But the real home of virgin births is the land of the Nile. Eighteen hundred years before Christ, we find carved on one of the walls of the great temple of Luxor a picture of the annunciation, conception and birth of King Amunothph III, an almost exact copy of the annunciation, conception and birth of the Christian God. Of course no one will think of maintaining that the Egyptians borrowed the idea from the Catholics nearly two thousand years before the Christian era. "The story in the Gospel of Luke, the first and second chapters is," says Malvert, "a reproduction, 'point by point,' of the story in stone of the miraculous birth of Amunothph." *
Sharpe in his Egyptian Mythology, page 19, gives the following description of the Luxor picture, quoted by G. W. Foote in his Bible Romances, page 126: "In this picture we have the annunciation, the conception, the birth and the adoration, as described in the first and second chapters of Luke's Gospel." Massey gives a more minute description of the Luxor picture. "The first scene on the left hand shows the god Taht, the divine Word or Loges, in the act of hailing the virgin queen, announcing to her that she is to give birth to a son. In the second scene the god Kneph (assisted by Hathor) gives life to her. This is the Holy Ghost, or Spirit that causes conception....Next the mother is seated on the midwife's stool, and the child is supported in the hands of one of the nurses. The fourth scene is that of the adoration. Here the child is enthroned, receiving homage from the gods and gifts from men." * The picture on the wall of the Luxor temple, then, is one of the sources to which the anonymous writers of the Gospels went for their miraculous story. It is no wonder they suppressed their own identity as well as the source from which they borrowed their material.
Not only the idea of a virgin mother, but all the other miraculous events, such as the stable cradle, the guiding star, the massacre of the children, the flight to Egypt, and the resurrection and bodily ascension toward the clouds, have not only been borrowed, but are even scarcely altered in the New Testament story of Jesus.
That the early Christians borrowed the legend of Jesus from earthly sources is too evident to be even questioned. Gerald Massey in his great work on Egyptian origins demonstrates the identity of Mary, the mother of Jesus, with Isis, the mother of Horus. He says: "The most ancient, gold-bedizened, smoke-stained Byzantine pictures of the virgin and child represent the mythical mother as Isis, and not as a human mother of Nazareth." * Science and research have made this fact so certain that, on the one hand ignorance, and on the other, interest only, can continue to claim inspiration for the authors of the undated and unsigned fragmentary documents which pass for the Word of God. If, then, Jesus is stripped of all the borrowed legends and miracles of which he is the subject; and if we also take away from him all the teachings which collected from Jewish and Pagan sources have been attributed to him—what will be left of him? That the ideas put in his mouth have been culled and compiled from other sources is as demonstrable as the Pagan origin of the legends related of him.
Nearly every one of the dogmas and ceremonies in the Christian cult were borrowed from other and older religions. The resurrection myth, the ascension, the eucharisty, baptism, worship by kneeling or prostration, the folding of the hands on the breast, the ringing of bells and the burning of incense, the vestments and vessels used in church, the candles, "holy" water,—even the word Mass were all adopted and adapted by the Christians from the religions of the ancients. The Trinity is as much Pagan, as much Indian or Buddhist, as it is Christian. The idea of a Son of God is as old as the oldest cult. The sun is the son of heaven in all primitive faiths. The physical sun becomes in the course of evolution, the Son of Righteousness, or the Son of God, and heaven is personified as the Father on High. The halo around the head of Jesus, the horns of the older deities, the rays of light radiating from the heads of Hindu and Pagan gods are incontrovertible evidence that all gods were at one time—the sun in heaven.
Only the uninformed, of whom, we regret to say, there are a great many, and who are the main support of the old religions, still believe that the cross originated with Christianity. Like the dogmas of the Trinity, the virgin birth, and the resurrection, the sign of the cross or the cross as an emblem or a symbol was borrowed from the more ancient faiths of Asia. Perhaps one of the most important discoveries which primitive man felt obliged never to be ungrateful enough to forget, was the production of fire by the friction of two sticks placed across each other in the form of a cross. As early as the stone age we find the cross carved on monuments which have been dug out of the earth and which can be seen in the museums of Europe. On the coins of later generations as well as on the altars of prehistoric times we find the "sacred" symbol of the cross. The dead in ancient cemeteries slept under the cross as they do in our day in Catholic churchyards.
