Theos-Talk Archives (March 2006 Message tt01298)

Cass

Jerry Hejka-Ekins <jjhe@charter.net> wrote: Dear Vince,

Yes, I agree that we are in a similar boat, but got there in very 
different ways.  The three topics that my parents never discussed in 
front of the children were religion, politics and race.  So, I never 
really discovered these things until I was about twelve--and then, on my 
own.  They then became subjects of primary interest. Since I had no 
religious instruction from home, lived in a Jewish neighborhood, and 
attended a public school where everyone was Jewish, I just half assumed 
that I was a Jew, like everyone else.

As I entered my teens, I discovered the beatniks at Venice beach, and 
used to hang around them.  My mother became alarmed and decided that I 
must be becoming a "juvenile delinquent" and began to take me to a very 
conservative Lutheran Church. That was my first formal contact with 
Christianity. I found the services and sermons curious.  Lots of 
mysticism about an invisible god, a ressurected man, and promise of an 
afterlife if I believed the right things.  The problem was that I didn't 
feel like I was damned. I understood about right and wrong actions, but 
this idea of "sin" was strange. Why should Eve's eating of an apple have 
anything to do with me?  After all, it was she who screwed up, not me.  
Soon we began going to classes to learn about the religion. The notion 
of original sin remain illogical.  I couldn't buy it. 

The Pastor spent most of his time talking about why Catholicism is in 
error and how awful the Jew were.  One night the Pastor told us that God 
is only now beginning to forgive the Jews for killing Jesus. That was 
the first time I ever heard such a thing and the remark deeply disturbed 
me. All of my friends were Jews and I didn't find them awful at all. The 
implication I got in the Pastor's remark, was that God must have been 
pleased with Hitler's attempted extermination of the Jews. 

So, other than the unfortunate encounter with the Lutheran Pastor, I 
entered a study of Christianity with pretty much of a clean slate, and 
began by reading, on my own, the New English Bible of the NT, which had 
just been published for the first time.  There I was delighted to 
discover that the three wise men were called "astrologers."  That 
delighted me because I had recently discovered that my aunt practiced 
astrology professionally, but out of respect for my mother's wishes, 
never mentioned it to me.  So, from the beginning, my investigation into 
Christianity had no theological guidance, which left me to my own 
resources to make of it what I could. 

When the Nag Hammadi codices were published in translation around 1970, 
I raced to the Bodhi Tree Bookstore and bought a copy.  I then began 
reading more scholarly commentaries on Christianity, Christian and 
Gnostic texts, beginning with Elaine Pagel's writings.  While all of 
this was happening, I attended churches and talked casually to ministers 
of various denominations. When we moved to Northern California, my wife 
and I began attending the Unitarian Universalist Church where a member 
with mainline Christian beliefs is not to be found.  

So, like you I discovered that the Bible is misrepresented by a strange 
theological structure, but took a very different route to end up in the 
same place. When we started the Origins of Christianity class two years 
ago, I discovered that there were a lot of barriers to communication. 
Theological conditioning from years of church going was to blame.  One 
of them is as you mentioned: The Gospels read very differently from the 
theological interpretations. One member or out group who was raised in a 
conservative Christian home discovered this when we began studying 
Judaism and investigating the Hebrew scriptures.

Some other barriers that met with considerable resistance were:

1. The Gospels were not written to be historical accounts of Jesus' 
life.  Rather, they are evangelical tracts written for the purpose of 
gaining converts and to answer the objections of critics of the early 
Christians.

2. One must therefore, make a distinction between the historical Jesus, 
the Jesus represented in the Gospels, and the theological Jesus. 

3. There were, in the beginning dozens of Christian communities with 
very divergent beliefs.  Many of them had Gospels and religious writings 
of their own.  Most of these writings were destroyed after Christianity 
was declared the only legal religion of the empire.  That is, the 
variety of Christianity adopted by the Emperor of Rome. 

4. Since these other Christian communities, later called "gnostics," 
were outlawed and their writings destroyed, we know little about them 
except through a few meager texts that survived, and through the 
criticisms of the canonical church fathers.  

5. The members of these other Christian communities considered 
themselves to be just as Christian as those belonging to the sect 
adopted by the Emperors.

6. Critical works of Christianity written by philosophers and other 
learned people were systematically destroyed.  All that survives are the 
reconstructed writings of Porphyry, Celsus, and the preserved orations 
of the apostate Emperor Julian.  

7. Because of 4 and 6, our knowledge of the earliest history of the 
Christian movement is fragmentary, biased in favor of the early Roman 
church, and much is left to conjecture and theological manipulation. 

