okay" modern American culture. And I can see where they're coming from with
this. But I really think there's more to it than this. Take this statement from
John Dominic Crossan, a Professor Emeritus of Religious Studies DePaul
University, on the differences between John the Baptist and Jesus:
Can you define what, in your opinion, the difference between them was?
The difference I see between John the Baptist and Jesus is, to use some fancy
academic language that, John is an apocalyptic eschatologist. An eschatologist
is somebody who sees that the problem of the world is so radical that it's going
to take some kind of divine radical solution to solve it. One type, for example,
is John. God is going to descend in some sort of a catastrophic event to solve
the world. There is another type of eschatology. And that's what I think Jesus
is talking [about]. I'm going to call it ethical eschatology. That is the demand
that God is making on us, not us on God so much as God on us, to do something
about the evil in the world. In an apocalypse, as it were, we are waiting for
God. And in ethical eschatology, God is waiting for us. That's, I think, what
Jesus is talking about in the Kingdom of God. It's demand for us to do something
in conjunction with God. It is the Kingdom of God. But it's the Kingdom on earth
of God.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/portrait/john.html
Now, I'm sure everyone has their own opinion, but I think it's easy to see
how, in the years following Christ's death, some of the teachings of John the
Baptist, a very charismatic teacher himself, could have got incorporated into
the main body of Christ's teachings. I don't think it takes much of a leap to
see someone putting the words of John the Baptist into Christ's mouth, to lend
them greater weight and/or credibility.
But the point is I think that Jesus' view, that of not waiting for God, but
one of God (ethically) waiting on us, is very important. From a Buddhist
perspective, ethics is the foundation on which all of our practice is based.
Without it, we have nothing. So I, of course, prefer this view. :-)
I have made some effort, however, to try and see or discover on what basis
would the other view, that of the apocalyptic eschatologist, would be helpful.
In Tibetan Buddhism, it is that that there are 3 scopes: small, middling, and
great. The small scope is only focused on avoiding a lower rebirth; i.e. falling
from a human rebirth into one of the 3 lower realms: animal, preta (hungry
ghost), or hell being. The middle scope practitioner is concerned with escape
the endless wheel of rebirth entirely; escaping being forced to be reborn at
all. Then the highest level of practitioner, following the view of the great
scope, is working not only for their own escape, but for everyone else's as
well.
So I think maybe this sort of gradation of goals might also exist within the
Christian paradigm: those of lesser capacity, who respond only to fear of
punishment, are taught the apocalyptic eschatology, which emphasizes ethics by
way of punishment and reward. Then maybe the next level of practitioner is one
who responds to Jesus' ethical eschatology; which places the responsibility for
our ethical behavior on us, without the emphasis on fear and reward.
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