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  • Arianism, Docetism and Ebionism compared with the Qur’an

    Arianism, Docetism and Ebionism compared with the Qur’an

    Survival of the fittest. Religions fight – survive or die.

    Arianism, Docetism and Ebionism were formal and near formal heresies ( heresy = a theological doctrine or system rejected as false by ecclesiastical authority ) such as including Nestorians, Apollinarian, Monophysitism  (several heresies ) and Gnosticism just to name few. Christian Gnostics  believed that someone else was crucified instead of Jesus Christ – e.g. the non canonical Gospel of Thomas.  Others believed just the opposite, that Jesus Christ was just human, that is also the current view of Islam. Interesting enough,  Islam usually claims that the  crucifixion of Jesus Christ was an illusion.  This article investigates the relationship of two early heresies, Docetism and Ebionism, with the Islam.

    Docetism

    In Christianity, a sectarian doctrine  “Docetism” claimed that Jesus Christ had appeared as an illusion, that he had not had a real or natural body, and that his crucifixion had only been an illusion. It emerged in the 2nd century, mingled with gnostic schools and resurfaced in the 7th century in the Islamic view of crucifixion.  The ideology has derived its name from Greek dokeo, “to seem”. Docetism is closely linked to the Gnostic ideas of the Middle East in its time, among them Valentianism. It explains that matter represents evil, spirit the good. Therefore, Jesus physical body was merely an illusion for humans witnessing it. The same applies to his crucifixion, Jesus was incorporeal, a pure spirit and could not physically die. Consequently, Christ’s resurrection and ascension into heaven were denied. The concept of a Jesus without a natural body appears well-known in the first stages of Jesus-Judaism, mentioned in the letters of John (1 John 4:1–3; 2 John 7). Docetism became more fully developed as an important doctrinal position of Gnosticism, a religious dualist system of belief arising in the 2nd century ad which held that matter was evil and the spirit good and claimed that salvation was attained only through esoteric knowledge, or gnosis. The heresy developed from speculations about the imperfection or essential impurity of matter.  Also later Islam, which closeness in time and location offers the theory that it picked up Docetism thoughts, asserted that all the acts and sufferings of Jesu’s life, including the Crucifixion, were mere appearances. It consequently denied Christ’s Resurrection and Ascension into heaven. Docetism was attacked with the same furor than Gnosticism, especially by Bishop Ignatius of Antioch in the 2nd century.

    Ebionism

    To be honest, it also overtly contradicts Gnosticism because it lays emphasis on Jesus’ human nature while objecting to the Christian belief in Jesus’ divinity. In order to reject the dogma of a divine Jesus, the Qur’an once claims that Jesus the Messiah is nothing more than a prophet (an a lesser one) and focuses on Jesus’ human nature by disregarding the Christian doctrine of incarnation.  When I try to get an overview of the different so-called heresies I found similarities of those heretical sects and the emphasis on Jesus’ human nature. In the 4th century most heresies were still not soundly defeated  and  Ebionism found its  rebirth which affirmed Jesus’ physical manhood and believed he was the Messiah ,but denied his divinity. I came to the conclusion this view might be Ebionism simplified. The doctrines of this sect are said by Irenaeus to be like those of Cerinthus and Carpocrates.  It is very hazardous, therefore, to maintain, as is sometimes done, that the distinction between Nazarenes and Ebionites goes back to the earliest days of Christianity.
    Of the history of this sect hardly anything is known.  In St. Epiphanius’s time small communities seem still to have existed in some hamlets of Syria and Palestine, but they were lost in obscurity. Further east, in Babylonia and Persia, their influence is perhaps traceable amongst the Mandeans, and it is suggested by Uhlhorn and others that they may be brought into connection with the origin of Islam.

    History clues

    That is when I learned about Karl-Heinz Ohlig, who came to the conclusion  that at this very early stage Islam was in fact an Arabic Christian sect (likely Ebionism), based on the recorded Ebionites faith of Khadija, Muhammad’s first wife. The later hadith and biographies have been seen  in large part legends, instrumental in severing Islam from its Christian roots and building a full-blown new religion.  John Wansbrough believed that the Qu’ran is a redaction in part of other sacred scriptures, in particular the Judaeo-Christian scriptures.  As Phillip  Jenkins points out, Islam’s understanding of Jesus has strong  similarities to Ebionism but also to Docetism, and may even have taken its understanding from its theology.  In the Koran 4:156 it is stated that: “…but they did not kill him, and they did not crucify him, but a similitude was made for them…”  The person of Jesus or Isa in Arabic  is of great significance in both Islam and Christianity. One of the apocryphal gospels, the one of Peter fits the basic concepts of Docetism.   Docetism is among the earliest Christian sectarian doctrines.

    Linguistic clues.

