hat the Church Doesn't Want You to Know
It has often been emphasised that
Christianity is unlike any other religion,
for it stands or falls by certain events
which are alleged to have occurred during a
short period of time some 20 centuries ago.
Those stories are presented in the New
Testament, and as new evidence is revealed
it will become clear that they do not
represent historical realities. The Church
agrees, saying:
"Our documentary sources of knowledge
about the origins of Christianity and its
earliest development are chiefly the New
Testament Scriptures, the authenticity of
which we must, to a great extent, take for
granted."
(Catholic Encyclopedia,
Farley ed., vol. iii, p. 712)
The
Church makes extraordinary admissions about
its New Testament. For example, when
discussing the origin of those writings,
"the most distinguished body of academic
opinion ever assembled" (Catholic
Encyclopedias, Preface) admits that the
Gospels "do not go back to the first century
of the Christian era" (Catholic
Encyclopedia, Farley ed., vol. vi, p.
137, pp. 655-6). This statement conflicts
with priesthood assertions that the earliest
Gospels were progressively written during
the decades following the death of the
Gospel Jesus Christ. In a remarkable aside,
the Church further admits that "the earliest
of the extant manuscripts [of the New
Testament], it is true, do not date back
beyond the middle of the fourth century AD"
(Catholic Encyclopedia, op. cit.,
pp. 656-7). That is some 350 years after the
time the Church claims that a Jesus Christ
walked the sands of Palestine, and here the
true story of Christian origins slips into
one of the biggest black holes in history.
There is, however, a reason why there were
no New Testaments until the fourth century:
they were not written until then, and here
we find evidence of the greatest
misrepresentation of all time.
It
was British-born Flavius Constantinus
(Constantine, originally Custennyn or
Custennin) (272-337) who authorised the
compilation of the writings now called the
New Testament. After the death of his father
in 306, Constantine became King of Britain,
Gaul and Spain, and then, after a series of
victorious battles, Emperor of the Roman
Empire. Christian historians give little or
no hint of the turmoil of the times and
suspend Constantine in the air, free of all
human events happening around him. In truth,
one of Constantine's main problems was the
uncontrollable disorder amongst presbyters
and their belief in numerous gods.
The majority of modern-day Christian writers
suppress the truth about the development of
their religion and conceal Constantine's
efforts to curb the disreputable character
of the presbyters who are now called "Church
Fathers" (Catholic Encyclopedia,
Farley ed., vol. xiv, pp. 370-1). They were
"maddened", he said (Life of Constantine,
attributed to Eusebius Pamphilius of
Caesarea, c. 335, vol. iii, p. 171; The
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, cited
as N&PNF, attributed to St Ambrose, Rev.
Prof. Roberts, DD, and Principal James
Donaldson, LLD, editors, 1891, vol. iv, p.
467). The "peculiar type of oratory"
expounded by them was a challenge to a
settled religious order (The Dictionary
of Classical Mythology, Religion, Literature
and Art, Oskar Seyffert, Gramercy, New
York, 1995, pp. 544-5). Ancient records
reveal the true nature of the presbyters,
and the low regard in which they were held
has been subtly suppressed by modern Church
historians. In reality, they were:
"...the most rustic fellows, teaching
strange paradoxes. They openly declared that
none but the ignorant was fit to hear their
discourses ... they never appeared in the
circles of the wiser and better sort, but
always took care to intrude themselves among
the ignorant and uncultured, rambling around
to play tricks at fairs and markets ... they
lard their lean books with the fat of old
fables ... and still the less do they
understand ... and they write nonsense on
vellum ... and still be doing, never done."
(Contra Celsum ["Against
Celsus"], Origen of Alexandria, c. 251, Bk
I, p. lxvii, Bk III, p. xliv, passim)
Clusters of presbyters had developed "many
gods and many lords" (1 Cor. 8:5) and
numerous religious sects existed, each with
differing doctrines (Gal. 1:6). Presbyterial
groups clashed over attributes of their
various gods and "altar was set against
altar" in competing for an audience (Optatus
of Milevis, 1:15, 19, early fourth
century). From Constantine's point of view,
there were several factions that needed
satisfying, and he set out to develop an
all-embracing religion during a period of
irreverent confusion. In an age of crass
ignorance, with nine-tenths of the peoples
of Europe illiterate, stabilising religious
splinter groups was only one of
Constantine's problems. The smooth
generalisation, which so many historians are
content to repeat, that Constantine
"embraced the Christian religion" and
subsequently granted "official toleration",
is "contrary to historical fact" and should
be erased from our literature forever (Catholic
Encyclopedia, Pecci ed., vol. iii, p.
299, passim). Simply put, there was no
Christian religion at Constantine's time,
and the Church acknowledges that the tale of
his "conversion" and "baptism" are "entirely
legendary" (Catholic Encyclopedia,
Farley ed., vol. xiv, pp. 370-1).
Constantine "never acquired a solid
theological knowledge" and "depended heavily
on his advisers in religious questions" (Catholic
Encyclopedia, New Edition, vol. xii, p.
