Jesus Christ in the New Testament preaches two essential doctrines: a rejection of the Earthly world and universal love. These emphases derive from the epistles of Paul, who was the first Christian author. It is crucial to understand that Paul does not describe any life of Christ. He does not say Jesus was born on Earth, nor does he say he died on Earth. Paul actually places the incarnation of Christ in the “third heaven”. Paul says he learned about Jesus Christ by studying the Jewish scriptures, and did not see Christ until after the resurrection, and only then in a kind of vision. He does not describe mother Mary, or a ministry, or any multitudes, or a political intrigue that was ended by Pontius Pilate. In fact, Paul situates the fulfillment of Jewish prophecies in Heaven precisely because they had not been fulfilled on Earth. He proclaims the triumph of Zion in heaven. And the only concrete thing he can say about the incarnation of Jesus Christ is that he allowed himself to be impaled on a stake by archons.
But the four Gospels turn Paul’s teachings inside out. Beginning with Mark, which was the first Gospel written, they take Paul’s stated criticism of Jewish law, and his rhetorical emphasis on “love”, and turn these into the spoken philosophies of Jesus. Remember, Paul says Christianity and spoken wisdom have nothing to do with each other. He says in Corinthians, “Christ did not send me to baptize but to evangelize, not with wise words [sophia logos], lest the stake of Christ be rendered moot” (1 Cor 1:17). Paul here rejects both Sophia and Logos, two concepts that were so important to Jewish sects in Alexandria. Paul’s “wisdom” is not spoken but is spiritual [pneumatic], and he admits his “philosophy” resembles nothing so much as nonsense.
Paul asks “Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputant of this age? Has not God made foolish the philosophies [sophias] of this world?” (1 Cor 1:20). Paul claims there was no wise man of his age; he had obviously never heard of any sermon on a mount. He claims there was no disputant of his age; he had obviously never heard of a sabbath breaker who whipped the money changers. The authentic letters of Paul are thought to have been written around 50-60 CE. Yet Paul doesn’t know anything about a famous preacher (or healer, or rebel). He concludes his introduction of Christianity by saying “Jews ask for signs and Greeks search out wisdom, yet we proclaim Christ has been crucified, an offense to the Jews and foolishness to the nations” (1 Cor 1:22-23).
Thus according to Paul, Christianity offers the unseen, the unreal and the nonsensical. He says “God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God chose the weak things to shame the strong things. God chose things base and despised, things that do not exist, in order to abolish the things that do exist” (1 Cor 1:27-28). When Paul does speak of wisdom, he speaks of “God’s secret wisdom”. In other words, Paul is the only one who knows about it! When Paul talks about love or Jewish law, he never quotes Jesus Christ. He is speaking for himself. Paul also has the need to tell everyone the good news about Jesus Christ. Yet in the Gospels, Jesus becomes world famous by himself, doing all the things that Paul denied and denigrated, offering both miraculous signs and wise parables to the multitudes.
Mark is the first Gospel and the second link in the evolution of Christianity, adapting Paul’s letters into the first fictitious biography of Jesus. Mark may have been written as early as 80 CE, after the destruction of the Jewish Temple in 70 CE, but none of the Gospels were known to the world until 130 CE (and Luke and Acts and John weren’t known until 180 CE). In Mark, Jesus Christ becomes the hero of a fable, the prognosticator of the fall of Jerusalem to Titus. Only the anachronistic arrangement of the New Testament and the fraudulent book of Acts give the appearance that the Gospels were written first. But Paul is not shy about who he is and what he is doing. He claims to be the sole architect of the foundation of Christianity (1 Cor 3:10-11), and boasts that he will say anything to anyone to get what he wants (1 Cor 9:21-22), which tends to be a hot meal and a donation for the Temple in Jerusalem. He demands the material blessings of the Gentiles in exchange for the “spiritual blessings” of the Jews (Romans 15:27).
