Herod
and Hadrian
Part Three:
Have the Gospels
delivered us a fake Jesus?
by
Damien F. Mackey
“Allegorical
or supposed "higher truths" exist in a dimension all their own
and a
fake historicism confuses the unwary”.
Kenneth Humphreys
At a site claiming and arguing
the ‘Jesus Never Existed’:
we read of situations that are
seemingly quite unfavourable regarding the reliability of the Gospels, but that
actually need to be considered anew in a revised context.
Here are some excerpts to which I
shall add my own comments wherever I consider necessary:
For two
hundred years, the municipality of Aelia –
the erstwhile city of Jerusalem – was demonstrably and triumphantly pagan,
enjoying all the refinements of a Roman colonia.
It was
also a garrison city for legio X
Fretensis – the Roman legion which
had destroyed Gamala, Qumran and Masada. In the siege of Jerusalem in 70 AD
the Tenth had
camped on the Mount of Olives,
and rained ballisticae onto
the city. In the war of 135 it had reduced the fortress of Betar, killing the
messianic claimant and the last of his supporters. Post-war, legio
decima was heavily involved in
reconstruction, its expertise deployed in a vast number of public works.
This
pagan past is dimly perceived today, even though the Roman imprint determined
the size and layout of the city for more than a thousand
years. "Pagan Jerusalem" is regarded by all and sundry as
an alien interlude in an essentially Judeo-Christian story. Yet Aelia
Capitolina is crucial in the history
of Christianity. It was while Jupiter was venerated on "Temple
Mount" and Venus honoured in the
heart of the city that the fable of Jesus was given form and substance. It was
upon, not the city of Herod, but the 2nd
century city of Hadrian that the
gospellers imposed their fable.
My comment: Indeed, that would all have been a “gospellers fable” if there really
had been a “war of 135 [AD]”, but that supposed “war”, or revolt of the Jews,
was the Maccabean revolt, but now projected onto a
C2nd AD ‘screen’. See e.g. my article:
Sorting out
the Jewish Revolts
“Pagan
Jerusalem” was the effect of the paganising of the Jews under the influence of
the Macedonian Greek king, Antiochus IV “Epiphanes”.
And it was at
this very time that Jesus Christ was born in Bethlehem, according to my
article:
A New
Timetable for the Nativity of Jesus Christ
So,
regarding the above statement: “It was upon,
not the city of Herod, but the 2nd century city of Hadrian that the gospellers imposed their fable”, this
is partly right and partly wrong. For, according to this present series, Herod was Hadrian.
A Roman Colonia
"The whole nation (of
the Jews) was prohibited from this time on by a decree, and by the commands of
Adrian, from ever going up to the country about Jerusalem. For the emperor gave
orders that they should not even see from a distance the land of their fathers.
Such is the account of Aristo of Pella. And thus, when the city had been emptied of the Jewish nation and
had suffered a total destruction
of its ancient inhabitants, it was colonized by a different race,
and the Roman city which subsequently arose was called Aelia, in honour of the
emperor Aelius Adrian."
–
Eusebius, History of the Church, 39.6.3.
If 4th century Christian historian
Eusebius is to be believed, the new city that Emperor Hadrian built upon the
ruins of Jerusalem was colonized by a "new race of Gentiles". When the
gospels took the shape familiar to us today Jerusalem was a memory. In its stead
stood the Romano-Hellenic city of Aelia
Capitolina, a minor town of the province of Syria Palestina.
My
comment: No, the “new race of Gentiles” was
comprised of the apostate Jews of the Maccabean era now co-mingling with pagan Greek
Gentiles. But Jerusalem was still there.
Coins issued by Hadrian
confirm that Colonia
Aelia Capitolina was founded about the year 132 AD, before,
not after, the second war of the Jews. It was originally intended to be the
emperor's gift
to the Jewish people ….
My
comment: Obviously no coin issued by Hadrian would
be marked with “the year 132 AD”.
The
Seleucid Greek colony (“Colonia”) was a prelude to the Maccabean revolt now
described:
But soon after Hadrian
returned to the west resentful religious reactionaries placed themselves at the
head of impoverished peasants and urban malcontents and began a well-planned
second war against Rome. Evidently, in munitions workshops Jewish craftsmen had
deliberately spoiled weapons intended for the Roman army and stored the rejects
for future use.
My
comment: Enter the revolutionary Maccabees, the
most outstanding of whom would be Simon – who would become known as Bar Kochba
(or ben Kosiba):
Three years of vicious
warfare against rebels led by Simon ben Kosiba left
the emperor furious with the Jews. When the revolt was eventually crushed,
Hadrian wiped off Judaea from the map [sic]. Privileges which the Jews had enjoyed
from the time of Julius Caesar were revoked.