576, passim). According to Eusebeius
(260-339), Constantine noted that among the
presbyterian factions "strife had grown so
serious, vigorous action was necessary to
establish a more religious state", but he
could not bring about a settlement between
rival god factions (Life of Constantine,
op. cit., pp. 26-8). His advisers warned him
that the presbyters' religions were
"destitute of foundation" and needed
official stabilisation (ibid.).
Constantine saw in this confused system of
fragmented dogmas the opportunity to create
a new and combined State religion, neutral
in concept, and to protect it by law. When
he conquered the East in 324 he sent his
Spanish religious adviser, Osius of Córdoba,
to Alexandria with letters to several
bishops exhorting them to make peace among
themselves. The mission failed and
Constantine, probably at the suggestion of
Osius, then issued a decree commanding all
presbyters and their subordinates "be
mounted on asses, mules and horses belonging
to the public, and travel to the city of
Nicaea" in the Roman province of Bithynia in
Asia Minor. They were instructed to bring
with them the testimonies they orated to the
rabble, "bound in leather" for protection
during the long journey, and surrender them
to Constantine upon arrival in Nicaea (The
Catholic Dictionary, Addis and Arnold, 1917,
"Council of Nicaea" entry). Their writings
totalled "in all, two thousand two hundred
and thirty-one scrolls and legendary tales
of gods and saviours, together with a record
of the doctrines orated by them" (Life
of Constantine, op. cit., vol. ii, p.
73; N&PNF, op. cit., vol. i, p. 518).
The First Council of Nicaea and the "Missing
Records"
Thus,
the first ecclesiastical gathering in
history was summoned and is today known as
the Council of Nicaea. It was a bizarre
event that provided many details of early
clerical thinking and presents a clear
picture of the intellectual climate
prevailing at the time. It was at this
gathering that Christianity was born, and
the ramifications of decisions made at the
time are difficult to calculate. About four
years prior to chairing the Council,
Constantine had been initiated into the
religious order of Sol Invictus, one of the
two thriving cults that regarded the Sun as
the one and only Supreme God (the other was
Mithraism). Because of his Sun worship, he
instructed Eusebius to convene the first of
three sittings on the summer solstice, 21
June 325 (Catholic Encyclopedia,
New Edition, vol. i, p. 792), and it was
"held in a hall in Osius's palace" (Ecclesiastical
History, Bishop Louis Dupin, Paris,
1686, vol. i, p. 598). In an account of the
proceedings of the conclave of presbyters
gathered at Nicaea, Sabinius, Bishop of
Hereclea, who was in attendance, said,
"Excepting Constantine himself and Eusebius
Pamphilius, they were a set of illiterate,
simple creatures who understood nothing" (Secrets
of the Christian Fathers, Bishop J. W.
Sergerus, 1685, 1897 reprint).
This is another luminous confession of the
ignorance and uncritical credulity of early
churchmen. Dr Richard Watson (1737-1816), a
disillusioned Christian historian and
one-time Bishop of Llandaff in Wales (1782),
referred to them as "a set of gibbering
idiots" (An Apology for Christianity,
1776, 1796 reprint; also, Theological
Tracts, Dr Richard Watson, "On
Councils" entry, vol. 2, London, 1786,
revised reprint 1791). From his extensive
research into Church councils, Dr Watson
concluded that "the clergy at the Council of
Nicaea were all under the power of the
devil, and the convention was composed of
the lowest rabble and patronised the vilest
abominations" (An Apology for
Christianity, op. cit.). It was that
infantile body of men who were responsible
for the commencement of a new religion and
the theological creation of Jesus Christ.
The Church admits that vital elements of the
proceedings at Nicaea are "strangely absent
from the canons" (Catholic Encyclopedia,
Farley ed., vol. iii, p. 160). We shall see
shortly what happened to them. However,
according to records that endured, Eusebius
"occupied the first seat on the right of the
emperor and delivered the inaugural address
on the emperor's behalf" (Catholic
Encyclopedia, Farley ed., vol. v, pp.
619-620). There were no British presbyters
at the council but many Greek delegates.
"Seventy Eastern bishops" represented
Asiatic factions, and small numbers came
from other areas (Ecclesiastical History,
ibid.). Caecilian of Carthage travelled from
Africa, Paphnutius of Thebes from Egypt,
Nicasius of Die (Dijon) from Gaul, and
Donnus of Stridon made the journey from
Pannonia.
It
was at that puerile assembly, and with so
many cults represented, that a total of 318
"bishops, priests, deacons, subdeacons,
acolytes and exorcists" gathered to debate
and decide upon a unified belief system that
encompassed only one god (An Apology for
Christianity, op. cit.). By this time,
a huge assortment of "wild texts" (Catholic
Encyclopedia, New Edition, "Gospel and
Gospels") circulated amongst presbyters and
they supported a great variety of Eastern
and Western gods and goddesses: Jove,
Jupiter, Salenus, Baal, Thor, Gade, Apollo,
Juno, Aries, Taurus, Minerva, Rhets, Mithra,
Theo, Fragapatti, Atys, Durga, Indra,
Neptune, Vulcan, Kriste, Agni, Croesus,
Pelides, Huit, Hermes, Thulis, Thammus,
Eguptus, Iao, Aph, Saturn, Gitchens, Minos,
Maximo, Hecla and Phernes (God's Book of
Eskra, anon., ch. xlviii, paragraph 36).