    In 1972 ancient Qur’anic manuscripts wer discovered in Sana’a, Yemen. Dr. Gerd R Puin, a quranic expert leading the scientific analysis dated them at between 705 and 715. It is the oldest datable Quran in the world but was created 70 years after Mohammed’s death. Fragments from nearly 1000 different Quran’s were identified and verses and chapters changed and rearranged.  It is proof, that the Quran was not a single product or a single entity that was fixed by 650 but developed much, much later hence the overlaying of text. Gerd Rüdiger Puin (born 1940) is a German scholar and an authority on Qur’anic historical orthography, the study and scholarly interpretation of ancient manuscripts. He is also specialist in Arabic palaeography and head of a restoration project, commissioned by the Yemeni government, which spent a significant amount of time examining the ancient Qur’anic manuscripts . Gerd Rüdiger Puin is quoted 1999 as saying that:

    My idea is that the Koran is a kind of cocktail of texts that were not all understood even at the time of Muhammad. Many of them may even be a hundred years older than Islam itself. Even within the Islamic traditions there is a huge body of contradictory information, including a significant Christian substrate; one can derive a whole Islamic anti-history from them if one wants. The Qur’an claims for itself that it is ‘mubeen,’ or clear, but if you look at it, you will notice that every fifth sentence or so simply doesn’t make sense. Many Muslims will tell you otherwise, of course, but the fact is that a fifth of the Qur’anic text is just incomprehensible. This is what has caused the traditional anxiety regarding translation. If the Qur’an is not comprehensible, if it can’t even be understood in Arabic, then it’s not translatable into any language. That is why Muslims are afraid. Since the Qur’an claims repeatedly to be clear but is not—there is an obvious and serious contradiction. Something else must be going on.

    Syrian Aramaic the language of the bible.

    Luxenberg picks up on that argument that the Qur’an contains much ambiguous and even inexplicable language and accuses Western academic scholars of the Qur’an of taking a timid and imitative approach, relying too heavily on the biased work of Muslim scholars. The author (Luxenberg  is not his real name) claims  in his book, that parts of philologically not clarified text can only be correctly understood by using Syrian Aramaic language.

    Questions asked.

    Now this opens questions. Was the Islam original a current or even syncretic combination of the Christianity?  Did the aspect of the establishment of religion only came later for political reasons? Since the nineteenth century the confidence of the European Islam science  in regards of the three sources of the Islam decreased considerably. Ignaz Goldziher recognized that the Hadith does not reflect in various way the early Islamic, but the  struggle which broke out about three decade after Mohammed death. What can be established about the historical Jesus depends therefore almost without exception on Christian (or heretic) traditions, especially on the material used in the composition of the Gospels of Mark, Matthew, and Luke, which may similar reflect deliberately  myth building  (and motives) of the later church and its faith in Jesus.

    Pre-islamic Islam

    Surprisingly  Western Church history and Western Islamic studies really miss the lack of evidence for pre-islamic Islam, that is to say its Ebionites Christians, Sabaean pagans, Seekers (hanifi) and Meccan pagans probably also Nestorian and Jewish roots. Why are all the pre-cursors to Islam all pagan or heretical christian? Why are the early sources of Islam not islamic when even the Nag Hammadi library of ‘gnostic Christianity’ survived.   Paul Addae and Tim Bowes (1998) write that the Ebionites were faithful to the original teachings of Jesus and thus shared Islamic views about Jesus’ humanity. In 610 AD, at age 40, Muhammad became a prophet. Mohammed’s wife’s cousin, Waraka, the Ebionite Bishop in Mecca, disciple of Mohammed.  The period immediately preceding the time of Muhammad witnessed the bitter fight of theistic sects and the Christological question which formed the background to the controversy: “How are divinity and humanity joined together and related to each other in Jesus Christ?”  John wrote against the Gnostics, Jews wrote against the worship of baal, yet silence against Islam until 632 AD or so, why would that be? Could it be, that Islam was just seen as a Christian offspring and alley against Constantinople and Rome.  Therefore its useful to find similarities and differences in terms of beliefs about the nature of  Jesus understanding the many schism before Islam and the Islamic information about Jesus in the Quran.

    Comparing (Chalcedonian) Christianity and Islam (1) Similarities ….

    Christians believe Jesus was a human and divine being sent by  God.  With the exception of Unitarian Christians and Ebionites Christians , who like Islam today  do not believe in the Trinity, most Christians now believe in the Divinity of Jesus, which is connected to the belief in Trinity. They say he is the second member of the Triune God, the Son of the first part of the Triune God, and at the same time “fully” God in every respect.

    Belief in all of the Prophets and Messengers of God is a fundamental article of faith in Islam. Thus, believing in Prophets Adam, Jesus, Moses, and Muhammad is a requirement for anyone who calls him or herself a Muslim. A person claiming to be a Muslim who, for instance, denies  that Jesus was a messenger, is not considered a Muslim.   The Quran says in reference to the status of Jesus as a Messenger:  “The Messiah (Jesus), son of Mary, was no more than a Messenger before whom many Messengers have passed away; and his mother adhered wholly to truthfulness, and they both ate food (as other mortals do). See how We make Our signs clear to them; and see where they are turning away!” (Quran 5:75).

