1 The Real Story of Christmas                                  Laurie Eddie
2 A few comments on THE REAL STORY OF…       Bob Potter
3 The Real Story Of Christmas A Response              Anonymous

The town of Bethlehem is referred to as the birthplace of Jesus and thus of Christianity. Yet neither Jesus nor Christianity originated in Bethlehem.

Although largely fictional the Nativity stories do serve one useful purpose. They represent a model with which we can examine the rest of the gospels, for, just as the nativity stories comprise a few facts, mixed in with a great deal of fiction, we find this same pattern repeated in the 'gospels.'

The term 'gospel' is very much a misnomer, for the word literally means the "good news" (evangelion) that is, that the kingdom of God is approaching, and indeed it was expected to happen within the then current generation. This promise is recorded in Mark 13:30-32,

Just as this was a false promise so too the gospels contain very few 'facts' along with a great deal of false promises, and a great deal of material from Gentile sources. As such they have little real relevance to the historical Jesus, since many of the gospel stories are really the feats of other deities, attributed to Jesus, and having been written by people who had little knowledge or understanding of the Jews and their existence in Judea, got the facts wrong. As a result many of the stories about Jesus are quite impossible; for instance the claim that Jesus attacked the moneylenders in the Temple is most unlikely.

Situated adjacent to the Temple, and actually forming part of the temple wall, was the Fortress Antonio. This was a Roman fortress, a high stone tower that contained a permanent detachment of Roman troops. The main tower of this fortress overlooked the public courtyards of the temple and Roman sentries were on 24-hour guard watching over the temple terraces below for any signs of trouble.

It would have had to be a very foolish individual who attempted to disrupt the daily operations of the temple, so it is unlikely that Jesus ever attacked the money lenders.

This is not to say that all the gospel stories are false. There are some passages in the gospels that have a particularly parochial appearance and suggest that, if as we must assume, they were recorded by Gentiles, they were actually words spoken if not by Jesus, then at least by some other Palestinian Jew. Indeed many of the sayings attributed to Jesus were actually the words of other Jewish rabbis, such as the great teacher Hillel, an Alexandrian Jew.

Whoever spoke these words was obviously a Jewish teacher of the law, for it involves some quite complex issues that tend to be overlooked by most Christians and would have made no sense to a Gentile. If these were in fact the real words of Jesus, they give us a good indication of what he was really like, a straightforward, no-nonsense teacher, who stood up for what he believed. Unlike many Jews who sought to gain the favour of the rich and powerful, whoever spoke these words, was not afraid to speak plainly about the fate of those who did not prepare for the coming kingdom.

To properly understand what he is saying we need to look at the terminology he uses. Most Christians assume that the term literally meant "the eye of a needle" and that Jesus is saying that it will be impossible for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. However, just as Cleopatra's Needle is not an ordinary sewing needle, neither does the "needle's eye" refer to the eye of an ordinary needle. What it refers to is in fact a small gate.

This parable has become more confusing with the passage of time, for most Christians now associate the kingdom of God, with heaven. But the kingdom of God did not refer specifically to a heavenly "kingdom" but rather to a physical kingdom, a theocracy that God was to establish upon the earth.

So where does that leave us? It appears most likely that Jesus was actually born in Nazareth, around the years 8-4 BCE, to a mother whose name is unknown; that he grew up in Nazareth, and then, at about the age of thirty, he left home to become a nomadic preacher.

We do not know for certain if he claimed to be the messiah, but it appears that many of his followers, the Nazarenes, believed he was. His principal message was that the Kingdom of God was at hand, a claim that was considered seditious by the Roman authorities – and Jesus was arrested, brought before Pilate, convicted and executed by the Romans.

It is important to understand that Jesus was not the founder of Christianity, it was Paul.

Before proceeding it is important to briefly note the role of the messiah. There is considerable difference between the Jewish messiah and the Christian Messiah.

As mentioned earlier, the Nazarenes appear to have believed that Jesus was the Jewish messiah – 'the anointed one.' To the Jews the messiah was a man who had been chosen by God to lead them to ultimate victory against their earthly enemies. With God and legions of angels behind them they would subdue all the nations of the Earth. Then would be established the Kingdom of God, a theocracy with God at the head, and the Jews as his administrators, who would rule the world until the end of time!