In ancient Egypt, as in modern China, India, Corea, the cross is venerated by the masses as a charm of great power. In the Musee Guimet, in Paris, we have seen specimens of pre-Christian crosses. In the Louvre Museum one of the "heathen" gods carries a cross on his head. During his second journey to New Zealand, Cook was surprised to find the natives marking the graves of their dead with the cross. We saw, in the Museum of St. Germain, an ancient divinity of Gaul, before the conquest of the country by Julius Caesar, wearing a garment on which was woven a cross. In the same museum an ancient altar of Gaul under Paganism, had a cross carved upon it. That the cross was not adopted by the followers of Jesus until a later date may be inferred from the silence of the earlier gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke, on the details of the crucifixion, which is more fully developed in the later gospel of John. The first three evangelists say nothing about the nails or the blood, and give the impression that he was hanged. Writing of the two thieves who were sentenced to receive the same punishment, Luke says, "One of the malefactors that was hanged with him." The idea of a bleeding Christ, such as we see on crosses in Catholic churches, is not present in these earlier descriptions of the crucifixion; the Christians of the time of Origin were called "the followers of the god who was hanged." In the fourth gospel we see the beginnings of the legend of the cross, of Jesus carrying or falling under the weight of the cross, of the nail prints in his hands and feet, of the spear drawing the blood from his side and smearing his body. Of all this, the first three evangelists are quite ignorant.
Let it be further noted that it was not until eight hundred years after the supposed crucifixion that Jesus is seen in the form of a human being on the cross. Not in any of the paintings on the ancient catacombs is found a crucified Christ. The earliest cross bearing a human being is of the eighth century. For a long time a lamb with a cross, or on a cross, was the Christian symbol, and it is a lamb which we see entombed in the "holy sepulchre." In more than one mosaic of early Christian times, it is not Jesus, but a lamb, which is bleeding for the salvation of the world. How a lamb came to play so important a role in Christianity is variously explained. The similarity between the name of the Hindu god, Agni and the meaning of the same word in Latin, which is a lamb, is one theory. Another is that a ram, one of the signs of the zodiac, often confounded by the ancients with a lamb, is the origin of the popular reverence for the lamb as a symbol—a reverence which all religions based on sun-worship shared. The lamb in Christianity takes away the sins of the people, just as the paschal lamb did in the Old Testament, and earlier still, just as it did in Babylonia.
To the same effect is the following letter of the bishop of Mende, in France, bearing date of the year 800 A. D.: "Because the darkness has disappeared, and because also Christ is a real man, Pope Adrian commands us to paint him under the form of a man. The lamb of God must not any longer be painted on a cross, but after a human form has been placed on the cross, there is no objection to have a lamb also represented with it, either at the foot of the cross or on the opposite side." * We leave it to our readers to draw the necessary conclusions from the above letter. How did a lamb hold its place on the cross for eight hundred years? If Jesus was really crucified, and that fact was a matter of history, why did it take eight hundred years for a Christian bishop to write, "now that Christ is a real man," etc.? Today, it would be considered a blasphemy to place a lamb on a cross.
On the tombstones of Christians of the fourth century are pictures representing, not Jesus, but a lamb, working the miracles mentioned in the gospels, such as multiplying the loaves and fishes, and raising Lazarus from the dead.
The first representations of a human form on the cross differ considerably from those which prevail at the present time.
While the figure on the modern cross is almost naked, those on the earlier ones are clothed and completely covered. Wearing a flowing tunic, Jesus is standing straight against the cross with his arms outstretched, as though in the act of delivering an address. Frequently, at his feet, on the cross, there is still painted the figure of a lamb, which by and by, he is going to replace altogether. Gradually the robe disappears from the crucified one, until we see him crucified, as in the adjoining picture, with hardly any clothes on, and wearing an expression of great agony.