    Both believe Jesus was born of a Virgin Mother,  chaste and pious human woman who gave birth to Jesus Christ, the second member of the Trinity, the Son of God, and at the same time “fully” God Almighty in every respect. Christians believe however, that while she was a virgin, she was married to a man named Joseph (Bible: Matthew:1:18). According to Matthew 1:25, Joseph “kept her a virgin until she gave birth to a Son; and he called His name Jesus”

    Like Christians, Muslims believe Mary, Maria in Spanish, or Maryam as she is called in Arabic, was a chaste, virgin woman, who miraculously gave birth to Jesus.  “Relate in the Book the story of Mary, when she withdrew from her family, to a place in the East. She screened herself from them; then We sent to her Our spirit (angel Gabriel) and he appeared before her as a man in all respects. She said: I seek refuge from you in God Most Gracious (come not near) if you do fear God. He said: Nay, I am only a Messenger from your Lord, to announce to you the gift of a pure son. She said: How shall I have a son, when no man has ever touched me, and I am not unchaste? He said: So it will be, your Lord says: ‘That is easy for Me; and We wish to appoint him as a sign unto men and a Mercy from Us’: It was a matter so decreed” (Quran 19:16-21).   The Quran says:  “She (Mary) said: ‘O my Lord! How shall I have a son when no man has touched me.’ He (God) said: ‘So (it will be) for God creates what He wills. When He has decreed something, He says to it only: ‘Be!’- and it is” (3:47).  It should also be noted about his birth that:  “Verily, the likeness of Jesus in God’s Sight is the likeness of Adam. He (God) created him from dust, then (He) said to him: ‘Be!’-and he was” (Quran 3:59).

    Muslims, like Christians believe Jesus performed miracles. “And now, Lord, look upon their threats, and grant to thy servants to speak thy word with all boldness, while thou stretches out thy hand to heal, and sign and wonders are performed through the name of thy holy servant Jesus (Bible: Acts 4:30). But im Islam these were performed by the will and permission of God, Who has power and control over all things.  “Then will God say: ‘O Jesus the son of Mary! recount My favor to you and to your mother. Behold! I strengthened you with the Holy Spirit (the angel Gabriel) so that you did speak to the people in childhood and in maturity. Behold! I taught you the Book and Wisdom, the Law and the Gospel. And behold: you make out of clay, as it were, the figure of a bird, by My leave, and you breathe into it, and it becomes a bird by My leave, and you heal those born blind, and the lepers by My leave. And behold! you bring forth the dead by My leave. And behold! I did restrain the children of Israel from (violence to you) when you did show them the Clear Signs, and the unbelievers among them said: ‘This is nothing but evident magic’ (5:110).

    Comparing (Chalcedonian) Christianity and Islam (2) differences

    With the exception of the Unitarian Christians and at that time Ebionites Christians,  Trinity is the central doctrine of the Christian religion. Islam charged Christianity with having distorted the pure monotheism of Jesus through the doctrines of trinity and through the veneration of icons. The belief is that in the unity of the Godhead there are Three Persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. These three Persons or beings are distinct from each another, while being similar in character: uncreated and omnipotent. The word “trinity” is a term used to denote the Christian doctrine that God exists as a unity of three distinct persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Each of the persons is distinct from the other, yet identical in essence. In other words, each is fully divine in nature, but each is not the totality of the other persons of the Trinity. Each has a will, loves, and says “I” and “You” when speaking. The Father is not the same person as the Son, who is not the same person as the Holy Spirit, who is not the same person as the Father. Each is divine, yet there are not three gods, but one God. There are three individual subsistences, or persons. The word “subsistence” means something that has a real existence. The word “person” denotes individuality and self-awareness.  Included in the doctrine of the Trinity is a strict monotheism which is the teaching that there exists in all the universe a single being known as God who is self-existent and unchangeable (Isaiah 43:10; 44:6,8). Therefore, it is important to note that the doctrine of the trinity is not polytheistic but monotheistic by definition:

    • God is three persons
    • Each person is divine
    • There is only one God.

    God is a trinity of persons consisting of one substance and one essence. God is numerically one. Yet, within the single divine essence are three individual subsistences that we call persons:

    •  Each of the three persons is completely divine in nature though each is not the totality of the Godhead.
    • Each of the three persons is not the other two persons.
    • Each of the three persons is related to the other two, but are distinct from them.

    The word “trinity” is not found in the Bible. But this does not mean that the concept is not taught there.  The First Vatican Council has explained the meaning to be attributed to the term mystery in theology.

    Muslims believe in the Absolute Oneness of God, Who is a Supreme Being free of human limitations, needs and wants. He has no partners in His Divinity. He is the Creator of everything and is completely separate from His creation.  God says in the Quran regarding the Trinity:  “People of the Book (Jews and Christians)! Do not exceed the limits in your religion, and attribute to God nothing except the truth. The Messiah, Jesus, son of Mary, was only a Messenger of God, and His command that He conveyed unto Mary, and a spirit from Him. So believe in God and in His Messengers, and do not say: ‘God is a Trinity.’ Give up this assertion; it would be better for you. God is indeed just One God. Far be it from His glory that He should have a son. To Him belongs all that is in the heavens and in the earth. God is sufficient for a guardian” (Quran 4:171).

    Only Christians believe that Jesus was the son of God. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him (Bible: John 3:16).  However, it is interesting to note that the term “son of God” is used in other parts of the Bible to refer to Adam (Bible: Luke 3:38), Israel (Bible: Exodus 4:22) and David (Bible: Psalms 2:7) as well. The creatures of God are usually referred to in the Bible as children of God.   The notion of Jesus as son of God is something that was established under the influence of Paul of Tarsus (originally named Saul), who had been an disbeliever, but later changed course and joined the disciples after the departure of Jesus. Paul is considered by a number of Christian scholars to be the father of Christianity whereas Islam later opposed trinity  as a misrepresentations of the message of Jesus.  Heretics struggled to reject the notion of the Divinity of Jesus for close to 200 years.   The Gospel of Barnabas was accepted as a Canonical Gospel in the Churches of Alexandria till 325 CE Irenaeus (130-200) wrote in support of pure monotheism and opposed Paul for injecting into Christianity doctrines of the pagan Roman religion and Platonic philosophy.  In 325 (CE), a council of Christian leaders met at Nicaea and made Paul’s beliefs officially part of Christian doctrine (see chart).