Up until the First Council of Nicaea, the
Roman aristocracy primarily worshipped two
Greek gods-Apollo and Zeus-but the great
bulk of common people idolised either Julius
Caesar or Mithras (the Romanised version of
the Persian deity Mithra). Caesar was
deified by the Roman Senate after his death
(15 March 44 BC) and subsequently venerated
as "the Divine Julius". The word "Saviour"
was affixed to his name, its literal meaning
being "one who sows the seed", i.e., he was
a phallic god. Julius Caesar was hailed as
"God made manifest and universal Saviour of
human life", and his successor Augustus was
called the "ancestral God and Saviour of the
whole human race" (Man and his Gods,
Homer Smith, Little, Brown & Co., Boston,
1952). Emperor Nero (54-68), whose original
name was Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus
(37-68), was immortalised on his coins as
the "Saviour of mankind" (ibid.). The Divine
Julius as Roman Saviour and "Father of the
Empire" was considered "God" among the Roman
rabble for more than 300 years. He was the
deity in some Western presbyters' texts, but
was not recognised in Eastern or Oriental
writings.
Constantine's intention at Nicaea was to
create an entirely new god for his empire
who would unite all religious factions under
one deity. Presbyters were asked to debate
and decide who their new god would be.
Delegates argued among themselves,
expressing personal motives for inclusion of
particular writings that promoted the finer
traits of their own special deity.
Throughout the meeting, howling factions
were immersed in heated debates, and the
names of 53 gods were tabled for discussion.
"As yet, no God had been selected by the
council, and so they balloted in order to
determine that matter... For one year and
five months the balloting lasted..." (God's
Book of Eskra, Prof. S. L. MacGuire's
translation, Salisbury, 1922, chapter
xlviii, paragraphs 36, 41).
At the end of that time, Constantine
returned to the gathering to discover that
the presbyters had not agreed on a new deity
but had balloted down to a shortlist of five
prospects: Caesar, Krishna, Mithra, Horus
and Zeus (Historia Ecclesiastica, Eusebius,
c. 325). Constantine was the ruling spirit
at Nicaea and he ultimately decided upon a
new god for them. To involve British
factions, he ruled that the name of the
great Druid god, Hesus, be joined with the
Eastern Saviour-god, Krishna (Krishna is
Sanskrit for Christ), and thus Hesus Krishna
would be the official name of the new Roman
god. A vote was taken and it was with a
majority show of hands (161 votes to 157)
that both divinities became one God.
Following longstanding heathen custom,
Constantine used the official gathering and
the Roman apotheosis decree to legally deify
two deities as one, and did so by democratic
consent. A new god was proclaimed and
"officially" ratified by Constantine (Acta
Concilii Nicaeni, 1618). That purely
political act of deification effectively and
legally placed Hesus and Krishna among the
Roman gods as one individual composite. That
abstraction lent Earthly existence to
amalgamated doctrines for the Empire's new
religion; and because there was no letter
"J" in alphabets until around the ninth
century, the name subsequently evolved into
"Jesus Christ".
How the Gospels Were Created
Constantine then instructed Eusebius to
organise the compilation of a uniform
collection of new writings developed from
primary aspects of the religious texts
submitted at the council. His instructions
were:
"Search ye these books, and whatever is
good in them, that retain; but whatsoever is
evil, that cast away. What is good in one
book, unite ye with that which is good in
another book. And whatsoever is thus brought
together shall be called The Book of Books.
And it shall be the doctrine of my people,
which I will recommend unto all nations,
that there shall be no more war for
religions' sake."
(God's Book of Eskra, op.
cit., chapter xlviii, paragraph 31)
"Make them to astonish" said Constantine,
and "the books were written accordingly" (Life
of Constantine, vol. iv, pp. 36-39).
Eusebius amalgamated the "legendary tales of
all the religious doctrines of the world
together as one", using the standard
god-myths from the presbyters' manuscripts
as his exemplars. Merging the supernatural
"god" stories of Mithra and Krishna with
British Culdean beliefs effectively joined
the orations of Eastern and Western
presbyters together "to form a new universal
belief" (ibid.). Constantine believed that
the amalgamated collection of myths would
unite variant and opposing religious
factions under one representative story.
Eusebius then arranged for scribes to
produce "fifty sumptuous copies ... to be
written on parchment in a legible manner,
and in a convenient portable form, by
professional scribes thoroughly accomplished
in their art" (ibid.). "These orders," said
Eusebius, "were followed by the immediate
execution of the work itself ... we sent him
[Constantine] magnificently and elaborately
bound volumes of three-fold and four-fold
forms" (Life of Constantine, vol.
iv, p. 36). They were the "New Testimonies",
and this is the first mention (c. 331) of
the New Testament in the historical record.
With his instructions fulfilled, Constantine
then decreed that the New Testimonies would
thereafter be called the "word of the Roman
Saviour God" (Life of Constantine,
vol. iii, p. 29) and official to all
presbyters sermonising in the Roman Empire.