The Jews eagerly awaited this new kingdom when they could finally put behind them a long history of subjugation by powerful empires that had defeated and humiliated them and abused their religion.

One can therefore appreciate how important Jesus was to the Nazarenes for, as the Jewish messiah, he was the vanguard of a completely new world order. So it must have been a devastating blow to his followers when Jesus was crucified, for it not only meant the end of all their individual hopes but also the end of the great Jewish dream. As they sought to rationalize the situation things started to change. Soon a process of cognitive dissonance commenced.

Cognitive dissonance is basically a form of rationalization. When someone invests a great deal of personal effort into a particular cause in the expectation that it will come to fruition, but the belief crashes, it is difficult for them to accept the reality. There is confusion in their mind, a refusal to accept the reality. So what they do is look for an alternative explanation.

Such 'evidence' encouraged the Nazarenes to rationalize the disaster of the crucifixion. They examined the Jewish scriptures and other sources for evidence to support an alternative scenario, one that included the execution of the messiah and his resurrection. It was not hard to find supporting texts in the voluminous content of the Hebrew Bible and in traditional teachings of the Jews. Soon these scriptures were being quoted as proof that God had a hidden plan.

Using this scenario they surmised, what if Jesus had been the forerunner of this resurrection process, the first to be reborn? Then Jesus was not only 'alive' but, even better, all that he had promised would still come to pass and his close followers would still gain their positions of power in the coming Kingdom. On this basis the Nazarenes (not Christians) continued to preach the message of Jesus in the expectation that the Kingdom of God was at hand!

Had extraneous events not intruded this group might have been able to survive. However, two major events brought about their demise. These were:

• It seems unlikely that he was a student of Gamaliel;
• It is unlikely that he persecuted the Christians from personal religious motivations. It seems more likely that he was simply a henchman of the Jewish rulers, one of the Temple Policemen;
• The claim that he was travelling to Damascus to persecute the Nazarenes is total fiction. The High Priest of Jerusalem had no authority over Damascus, which was a Syrian city, and since each Jewish synagogue was an independent entity, he also had no power over these congregations.

• … imparting full wisdom and insight. (Ephesians 1:8);
• Spiritual powers of wisdom… your inward eyes may be illuminated (Ephesians 1:17-18);
• … dominion, authority and power, (1 Corinthians 15:24);
• … the invisible order of thrones, sovereignties, authorities and powers. (Colossians 1:16);
• Powers and Dominions (Ephesians 1:21);
• Cosmic powers, against the authorities and potentates of this dark world… (Ephesians 6:12);
• Spiritual body (1 Corinthians 15:45);
• He who ascended far above all heavens (Ephesians 4:10);
• We were slaves to passion and pleasures of every kind. (Titus 3:3);
• … the name above all names. (Philippians 2:9-10).

In offering the Gentiles a new saviour deity Paul was teaching a doctrine that was not only alien but would have been abhorrent to the Nazarenes. The Jews believed, as the "chosen race", all Jews were sons and daughters of God. Paul converted Jesus from a 'son of God' into the "Son of God" that is, a pre-existent deity, the equal of God. While such a concept was relatively common in the ancient non-Jewish world it was alien and unacceptable to the Jews.

By the time they realized the truth that Paul was preaching a gospel that was very different from the one they preached, it was too late. The numbers of Gentiles who had been attracted to the Paulian faith were so large that they were now in a situation where they were able to break free of their Jewish origins and become established in their own right.

In preaching his new gospel and transferring the religious base from the Jews to the Gentiles, Paul effectively weakened the Nazarene power base. The Nazarenes were simply another Jewish sect, one of many. Paul constantly attacked their Jewish articles of faith as too restrictive. Paul viewed the Nazarenes as anachronistic; their 'old' message, he claimed, had been superseded by his 'new gospel'. While the Nazarenes continued to preach the imminent return of Jesus who, on behalf of the Jews, would usher in the Kingdom of God, Paul presented Jesus as the Gnostic's universal saviour concerned with the redemption of the individual from a world inherently corrupt and evil.