In all historical matters, we cannot ask for more than a reasonable assurance concerning any question. In fact, absolute certainty in any branch of human knowledge, with the exception of mathematics, perhaps, is impossible. We are finite beings, limited in all our powers, and, hence, our conclusions are not only relative, but they should ever be held subject to correction. When our law courts send a man to the gallows, they can have no more than a reasonable assurance that he is guilty; when they acquit him, they can have no more than a reasonable assurance that he is innocent. Positive assurance is unattainable. The dogmatist is the only one who claims to possess absolute certainty. But his claim is no more than a groundless assumption. When, therefore, we learn that Josephus, for instance, who lived in the same country and about the same time as Jesus, and wrote an extensive history of the men and events of his day and country, does not mention Jesus, except by interpolation, which even a Christian clergyman, Bishop Warburton, calls "a rank forgery, and a very stupid one, too," we can be reasonably sure that no such Jesus as is described in the New Testament, lived about the same time and in the same country with Josephus.
The failure of such a historian as Josephus to mention Jesus tends to make the existence of Jesus at least reasonably doubtful.
Few Christians now place any reliance upon the evidence from Josephus. The early Fathers made this Jew admit that Jesus was the Son of God. Of course, the admission was a forgery. De Quincey says the passage is known to be "a forgery by all men not lunatics." Of one other supposed reference in Josephus, Canon Farrar says: "This passage was early tampered with by the Christians." The same writer says this of a third passage: "Respecting the third passage in Josephus, the only question is whether it be partly or entirely spurious." Lardner, the great English theologian, was the first man to prove that Josephus was a poor witness for Christ.
In examining the evidence from profane writers we must remember that the silence of one contemporary author is more important than the supposed testimony of another. There was living in the same time with Jesus a great Jewish scholar by the name of Philo. He was an Alexandrian Jew, and he visited Jerusalem while Jesus was teaching and working miracles in the holy city. Yet Philo in all his works never once mentions Jesus. He does not seem to have heard of him. He could not have helped mentioning him if he had really seen him or heard of him. In one place in his works Philo is describing the difference between two Jewish names, Hosea and Jesus. Jesus, he says, means saviour of the people. What a fine opportunity for him to have added that, at that very time, there was living in Jerusalem a saviour by the name of Jesus, or one supposed to be, or claiming to be, a saviour. He could not have helped mentioning Jesus if he had ever seen or heard of him.
We have elsewhere referred to the significant silence of the Pagan historians and miscellaneous writers on the wonderful events narrated in the New Testament. But a few remarks may be added here in explanation of the supposed testimony of Tacitus.
The quotation from Tacitus is an important one. That part of the passage which concerns us is something like this:—"They have their denomination from Chrestus, put to death as a criminal by Pontius Pilate during the reign of Tiberius." I wish to say in the first place that this passage is not in the History of Tacitus, known to the ancients, but in his Annals, which is not quoted by any ancient writer. The Annals of Tacitus were not known to be in existence until the year 1468. An English writer, Mr. Ross, has undertaken, in an interesting volume, to show that the Annals were forged by an Italian, Bracciolini. I am not competent to say whether or not Mr. Ross proves his point. But is it conceivable that the early Christians would have ignored so valuable a testimony had they known of its existence, and would they not have known of it had it really existed? The Christian Fathers, who not only collected assiduously all that they could use to establish the reality of Jesus—but who did not hesitate even to forge passages, to invent documents, and also to destroy the testimony of witnesses unfavorable to their cause—would have certainly used the Tacitus passage had it been in existence in their day. Not one of the Christian Fathers in his controversy with the unbelievers has quoted the passage from Tacitus, which passage is the church's strongest proof of the historicity of Jesus, outside the gospels.
But, to begin with, this passage has the appearance, at least, of being penned by a Christian. It speaks of such persecutions of the Christians in Rome which contradict all that we know of Roman civilization. The abuse of Christians in the same passage may have been introduced purposely to cover up the identity of the writer. The terrible outrages against the Christians mentioned in the text from Tacitus are supposed to have taken place in the year 64 A. D. According to the New Testament, Paul was in Rome from the year 63 to the year 65, and must, therefore, have been an eye-witness of the persecution under Nero. Let me quote from the Bible to show that there could have been no such persecution as the Tacitus passage describes. The last verse in the book of Acts reads: "And he (Paul) abode two whole years in his own hired dwelling, and received all that went in unto him, preaching the kingdom of God, and teaching things concerning the Lord Jesus Christ with all boldness, none forbidding him." How is this picture of peace and tranquility to be reconciled with the charge that the Romans rolled up the Christians in straw mats and burned them to illuminate the streets at night, and also that the lions were let loose upon the disciples of Jesus?