    Muslims believe that God is one, that there are no gods except the God. They may contend that even though Christians claim to be monotheists, they actually believe in more than one God. Since Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God, to them they therefore err like other people of ancient or modern times who have believed in a plurality of gods or the sons and daughters of Go. The Quran, of course is simplified in that respect and strictly monotheistic:. “Say: “God is Unique! God, the Source [of everything]. He has not fathered anyone nor was He fathered, and there is nothing comparable to Him!” (Quran 112:1-4).  The Quran also states: “Such was Jesus, the son of Mary; it is a statement of truth, about which they vainly dispute. It is not befitting to the majesty of God, that He should beget a son. Glory be to Him! When He determines a matter, He only says to it, ‘Be’ and it is” (Quran 19:34-35). 

    Only Christians believe that Jesus was killed on the cross then resurrected. In that respect Islam is similar to  Docetism belief that Jesus’ physical body was an illusion, as was his crucifixion; that is, Jesus only seemed to have a physical body and to physically die, but in reality he was incorporeal, a pure spirit, and hence could not physically die. ““They did not kill him, nor did they crucify him, but they thought they did.” (Quran 4:156) “God lifted him up to His presence. God is Almighty, All-Wise” (Quran 4:157) .

    Death and resurrection is a core Christian belief and it relates to the concept of atonement. According to this belief, Jesus died to save mankind from sin. However, this is not stated explicitly in the four gospels which form the primary source texts of Christianity. It is found, however, in Romans 6:8,9.   Christians believe Jesus was spat on, cut, humiliated, kicked, striped and finally hung up on the cross to endure a slow and painful death.  According, to Christian belief, the original sin of Adam and Eve of eating from the forbidden tree was so great that God could not forgive it by simply willing it, rather it was necessary to erase it with the blood of a sinless, innocent Jesus.   The four Gospels and the Epistles of St. Paul are the main sources of Christianity which discuss the Resurrection of Jesus after his crucifixion. According to St. Matthew, Jesus appeared to the holy women, and again on a mountain in Galilee. Mark’s Gospel tells a different story: Jesus was seen by Mary Magdalene, by the two disciples at Emmaus, and the Eleven before his Ascension into heaven.  Luke’s Gospel says Jesus walked with the disciples to Emmaus, appeared to Peter and to the assembled disciples in Jerusalem. In John’s Gospel, Jesus appeared to Mary Magdalene, to the ten Apostles on Easter Sunday, to the Eleven a week later, and to seven disciples at the Sea of Tiberias.  Another account of the resurrection by St. Paul is found in Bible: Corinthians 15: 3-8.  According to Christian belief, Resurrection is a manifestation of God’s justice, Who exalted Christ to a life of glory, as Christ had humbled himself unto death (Phil., 2: 8-9). This event also completes the mystery of Christian salvation and redemption. The death of Jesus frees believers from sin, and with his resurrection, he restores to them the most important privileges lost by sin (Bible: Romans 4:25).  More importantly, the belief in the resurrection of Jesus indicates Christian acknowledgment of Christ as the immortal God, the cause of believers’ own resurrection (Bible: I Corinthians 4: 21; Phil., 3:20-21), as well as the model and the support of a new life of grace (Bible: Romans 4: 4-6; 9-11).

    Wrapping it up.

    The emergence of the Islam can so be seen as a part of ancient church history.  Islam researcher Friedrich Schwally said 1919: The theologians are not aware that the Islam is a part of our church history. The more one with studies the Quran, the clearer it becomes that its origin comes from a form of the Christianity.  Probably only around the year 800 from Islam became its own religion.

    What are the central proofs? As said, the Syrian church always saw Jesus as prophet, as a messenger of God. The Syrian church father Afrahat often calls Jesus „ the large prophet “, not the son of God, but the son Maria’s, and on this Syrian theology the Koran decreases/goes back. They wrote that „ Muhammad is actually “ a name for Jesus. „ Muhammad “ is called „ the praising “, and the first coin minting, on which this title appears, carry excluding Christian symbols, the cross, the baptism Jesu or the like.

    The Kalif Abd Al-Malik established the rock cathedral, which is considered as the first Muslim building in Jerusalem, but it was a church. The inscription  the inside, is a purely christian text, against the thesis, Jesus is the son of God.  If one, as Christoph Luxenberg suggests, reads in such a way „ Muhammad “ literally translated and the sentence: is praised (muhammad), then it is to be referred to thereafter the mentioned Jesus.

    Abdallah, the slave of God, is an old Syrian name for Jesus. Later the inscription was read: Mohammed, son of the Abdallah.  The first Muslims did not know thus at all that they were Muslims. They held themselves for Christians, a special form of the Christianity which rejected trinity. This could be the  cause could be for the fast propagation of the Islam: That people did not have to be converted, where the religious was already a rather unitarian tradition, where Jesus was admired as humans and an envoy (messenger) of God, not as God. Can such realizations carry the communication between the religions?  No, but consciousness that one has common roots, can lead perhaps nevertheless to a communication, as it the communication between Christians and Jews.