He then ordered earlier presbyterial
manuscripts and the records of the council
"burnt" and declared that "any man found
concealing writings should be stricken off
from his shoulders" (beheaded) (ibid.). As
the record shows, presbyterial writings
previous to the Council of Nicaea no longer
exist, except for some fragments that have
survived.
Some council records also survived, and they
provide alarming ramifications for the
Church.Some old documents say that the First
Council of Nicaea ended in mid-November 326,
while others say the struggle to establish a
god was so fierce that it extended "for four
years and seven months" from its beginning
in June 325 (Secrets of the Christian
Fathers, op. cit.). Regardless of when
it ended, the savagery and violence it
encompassed were concealed under the glossy
title "Great and Holy Synod", assigned to
the assembly by the Church in the 18th
century. Earlier Churchmen, however,
expressed a different opinion.
The
Second Council of Nicaea in 786-87 denounced
the First Council of Nicaea as "a synod of
fools and madmen" and sought to annul
"decisions passed by men with troubled
brains" (History of the Christian Church, H.
H. Milman, DD, 1871). If one chooses to read
the records of the Second Nicaean Council
and notes references to "affrighted bishops"
and the "soldiery" needed to "quell
proceedings", the "fools and madmen"
declaration is surely an example of the pot
calling the kettle black.
Constantine died in 337 and his outgrowth of
many now-called pagan beliefs into a new
religious system brought many converts.
Later Church writers made him "the great
champion of Christianity" which he gave
"legal status as the religion of the Roman
Empire" (Encyclopedia of the Roman
Empire, Matthew Bunson, Facts on File,
New York, 1994, p. 86). Historical records
reveal this to be incorrect, for it was
"self-interest" that led him to create
Christianity (A Smaller Classical
Dictionary, J. M. Dent, London, 1910,
p. 161). Yet it wasn't called "Christianity"
until the 15th century (How The Great
Pan Died, Professor Edmond S. Bordeaux
[Vatican archivist], Mille Meditations, USA,
MCMLXVIII, pp. 45-7).
Over the ensuing centuries, Constantine's
New Testimonies were expanded upon,
"interpolations" were added and other
writings included (Catholic Encyclopedia,
Farley ed., vol. vi, pp. 135-137; also,
Pecci ed., vol. ii, pp. 121-122). For
example, in 397 John "golden-mouthed"
Chrysostom restructured the writings of
Apollonius of Tyana, a first-century
wandering sage, and made them part of the
New Testimonies (Secrets of the
Christian Fathers, op. cit.). The
Latinised name for Apollonius is Paulus (A
Latin-English Dictionary, J. T. White
and J. E. Riddle, Ginn & Heath, Boston,
1880), and the Church today calls those
writings the Epistles of Paul. Apollonius's
personal attendant, Damis, an Assyrian
scribe, is Demis in the New Testament (2
Tim. 4:10).
The
Church hierarchy knows the truth about the
origin of its Epistles, for Cardinal Bembo
(d. 1547), secretary to Pope Leo X (d.
1521), advised his associate, Cardinal
Sadoleto, to disregard them, saying "put
away these trifles, for such absurdities do
not become a man of dignity; they were
introduced on the scene later by a sly voice
from heaven" (Cardinal Bembo: His
Letters and Comments on Pope Leo X, A.
L. Collins, London, 1842 reprint).
The Church admits that the Epistles of Paul
are forgeries, saying, "Even the genuine
Epistles were greatly interpolated to lend
weight to the personal views of their
authors" (Catholic Encyclopedia,
Farley ed., vol. vii, p. 645). Likewise, St
Jerome (d. 420) declared that the Acts of
the Apostles, the fifth book of the New
Testament, was also "falsely written" ("The
Letters of Jerome", Library of the Fathers,
Oxford Movement, 1833-45, vol. v, p. 445).
The Shock Discovery of an Ancient Bible
The New
Testament subsequently evolved into a
fulsome piece of priesthood propaganda, and
the Church claimed it recorded the
intervention of a divine Jesus Christ into
Earthly affairs. However, a spectacular
discovery in a remote Egyptian monastery
revealed to the world the extent of later
falsifications of the Christian texts,
themselves only an "assemblage of legendary
tales" (Encyclopédie, Diderot,
1759). On 4 February 1859, 346 leaves of an
ancient codex were discovered in the furnace
room at St Catherine's monastery at Mt
Sinai, and its contents sent shockwaves
through the Christian world. Along with
other old codices, it was scheduled to be
burned in the kilns to provide winter warmth
for the inhabitants of the monastery.
Written in Greek on donkey skins, it carried
both the Old and New Testaments, and later
in time archaeologists dated its composition
to around the year 380. It was discovered by
Dr Constantin von Tischendorf (1815-1874), a
brilliant and pious German biblical scholar,
and he called it the Sinaiticus, the Sinai
Bible. Tischendorf was a professor of
theology who devoted his entire life to the
study of New Testament origins, and his
desire to read all the ancient Christian
texts led him on the long, camel-mounted
journey to St Catherine's Monastery.