We do not know whether or not there was a major confrontation between the Nazarenes and Paul over the false doctrines he was teaching. By 60 A.D. when Paul was under arrest it was already too late. The Gentile church was effectively independent. The Nazarenes had lost control of the situation – cut adrift, a small Jewish sect. Then came the final straw, the Jewish War, which virtually wiped them out.

The Jewish authorities had tried to control the rebels within their midst for they knew that if any radical group was to threaten Rome it could result in full-scale war. They were aware that they, not the Romans, would be the losers. Their worst fears were realized in 66 A.D. when a group of Zealot rebels attacked a Roman convoy and the Jews found themselves at war with Rome.

Finally the Gentile Christians placed the blame for the death of Jesus on the Jews, thus freeing the Romans of all responsibility.

In Mark 13:30-32, we can read the words "I tell you this: the present generation will live to see it all. Heaven and earth will pass away: my words will never pass away. But about that day or that hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, not even the Son, only the Father.

So it was, in the early days of the new faith it was expected that Jesus would return very soon, 'within the lifetime of the disciples' so there was never ever considered any need for an historical record of the life of Jesus; such a record would have been superfluous.

Mithra was said to have been born on the 25^th December. This is hardly remarkable for Mithra, like many of the ancient deliverers of salvation, was a solar deity. In ancient time religion was essentially dualistic. This is a simple division of the cosmos into light and darkness; the good deities were represented by the powers of light, and the greatest light was naturally the sun.

[1] The 25th December, was originally the Roman Saturnalia, a time of rejoicing and exchanging of gifts. It was also the birth date of Mithra, the Son of Righteousness. In the 4th century this date was adopted by the majority of Christians but the Armenians refused to accept this day.

[2] Pagan creeds popular at the time of Jesus, and for several centuries preceding his birth, were Adonis, Apollo, Astarte, Attis, Baal, Dionysus, Hercules, Horus, Isis, Mithra and Osiris. Of nearly all the deities above it was said and believed that:

[4] Dionysus, like other Sun or Nature deities, was born of a Virgin (Semele or Demeter) untainted by any earthly husband; and born on the 25th December. He was nurtured in a Cave, and even at that early age was identified with the Ram or Lamb,* into whose form he was for the time being changed. At times also he was worshiped in the form of a Bull. He travelled far and wide; and brought the great gift of wine to mankind.** He was called Liberator and Saviour. His grave was shown at Delphi in the inmost shrine of the temple of Apollo. Secret offerings were brought thither, while the women who were celebrating the feast woke up the new-born god. Carpenter, p. 52 (* cf. the shepherds who came to worship the baby Jesus. ** Cf. Wedding at Cana. It was the women who found Jesus risen from his tomb)

[5] In the Parthian epoch, for example there existed a great syncretic myth of the Cosmocrator, Redemptor, of which Mithra, born of a rock or out of a cave, was the protagonist. His birth, which would later be celebrated on 25 December, was accompanied by special signs and by luminous epiphanies and taken as symbolic of a kind of royal initiation. The Encyclopedia of Religion, p. 580.

Date of birth: Sometime before 4 BCE since according to Matthew Herod the Great was still alive. (Matthew 2:1)

The three wise men, this story originally referred to the birth of the Emperor Nero. Born in 37 AD when he became emperor in 54 AD he was surrounded by those who sought to gain his favour by proclaiming his exceptional nature. One of the manufactured stories was that he was divine, and that even at his birth his special nature had been acknowledged in the stars, (a common claim in those times), and that certain magi in the East who had seen a unusual heavenly signs had travelled to Antium to visit the infant prodigy.

The very same expediency which had demanded that Jesus should have been generated by God also turned his mother into a goddess. Hyperdulia, or the worship of the Virgin Mary - also called Marianity or Mariology - owes its origin to the fact that the most popular Roman goddess which Christianity had to combat was Isis, the former Egyptian deity whose son had also been generated by a god. Isis worship could be countered only by the new faith absorbing the pagan goddess, and so Isis became Mary the Mother of God, even assuming the pagan deity's titles of 'Redemptress' and 'Star of the Sea'. In fact, the very first statues of Mary in Rome were merely those of Isis with–literally a new coat of paint; even her elaborate temples were taken over to house the chief goddess of the new paganism.