Moreover, it is generally known that the Romans were indifferent to religious propaganda, and never persecuted any sect or party in the name of religion. In Rome, the Jews were free to be Jews; why should the Jewish Christians—and the early Christians were Jews—have been thrown to the lions? In all probability the persecutions were much milder than the Tacitus passage describes, and politics was the real cause.
Until not very long ago, it was universally believed that William Tell was a historical character. But it is now proven beyond any reasonable doubt, that Tell and his apple are altogether mythical. Notwithstanding that a great poet has made him the theme of a powerful drama, and a great composer devoted one of his operas to his heroic achievements; notwithstanding also that the Swiss show the crossbow with which he is supposed to have shot at the apple on his son's head—he is now admitted to be only a legendary hero. The principal arguments which have led the educated world to revise its views concerning William Tell are that, the Swiss historians, Faber and Hamurbin, who lived shortly after the "hero," and who wrote the history of their country, as Josephus did that of his, do not mention Tell. Had such a man existed before their time, they could not have failed to refer to him. Their complete silence is damaging beyond help to the historicity of Tell. Neither does the historian, who was an eye witness of the battle of Morgarten in 1315, mention the name of Tell. The Zurich Chronicle of 1497, also omits to refer to his story. In the accounts of the struggle of the Swiss against Austria, which drove the former into rebellion and ultimate independence, Tell's name cannot be found. Yet all these arguments are not half so damaging to the William Tell story, as the silence of Josephus is to the Jesus story. Jesus was supposed to have worked greater wonders and to have created a wider sensation than Tell; therefore, it is more difficult to explain the silence of historians like Josephus, Pliny and Quintilian; or of philosophers like Philo, Seneca and Epictetus, concerning Jesus, than to explain the silence of the Swiss chroniclers concerning Tell.
We have now progressed far enough in our investigation to pause a moment for reflection before we proceed any further. I am conscious of no intentional misrepresentation or suppression of the facts relating to the question in hand. If I have erred through ignorance, I shall correct any mistake I may have made, if some good reader will take the trouble to enlighten me. I am also satisfied that I have not commanded the evidence, but have allowed the evidence to command me. I am not interested in either proving or disproving the existence of the New-Testament Jesus. I am not an advocate, I am rather an umpire, who hears the evidence and pronounces his decision accordingly. Let the lawyers or the advocates argue pro and con. I only weigh,—and I am sure, impartially,—the evidence which the witnesses offer. We have heard and examined quite a number of these, and, I, at least, am compelled to say, that unless stronger evidence be forthcoming, a historical Jesus has not been proven by the evidence thus far taken in. This does not mean that there is no evidence whatever that Jesus was a real existence, but that the evidence is not enough to prove it.
To condemn or to acquit a man in a court of law, there must not only be evidence, but enough of it to justify a decision. There is some evidence for almost any imaginable proposition; but that is not enough. Not only does the evidence offered to prove Jesus' historicity, already examined, fail to give this assurance, but, on the contrary, it lends much support to the opposite supposition, namely, that in all probability, Jesus was a myth—even as Mithra, Osiris, Isis, Hercules, Sampson, Adonis, Moses, Attis, Hermes, Heracles, Apollo of Tyanna, Chrishna, and Indra, were myths.
The story of Jesus, we are constrained to say, possesses all the characteristics of the religious drama, full of startling episodes, thrilling situations, dramatic action and denouement. It reads more like a play than plain history. From such evidence as the gospels themselves furnish, the conclusion that he was no more than the principal character in a religious play receives much support. Mystery and morality plays are of a very ancient origin. In earlier times, almost all popular instruction was by means of Tableaux vivant.