During his lifetime, Tischendorf had access
to other ancient Bibles unavailable to the
public, such as the Alexandrian (or
Alexandrinus) Bible, believed to be the
second oldest Bible in the world. It was so
named because in 1627 it was taken from
Alexandria to Britain and gifted to King
Charles I (1600-49). Today it is displayed
alongside the world's oldest known Bible,
the Sinaiticus, in the British Library in
London. During his research, Tischendorf had
access to the Vaticanus, the Vatican Bible,
believed to be the third oldest in the world
and dated to the mid-sixth century (The
Various Versions of the Bible, Dr
Constantin von Tischendorf, 1874, available
in the British Library). It was locked away
in the Vatican's inner library. Tischendorf
asked if he could extract handwritten notes,
but his request was declined. However, when
his guard took refreshment breaks,
Tischendorf wrote comparative narratives on
the palm of his hand and sometimes on his
fingernails ("Are Our Gospels Genuine or
Not?", Dr Constantin von Tischendorf,
lecture, 1869, available in the British
Library).
Today, there are several other Bibles
written in various languages during the
fifth and sixth centuries, examples being
the Syriacus, the Cantabrigiensis (Bezae),
the Sarravianus and the Marchalianus.
A shudder of apprehension echoed through
Christendom in the last quarter of the 19th
century when English-language versions of
the Sinai Bible were published. Recorded
within these pages is information that
disputes Christianity's claim of
historicity. Christians were provided with
irrefutable evidence of wilful
falsifications in all modern New Testaments.
So different was the Sinai Bible's New
Testament from versions then being published
that the Church angrily tried to annul the
dramatic new evidence that challenged its
very existence. In a series of articles
published in the London Quarterly Review
in 1883, John W. Burgon, Dean of Chichester,
used every rhetorical device at his disposal
to attack the Sinaiticus' earlier and
opposing story of Jesus Christ, saying that
"...without a particle of hesitation, the
Sinaiticus is scandalously corrupt ...
exhibiting the most shamefully mutilated
texts which are anywhere to be met with;
they have become, by whatever process, the
depositories of the largest amount of
fabricated readings, ancient blunders and
intentional perversions of the truth which
are discoverable in any known copies of the
word of God". Dean Burgon's concerns mirror
opposing aspects of Gospel stories then
current, having by now evolved to a new
stage through centuries of tampering with
the fabric of an already unhistorical
document.
The Revelations of Ultraviolet Light Testing
In
1933, the British Museum in London purchased
the Sinai Bible from the Soviet government
for £100,000, of which £65,000 was gifted by
public subscription. Prior to the
acquisition, this Bible was displayed in the
Imperial Library in St Petersburg, Russia,
and "few scholars had set eyes on it" (The
Daily Telegraph and
Morning Post, 11 January 1938, p. 3).
When it went on display in 1933 as "the
oldest Bible in the world" (ibid.), it
became the centre of a pilgrimage unequalled
in the history of the British Museum.
Before I summarise its conflictions, it
should be noted that this old codex is by no
means a reliable guide to New Testament
study as it contains superabundant errors
and serious re-editing. These anomalies were
exposed as a result of the months of
ultraviolet-light tests carried out at the
British Museum in the mid-1930s. The
findings revealed replacements of numerous
passages by at least nine different editors.
Photographs taken during testing revealed
that ink pigments had been retained deep in
the pores of the skin. The original words
were readable under ultraviolet light.
Anybody wishing to read the results of the
tests should refer to the book written by
the researchers who did the analysis: the
Keepers of the Department of Manuscripts at
the British Museum (Scribes and
Correctors of the Codex Sinaiticus, H.
J. M. Milne and T. C. Skeat, British Museum,
London, 1938).
Forgery in the Gospels
When
the New Testament in the Sinai Bible is
compared with a modern-day New Testament, a
staggering 14,800 editorial alterations can
be identified. These amendments can be
recognised by a simple comparative exercise
that anybody can and should do. Serious
study of Christian origins must emanate from
the Sinai Bible's version of the New
Testament, not modern editions.
Of importance is the fact that the
Sinaiticus carries three Gospels since
rejected: the Shepherd of Hermas (written by
two resurrected ghosts, Charinus and
Lenthius), the Missive of Barnabas and the
Odes of Solomon. Space excludes elaboration
on these bizarre writings and also
discussion on dilemmas associated with
translation variations.
Modern Bibles are five removes in
translation from early editions, and
disputes rage between translators over
variant interpretations of more than 5,000
ancient words. However, it is what is
not written in that old Bible that
embarrasses the Church, and this article
discusses only a few of those omissions. One
glaring example is subtly revealed in the
Encyclopaedia Biblica (Adam &
Charles Black, London, 1899, vol. iii, p.
3344), where the Church divulges its
knowledge about exclusions in old Bibles,
saying: "The remark has long ago and often
been made that, like Paul, even the earliest
Gospels knew nothing of the miraculous birth
of our Saviour". That is because there never
was a virgin birth.
It is apparent that when Eusebius assembled
scribes to write the New Testimonies, he
first produced a single document that
provided an exemplar or master version.
Today it is called the Gospel of Mark, and
the Church admits that it was "the first
Gospel written" (Catholic Encyclopedia,
Farley ed., vol. vi, p. 657), even though it
appears second in the New Testament today.