For the first three centuries the Church had ignored Mary, but after the Roman Empire had fallen to Christianity and Constantine's Council of Nicea had conducted its ballot of the Bishops - which decided that Jesus was divine, the Son of God and God himself - it became obvious that special status was required for his mother.

How should one answer the simple question, "Was Jesus an historical person?" As Laurie points out, in its Hebrew forms (Joshua probably being the most common) Jesus was a common name. In every Palestinian town there would have been scores bearing that name – as today, hundreds answer to Fred or Tom. In this sense, there were hundreds of historical Jesuses in the period 8 - 4 BC.

In a desperate attempt to rescue the groundings of their doctrines, many so-called "progressive" Christians try to argue that although the narratives of the gospels may be fiction, nevertheless the teachings of Jesus are unique and divinely inspired and perhaps the myths were created to help people understand the "teachings".

The only evidence we have regarding both the life and teachings of the mythical Jesus is to be found in the gospels.

Laurie Eddie correctly reports that the stories about Jesus in the four gospels can be matched with similar, but older, tales associated with cult figures from other religions. Indeed there is absolutely no teaching in Christianity that cannot be found in a more ancient belief system. Laurie does well to highlight many of the similarities with Mithraic teachings – could I add to what he has said by pointing out that worshippers of Mithras celebrated a "eucharist", or "totem feast", by drinking the blood of the sacrificed bull.

I hope readers will seek out the Didache for themselves – a few "tasters" from the early chapters:

Ch 2 "Thou shalt not lust after the things of thy neighbour, nor forswear thyself, nor bear false witness, nor revile, nor be revengeful, nor be double-minded or double-tongued; for a snare of death is the double tongue.

Ch 3 "…become not a murmurer; since it leadeth to blasphemy; nor self-willed, nor evil-minded; for of all of these things blasphemies are begotten. But be meek, since the meek shall inherit the earth. Become long suffering and merciful and guileless and gentle and good, and tremble continually at the words which thou hast heard…"

Spend some time looking at the Epistle to the Romans, one of the most frequently quoted texts ascribed to Paul. Ideally readers interested in exploring this question will read the epistle for themselves and consider whether they agree with J C O'Neill who argues it to be the work of a number of authors at different times and aimed at different audiences.

The authors of the Pauline epistles lived in a period when there was no 'established' church. By the time of the gospel of Matthew, the foundations of such a church were being laid – indeed the compilation of Matthew was probably to assist that process. Of 661 verses in Mark, 600 verses (often verbatim) are carried over in substance. An associated question relevant to understanding the origins of the church might well be "where did Matthew get his additional material?" [Generally, Matthew improved on Mark's Greek. He eliminated all Mark's Aramaic words–this may have been no more than the elimination of magical formulae in the Marcian text. Many of Christ's 'miracles' are there described as the work of a magician mouthing the right incantation usually in Aramaic.]

Laurie Eddie is certainly right to perceive a 'distinction' between Pauline doctrines and the 'home-group' he labels Nazarenes. While the gospel of Mark was constructed for a Roman congregation, largely ignorant of Palestine (hence all the geographical errors) and its traditions, Matthew represents the grounding of the new faith inside the existing Hebrew culture–with the potential of expansion into the non-Hebrew world beyond. Part of Matthew's task was to create the credibility of the new 'priesthood', which accounts for the changing of Mark's hostility towards the disciples (ignorant men incapable of understanding anything) into Matthew's disciples, the select elite, who do understand if at the same time 'lack faith'.

The rest of Mr Eddie's conclusions are questionable.
 

"The origin of Mithraism goes back to the Mitra of the Aryans, though it underwent many transformations." (New Larouse Encyclopedia of Mythology 1968 p. 314)

Precise dates cannot be set on the first appearance of the above ideas and behaviors. If, as an example, we observe that ancient Greeks did some of the above and the Ethiopians did too, this would be insufficient reason to conclude one copied the other. It's insufficient because some of the ideas: 

• Arose long before Ethiopians or Greeks had them;
• Existed in many other societies;
• May have been thought up independently by both societies.