But even Mark is not the first book of the New Testament. That prestige belongs to Matthew, which, despite being an adaptation of Mark, which was in turn an adaptation of Paul, is presented as the very origin of Christianity. Unlike Mark, Matthew is literally a satire, a pesher, a darkly ironic series of jokes. Matthew gives this away right at the beginning, providing a genealogy that proves Joseph is descended from the seed of Abraham and David. This makes Joseph’s son eligible to be the Messiah according to old testament prophecies. But in the very next verse, Matthew tells his audience “Although [Jesus Christ’s] mother was betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be pregnant by the Holy Spirit” (Matt 1:18). Thus the very beginning of the New Testament tells us that although Joseph’s son could fulfill the prophecies of the Messiah [the Christ], Jesus was not actually born of the seed of Joseph! This dramatic irony is the key to understanding the book of Matthew and the zeitgeist of Christianity more broadly. Matthew can only be understood in the context of Jesus impersonating the Messiah and deceiving his Jewish peers.
Who was Jesus?
Although the “historical Jesus” is a man of many faces, an elementary reading of the Gospels shows that Jesus Christ is a Jew who addresses himself solely to other Jews. This is an inversion of Paul, who addresses himself to Gentiles. Not only is Christ a Jew, he appears to be the Jewish messiah or king, as proven by his breakneck fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies. Jesus confesses “I came not to send peace, but a sword” (Matthew 10:34) and “not peace but division” (Luke 12:51). He says he has come to send fire on Earth (Luke 12:49). Yet he also tells the Jews, “Take my yoke upon you, for I am meek and lowly in heart. My yoke is easy” (Matthew 11:29-30). Whether by fire or yoke, Christ promises to redeem the Jews of his generation. He must know that he’s joking when he calls himself meek. That’s called chutzpah.
Throughout the Gospels, the Jews that Jesus interacts with are characterized as evil. John the Baptist calls them a “generation of vipers” (Matthew 3:7). He says Jesus will baptize the Pharisees and Sadducees with fire (3:11). Jesus later asks “O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? (12:34).” He calls them a "wicked and adulterous generation” (Matthew 16:4) and a “faithless and perverse generation” (17:17). It is only his peers that Jesus has come to reform. Jesus says “all judgment shall come on this generation”. At Matthew 24:34, and again in Mark and Luke, Jesus says “this generation shall not pass” before the Son of Man returns in judgment. He tells his disciples that some of them will still be living when the Son of Man comes back “in the glory of his Father with his angels” (Matthew 16:27-28). Those who still anticipate a second coming have missed the meaning of Christ’s prophecies. In fact Titus fulfilled these prophecies and it is Titus whom the authors of the Gospels evidently regard as the Son of Man (and second coming of Christ). It is Titus who sent fire upon Jerusalem 40 years after the Jewish Messiah allowed himself to be crucified.
The dramatic irony of the Gospels provides strong evidence that they are intentional works of literature. Dramatic irony allows the audience of a story to know something that the characters of the story do not. The parentage of Jesus Christ is a textbook example thereof. Despite the fact that Joseph is the seed of David, Joseph was cuckolded by a ghost. Which explains why his “son” refuses to claim the title of Messiah.Jesus’s prophecies about the Son of Man also evoke dramatic irony. The earliest possible composition of the Gospels is 80 CE (compared to 50 CE for Paul). Readers of the Gospels would have known about Titus’ destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE and recognized that Jesus Christ is warning the Jews of 30 CE that this judgment day will come. Thus although Jesus seems intent on telling the Jews how to prevent their coming destruction, readers of the Gospels would have known the destruction was inevitable.
As for the eternal debate over whether Jesus was a Jew, Jesus states his mission quite clearly: “I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Matthew 15:24). Matthew writes he “will save his people from their sins” (1:21) and Jesus says “I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (9:13). Jesus explicitly tells his apostles not to preach to the Gentiles (Matthew 10:5). When asked by a Greek woman to heal her daughter, Jesus says only his children (Jews) may eat from the table, while dogs (non Jews) may pick up crumbs off the floor (Mark 7:27). He says “I ever taught in the synagogue and the temple” (John 17:20). He repeats variations of the phrase “no prophet is accepted in his own country” (Luke 4:24). John says “he came unto his own, and his own received him not” (1:11). Jesus is described as he “whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write” (John 1:45). Jesus is called the King of Israel (John 1:49). Pontius Pilate tells Jesus “thine own nation and chief priests have delivered you” (John 17:35). When a woman of Samaria point out that Jesus is a Jew, he responds “Ye worship ye know not what: we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews” (John 4:22) He says “If ye believe not Moses, how shall ye believe Christ?” (John 5:47). When he mentions the “children of God scattered abroad” (John 11:52) he is referencing the Jewish diaspora. Any Christian claiming Jesus was not a Jew needs to have their head assessed. He is by all appearances the prophesied messiah of the Jews, and states his mission as such. But contrary to his claims, Jesus came to destroy the law of the Jews. (Note: I use Jew as a shorthand for Judite).