As a great scenic or dramatic performance, with Jesus as the hero, Judas as the villain—with conspiracy as its plot, and the trial, the resurrection and ascension as its finale, the story is intelligent enough. For instance, as the curtain rises, it discloses upon the stage shepherds tending their flocks in the green fields under the moonlit sky; again, as the scene shifts, the clouds break, the heavens open, and voices are heard from above, with a white-winged chorus chanting an anthem. The next scene suggests a stable with the cattle in their stalls, munching hay. In a corner of the stable, close to a manger, imagine a young woman, stooping to kiss a newly born babe. Anon appear three bearded and richly costumed men, with presents in their hands, bowing their heads in ecstatic adoration. Surely enough this is not history: It does not read like history. The element of fiction runs through the entire Gospels, and is its warp and woof. A careful analysis of the various incidents in this ensemble will not fail to convince the unprejudiced reader that while they possess all the essentials for dramatic presentation, they lack the requirements of real history.
The "opened-heavens," "angel-choirs," "grazing flocks," "watchful shepherds," "worshiping magicians," "the stable crib," "the mother and child," "the wonderful star," "the presents," "the anthem"—all these, while they fit admirably as stage setting, are questionable material for history. No historical person was ever born in so spectacular a manner. The Gospel account of Jesus is an embellished, ornamental, even sensationally dramatic creation to serve as an introduction for a legendary hero. Similar theatrical furniture has been used thousands of times to introduce other legendary characters. All the Savior Gods were born supernaturally. They were all half god, half man. They were all of royal descent. Miracles and wonders attended their birth. Jesus was not an exception. We reject as mythical the birth-stories about Mithra, and Apollo. Why accept as history those about Jesus? It rests with the preachers of Christianity to show that while the god-man of Persia, or of Greece, for example, was a myth, the god-man of Palestine is historical.
The dramatic element is again plainly seen in the account of the betrayal of Jesus. Jesus, who preaches daily in the temples, and in the public places; who talks to the multitude on the mountain and at the seaside; who feeds thousands by miracle; the report of whose wonderful cures has reached the ends of the earth, and who is often followed by such a crush that to reach him an opening has to be made in the ceiling of the house where he is stopping; who goes in and out before the people and is constantly disputing with the elders and leaders of the nation—is, nevertheless, represented as being so unknown that his enemies have to resort to the device of bribing with thirty silver coins one of his disciples to point him out to them, and which is to be done by a kiss. This might make a great scene upon the stage, but it is not the way things happen in life.
Then read how Jesus is carried before Pilate the Roman governor, and how while he is being tried a courier rushes in with a letter from Pilate's wife which is dramatically torn open and read aloud in the presence of the crowded court. The letter, it is said, was about a dream of Pilate's wife, in which some ghost tells her that Jesus is innocent, and that her husband should not proceed against him. Is this history? Roman jurisprudence had not degenerated to that extent as to permit the dreams of a woman or of a man to influence the course of justice. But this letter episode was invented by the playwright—if I may use the phrase—to prolong the dramatic suspense, to complicate the situation, to twist the plot, and thereby render the impression produced by his "piece" more lasting. The letter and the dream did not save Jesus. Pilate was not influenced by his dreaming wife. She dreamed in vain.
In the next place we hear Pilate pronouncing Jesus guiltless; but, forthwith, he hands him over to the Jews to be killed. Does this read like history? Did ever a Roman court witness such a trial? To pronounce a man innocent and then to say to his prosecutors: "If you wish to kill him, you may do so," is extraordinary conduct. Then, proceeding, Pilate takes water and ostentatiously washes his hands, a proceeding introduced by a Greek or Latin scribe, who wished, in all probability, to throw the blame of the crucifixion entirely upon the Jews. Pilate, representing the Gentile world, washes his hands of the responsibility for the death of Jesus, while the Jews are made to say, "His blood be upon us and our children."
Imagine the clamoring, howling Jews, trampling on one another, gesticulating furiously, gnashing their teeth, foaming at the mouth, and spitting in one another's face as they shout, "Crucify him! Crucify him!" A very powerful stage setting, to be sure—but it is impossible to imagine that such disorder, such anarchy could be permitted in any court of justice. But think once more of those terrible words placed in the mouths of the Jews, "His blood be upon us and our children." Think of a people openly cursing themselves and asking the whole Christian world to persecute them forever—"His blood be upon us and our children."