The scribes of the Gospels of Matthew and
Luke were dependent upon the Mark writing as
the source and framework for the compilation
of their works. The Gospel of John is
independent of those writings, and the
late-15th-century theory that it was written
later to support the earlier writings is the
truth (The Crucifixion of Truth,
Tony Bushby, Joshua Books, 2004, pp. 33-40).
Thus, the Gospel of Mark in the Sinai Bible
carries the "first" story of Jesus Christ in
history, one completely different to what is
in modern Bibles. It starts with Jesus "at
about the age of thirty" (Mark 1:9), and
doesn't know of Mary, a virgin birth or mass
murders of baby boys by Herod. Words
describing Jesus Christ as "the son of God"
do not appear in the opening narrative as
they do in today's editions (Mark 1:1), and
the modern-day family tree tracing a
"messianic bloodline" back to King David is
non-existent in all ancient Bibles, as are
the now-called "messianic prophecies" (51 in
total). The Sinai Bible carries a
conflicting version of events surrounding
the "raising of Lazarus", and reveals an
extraordinary omission that later became the
central doctrine of the Christian faith: the
resurrection appearances of Jesus Christ and
his ascension into Heaven. No supernatural
appearance of a resurrected Jesus Christ is
recorded in any ancient Gospels of Mark, but
a description of over 500 words now appears
in modern Bibles (Mark 16:9-20).
Despite a multitude of long-drawn-out
self-justifications by Church apologists,
there is no unanimity of Christian opinion
regarding the non-existence of
"resurrection" appearances in ancient Gospel
accounts of the story. Not only are those
narratives missing in the Sinai Bible, but
they are absent in the Alexandrian Bible,
the Vatican Bible, the Bezae Bible and an
ancient Latin manuscript of Mark, code-named
"K" by analysts. They are also lacking in
the oldest Armenian version of the New
Testament, in sixth-century manuscripts of
the Ethiopic version and ninth-century
Anglo-Saxon Bibles. However, some
12th-century Gospels have the now-known
resurrection verses written within
asterisksÑmarks used by scribes to indicate
spurious passages in a literary document.
The
Church claims that "the resurrection is the
fundamental argument for our Christian
belief" (Catholic Encyclopedia,
Farley ed., vol. xii, p. 792), yet no
supernatural appearance of a resurrected
Jesus Christ is recorded in any of the
earliest Gospels of Mark available. A
resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ
is the sine qua non ("without which,
nothing") of Christianity (Catholic
Encyclopedia, Farley ed., vol. xii, p.
792), confirmed by words attributed to Paul:
"If Christ has not been raised, your faith
is in vain" (1 Cor. 5:17). The resurrection
verses in today's Gospels of Mark are
universally acknowledged as forgeries and
the Church agrees, saying "the conclusion of
Mark is admittedly not genuine ... almost
the entire section is a later compilation" (Encyclopaedia
Biblica, vol. ii, p. 1880, vol. iii,
pp. 1767, 1781; also, Catholic Encyclopedia,
vol. iii, under the heading "The Evidence of
its Spuriousness"; Catholic Encyclopedia,
Farley ed., vol. iii, pp. 274-9 under
heading "Canons"). Undaunted, however, the
Church accepted the forgery into its dogma
and made it the basis of Christianity.
The trend of fictitious resurrection
narratives continues. The final chapter of
the Gospel of John (21) is a sixth-century
forgery, one entirely devoted to describing
Jesus' resurrection to his disciples. The
Church admits: "The sole conclusion that can
be deduced from this is that the 21st
chapter was afterwards added and is
therefore to be regarded as an appendix to
the Gospel" (Catholic Encyclopedia,
Farley ed., vol. viii, pp. 441-442; New
Catholic Encyclopedia (NCE), "Gospel of
John", p. 1080; also NCE, vol. xii,
p. 407).
"The Great Insertion" and "The Great
Omission"
Modern-day versions of the Gospel of Luke
have a staggering 10,000 more words than the
same Gospel in the Sinai Bible. Six of those
words say of Jesus "and was carried up into
heaven", but this narrative does not appear
in any of the oldest Gospels of Luke
available today ("Three Early Doctrinal
Modifications of the Text of the Gospels",
F. C. Conybeare, The Hibbert Journal,
London, vol. 1, no. 1, Oct 1902, pp.
96-113). Ancient versions do not verify
modern-day accounts of an ascension of Jesus
Christ, and this falsification clearly
indicates an intention to deceive.
Today, the Gospel of Luke is the longest of
the canonical Gospels because it now
includes "The Great Insertion", an
extraordinary 15th-century addition
totalling around 8,500 words (Luke
9:51-18:14). The insertion of these
forgeries into that Gospel bewilders modern
Christian analysts, and of them the Church
said: "The character of these passages makes
it dangerous to draw inferences" (Catholic
Encyclopedia, Pecci ed., vol. ii, p.
407).
Just as remarkable, the oldest Gospels of
Luke omit all verses from 6:45 to 8:26,
known in priesthood circles as "The Great
Omission", a total of 1,547 words. In
today's versions, that hole has been
"plugged up" with passages plagiarised from
other Gospels. Dr Tischendorf found that
three paragraphs in newer versions of the
Gospel of Luke's version of the Last Supper
appeared in the 15th century, but the Church
still passes its Gospels off as the
unadulterated "word of God" ("Are Our
Gospels Genuine or Not?", op. cit.)
