Was Jesus really a teacher of peace, or was he in reality violent?

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Originally posted:

http://bendench.blogspot.com/2009/05/violent-jesus.html

Jesus is recorded as having said many beautiful things about love, but those are not the only sort of things he is recorded as having said.

Matthew 10:34-39

“Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and one’s foes will be members of one’s own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it."1

(other versions read, whoever does not hate his father and mother is unworthy of me)

Luke 19:27

"But as for these enemies of mine who did not want me to be king over them—bring them here and slaughter them in my presence.”

Mark 4:11-12; see also Matthew 13:13-15

And he said to them, “To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside, everything comes in parables; in order that ‘they may indeed look, but not perceive, and may indeed listen, but not understand; so that they may not turn again and be forgiven.’ ” [Emphasis added.]

Apparently, Jesus wants some to go without forgiveness.

Luke 22:36-38

He said to them, “But now, the one who has a purse must take it, and likewise a bag. And the one who has no sword must sell his cloak and buy one. For I tell you, this scripture must be fulfilled in me, ‘And he was counted among the lawless’; and indeed what is written about me is being fulfilled.”

They said, “Lord, look, here are two swords.”

He replied, “It is enough.”

[Emphasis added.]

Marvin Harris gives us insight into this passage:

“The gospels also indicate that some of the disciples carried swords and were prepared to resist arrest. Just before being taken into custody, Jesus said, ‘He that hath no sword, let him sell his garment and buy one.’ This prompted the disciples to show him two swords—indicating that at least two of them were not only habitually armed but had kept their swords concealed under their clothes… like dagger men [a common type of assassin at the time].” (Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches, Marvin Harris, 188)

“In Jerusalem, assassinations by dagger men who concealed their weapons inside their garments now had become common. One of their most famous victims was the High Priest Jonathan. In the midst of all the bloodshed, military-messianic contenders appeared again and again.” (Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches, Marvin Harris, 169)

Matthew 10:5-6

These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: “Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”

Matthew 15:24

He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”

Mark 7:24-30

From there he set out and went away to the region of Tyre. He entered a house and did not want anyone to know he was there. Yet he could not escape notice, but a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately heard about him, and she came and bowed down at his feet. Now the woman was a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. He said to her, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.”

But she answered him, “Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.”

Then he said to her, “For saying that, you may go—the demon has left your daughter.” So she went home, found the child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.

Jesus was unwilling to heal the Syrian Greek woman’s daughter until she admitted her (a dog’s) inferiority to the Jews (the children). Marvin Harris elaborates:

“The preserved evidence of Jesus’ reported actions and sayings provides no support for Paul’s attempt to scrap the distinction between Jew and non-Jew in the overseas communes. In the Gospel according to Mark, for example, a Syrian Greek woman falls at Jesus’ feet and begs him to drive out the devils from her daughter. Jesus refuses: ‘Let the children first be filled: for it is not meet to take the children’s bread and to cast it to the dogs.’ The Syrian Greek woman argues back, saying: ‘The dogs under the table eat the childrens’ crumbs,’ whereupon Jesus relents and cures the woman’s daughter. ‘Children’ here can only mean ‘children of Israel’ and ‘dogs’ can only mean non-Jews, especially enemies like the Syrian Greeks. Incidents and sayings of this sort were preserved in Mark and the other gospels for the same reason that the other vengeful and ethnocentric sayings and actions could not be entirely expunged. There were lively oral traditions upon which the gospels were based.” (Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches, Marvin Harris, 198-199)

Mark 5:9-13

Then Jesus asked him, ‘What is your name?’ He replied, ‘My name is Legion; for we are many.’ He begged him earnestly not to send them out of the country. Now there on the hillside a great herd of swine was feeding; and the unclean spirits begged him, ‘Send us into the swine; let us enter them.’ So he gave them permission. And the unclean spirits came out and entered the swine; and the herd, numbering about two thousand, rushed down the steep bank into the lake, and were drowned in the lake.