Next, the composers of the gospels conduct us to the Garden of Gethsemane, that we may see there the hero of the play in his agony, fighting the great battle of his life alone, with neither help nor sympathy from his distracted followers. He is shown to us there, on his knees, crying tears of blood—sobbing and groaning under the shadow of an almost crushing fear. Tremblingly he prays, "Let this cup pass from me—if it be possible;" and then, yielding to the terror crowding in upon him, he sighs in the hearing of all the ages, "The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak," precisely the excuse given by everybody for not doing what they would do if they could. Now, we ask in all seriousness, is it likely that a God who had come down from heaven purposely to drink that cup and to be the martyr-Savior of humanity—would seek to be spared the fate for which he was ordained from all eternity?
The objection that Jesus' hesitation on the eve of the crucifixion, as well as his cry of despair on the cross, were meant to show that he was as human as he was divine, does not solve the difficulty. In that event Jesus, then, was merely acting—feigning a fear which he did not feel, and pretending to dread a death which he knew could not hurt him. If, however, Jesus really felt alarmed at the approach of death, how much braver, then, were many of his followers who afterwards faced dangers and tortures far more cruel than his own! We honestly think that to have put in Jesus' mouth the words above quoted, and also to have represented him as closing his public career with a shriek on the cross: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" was tantamount to an admission by the writers that they were dealing with a symbolic Christ, an ideal figure, the hero of a play, and not a historical character.
It is highly dramatic, to be sure, to see the sun darkened, to feel the whole earth quaking, to behold the graves ripped open and the dead reappear in their shrouds—to hear the hero himself tearing his own heart with that cry of shuddering anguish, "My God! my God!"—but it is not history. If such a man as Jesus really lived, then his biographers have only given us a caricature of him. However beautiful some of the sayings attributed to Jesus, and whatever the source they may have been borrowed from, they are not enough to prove his historicity. But even as the Ten Commandments do not prove Moses to have been a historical personage or the author of the books and deeds attributed to him, neither do the parables and miracles of Jesus prove him to have once visited this earth as a god, or to have even existed as a man.
Socrates and Jesus! Compare the quite natural behavior of Socrates in prison with that of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. The Greek sage is serene. Jesus is alarmed. The night agony of his soul, his tears of blood, his pitiful collapse when he prays, "if it be possible let this cup pass from me,"—all this would be very impressive on the boards, but they seem incredible of a real man engaged in saving a world. Once more we say that the defense that it was the man in Jesus and not the god in him that broke down, would be unjust to the memory of thousands of martyrs who died by a more terrible death than that of Jesus. As elsewhere stated, but which cannot be too often emphasized, what man would not have embraced death with enthusiasm,—without a moment's misgiving, did he think that by his death, death and sin would be no more! Who would shrink from a cross which is going to save millions to millions added from eternal burnings. He must be a phantom, indeed, who trembles and cries like a frightened child because he cannot have the crown without the cross! What a spectacle for the real heroes crowding the galleries of history! It is difficult to see the shrinking and shuddering Savior of the world, his face bathed in perspiration, blood oozing out of his forehead, his lips pale, his voice breaking into a shriek, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me!"—it is difficult to witness all this and not to pity him. Poor Jesus! he is going to save the world, but who is going to save him?
If we compare the trial of Jesus with that of Socrates, the fictitious nature of the former cannot possibly escape detection. Socrates was so well known in Athens, that it was not necessary for his accusers to bribe one of his disciples to betray him. Jesus should have been even better known in Jerusalem than Socrates was in Athens. He was daily preaching in the synagogues, and his miracles had given him an eclat which Socrates did not enjoy.
Socrates is not taken to court at night, bound hand and feet. Jesus is arrested in the glare of torchlights, after he is betrayed by Judas with a kiss; then he is bound and forced into the high priest's presence. All this is admirable setting for a stage, but they are no more than that.