Best,
Jerry









Vincent wrote:

>Jerry-
>
>I'm pretty much in a similar boat in my own kind of way.  My 
>personal experience has been that I had formerly attended Christian 
>fundamentalist churches for many years, and so I am quite well 
>acquainted with Christian fundamentalist doctrines.  However, a 
>vital inconsistency then occured.  When I actually went and read the 
>Bible for myself, I began to find that it said things completely 
>different than what my former Christian fundamentalist teachers were 
>telling me.
>
>I therefore concluded that my former Christian fundamentalist 
>teachers were actually misrepresenting the Bible, even though they 
>claim that it infallibly validates their interpretation of absolute 
>truth. When I began asking the leaders questions about various 
>inconsistencies in their biblical interpretations, I was then deemed 
>a threat for asking too many questions which may potentially upset 
>the religious faith of their converts.
>
>Vince
>
>--- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, Jerry Hejka-Ekins  
>wrote:
>  
>
>>Dear Vince,
>>
>>I'm glad to know that you did not throw out the baby with the bath 
>>water.  There is a lot of value in the Biblical texts, but they 
>>    
>>
>have to 
>  
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>>to be read from perspectives other than traditional theology. In 
>>    
>>
>our own 
>  
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>>study group, we are into our second year of seminars on the 
>>    
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>historical 
>  
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>>origins of Christianity. We began with the classical Roman, Greek 
>>    
>>
>and 
>  
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>>Egyptian religions, philosophical schools and cultures (we already 
>>    
>>
>put 
>  
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>>three years into the origins of Judaism and Kaballah).  Now we are 
>>looking at both the canonical  and the gnostic texts in light of 
>>    
>>
>the 
>  
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>>prevailing beliefs of the time. What we discovered turns 
>>    
>>
>everything one 
>  
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>>ever learned in Sunday school on its head.  We will be ending the 
>>    
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>class 
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>>with an historical overview on Christianity's progress from the 
>>    
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>1st to 
>  
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>>the 6th centuries.  Keep up your reading.
>>
>>Best
>>Jerry
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>Vincent Blazina wrote:
>>
>>    
>>
>>>Jerry:
>>>  
>>> I've pretty much made a separation from the Christian groups, 
>>>      
>>>
>insofar as they have deemed me to be a bit too sinful for them, due 
>to my metaphysical interests.  I still read the Bible quite a bit, 
>even though some Christians have told me that I have no business 
>doing so, if I am not strictly aligned with their own belief systems.
>  
>
>>>  
>>> Vince
>>>
>>>Jerry Hejka-Ekins  wrote:
>>> Dear Vince,
>>>
>>>I understand what you are going through with the Christian 
>>>      
>>>
>communities 
>  
>
>>>out there. We live in a very conservative town in California 
>>>      
>>>
>where most 
>  
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>>>of the churches are evangelical in nature. But we have found lots 
>>>      
>>>
>of 
>  
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>>>individuals within the community who have been quietly looking 
>>>      
>>>
>for the 
>  
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>>>kind of study we offer. It sounds like you already have developed 
>>>      
>>>
>close 
>  
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>>>ties with those church groups over the years. Some may try to 
>>>      
>>>
>make it 
>  
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>>>difficult for you to separate from them. I will be very 
>>>      
>>>
>interested in 
>  
>
>>>learning how your situation progresses.
>>>
>>>Best
>>>Jerry
>>>
>>>
>>>vblaz20042004 wrote:
>>>
>>> 
>>>
>>>      
>>>
>>>>Hi there, I'm Vince and I am new to the group. I have recently 
>>>>        
>>>>
>been 
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>>>>attending the Theosophical Society of Wheaton, Illinois for the 
>>>>        
>>>>
>past 
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>>>>month, and have been enjoying the various teachings and 
>>>>        
>>>>
>discussions 
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>>>>at that facility.
>>>>
>>>>My life has been rich with metaphysical experiences, but the 
>>>>Christian Fundamentalist churches that I had previously attended 
>>>>        
>>>>
>for 
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>>>>twenty years got very judgmental towards me when I might venture 
>>>>        
>>>>
>to 
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>>>>reference them. I also began finding many inconsistencies with 
>>>>        
>>>>
>the 
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>>>>way that many Christians were representing the Bible, and my 
>>>>questions about Christianity were often deemed dangerous to 
>>>>        
>>>>
>people's 
>  
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>>>>religious faith.
>>>>
>>>>I am looking for a place in the Theosophical Society wherein I 
>>>>        
>>>>
>may 
>  
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>>>>potentially freely discuss metaphysical issues as they directly 
>>>>pertain to my life, with people who are more open to such 
>>>>discussions. I am very well read with the Bible, although my 
>>>>interpretations of it are more metaphysical versus orthodox.
>>>>
>>>>I look forward to constuctive discussion with the people here, 
>>>>        
>>>>
>and 
>  
>
>>>>would like to learn more about the Theosophical Society and it's 
>>>>perspectives, insofar as many of them are brand new to me.
>>>>
>>>>Thank you,
>>>>
>>>>Vince
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
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>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>Yahoo! Groups Links
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>>>Yahoo! Groups Links
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>>>Yahoo! Groups Links
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