    Sources: Mark. A. Gabriel “Jesus and Muhammad”, Translation Resch Verlag 2006,

    Historia Mundi Volume IV, Lehnen Verlag,

    Die Kirche zur Zeit der Apostal und Märtyrer

    Phillip Jenkins, “Jesus Wars” Harper, 2010

    R. M. Grant Gnosticism and Early Christianity

    Web resources:

    The Gnosis Archive

    http://www.nestorian.org/nestorian_theology.html

    http://www.miraclesofthequran.com/historical_09.html

    http://answering-islam.org.uk/Books/Goldsack/Sources/chap1.htm

  • Phillip Jenkins book “Jesus Wars” seen from a Jungian view

    Phillip Jenkins book “Jesus Wars” seen from a Jungian view

    In his book book “Jesus Wars” Philip Jenkins is able to communicate complex ideas and complicated concepts in a manner that preserves their integrity  to a wide audience and at the same time renders them as a fascinating and lively story. I have been a fan of his books for some time.  His book “Jesus Wars” describes the historical intricacies that surrounded the theological debates of the fifth through eighth centuries of nature and person of Christ. The book  lives up to its subtitle — How Four Patriarchs, Three Queens, and Two Emperors Decided What Christians Would Believe for the Next 1,500 Years in more than one way.   “Jesus Wars” explains how arbitrary and narrowly the Orthodox belief won over what’s declared as Heresy. Phillip Jenkins  got me hooked from the first page by answering my key questions  about this Byzantine period of Christian schism in the 4th and 5th century (and beyond):

    • Why were theological battles about Jesus’  nature that  fierce and violent?
    • Were those Christian “civil wars” the primary cause of the “Fall of the Roman Empire”
    • Did those tensions in the cradle of Christianity lead to appeasement toward their  invaders?
    • How interacted religion, patriarchs and worldly powers?
    • Were the theological differences subtile or substantial?

    Orthodoxy (and of course the Roman Catholic Church) state that Jesus was both God and Human. Seen from C. G. Jung  it misses just one dimension why the most complex monotheistic symbol  (Trinity) prevailed.  As Phillip Jenkins explained in  another brilliant book  “The Lost History of Christianity” –  religions fight, prosper, flee, fade away, die or get even killed. His sociological understanding of religious history is always  helpful to connect related and interdependent events. He argues also convincingly from Mark gospel and even more from  (mystic and slightly gnostic) St. John the validation approaches. Approaching religious and the mystic questions with logic (!) is less convincing: “But when we have said that, we have raised more questions than we have answered, as the basic belief in Jesus Christ demands combining two utterly different categories of being”. 

    The book explains very well, the substance of different beliefs of Jesus’ nature and their political and philosophical implications. Such a transgression of boundaries indicated indeed a crossroad within Christianity between the “patriarchs” of Constantinople, Rome, Antiochian and Alexandria. It has been also hotly disputed, up today  by strict monotheists such as Muslims and Jews. If pressed to identify a deficiency in Jenkins’ telling of these debates it is that his text emphasis to the human and political factors in this drama. Modern history is somewhat deaf in regards of religious, transcendent and psychoanalytical importance of those positions  keeping  God at a distance.  Jenkins knows the Gospel but may underestimate the powerful value of combining the material (human) and the spiritual (divine), the power of archetypes and symbols and the importance of the female Mary leading to Quaternity.

    Seen only from the historian angle Phillip Jenkins notes correctly “What ultimately became accepted as Christian orthodoxy was hammered out in a process that was painfully slow, gradual, and often bloody. This conflict was marked by repeated struggles, coups, and open warfare spread over centuries. It is easy to imagine another outcome in which the so-called Orthodox would have been scorned as heretics, with incalculable consequences for mainstream political history, not to mention all later Christian thought and devotion.” Phillip Jenkins believes that this thing “turned on a dime.” Doctrinal shifts went back and forth and there was a time when the two-nature or God/Human description of Jesus was a heresy.  This is how one of the battles was won: “Caledonian ideas triumphed not because of the force of their logic, but because the world that opposed them perished.” “Looking at history, the process of establishing orthodoxy involved a huge amount of what we might call political accident” he claims — on the outcome of dynastic succession, on victory or defeat in battle, on the theological tastes and political plans of key figures. History is however, always a story of ifs, and matters might very easily have gone another way.  And yet the outcome — the Trinity and the supposed two natures of Jesus — form the bedrock of orthodox Christian belief.

    Jenkins asks if chance is a valid concept and when he says no — not from a Christian perspective – he steps over the border being a historian. Yes, Nestorians, or Monophysites could have won – but they didn’t – and so failed other competitors to the Roman Church. As Christians refused to worship the emperor as a god, persecution of the Christians and conflicts continued until the reign of Constantine in the early 4th century AD. Very popular with the military was for instance Mithraism, until by 392 AD, Emperor Theodosius I banned the practice of pagan religions in Rome altogether and Christianity was, without question, the official religion of the state. That is just another if.