The disciples of Socrates behave like real men, those of Jesus are actors. They run away; they hide and follow at a distance. One of them curses him. The cock crows, the apostate repents. This reads like a play.
In the presence of his judges, Socrates makes his own defense. One by one he meets the charges. Jesus refused, according to two of the evangelists, to open his mouth at his trial. This is dramatic, but it is not history. It is not conceivable that a real person accused as Jesus was, would have refused a great opportunity to disprove the charges against him. Socrates' defense of himself is one of the classics. Jesus' silence is a conundrum. "But he answered nothing," "But Jesus as yet answered nothing," "And he answered him never a word," is the report of two of his biographers. The other two evangelists, as is usual, contradict the former and produce the following dialogues between Jesus and his judges, which from beginning to end possess all the marks of unreality:
Pilate.—"Art thou the King of the Jews?"
Jesus.—"Sayest thou this thing of thyself, or did others tell it thee of me?"
Pilate—"Art thou a King?"
Jesus.—"Thou sayest that I am a King."
Is it possible that a real man, not to say the Savior of the world, would give such unmeaning and evasive replies to straightforward questions? Does it not read like a page from fiction?
In the presence of the priests of his own race Jesus is as indefinite and sophistical as he is before the Roman Pilate.
The Priests—"Art thou the Christ—tell us?"
Jesus.—"If I tell you ye will not believe me."
The Priests.—"Art thou the Son of God?"
Jesus.—"Ye say that I am."
In the first answer he refuses to reveal himself because he does not think he can command belief in himself; in his second answer he either blames them for saying he was the Son of God, or quotes their own testimony to prove that he is the Son of God. But if they believed he was God, would they try to kill him? Is it not unthinkable? He intimates that the priests believe he is the Son of God—"Ye say that I am." Surely, it is more probable that these dialogues were invented by his anonymous biographers than that they really represent an actual conversation between Jesus and his judges.
Compare in the next place the manner in which the public trials of Socrates and Jesus are conducted. There is order in the Athenian court; there is anarchy in the Jerusalem court. Witnesses and accusers walk up to Jesus and slap him on the face, and the judge does not reprove them for it. The court is in the hands of rowdies and hoodlums, who shout "Crucify him," and again, "Crucify him." A Roman judge, while admitting that he finds no guilt in Jesus deserving of death, is nevertheless represented as handing him over to the mob to be killed, after he has himself scourged him. No Roman judge could have behaved as this Pilate is reported to have behaved toward an accused person on trial for his life. All that we know of civilized government, all that we know of the jurisprudence of Rome, contradicts this "inspired" account of a pretended historical event. If Jesus was ever tried and condemned to death in a Roman court, an account of it that can command belief has yet to be written.
Again, when we come to consider the random, disconnected and fragmentary form in which the teachings of Jesus are presented, we cannot avoid the conclusion that he is a dramatis persona brought upon the stage to give expression not to a consistent, connected and carefully worked-out thought, but to voice with many breaks and interruptions, the ideas of his changing managers. He is made to play a number of contradictory roles, and appears in the same story in totally different characters.
One editor or compiler of the Gospel describes Jesus as an ascetic and a mendicant, wandering from place to place, without a roof over his head, and crawling at eventide into his cave in the Mount of Olives. He introduces him as the "Man of Sorrows," fasting in the wilderness, counseling people to part with their riches, and promising the Kingdom of Heaven to Lazarus, the beggar.
Another redactor announces him as "eating and drinking" at the banquets of "publicans and sinners,"—a "wine-bibbing" Son of Man. "John the Baptist came neither eating nor drinking, but the Son of Man came both eating and drinking," which, if it means anything, means that Jesus was the very opposite of the ascetic John.
A partisan of the doctrine of non-resistance puts in Jesus' mouth the words: "Resist not evil;" "The meek shall inherit the earth," etc., and counsels that he who smites us on the one cheek should be permitted to strike us also on the other, and that to him who robs us of an undergarment, we should also hand over our outer garments.
