Alternative Perspective

[Stryder]

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I've mentioned this particular view a couple of times in other posts and I thought also somewhere within the religion section however it appears not.

Firstly the title to this thread "Alternative Perspective" was decided on since I have a theory which can't be necessarily proven, however it's alternative in this particular instance to Christian doctorines.

To some it might upset because of it's nature but all should understand that it's a historical interest to all to try and get to the bottom of the nature of where religion sprouted and what it's real meaning is.

During Christmas (notibly a holiday based on the very religion in discussion), there was a theological output about where true religion came from. The actual program itself however only collected pieces of data together and didn't hypothesise anything.

What was stated in the program was that the bible was comprised of different writing styles not just handed to it by the individuals that wrote the stories but because of the places the people were from, they suggested that two or three chapters were just rewrites of the same information in these different forms but no statement was made about why.

I realised during the program why the texts were "copies", and why they had regional traits.

What I saw was someone in a walk of life that was poverish, in a land that was oppressed by another empires protectorate rule. In such a land if you were not someone, then you were no-one and as a no one you could potentially become a slave to another man.

So it might of dawned upon such a person that they would have to establish importance however how would a person do that? Well in this case the invention of a religion with the help of those people that were also downtrodden.

So with the help of a few people, some doctorines are formed to be spread to people in exchange for money and their support. (Afterall they didn't have much else to sell) The creation of some doctorines would perhaps help teach the street urchins of that period things that previously they wouldn't have learned through stories being told to them, while the centralisation of their group/cult would need to spread out to increase their power through support of the people.

Since the land at the time had no quick communication methods it meant when increasing the territory that their religion covered they would require a person to be left in charge (a disciple) Since the group included an internal infrastructure it allowed for similar things to occur to what local councils might have like "Treasurers", "Secretaries" etc That would either write the words down of the designated leader or deal with collecting money from all the locations within their group (Taxation)

When their leaders words were sent to different regions it required the "translation" of not just the words but the paraphrasing to be more legible to the people of that region (This is where the duplication of stories comes from by different disciples.)

As the group/cult/religion spreads, it gets deeper into the heart of the Roman Empire. Rome at the time had to deal with many different religions and cult groups, that were constantly contesting each others religions and preposing theirs was the better, the more correct or only one.

When this new "religion" started to send emissaries to Rome, it was already reported they were growing in number and more importantly in Power to the Roman Senate. The Senate feared that such a religion could potentially catalyse unrest or even outright rebellion, Rome decided it wouldn't be a good idea to allow such a religion to grow in size and threaten their authority.

With that Rome decided that the Religion in question would need to have the ring leaders searched for, and the overall leader made an example of so that all such religions might understand the might of Rome and remember their positions.

With that the ring leader was sought out through the price placed on his head. Eventually they got him and Crucified him.

When the body was eventually taken down, Rome had a problem, other religions that existed at the time would have taken the body and paraded it to lower peoples resolve in that particular relgion. Which meant they took the body and hid it to stop such acts from occuring.

Distraught a number of the particular religion in question hid, they were upset their leader was slain and in turn turned him into a Martyr. Carefully executed propaganda allowed the disappearance of his body to be a sign that he was alive. People asked who the man was, how could his religion grant him the capacity to reanimate from death and before you know it the whole story of his life was made Extraordinary.

The numbers of that religion never actually died, in fact the Martyrdoom nd whitelies(polymorphic stories) spread far and wide until one day Rome realised that it had two choices, one would to be seen the bad guy, the fallen government that had the origin of this religion killed with the potential result being revolt where as the other would be to propagate this religion and convert the unstable polythesistic society into a monothesism thereby culling unrest.

Thats how I suggest it happened, perhaps with a little extra dramatisation, however if my explaination was to be proven a reality then it would mearly rely on working out where the supposed disciples/apostles were located regionally.

What do you think?</TD></TABLE>

 

[Stryder]

I notice not much response, Okay let me put it short and sweet. The above post might seem long to some, but it's a semi-story about how some of the religion we see now adays is actually just a big fraud to generate self-empowerment to rival the at the time might of Rome.

 

[Silas]

Interesting, but there are elements which conflict with known history and elements which contradict common sense.

First of all, it is fairly clear that the Jesus movement itself had no intention (especially during Christ's lifetime) of setting itself up as a "new religion" or a "separate religion". Jesus and his followers were Jews, and even if Jesus didn't see it that way himself, his followers were convinced that he was the long-promised Messiah. This meant the "fulfillment of prophecy from Scripture", and the culmination of their entire religious belief, as Jews. Alternatively, the Jesus movement was in fact an upswelling of old Hasmonean nationalism, using Jesus as a figurehead to promote a holy war on the model of the Maccabees two hundred years or so before, in which case they were political rather than specifically religious.

Secondly, assuming the Gospels have any kind of historical value at all, it is clear (and commonsensical) that the opposition would come from established Jewry. It was the Jewish authoritative body, the Sanhedrin, which manoeuvred to get the all-powerful Romans to indict Christ under Roman law. It is quite doubtful that the Romans considered the tiny (at the time) Jesus movement an actual threat, but peace in Judaea was bought at the cost of mollifying the Sanhedrin who were able to keep their people under control, or so they thought. (As events of 66 - 70 were to prove, this control was evidently illusory.)

Roman persecution of Christianity in later years was indeed due to the swelling numbers of Gentile converts, some of them members of the Roman citizenry. But that is a different matter. Ultimately someone "got through" to Constantine, and Christianity became an official (later the official) religion of the Empire. It was not until this point that you can talk about the legacy of religion today, because it was not until the Christian religion actually obtained power and influence that the power and influence itself became the raison d'être for those in high positions within the Church. By that time, of course, the original point of the Jesus movement had all but evaporated, since nothing that Christ had suggested would be "fulfilled" within his lifetime or that of the people around him had, in fact, come to pass.

For a century and a half, under the pressure of the Enlightenment and the education (at least the teaching to read) of the masses, and the advance of science and technology, the influence of the Church has apparently waned considerably. Then Pope John Paul II Magnus died, and suddenly religion was back on the centre stage in a way that it hasn't been since practically the dawning of the nineteenth century.