    From  my catholic profession and Jungian point I would strongly disagree with Jenkins when he analyzes logically Monophysitism,Nestorianism and  the prevailing Orthodox concept of Trinity.  He leaves aside its  theological novelty, uniqueness and the symbolic value of the separated dual nature picture of Jesus. I share his critique of the basic political process: this is the truth and if you don’t believe it, you are a heretic. Philip Jenkins points out that these conflicts have “left an impact that survives into the present day.” He then makes what I feel is his most profound contribution: he says that the church councils which were responsible for the present-day creeds “remade a faith.” Quite frankly – yes-  this central and dogmatic approach is the very reason why the Roman Church became the first and still is the largest global organisation with the “biggest brand name” and not 38000 other Christian side branches.

    We all know that the winners write history but as Jenkins sees it, it is even worse than that — far worse. He rightfully argues that “historians write retroactively from the point of view of those who would win at some later point, even if that victory was nowhere in sight at the time they are describing.” Quite frankly, his story of twisted, tortured history applies also to the background of postmodern de-constructionism also known as political correctness.

    The author describes the key questions of an honest fight between concepts (or religions): How is it possible to possess two natures — what was their relationship?

    Arianism is the teaching that Jesus was not eternal, that he was a created being, created within the framework of earthly space and time, and thus not fully God. Arius was a priest in Alexandria, Egypt, who died in AD 336. Jesus was seen as the very best creature that God created.  Arius had triggered such turmoil within the churches that it was a leading cause of the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD. The Council examined the Scriptures that spoke of who and what Jesus was, in Paul’s letters and the first chapter of the Gospel of John, and declared Arianism to be a heresy. They wrote a creed that was mainly aimed at opposing Arianism. The struggle continued after Nicaea and after Arius’ death, and it even took on political implications. The chief of the opposition to Arianism was Athanasius. In 381, the Council of Constantinople once again called Arianism a heresy, mostly due to the Biblical and philosophical case that Athanasius had built over the years. Arianism faded fast after that.  The specific Arianist group Athanasius fought had died, but the basic idea did not. It resurrected itself many times throughout church history. Many of today’s groups that derived from Christianity have strong tendencies toward that belief, even if expressed very differently: Unitarianism and Jehovah’s Witnesses

    Docetism [ < Greek dokeo (to seem, appear to be)] : The idea that Jesus Christ was a totally divine being who only appeared to be human. It is the opposite idea to Arianism, in which Jesus was all-human and not in any way divine in nature. For docetists, Jesus was with us, but never really of us, and thus didn’t really suffer, and (for most Docetism) didn’t really die. Docetism is not a heretical group as much as it is a category, a basic idea which describes many schools of thought over the years.  Any idea that assigns a low worth to the material world and a high value to that which is deemed ‘spiritual’ will tend toward this idea. (See “Gnostic” below.) Docetism is a form of dualism, and like other dualisms, Docetism was rejected by the early church as not being in keeping with what Christ was about. God so loved us that God ‘incarnated’ (that is, became human) in Jesus, thus blessing the whole ‘material’ realm with the ‘spiritual’ impact of God. But like most heresies, Docetism tries to come in the back door; the churches, especially parts of Roman Catholicism, and fundamentalist Calvinists often draw a vigorous sacred/secular divide. Christian Gnostics are in effect docetists.

    Ebionitism [ < Heb. ‘ebyônim (the poor) < ‘ebyôn (a poor person)]: The idea that Jesus was a human being and not at all divine, but Jesus was given certain gifts by God’s spirit which set him apart from other people. Because of what God gave Him, Jesus was deemed the Messiah or Christ, but that meant only that He was chosen by God, not that He was savior of all humankind. The Law of Moses was still what counts with God. The church rejected the idea behind it, possibly as early as 110 AD.  Some scholars have made the claim that the Ebionites were pretty much the lineal descendents of the Jewish Christians that were led by James the Just at the time of Paul. (These scholars posit a stronger adversarial relationship between James himself and Paul than Acts or Paul’s letters show.) However, it would be much more accurate to put them in the context of other groups, both Jewish and Christian, that existed during the first two centuries of Christianity. There were many small Jewish groups (like the Essenes of Dead Sea Scrolls fame) with many different shades of practice, with many ideas and practices which bled into those of other groups, making a continuum. Like Judaism, Christianity also had small groups which took a different direction than the mainstream. Nearly all of these were moral rightist in some way — their behavior had to tightly conform to the Law of Moses, seen to varying degrees through the lens of Jesus’ sermons. And only some of them were rejected by mainstream Christianity. Ebionitism view of Jesus is shared by Islam.

    Apollinarism or Apollinarianism : Since the Nicean Council in 325, Christian theological-talk focused on what the Trinity meant, especially to explain how Jesus Christ could be fully God and fully human at the same time. Apollinaris the Younger (d. 390 AD) became bishop of Laodicea (in Syria) around 361 AD. He championed the idea that Jesus’ mind was solely divine and not human, that the creative Logos of God had in some way taken the place of the human Jesus’ mind. His human nature was confined to His body (physical nature), but even that was in a sense ‘glorified’. This made Jesus almost entirely divine and not fully human.  The trouble was that the churches had come to see in Scripture Jesus’ role in relating not just to God within the Trinity but to humans as a human. He was on both sides of the Divine/Human relationship. It was the only way he could effectively reunite and reconcile the two sides. Or, to use the language of the sacrifice: he was fully God, in order to be a pure and worthy sacrifice, and he was fully human like us, so he could be the sacrifice for us. Apollinaris’ approach makes Jesus un-like us and not quite like God, a third kind of being. Athanasius showed how Apollinaris’ approach poorly explained what Jesus Christ did, at a Synod (in Alexandria in 362. The “fully God, fully human” approach of Athanasius won the day in 381 at the Council of Constantinople.