Luigi Cascioli explains this strange passage:

“Only now that the mask has been removed, can we understand the meaning of all those gospel passages, which up until now seemed incomprehensible and contradictory. An example is the passage that describes the casting out of demons that possessed a man from Gerasa, which symbolized all the hatred of the Jewish revolutionaries towards Rome. Now we finally know that the name ‘Legion’ given to the demons referred to the Fretensis Roman legion stationed in Judea. The ‘pigs’ represented this legion, which had a pig’s head as its insignia. The sea these animals drowned in was really the Adriatic Sea where they would throw the Roman army after they had expelled it from Egypt according to the War Scrolls [part of the Dead Sea Scrolls].” (The Fable of Christ, Luigi Cascioli, 156-157)

There is reason to believe that Jesus, along with John the Baptist (who were possibly originally the same figure and only later separated), were members of the Essene religious sect of Judaism. This was a group which is described by historians of the time as being a deeply religious order. They preached to the poor to gain converts. “Like John the Baptist, these missionaries are said to have eaten locusts and wild honey and dressed in the skins of animals” (Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches, Marvin Harris, 184). They lived a communist lifestyle in which all converts sold all their possessions and gave the money to the group (like with the early “Christian” communes). These communes existed all over the Empire. The historian Josephus describes them as having “a greater affection for one another than the other sects” (Jewish Antiquities, Flavius Josephus). Their leaders were called Nazarites.2 This would be practically all we knew about them, if not for the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in the caves of their Khirbet Qumran commune in 1947, preserved in jars and forgotten for two thousand years.

As a result of this access to their internal literature, we have come to discover that the peaceful outer appearance they presented was merely a pretense. In truth they were a terrorist organization that sought to overthrow the Romans and establish the Holy Jewish Empire—the Kingdom of God. Because of this discrepancy between their outer appearance and inner reality, converts had to undergo three years of indoctrination before they were admitted to the communities as full members. The communes had extensive bathing facilities within their settlements, which presumably were used for baptismal rites. And they held a simple Eucharistic rite: whenever ten or more sat down to eat, a priest would bless the bread and wine. Luigi Cascioli and Marvin Harris explain the Essene connection to Christianity extensively in their books, but it is perhaps most extensively addressed by Edmond Bordeaux Szekely in his book The Essene Origins of Christianity. The nature of the Essenes, and the Dead Sea Scrolls for that matter, is complicated, however, and it is difficult to say anything definitively. Even so, this seems an angle worth exploring.

According to his “about the author” paragraph from The Essene Origins of Christianity, Szekely received his Ph.D. from the University of Paris and degrees from the Universities of Vienna and Leipzig. He held professorships in Philosophy and Experimental Psychology; was a philologist in Sanskrit, Aramaic, Greek, and Latin; spoke ten modern languages; and translated selected texts from the Dead Sea Scrolls. After studying all the documents that we have concerning the origin and evolution of Christianity, he concluded that Jesus and John the Baptist were based on “John of Gamala”—the eldest son of Judas the Gaulonite (Judas of Galilee). “John of Gamala” was the leader of the Essene Messianic (“Christist”) movement until his military defeat and crucifixion. Szekely says John of Gamala was the author of the original book of Revelations (which has since undergone numerous additions and revisions to reach its current state) and that Christianity developed from this militant terrorist organization after it lost its ability to wage open war on Rome. During the centuries the Church enjoyed unchecked power after the fall of Rome, it forged documents and rewrote history to serve its purposes.

For interests sake, here are the family connections of Jesus pieced together by Luigi Cascioli and Edmond Bordeaux Szekely in their respective books:

The Assideans (Hassedin) of the Old Testament:

Mattathias (founder of the Hasmonean line, heir to the Davidic throne)

Simon, son of Mattathias

John Hyrcanus I, son of Simon

Alexander Jannaeus, son of John Hyrcanus I

Aristobulus II, son of Alexander Jannaeus

The Essenes (Hassenin—still the Assideans, only the pronunciation has changed):

Ezekias, direct descendant of Aristobulus II

Judas the Gaulonite, son of Ezekias

The Nazarite “John of Gamala” (Jesus), son of Judas (Joseph) and Salome (Mary). He had six younger brothers and two sisters. Cascioli and Szekely agree upon these brothers: Simon called Peter, Jacob-James the elder, Judas (Judas-Jude according to Szekely and Judas Thaddeus according to Cascioli), Jacob-James the younger, and Menahem.

Cascioli says that the last brother is Eleazar, that the two sisters are unnamed, and that Jesus is married to Mary Magdalene with Lazarus as his brother-in-law.