What is the Law of Moses?
Christianity conceives that Jews have strayed from the law of Moses and this is what defines their wickedness. However, Jesus is clearly opposed to the Mosaic covenant and his claim that nothing will pass from the Hebrew law is deeply disingenuous. The Mosaic covenant is essentially materialist; it has to do with property rights and criminal justice. Why would Jesus be interested in property rights when he recommends giving all one’s property away? Moses requires “eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,” (Exodus 21:24) yet Jesus says to turn the other cheek to your attacker, and/or pluck your own eye out yourself. Moses says “Honor thy father and thy mother,” Jesus says reject your family if necessary. Moses says get a writ of divorce; Jesus says stay married forever. Moses says stone the adultress, Jesus says withhold judgment. Moses supports the swearing of oaths (Exodus 22:11), yet Jesus tells the Jews not to make oaths at all. Jesus conspicuously flaunts the Sabbath. It is evident that Jesus wants to overturn the law of Moses, and his claims of fulfilling it are black propaganda.
Jesus, reciting the commandments of YHWH, says “Honour thy father and mother: and, He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death” (Matthew 15:4, Mark 7:10). Moses said “he that curseth his father, or his mother, shall surely be put to death.” (Exodus 21:17). Yet in numerous other instances Jesus Christ insists that his followers must be willing to repudiate their families. He says a man’s foes will be of his own household (Matthew 10:35-36). He says you must love Christ more than family (10:37) and in fact articulates a new family in God (12:50). Jesus promises “every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's sake, shall receive an hundredfold (Matthew 19:29). He forbids a follower to say goodbye to his family (Luke 9:61-62). Contradicting himself, he says “Forgive every brother his trespasses” (18:35) right after “let your brother be unto thee as a heathen” (18:17). As in every other aspect of his instructions to the Jews, Christ is a hypocrite. The Gospels intentionally depict him as such.
Jesus gives his strongest advice to the Jews in his “sermon on the mount”. He says they will be blessed if they are poor in spirit, mourning, or merely meek. He tells them to always agree with their enemy. He tells them not to make promises. He tells them “resist not evil and turn the other cheek” (Matthew 5:39) which is a strange way to redeem a wicked people. He tells them to love their enemies, and so be made perfect. He tells them to gives alms in secret, to pray in a closet, forgive trespassers, and lay up no treasures upon the Earth. He tells them to abandon foresight and trust in providence. He tells them to take no thought for tomorrow (Matthew 6:34). He reminds them that they are evil. He says they must lose their life in order to gain it (Matthew 16:25). He later tells the Jews not to fear killers of the body (Luke 12:4). This is Christ’s message to the Jews: surrender all your wealth, reject your society, and do not resist violence or death at the hands of your enemies.
Contrary to popular opinion, Jesus preaches poverty, not charity. He famously tells a follower that to be perfect he must sell all his belongings (Matthew 19:21). But his highest praise is for a poor woman who gives her last shekel to the Temple treasury (Luke 21:1). In other words he extols the poor giving to the rich. Jesus explicitly contradicts the law of his “forefathers”, because the covenant with YHWH is essentially about accumulating wealth. He says “a rich man shall hardly enter into the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 19:23). Jesus denigrates wealth, yet in Luke tells a parable about a Lord who leaves his servants with one piece of silver each. The servant who multiplies the wealth by 10 is praised while the servant who holds and saves the money is condemned for not providing interest. The Lord calls this servant wicked, and says “I might have required mine own with usury”. He gives this servant’s money to the one who can better multiply it, and concludes by saying “unto every one which hath shall be given; and from him that hath not, even that he hath shall be taken away from him.” (Luke 19:26). Are these the words of someone who hates moneychangers?