My
comment: For my doubts on the historicity of
‘Julius Caesar’ and of some of the textbook Roman Republican history, see my “A
New Timetable” article above, and see also:
Horrible Histories. Retracting Romans
Except for the ninth of Av, the day of
mourning, the Jews faced penalties for even laying eyes on the city. Under the
edicts of Hadrian the Roman administration made no distinction between
Judeo-Christians and orthodox Jews – all were expelled.
Not to be thwarted, the
emperor pressed ahead with his plans for the new city. His architects marked
out a colony extending further north than the earlier [sic] Herodian city – its
full extent is yet to be established. But Aelia would no longer be a city for
the Jews. Under new Roman laws they were forbidden to live in the city or
anywhere between Jerusalem and Hebron. Capital punishment faced any Jew who so
much as stepped foot in the city. The Aelia which arose would make no
concessions to the Jews.
The city itself, no longer
the hub of a theocracy, took on the status of a minor provincial town. No major
trade route passed its way and rabbinic Judaism established itself elsewhere.
Caesarea, the provincial capital, became the city of choice for both the Jewish
elite and ambitious artisans, attracted by the thriving port and Hellenistic lifestyle.
Aelia, lost in the high country, was on the road to nowhere.
But Aelia was a city with
a dimly perceived "past" that would colour a wondrous tale of a
saviour god. Who would
have anticipated that within a few centuries this minor provincial town would
flourish as the "centre of the earth" and enjoy the dubious honour of
being the maelstrom of conflict and war for the next two millennia?
Jesus in the
city of Hadrian?
"Jerusalem
... was so thoroughly laid even with the ground by those that dug
it up to the foundation, that
there was left nothing to make those that came thither believe it had ever been
inhabited." – Josephus, War VII.1,1.
"And Jesus answering
said unto him, Seest thou these great buildings? there
shall not be left one stone upon another,
that shall not be thrown down." –
Mark 13.2.
My comment: This prophecy of Jesus was fulfilled to the letter, and there was
no subsequent destruction of Jerusalem in 135 AD, in some imaginary, so-called
Second Revolt:
"… there shall not be left one stone upon another”. How
to explain Jerusalem today?
The whole world knows that
the gospel pageant is set in the first half of the first century. Rather more
pertinent is determining precisely
when and by
whom the fabulous tale was concocted [sic]. The inspired
religious writers of the second
century [sic] – who quite possibly had no familiarity
with real Jerusalem
at all – would have been very aware that the city had changed drastically in a
century of turmoil and war. But, in fact, that hiatus helped to establish their
salvation drama as a cosmic
event. The gospellers' Jerusalem was no mere geography but was
the Holy City,
a sacred mountain where God had communed with his chosen people.
Aelia's existence
on the ruins of Jerusalem – erasing
all that had gone before – underscored the transcendent and
timeless nature of the gospel message. Divinity had intruded briefly into human
affairs and, for the Christian story writers, the comings and goings of Jesus
had been a sacred drama, occurring not in simple past and common place but in
"sacred time"
and "sacred space".
Sacred space is replete
with a Holy of Holies, hallowed ground, Paradise,
and – inevitably – an Abode
of the Damned. Sacred space has place for a "centre",
"four corners" and the "ends" of the earth and for a firmament that "divides the waters from the waters"
(Genesis 1.6). In sacred space zodiacal coordinates and the position of the
stars have meaning ("And
there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars"
– Luke 21.25.)
Sacred time is no less a
departure from rationality – and is certainly not linear, chronological and
unidirectional. What
importance has normal time to eternal truths or eternal beings? – a
day is as a year or a millennium. Sacred time has an "In the
Beginning", an "End Time", a "time before time",
"first and last days" and, by inference, an indeterminate
"meantime". The once and future king is always with us, his pithy
"wisdom" statements are true now, have always been true, and will
remain true for all time. The superhero who utters them does so in times past,
present and future. In this quirky universe Joshua can make the sun stand still
and a sacrificial redeemer can still live two thousand years after his death,
forever dying and resurrecting.
Allegorical or supposed
"higher truths" exist in a dimension all their own and a fake historicism confuses
the unwary. The problem arises when the theological
dreamscape is misinterpreted as literal truth and lesser
minds impose the cosmic event onto a real geography and intrude a holy pageant
into real history. ….
My
comment: In a properly revised context, it will
clearly be seen to be, not a mental imposition by “lesser minds, but “a real geography and … real history”.
The Church in Germany must revise its synodal plans in line with the pope’s leadership and the universal Church, Cardinal Rainer Woelki told the plenary session of the German Episcopal Conference Tuesday morning. Woelki, who is Archbishop of Cologne, told the bishops that Pope Francis had offered them essential “fatherly advice” in his June letter, warning about the need to remain in harmony with the universal church.