Szekely says that the last brother is called Phillip but that his Hebrew name has been lost, that the two sisters are Esther (called Mary, married to Eleazar/Lazarus) and Thamar (called Martha, married to Jairus), and that Jesus is the brother-in-law of Lazarus (who he thinks is the same person as Eleazar) because Esther (Mary) is Jesus’s sister. So both agree that Lazarus is Jesus’s brother-in-law through Mary, they just disagree as to whether Mary is Jesus’s sister or wife! Still, Cascioli and Szekely come fairly close to one another in their interpretations, considering all the distortions the Church has put in place for them to sort through.

http://www.luigicascioli.eu/traduzioni/en_argomenti_gesu_apostoli.htm

http://www.luigicascioli.eu/traduzioni/en_argomenti_nazoreo.htm

http://www.luigicascioli.eu/traduzioni/en_argomenti_codice_da_vinci.htm

http://www.communityofpeace.net/Britxt/B01profes.htm

Matthew 5:17-20

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

Read the ridiculously specific and (many of which) impractical laws of the Old Testament (all of which are followed by Orthodox Jews today—there are 613 of them) and decide whether Jesus thinks you will enter the kingdom of heaven:

http://www.jewfaq.org/613.htm

“I should also note at this point the obvious false construction traditionally given to what Jesus said when he was asked if Jews ought to pay taxes to the Romans: ‘Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s and unto God that which is God’s.’ This could mean only one thing to the Galileans who had participated in Judas of Galilee’s tax revolt—namely, ‘Don’t pay.’ For Judas of Galilee had said that everything in Palestine belonged to God. But the authors of the Gospels and their readers probably knew nothing about Judas of Galilee, so they preserved Jesus’ highly provocative response on the mistaken assumption that it showed a genuinely conciliatory attitude toward the Roman government.” (Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches, Marvin Harris, 190-191)

If Jesus truly was “John of Gamala,” Judas of Galilee (Judas the Gaulonite) was his father.

An informed reader of the Gospels will discover something rather quickly: whoever wrote them knew very little about Judaism, very little about Palestine, and very little about the Old Testament (from which they lift quotes totally out of context for their “prophecies”):

http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/messianic.html

I am indebted, yet again, to Paul Tobin, who provides excellent analyses of these matters as well as scholarly quotes. We will sample some of these now:

http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/ethics.html

“Where [Jesus’s] ethical teachings are attractive, they were not original.”

http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/ethics.html#original

“Where [Jesus’s] teachings were original, they are repugnant.”

http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/ethics.html#repugnant

Mark 9:43-48 (Also Matthew 18:8-9)

"If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life maimed than to have two hands and to go to Gehenna, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into Gehenna. And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into Gehenna, where their worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched.” (Jesus likely believed, along with the other Jews, that with the body destroyed there could be no resurrection of the soul.)

http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/personality.html

Margaret K. Knight, psychologist:

“Jesus, in fact, was typical of a certain kind of fanatical young idealist: at one moment holding forth, with tears in his eyes, about the need for universal love; at the next furiously denouncing the morons, crooks, and bigots who do not see eye to eye with him. It is a very natural and human behavior. Many great men of history (for example, Socrates) have met criticism with more dignity and restraint.”

Matthew 11:20-24

Then he began to reproach the cities in which most of his deeds of power had been done, because they did not repent. “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the deeds of power done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, on the day of judgement it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon than for you. And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? No, you will be brought down to Hades. For if the deeds of power done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. But I tell you that on the day of judgement it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom than for you.”

Matthew 5:22

“But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgement; and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, ‘You fool’, you will be liable to the fire of Gehenna.” [Emphasis added.]

Matthew 23:13-34

“But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!...woe to you, blind guides...You blind fools!...You snakes, you brood of vipers! How can you escape being sentenced to Gehenna?” [Emphasis added.]

Tobin:

“Where was the 'love your enemies' attitude in the above quotes? Surely people who are unimpressed with your teachings are not worse than your enemies. For your enemies, by definition, are people who want to do you harm, or at least, would like to see harm come to you. The people who rejected his apostles’ teachings may not be like that at all, and like the residents of Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum may simply have been unimpressed by his miracles and his teachings.”

http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/psychology.html

Tobin:

“Dr. Dagonet noted that theomaniacs get very easily irritated and will not permit contradiction of their utterances…They often speak in tones of authority.”

Matthew 19:12

“For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by others, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let anyone accept this who can.” (!!)

http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/intellect.html

Charles Guignebert, Professor of History of Christianity in the Sorborne:

“...we find in it no abstractions, no theories concerning man, life, the world of God, in short, not the slightest interest in rational and objective knowledge. He observes the world and quite simply records his impressions in what he says.

…

“When he feels himself opposed by a doubt, he makes no attempt to refute it, for there is nothing for him to say. He neither argues nor discusses, proves nor confutes; he knows the truth and he utters it, and when he realized that it is not believed he grows angry and depressed.”