Christ also hypocritically offers material incentives to his believers. He offers telekinetic power at Mark 21:21 and material reward at Mark 10:30. He offers wish fulfillment (Mark 11:24). The book of John greatly expands the tension between Christ’s unworldly philosophy and worldly incentives. Throughout John, Jesus uses the promise of eternal life to sell his teachings (John 3:15). Despite the implication that eternal life can only be gained in Heaven, Jesus’ works a major miracle by bringing Lazarus back to life after 4 days in the tomb. He is once again offering a material incentive for accepting his immaterial wisdom. In the same way many Christians expect a physical resurrection on judgment day. This contradiction between anti materialism and material reward cannot easily be reconciled.
Christ the Deceiver
The fame of Christ is incessantly asserted by the Gospels. Christ was famous not so much because he was a great teacher, but because he was a great healer and exorcist. Matthew says “his fame went throughout all Syria” (4:24) and he was followed by great multitudes “from Galilee, Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea, and beyond Jordan” (4:25) to which Mark adds Tyre and Sidon. An entire city comes to meet Jesus (Matthew 8:34). Mark raises even more starkly the issue of Christ’s fame. Mark says after Jesus healed a man with an unclean spirit, “immediately his fame spread abroad throughout all the region” (1:28). After numerous healings, Simon tells Jesus “All men seek for thee” (1:37). At the end of the first chapter of Mark, Jesus is so famous he cannot enter into a city, and still supplicants flock to him in the desert (1:45). Jesus must endure the “press of multitudes” (2:1). Jesus is recognized by the citizens of Gennasaret immediately upon disbarking his ship (Mark 6:54). Jesus tries to hide from the multitudes, but “cannot be hid” (Mark 7:24). He constantly tells his followers and beneficiaries not to talk about his miracle work, but this only encourages them to publish it more (Mark 7:36). Even the tetrarch Herod views Jesus as a celebrity (Luke 23:8).
The problem with the fame of Christ, as predicated on his ability to heal, is that is contradicted elsewhere. Most notably, at the height of Jesus’s fame, Judas must betray him to the authorities by marking him with a kiss. Why cannot Jesus simply be recognized by his persecutors? When Peter denies Christ, Peter is recognized by random passerby. Yet the scribes could not recognize their celebrity antagonist and needed Judas to betray him? The other argument against Christ’s fame is his lack of citation outside of the New Testament. Neither Philo nor Seneca mentions the advent of Jesus Christ, nor does any eye witness to the 1st century. Josephus makes a couple of passing references to Christ, but these are suspected of interpolation, and a passing reference in an otherwise voluminous historical corpus is hardly reflective of a world famous individual. The fact is that there was no world famous healer or preacher of the first century.
Christ has foreknowledge of his death at the hands of the scribes. He tells his disciples he “must” go to Jerusalem to be killed and resurrected (Matthew 16:21). He understands that it is a sacrifice for the greater good of humanity. He insists “No man taketh my life, I lay it down for myself” (John 10:18). He describes his death as a “ransom for many” (Matthew 20:28), yet despite being divine, despite knowing of his fate and its purpose, despite knowing of his resurrection and coming glory, despite calling the “rock” of his church “Satan” for questioning the necessity of crucifixion, Jesus Christ himself has grave doubts in the garden of Gethsemane and on the cross asks God “why hast thou forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46). The doubt and despair of Christ in no way comports with his divine fearlessness and omniscience, nor his divine mission. Judas is villainized as a traitor, and Jesus calls Judas Satan in the book of John. How can the apostle who wants to prevent crucifixion, and the apostle who enables crucifixion, both be Satanic? If Christ knows his duty and lays down his life of his own accord, why does he say God has forsaken him? Why are Jews then blamed for his death? The hypocrisy is so glaring that it must be intentional. The canonical Gospels are a satire.