To prove copying or rehashing occurred requires documents or inscriptions stating that such-and-such was adapted from so-and-so. The same logic applies to seeming overlap in ideas between the Bible and rival ancient thought.

In Investigator 73 De Kretser listed forty alleged similarities between Horus (an Egyptian god) and Jesus. In Investigator 74 I listed similarities between Horus and Adolf Hitler. My list is not as impressive as the Horus/Jesus one – but I'm not a specialist on Hitler or Horus. The trick in such lists is the generality of the similarities. Thousands of stories mention a mountain but differ in everything else they say about it, in which case the similarity of including a mountain is irrelevant as evidence of copying. The world also has thousands of resurrection stories – if we include films, novels and claims of religious cults. Without law suits for plagiarism it's difficult to prove if any are derived from others. The resurrection stories of Horus and Jesus had in common the idea of a return from the dead but little else.

Consider the millions of crime stories and reports in books, movies, magazines and newspapers. Did any author copy from another? Even if we demonstrate identical sentences by two authors it may be either chance or perhaps both authors copied from earlier authors!

Most of Eddie's alleged similarities between Mithra and Jesus are irrelevant to his thesis that copying occurred as they were common elsewhere. Examples are being an "enemy of the powers of darkness", buried in a rock tomb, spreading the word, offering salvation, labels such as "saviour", "Lord" and "the Light", and calling followers "brothers" and "sisters".
The major similarities – virgin mother, water turned to wine, and resurrected the third day – are explainable by principles discussed below.

"The idea of a god dying for his people and coming back to life again is by no means unique to Christianity; it is one of the oldest religious ideas of all, and was at the very centre of the earliest solar religions and crop fertility religions." (Barratt 1996)

According to the Bible God said to the "serpent" that tempted Eve:

I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed;
he shall bruise you in the head, and you shall bruise his heel. (Genesis 3:15)

"Seed" means "offspring" or "descendant" and can, even in the singular, mean many. A "bruise" to the heal is a wound from which the recipient will recover. A "bruise in the head" is either fatal or decisive.

The prophecy, therefore, refers to a descendant of Eve who would be temporarily defeated by the "serpent" – the supernatural source of evil – but would recover and defeat the "serpent".

The "seed" of the serpent are not descendants by literal birth but converts who copy the "serpent" in becoming rebels against God.

Genesis 3:15 is thus a prophecy of someone who ultimately defeats the supernatural source of evil. No ordinary human could do this because humans cannot even fully defeat evil in themselves:

If the prophecy of Genesis 3:15 is as old as humankind variants of it would have entered folklore. Subsequent thinkers, then, could have inferred that the human who conquers the "serpent" needs a dual origin – human and divine – hence a virgin birth. The notion of virgin birth could then have entered various religions as they became established.

Historically we cannot pinpoint the origin of ideas of a "god dying" or of virgin birth. Hence we cannot rule out that they began with the first humans. The Gospel about Jesus, therefore, need not be a rehash of anything but could be what it claims to be – the good news of salvation.

My placing the origin of some ideas in pre-history has echoes in other areas. Mazar (1990) writes:

Some similarities between the Bible and other belief are explainable by the Biblical theme of God cooperating with humans.

Before humans chose independence the intent was cooperation between God and humans. We see this in God "planted a garden" where humans could have a safe start before going out to "subdue the earth." (Genesis 1:28; 2:8)  There is cooperation in naming the animals and in God identifying one tree from which humans must not eat.

This initial situation changed when humans went their own way. Most subsequent humans concurred and have tried everything they could to improve their lives without God – in religion, ethics, law, ideology and technology. Humanity, therefore, is in an experiment to determine how they will do without God enforcing what is best for them. (Investigator 65-69)

Humans are failures in their rejection of God. This is shown by the hurt they inflict on each other and in the temporary nature of their cities, empires, ideologies and religions. The Bible portrays God as working behind the scenes to rescue humans from the final results of their rebellion.