Now, back to Marvin Harris:

“The logic of his growing popularity drew Jesus forward into increasingly dangerous exploits. Before long, he and his disciples set out to missionize Jerusalem, the promised capital of the future Holy Jewish Empire. Deliberately invoking the messianic symbolism of the Book of Zechariah, Jesus rode through the gates mounted on a donkey (or possibly a pony). Sunday School teachers claim that Jesus did this because it signified an intention to ‘speak peace unto the heathen.’ This ignores the overwhelming military-messianic significance of everything else in Zechariah. For after Zechariah’s messiah appears, lowly and riding on an ass, the sons of Zion ‘devour and subdue’… and become ‘mighty men which tread down their enemies in the mire of the streets in battle… because the Lord is with them and the riders on horses shall be confounded.’

“The lowly figure on the ass was not a peaceful messiah. It was the messiah of a small nation and its apparently harmless prince of war, a descendant of David, who also rose from apparent weakness to confound and subdue the enemy’s horsemen and charioteers. The heathen were to have peace—but it was to be the peace of the long-awaited Holy Jewish Empire. That at least is how the crowds who lined the way understood what was happening, for as Jesus passed by, they shouted: ‘Hosanna! Blessed is he that comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed be the Kingdom of our Father David that is coming!’” (Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches, Marvin Harris, 185-186)

Jesus and Paul, as recorded in the New Testament, both make it very clear that the “Second Coming” and the “End of the World” were supposed to occur soon—within the first century CE (just as the Essenes believed the Romans would fall and the Kingdom of God would be established within this time period). This did not occur. Their prophecies failed. That Christianity was able to survive 2 thousand years despite the fact that it was based on clearly failed prophecies shows that its learned clergy have been true masters at the art of distraction and slight of hand.

http://www.religioustolerance.org/end_wrl16.htm

http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/kingdom.html

http://jcnot4me.com/Items/theology/Second%20Coming%20stuff/matthew_24_verse_by_verse.htm

There are many more strange and violent passages, but I think this is probably a good start. It is also very important to note that Jesus never redefines the terms “messiah” or “kingdom of god”3 and gives his audience every reason to believe that he means them in the traditional violent sense. This, of course, he failed to deliver. He brought the Jewish people absolutely nothing of any practical use and so they, naturally, rejected him. Christians have made many attempts to interpret the above passages in ways that do not paint Jesus as being violent in the way that a literal reading of these passages clearly indicates. This should come as no surprise, given that they have had two thousand years to try and square old recorded sayings for their movement with new theological and political agendas. This article, and the one’s preceding it, are especially meant as an invitation for you to study these matters yourself. Read both sides of the various arguments and come to your own informed conclusions. For example, read Lee Strobel’s The Case for Christ, but also read Earl Doherty’s Challenging the Verdict. Read them side by side—chapter for chapter. See which of them treats the data more thoroughly and honestly. The answer should become very clear fairly quickly.

I have but one last thought to share on this matter, which is this: If it is the case that Jesus is merely being taken out of context in being made to appear violent, why is it so easy to accomplish this feat? Buddhism has been around half a millennium longer than Christianity. Where are Buddhism’s Inquisitions and Crusades? Why is it that scholars have not been forced to recant their positions under threat of torture because of “misquoting” Socrates or Confucius? Any theory that explains the violence done by Christians through asserting it is the fault of the sinfulness of human nature must explain why it is Christianity and not, say, Taoism that is renowned for bringing this sinful nature forward.4

Am I saying that the Jesus character is bad because he is violent? Not necessarily. I'm just saying that the term “Prince of Peace” is somewhat ironic. If you have any doubts that the Christian tradition has a wrathful streak running through it, read Revelations.

http://www.luigicascioli.eu/traduzioni/en_argomenti.htm
http://www.drabruzzi.com/jesus_movement.htm
http://www.angelfire.com/biz3/mostlyharmless/jesus.html

Authors Website: http://bendench.blogspot.com/

Authors Bio:
Ben Dench graduated valedictorian of his class from The Richard Stockton College of New Jersey in the Spring Semester of 2007 with a B.A. in philosophy (his graduation speech, which received high praise, is available on YouTube). He is currently enrolled in the Pebble Hill School of Sacred Ministry, where he is studying to be an interfaith minister. His interests include all forms of experiential and technique oriented spirituality, especially shamanism and the out-of-body-experience; social justice, including environmentalism and building a sustainable global community; and the study of how to live effectively and maximize human potential.