    Eutychianism: In the Eutychian way of thinking, Christ was put through a blender – that is, His being God and His being human were so totally mixed together that He was homogenized into being Something Else. When theologians say that Christ has two natures, they mean that Jesus was fully God (and thus had the full power and ability to accomplish His mission of rescue) – and fully a human, living out a material human life (which made it possible to experience life such as what we have, to be in full solidarity with us, and to redeem us out of love). Jesus is one of us, and that is what makes what He did so real, what makes it matter. No third type of being could do it for real, because it wouldn’t be on either side of the relationship that was to be healed.

    Gnosticism  gnosis [ < Greek gnosis (knowledge)]. The Greek word gnosis is a basic word for any sort of knowledge. In a religious or philosophical context, it usually refers to the ‘secret’ or ‘special’ knowledge that is said to set one free from the ‘illusory’ material world. Gnosticism was a religious and philosophical movement of the late Hellenistic times, which according to modern scholar have Egyptian and Persian roots and arising out of Jewish mysticism.   Gnosticism arrived therefore even before  Christianity. It was the offspring of the mystery cults and pantheism religions of Greece, Persian Dualism, and Palestine, with Jewish sectarian apocalypse .

    The starting point is noble but it’s many ideas depressing.  The one God is without fail and perfect but the created world is on big mistake and illusion.  The contradiction is solved by an imperfect creator – the demiurge – created an illusionary world – in modern times the Movie “Matrix” has purely gnostic concepts:

    •  the material world is not an illusion for us to be freed from, it is a wonder-work of God’s creation we were made to be a part of, and God is still at work today to make it whole again;
    • the knowledge on which everything hangs is already revealed by (and as) Jesus Christ, and God sent the Spirit to reveal to all believers what God is up to — this is no ‘secret’, and even if it was, the Christian’s duty would be to give it away freely anyway.

    To the contrary, the Christian see a perfect world, created by a God as perfect creator. , in that the eval came by Gnosticism was more than a corruption of Christianity, which fought  it with furor. Even today you can read Christian qualify Gnostic as “fungus” and “cancer” trying to take over Christianity  which tried its best to suck in the strong, fledgling Christian faith and reshape it into its image.

    The gnostic “Jesus” is one who saves you from the world, not for it. A Gnostic god could never really be ‘God-with-us’, nor could it be so focused on loving those wallowing in the earthly mire. Gnosticism faded away as they most converted to Islam but recently raised again New Age and  left its traces in other places (Psychoanalysis). The idea of ‘secret’ or ‘special’ spiritual knowledge has historically had its strongest appeal among the intelligentsia and C.G. Jung was deeply influenced with Gnostic thoughts.

    Nestorianism, deriving from Antiochian school sees the Person of Christ as a single unified human person having two disjoint natures. Nestorianism stressed the distinction between the divine and the human in Christ to such an extent that it appeared that two persons were living in the same body and rejected the title Theotokos (“Bringer forth of God”) for the Virgin Mary.

    Monophysitism, from the Alexandrian school of thought (fashioned on the Gospel of John) see Jesus Christ, as the incarnation of the eternal Son or Word (Logos) of God, who had only a single (divine) nature.

    Miaphysitism holds that in the one person of Jesus Christ, Divinity and Humanity are mingled in one or single nature (“physis”). As Nestorianism had its roots in the Antiochene tradition and was opposed by the Alexandrian tradition, Christians in Syria and Egypt  wanted to distance themselves with this term. A scholarly used term only, Miaphysitism will be usually – and is also by Jenkins’ book – lumped together with Monophysitism. Note the subtile difference to Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox belief, which is mainly in understanding of the word nature.

    Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox belief explained the huge issue of a God better, who could suffer and die, strongly opposing Nestorius who said, “The creature did not bear the Creator, but she bore a man, the instrument of deity” and Cyril, Bishop of Alexandria, who thought that Christ was an abstraction, going into very grave heresies, seeing Jesus as a “nonresident alien.”  The Council of Chalcedon was the watershed of prevailing Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox belief. Human and divine natures of the Person of Christ co-exist, yet each is distinct and complete and the Council clearly distinguished between person and nature. The fight between Monophysitism and  Caledonians (later Roman Catholic) went on for 200 years after the Council of Chalcedon until Antioch and Alexandria came under -from Monophysitism welcomed- rule of the Islam with disastrous results. After a brief period of dimmni status,  this part of the world was in effect lost to Christianity after the Christians lost majority presecutution started.

    I appreciate, as always, Jenkins the fresh and unique historian and recommend this book, but I am a little bit disappointed in Jenkins’ description of “transcendent issues” and behavior of organisation in this “business”.  Great book though of  the best  scholar covering those issues and that time.

