The Jesus Papers...

[helen99]

I'm reading "The Jesus Papers" by Baigent. Several new twists on the Jesus story and such. Fun to speculate.

The thing that had me chuckling this morning, however, is this:

Execution by crucifixion was reserved for political seditionists, not religious dissidents. Heretics were generally stoned to death. So ok, that's not very funny, but bear with me.

According to reports, Jesus was crucified along with two thieves. However, the older translations do not use a word that means "thieves". The word is "Listai" which means "Terrorist" or "Political Dissident" (Insurgent, if you will).

Baigent goes on to make a case that Jesus, who was of the bloodlines of both David (King) and Aaron (Priest), was thus qualified to become king of Judea, and was being promoted as such by the Zealots. The Zealots were revolutionaries who wanted to install legitimate priests and kings of the Aaron/David bloodlines in positions of power in Jerusalem. They also wished to violently depose the usurpers that were installed by Rome. The Zealots were definitely considered to be Listai. So it is looking more and more like Jesus was an Insurgent, a political dissident, a terrorist, otherwise known as a Listai.

It's only missing one little R, folks. One measly little R, and we have Listari.

That's really the only part that was funny, but I'm still chuckling in light of the fact that one of rialian's college friends once went temporarily delusional and thought Rialian was Jesus. She was under the influence of 3 weeks of sleep dep, caffiene, and nonstop studying for finals. They tried to hide the car keys, but she had a spare set. They found her some days later in a motel. By that time, she accused another guy of being Inuit Eskimo Satan (which I think is even cooler than accusing someone of being Jesus). She ended up marrying Eskimo Satan, and is much better now.

But seriously, kidding aside, this sounds a bit familiar - the part about the Zealots who were trying to kick Rome out of Jerusalem in order to purify their religious environment, and being considered, well, Listai. Ironically, the same person they were trying to promote as the one who would save them from the usurpers later became the religious weapon of choice that has been used by many of the power elite to subjugate the population.

Comments

Re: Selective thinking

[helen99.livejournal.com]

I think it has to do with the number of people involved. As long as something is small and stays small, it seems benign. As soon as the first generation dies, though, the impulse to keep it "in the family" so to speak, probably dies with them. Then you hvae the game of "telephone" starting, with each subsequent generation putting its own stamp on it, and if it's popular enough, the powermongers taking it over and using it as their instrument of brainwashing and control.

I'm a firm believer in never advertising one's beliefs. It might become popular, and that will be the end of it.