Another draws the picture of a militant Jesus who could never endorse such precepts of indolence and resignation. "The kingdom of heaven is taken by violence," cries this new Jesus, and intimates that no such beggar like Lazarus, sitting all day long with the dogs and his sores, can ever earn so great a prize. With a scourge in his hands this Jesus rushes upon the traders in the temple-court, upturns their tables and whips their owners into the streets. Surely this was resistance of the most pronounced type. The right to use physical force could not have been given a better endorsement than by this example of Jesus.
It will not help matters to say that these money-changers were violating a divine law, and needed chastisement with a whip. Is not the man who smites us upon the cheek, or robs us of our clothing, equally guilty? Moreover, these traders in the outer courts of the synagogue were rendering the worshipers a useful service. Just as candles, rosaries, images and literature are sold in church vestibules for the accommodation of Catholics, so were doves, pigeons and Hebrew coins, necessary to the Jewish sacrifices, sold in the temple-courts for the Jewish worshiper. The money changer who supplied the pious Jew with the only sacred coin which the priests would accept was not very much less important to the Jewish religion than the rabbi. To have fallen upon these traders with a weapon, and to have caused them the loss of their property, was certainly the most inconsistent thing that a "meek" and "lowly" Jesus preaching non-resistance could have done.
Again; one writer makes Jesus the teacher par excellence of peace. He counsels forgiveness of injuries not seven times, but seventy times that number—meaning unlimited love and charity. "Love your enemies," "Bless them that curse you," is his unusual advice. But another hand retouches this picture, and we have a Jesus who breaks his own golden rule. This other Jesus heaps abuse upon the people who displease him; calls his enemies "vipers," "serpents," "devils," and predicts for them eternal burnings in sulphur and brimstone. How could he who said, "Come unto me all ye that are heavy laden," say also, "Depart from me ye cursed?" Who curses them? How can there be an everlasting hell in a universe whose author advises us to love our enemies, to bless them that curse us, and to forgive seventy times seven? How could the same Jesus who said, "Blessed are the peacemakers," say also, "I came not to bring peace, but a sword?" Is it possible that the same Jesus who commands us to love our enemies, commands us also to "hate" father, mother, wife and child, for "his name's sake?" Yes! the same Jesus who said, "Put up thy sword in its sheath," also commands us to sell our effects and "buy a sword."
Once more: A believer in the divinity of Jesus—I am going to say—invents the following text: "The Father and I are one." An opponent to this Trinitarian dogma introduces a correction which robs the above text of its authority: "The Father is greater than I," and makes Jesus admit openly that there are some things known to the father only. It is difficult not to see in these passages the beginnings of the terrible controversies which, starting with Peter and Paul, have come down to our day, and which will not end until Jesus shall take his place among the mythical saviors of the world.
To harmonize these many and different Jesuses into something like unity or consistency a thousand books have been written by the clergy. They have not succeeded. How can a Jesus represented at one time as the image of divine perfection, and at another as protesting against being called "good," for "none is good, save one, God,"—how can these two conceptions be reconciled except by a resort to artificial and arbitrary interpretations? If such insurmountable contradictions in the teachings and character of another would weaken our faith in his historicity, then we are justified in inferring that in all probability Jesus was only a name—the name of an imaginary stage hero, uttering the conflicting thoughts of his prompters.
Again, such phrases as, "and he was caught up in a cloud,"—describing the ascension and consequent disappearance of Jesus, betray the anxiety of the authors of the Gospels to bring their marvelous story to a close. Not knowing how to terminate the career of an imaginary Messiah, his creators invented the above method of dispatching him. "He was caught up in a cloud,"—but for that, the narrators would have been obliged to continue their story indefinitely.
In tragedy the play ends with the death of the hero, but if the biographers of Jesus had given a similar excuse for bringing their narrative to a finale, there would have been the danger of their being asked to point out his grave. "He was caught up in a cloud," relieved them of all responsibility to produce his remains if called upon to do so, and, at the same time, furnished them with an excuse to bring their story to a close.
It would hardly be necessary, were we all unbiased, to look for any further proofs of the mythical and fanciful nature of the Gospel narratives than this expedient to which the writers resorted. To questions, "Where is Jesus?"
"What became of his body?" etc., they could answer, "He was caught up in a cloud." But a career that ends in the clouds was never begun on the earth.