After the original cooperation was put on hold, a tenuous, behind-the-scenes cooperation commenced. It's via prayer and answered prayer, spokesmen (such as prophets and apostles), written communication, and by giving humans the sorts of proof they think impressive.

For example, humans invented the idea of paying for sin by sacrifice of animals. God did better – prepared a "sacrifice" that made all other sacrifices obsolete. (Isaiah 53:7-12) Humans considered success in war impressive. God did better and destroyed great armies and cities almost instantaneously. Humans invented deities of wood and stone and imagined a virgin birth for some of them. God did better – According to the Bible He predicted the demise of all those ancient deities and prepared a real virgin birth.

Ancient people thought astrology impressive, connected births of some kings to stars, and told of visitors bringing gifts. Eddie mentions such a legend in connection with Emperor Nero (37-68 AD) of Rome. (p. 44) The Star of Bethlehem, in contrast, has scientific support. (Investigator 81)

We see cooperation reflected in the 20th and 21st centuries. Today humans are impressed by science. Yet, in scores of conflicts between science and the Bible the latter triumphed and textbooks had to be revised or discarded. I personally used the Bible to produce a small revision in the Encyclopedia Britannica.

This theme of cooperation of God with humans – a cooperation constrained by human rejection of God – may explain some resemblances of Biblical reports with other stories. It's God outdoing in reality what humans proposed in their myths.

To accept this explanation requires accepting the Bible. For non-believers it's therefore circular reasoning. However, in recent decades science has demonstrated that hundreds of Bible statements are correct. Often the latest science was needed because earlier scientists were wrong. From such results it's rational to infer that the entire original Scriptures are error-free and only seem wrong because science has not caught up. From this stance the circularity is removed.

Jesus spoke of "this generation" that would witness various events. (Matthew 24; Mark 13; Luke 21)

I explained the prophecy in Investigator 60. Jesus addressed four disciples and hence the pronoun "you" (plural) describes events the four and their generation would see. In describing his return "on the clouds of heaven" Jesus changes to "they" implying it's a distant event which his generation would not see. Everything that Jesus predicted for his "generation" did occur including the start of the "great tribulation" upon the Jews in 66-70 AD.

The Magdalen Fragments of Matthew were published in 1953. In the 1990s Peter Thiede, an expert in ancient papyrus manuscripts, examined the handwriting style and placed their origin to before 70 AD. (Time, April 8, 1995) The debate is, however, still on.

Dr John Wenham in Redating Matthew, Mark and Luke (1991) argued that these three Gospels were written in the 40s AD! For example:

Because a Roman fortress stood next to the Jewish Temple Mr Eddie says, "it is unlikely that Jesus ever attacked the money lenders."

Modern countries have laws to control demonstrations. However, to argue from such laws that the demise of Communism in Eastern Europe by "people power" didn't happen would be silly. Whether laws are enforced depends on numerous circumstances.

The New Testament records there was conflict over whether circumcision and other Jewish customs should be enforced on Christians – but not the sharp division that Eddie ascribes to Paul and the Nazarenes. Indeed Paul was considered a "ringleader of the Nazarenes". (Acts 24:5)

Some critics have used the non-mention of Nazareth after the Gospels and its non-mention in other 1st-century writings as proof there was no 1st-century Nazareth. Archaeologists, in the 1950s, excavated the site where Nazareth should be. The remains of a village were found that was inhabited 900 to 600 BC and again after 200 BC. It shows that arguments based on gaps in knowledge – what Mr Eddie often relies on – are weak.
 

The Apostle Paul, says Mr Eddie, copied from the Jewish teacher Hillel and from Gnosticism. General ethical principles such as "love your neighbour" came from the Old Testament and were used by Jews and Christians alike.

Quoting Gnostic sources – if Eddie is correct that Paul did this – is not necessarily a problem. To mention common ground is often done when preaching or debating. It's what I do when I quote science journals to prove statements in the Bible, i.e. I use what skeptics and I have in common – respect for science.

Gnosticism, however, became prominent in the 2nd-century – long after Paul. So, when Eddie alleges Paul quoted from Gnostics, we really need the names of the documents involved and the dates they were written.