The "Expurgatory Index"
As was
the case with the New Testament, so also
were damaging writings of early "Church
Fathers" modified in centuries of copying,
and many of their records were intentionally
rewritten or suppressed.
Adopting the decrees of the Council of Trent
(1545-63), the Church subsequently extended
the process of erasure and ordered the
preparation of a special list of specific
information to be expunged from early
Christian writings (Delineation of Roman
Catholicism, Rev. Charles Elliott, DD,
G. Lane & P. P. Sandford, New York, 1842, p.
89; also, The Vatican Censors,
Professor Peter Elmsley, Oxford, p. 327,
pub. date n/a).
In 1562, the Vatican established a special
censoring office called Index Expurgatorius.
Its purpose was to prohibit publication of
"erroneous passages of the early Church
Fathers" that carried statements opposing
modern-day doctrine.
When Vatican archivists came across "genuine
copies of the Fathers, they corrected them
according to the Expurgatory Index" (Index
Expurgatorius Vaticanus, R. Gibbings,
ed., Dublin, 1837; The Literary Policy
of the Church of Rome, Joseph Mendham,
J. Duncan, London, 1830, 2nd ed., 1840;
The Vatican Censors, op. cit., p. 328).
This Church record provides researchers with
"grave doubts about the value of all
patristic writings released to the public" (The
Propaganda Press of Rome, Sir James W.
L. Claxton, Whitehaven Books, London, 1942,
p. 182).
Important for our story is the fact that the
Encyclopaedia Biblica reveals that around
1,200 years of Christian history are
unknown: "Unfortunately, only few of the
records [of the Church] prior to the year
1198 have been released". It was not by
chance that, in that same year (1198), Pope
Innocent III (1198-1216) suppressed all
records of earlier Church history by
establishing the Secret Archives (Catholic
Encyclopedia, Farley ed., vol. xv, p.
287). Some seven-and-a-half centuries later,
and after spending some years in those
Archives, Professor Edmond S. Bordeaux wrote
How The Great Pan Died. In a
chapter titled "The Whole of Church History
is Nothing but a Retroactive Fabrication",
he said this (in part):
"The Church ante-dated all her late
works, some newly made, some revised and
some counterfeited, which contained the
final expression of her history ... her
technique was to make it appear that much
later works written by Church writers were
composed a long time earlier, so that they
might become evidence of the first, second
or third centuries."
(How The Great Pan Died, op.
cit., p. 46)
Supporting Professor Bordeaux's findings is
the fact that, in 1587, Pope Sixtus V
(1585-90) established an official Vatican
publishing division and said in his own
words, "Church history will be now be
established ... we shall seek to print our
own account"Encyclopédie, Diderot,
1759). Vatican records also reveal that
Sixtus V spent 18 months of his life as pope
personally writing a new Bible and then
introduced into Catholicism a "New Learning"
(Catholic Encyclopedia, Farley ed., vol. v,
p. 442, vol. xv, p. 376). The evidence that
the Church wrote its own history is found in
Diderot's Encyclopédie, and it
reveals the reason why Pope Clement XIII
(1758-69) ordered all volumes to be
destroyed immediately after publication in
1759.
Gospel Authors Exposed as Imposters
There
is something else involved in this scenario
and it is recorded in the Catholic
Encyclopedia. An appreciation of the
clerical mindset arises when the Church
itself admits that it does not know who
wrote its Gospels and Epistles, confessing
that all 27 New Testament writings began
life anonymously:
"It thus appears that the present titles
of the Gospels are not traceable to the
evangelists themselves ... they [the New
Testament collection] are supplied with
titles which, however ancient, do not go
back to the respective authors of those
writings." (Catholic Encyclopedia,
Farley ed., vol. vi, pp. 655-6)
The
Church maintains that "the titles of our
Gospels were not intended to indicate
authorship", adding that "the headings ...
were affixed to them" (Catholic
Encyclopedia, Farley ed., vol. i, p.
117, vol. vi, pp. 655, 656). Therefore they
are not Gospels written "according to
Matthew, Mark, Luke or John", as publicly
stated. The full force of this confession
reveals that there are no genuine apostolic
Gospels, and that the Church's shadowy
writings today embody the very ground and
pillar of Christian foundations and faith.
The consequences are fatal to the pretence
of Divine origin of the entire New Testament
and expose Christian texts as having no
special authority. For centuries, fabricated
Gospels bore Church certification of
authenticity now confessed to be false, and
this provides evidence that Christian
writings are wholly fallacious.
After years of dedicated New Testament
research, Dr Tischendorf expressed dismay at
the differences between the oldest and
newest Gospels, and had trouble
understanding...
"...how scribes could allow themselves to
bring in here and there changes which were
not simply verbal ones, but such as
materially affected the very meaning and,
what is worse still, did not shrink from
cutting out a passage or inserting one."
(Alterations to the Sinai Bible,
Dr Constantin von Tischendorf, 1863,
available in the British Library, London)
After years of validating the fabricated
nature of the New Testament, a disillusioned
Dr Tischendorf confessed that modern-day
editions have "been altered in many places"
and are "not to be accepted as true" (When
Were Our Gospels Written?, Dr
Constantin von Tischendorf, 1865, British
Library, London).