John is the most inspiring of the Gospels, constantly emphasizing the light of Christ and the everlasting life and love he offers. Yet John is also highly contradictory. Jesus says “the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son” (John 5:22) then says “I judge no man” (8:15) and “I came not to judge but to save” (12:47). He complains that the Jews do not keep the law of Moses (5:19) but after noting that Moses would stone an adultress, he prevents her from being judged and stoned (8:7). He says “For judgment I am come, that they which see might be made blind. If ye were blind, ye should have no sin” (9:39-41). Now the supposed being of light is promising and praising blindness! Yet he also says “if a man walketh in the night, he stumbles because there is no light in him” (11:10). So does Christ judge men or not? Does he offer illumination or blindness? Or is he just a wicked hypocrite hiding behind lofty ideals?
Christ the Thief
It becomes evident that Christ’s message, directed to the generation of evil Jews, is not one of love and mercy, but one of self-negation. The Jesus Christ of the Gospels came to destroy the Jews. He promised to return and physically do so. Jesus tells the Jews quite clearly “The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth fruits thereof” (21:43) and “Jerusalem shall be trodden down by the Gentiles” (Luke 21:24). The nation he refers to is Rome. Titus fulfilled all of Christ’s prophecies one generation after Christ’s death. He encircled Jerusalem, beseiged and destroyed the Jews, left the temple with not one stone set upon another (24:2). Jesus speaks approvingly of the Romans, saying “they which are accounted to rule over Gentiles exercise lordship over them, and their great ones exercise authority.” (Mark 10:42). The Jews worry that if people believe in Jesus, “the Romans shall come and take away both our place and nation” (John 11:48).
If you are beginning to understand that Christ often says the right thing for the wrong reason, consider that he openly compares himself to a thief in one of his parables. Jesus insists that the mysteries of Heaven must be related in parable, so that only the elect will understand (Matthew 13:11). And yet, in his typical mode of self-contradiction, Christ goes on to dutifully explain the meanings of his parables. But there is one parable he doesn’t explain at Mark 3:27 in which he explains that if you want to spoil a strong man’s house, you should bind him first. He returns to this theme in Matthew, saying “If the goodman of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken up. Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of Man cometh” (Matthew 24:43-44). Here he is referring to his second coming as a thief in the night. He is going to rob the house of YHWH and claim his covenant for Rome.
The Jews of the Gospels are made to say “if you let this man go, you are not Caesar’s friend. Who makes himself a king speaks against Caesar” (John 18:12) and “we have no King but Caesar” (John 18:15). Here we have more proof that the Gospels were written after the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus. In the year 30, when Jesus is supposed to have preached, Jerusalem was embroiled in the Roman-Jewish war, and the Jews refused to acknowledge Roman authority. The real messianic movement of the time expected a heroic warrior, and not a proponent of self-negation, to save Judea from the Romans. The Jews did not recognize the authority of Caesar in 30 CE, or at any other time; it was only the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus in 70 CE that allowed the Romans to makes Judea its subject. God told Abraham, “unto thy seed will I give this land” (Genesis 12:7) and that is why Christ was first turned into the seed of David and later into the forerunner of Titus. Thus do the Gospels justify the imperial dispossession of Judea.
In the end, all the contradiction and hypocrisy of the Gospels cannot be accidental. Rather it becomes obvious that the canonical gospels are a satire in which Jesus pretends to a be a Jew so that he can lead the Jews into ruin. I have no sympathy for Jewish beliefs, but I have neither sympathy for the perversion of universal wisdom and falsification of history that the canonical Gospels represent.
The Bad News About Jesus Christ
Good call on the woman being compared to a dog. I never noticed that was so blatant. Either it was swept under the rug when taught to me, or re-framed somehow as to make it positive.
Parables are not be taken literally. The Gnostic writings paint Jesus as a magician of sorts. Is it possible that in some of this, the character Jesus is teaching mind power? Manifestation sorcery? "As a man thinketh." So, to those that have (in consciousness, which is faith) more is given, and to those that have not (in consciousness, which is faith) even that which they have will be taken from them. The modern day woo-woo version of that is "where attention goes, energy flows." The parable of minas is parallel to the parable of talents: multiplying one's talent vs hiding/preserving (essentially allowing to wither) one's talent.