Just What is Christianity?
The
important question then to ask is this: if
the New Testament is not historical, what is
it?
Dr Tischendorf provided part of the answer
when he said in his 15,000 pages of critical
notes on the Sinai Bible that "it seems that
the personage of Jesus Christ was made
narrator for many religions". This explains
how narratives from the ancient Indian epic,
the Mahabharata, appear verbatim in
the Gospels today (e.g., Matt. 1:25, 2:11,
8:1-4, 9:1-8, 9:18-26), and why passages
from the Phenomena of the Greek statesman
Aratus of Sicyon (271-213 BC) are in the New
Testament.
Extracts from the Hymn to Zeus,
written by Greek philosopher Cleanthes (c.
331-232 BC), are also found in the Gospels,
as are 207 words from the Thais of
Menander (c. 343-291), one of the "seven
wise men" of Greece. Quotes from the
semi-legendary Greek poet Epimenides (7th or
6th century BC) are applied to the lips of
Jesus Christ, and seven passages from the
curious Ode of Jupiter (c. 150 BC;
author unknown) are reprinted in the New
Testament.
Tischendorf's conclusion also supports
Professor Bordeaux's Vatican findings that
reveal the allegory of Jesus Christ derived
from the fable of Mithra, the divine son of
God (Ahura Mazda) and messiah of the first
kings of the Persian Empire around 400 BC.
His birth in a grotto was attended by magi
who followed a star from the East. They
brought "gifts of gold, frankincense and
myrrh" (as in Matt. 2:11) and the newborn
baby was adored by shepherds. He came into
the world wearing the Mithraic cap, which
popes imitated in various designs until well
into the 15th century.
Mithra, one of a trinity, stood on a rock,
the emblem of the foundation of his
religion, and was anointed with honey. After
a last supper with Helios and 11 other
companions, Mithra was crucified on a cross,
bound in linen, placed in a rock tomb and
rose on the third day or around 25 March
(the full moon at the spring equinox, a time
now called Easter after the Babylonian
goddess Ishtar). The fiery destruction of
the universe was a major doctrine of
Mithraism-a time in which Mithra promised to
return in person to Earth and save deserving
souls. Devotees of Mithra partook in a
sacred communion banquet of bread and wine,
a ceremony that paralleled the Christian
Eucharist and preceded it by more than four
centuries.
Christianity is an adaptation of Mithraism
welded with the Druidic principles of the
Culdees, some Egyptian elements (the
pre-Christian Book of Revelation was
originally called The Mysteries of
Osiris and Isis), Greek philosophy and
various aspects of Hinduism.
Why There are no Records of Jesus Christ
It is
not possible to find in any legitimate
religious or historical writings compiled
between the beginning of the first century
and well into the fourth century any
reference to Jesus Christ and the
spectacular events that the Church says
accompanied his life. This confirmation
comes from Frederic Farrar (1831-1903) of
Trinity College, Cambridge:
"It is amazing that history has not
embalmed for us even one certain or definite
saying or circumstance in the life of the
Saviour of mankind ... there is no statement
in all history that says anyone saw Jesus or
talked with him. Nothing in history is more
astonishing than the silence of contemporary
writers about events relayed in the four
Gospels."
(The Life of Christ,
Frederic W. Farrar, Cassell, London, 1874)
This
situation arises from a conflict between
history and New Testament narratives. Dr
Tischendorf made this comment:
"We must frankly admit that we have no
source of information with respect to the
life of Jesus Christ other than ecclesiastic
writings assembled during the fourth
century."
(Codex Sinaiticus, Dr
Constantin von Tischendorf, British Library,
London)
There is an explanation for those hundreds
of years of silence: the construct of
Christianity did not begin until after the
first quarter of the fourth century, and
that is why Pope Leo X (d. 1521) called
Christ a "fable" (Cardinal Bembo: His
Letters..., op. cit.).
About the
Author:
Tony Bushby, an Australian, became a
businessman and entrepreneur early in his
adult life. He established a
magazine-publishing business and spent 20
years researching, writing and publishing
his own magazines, primarily for the
Australian and New Zealand markets.
With strong spiritual beliefs and an
interest in metaphysical subjects, Tony has
developed long relationships with many
associations and societies throughout the
world that have assisted his research by
making their archives available. He is the
author of The Bible Fraud (2001;
reviewed in NEXUS 8/06 with extracts in
NEXUS 9/01—03), The Secret in the Bible
(2003; reviewed in 11/02, with extract,
"Ancient Cities under the Sands of Giza", in
11/03) and The Crucifixion of Truth
(2005; reviewed in 12/02) and The Twin
Deception (2007; reviewed 14/03).
Copies of these books are available from the
NEXUS website and the Joshua Books website
http://www.joshuabooks.com.
As Tony Bushby vigorously protects his
privacy, any correspondence should be sent
to him care of NEXUS Magazine, PO Box 30,
Mapleton Qld 4560, Australia, fax +61 (0) 7
5442 9381.
Last
Updated:
Monday, January 21, 2008 07:10:43 AM
|| Posted: Sunday, January 20, 2008,
12:55PM
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