  • Philip Jenkins “The Next Christendom” – in the long run . . . Christ wins out

    Philip Jenkins “The Next Christendom” – in the long run . . . Christ wins out

    Philip Jenkins argues that in his book the “The Next Christendom” – in the long run Christ wins out. He observes that especially Pentecostalism, mainly a protestant renewal movement within Christianity (German: Pfingstler, Pfingstkirche, Pfingstbewegung), is steadily winning  millions of follower in Latin America, South America, Africa, India, Malaysia, China, and Eastern Europe, including Russia. There is also a Catholic Charismatic Renewal, which  Benedict XVI praised  highlighting its positive contribution.  According to the U.S. urban specialist Mike Davis “Pentecostalism is the largest self-organized movement of urban poor in the world”. Philip Jenkins has a joint appointment  at Penn State University and at Baylor University and  is also  the author of “The Lost History of Christianity”, another excellent book.  A respected professor of  history and religious studies who has been known for “going against the flow,” Jenkins argues that the rapid growth of  Christianity around the world (both within and alongside existing traditions) will literally reshape the world, with possible religious and geopolitic conflicts.

    Between 1900 and 2000, the number of Christians in Africa grew from 10 million to 360 million, and by 2025 is expected to reach 633 million. In a post-modern world, religion returned to center stage in the 90s , and Jenkins revisits Huntington from a Christian perspective and new data. Jenkins contests Samuel Huntington’s thesis in The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, that “the relative Christian share of global population will fall steeply in the [21st] century, and that this religion will be supplanted by Islam.” Huntington predicted that “in the long run . . . Muhammad wins out,” mainly because Islam is advanced by “conversion and reproduction,” whereas “Christianity spreads primarily by conversion.” Both share many valid points, and even Philip Jenkins dryly notes in his own book difficulties to predict the future.  Both do agree on the danger of potential conflicts caused by religious and cultural differences.  Sociological and religious future trends interact – as always – and this perils are  unfortunately today’s reality.

    Philip Jenkins “The Next Christendom”  is not entirely an optimistic book, but it is profoundly helpful and up-to-date. Another eye opener.

    Ch. 1. The Christian Revolution

    Jenkins’ opening chapter provocatively suggests, religious revolutions are not, as Western intellectuals too often propose against the history, mere spiritual, private matters. They bring with them profoundly this-worldly repercussions like genocides, wars, and what Samuel Huntington has famously termed ‘the clash of civilizations’. They can also renew and uproot societies. Jenkins argues that a ‘Christian revolution’ is already underway in the developing world, one that our political leaders ignore to the peril of all of us: “We are currently living through one of the transforming moments in the history of religion worldwide. – ” The Christian center of gravity has shifted to Africa, Asia, and Latin America   “By 2050, only about 1/5 of the world’s 3 billion Christians will be non-Hispanic Whites.” “The era of Western Christianity has passed within our lifetimes….”  “The emerging Christian world will be anchored in the Southern continents.” Growing from a handful to several hundred million, the Pentecostal movement is the most successful social movement of the past century that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through the baptism in the Holy Spirit.

    Ch. 2. Disciples of All Nations

    The chapter reviews the history of Christian expansion, showing that it developed globally from the beginning. particularly it questioned the modernization requests to and attempts of the christian institutions, like the Catholic Church as the whole idea of ‘Western Christianity’ distorts the true scope of the religion’s development.  As the author already pointed out in his former book, even in the Middle East, African and Asian regions subjugated by Islam, Christian loyalties survived for centuries in some cases until today. In the Middle East, “Arab Christians remained politically powerful until the rise of a new Muslim fundamentalism in the 1980s.” Westerners apologize for the Crusades but do not suggest that Muslims apologize for the aggressive acts that gave them power over these various lands in the first place. Westerners have forgotten the once-great Christian communities of the Eastern world.

    Ch 3. Missionaries and Prophets

    Jenkins, states – “Undeniably, the Christian missions of this historical phase were intimately connected with political and imperial adventures, and Protestant and Catholic fortunes followed the success of the different empires.” and  “For all the hypocrisy and the flagrantly self-serving rhetoric of the imperial age, the dedication of the missionaries was beyond question.” He continues, “amazing as it may appear to a blasé West, Christianity exercises an overwhelming global appeal, which shows not the slightest sign of waning.” and “Many Westerners…see missionary Christianity as a kind of cultural leprosy.”  But why did Africans and Asians adopt Christianity?  “One all-too-obvious explanation is that individuals came to believe the message offered, and found this the best means of explaining the world around them.” Their convictions are illustrated by the many stories of zeal in the face of persecution.

    Ch. 4. Standing Along

    When the demise of European empires brought forward the moment for non-Western churches to stand alone, they had little trouble doing so.  Jenkins observes parallels between the developments he surveys in the ‘South’ and those that characterized a similar time of awakening, urbanization, and religious effervescence in the industrializing North. He states, that “Up until the end of the eighteenth century, large-scale missionary efforts were strictly the preserve of the Catholic powers….” The book argues, to connect the spread of Christianity only with imperial expansion is not entirely correct, since fate of the religion would be affected by the breakup of the old European empires. The countries with the largest number of Catholics are Brazil (137 million), Mexico (89 million), Philippines (61 million), the United States (58 million), and Italy (55 million). Catholic growth has been particularly dramatic in Africa, usually in former French and Belgian territories. In 1995, there were 16 million Catholics in all of Africa. Today, there are 120 million.  Jenkings states, “For the foreseeable future, the characteristic religious forms of Southern Christianity, enthusiastic and spontaneous, fundamentalist and supernatural-oriented, look massively different from those of the older centers in Europe and North America.” and “In the coming decades, the religious life characteristic of those regions may well become the Christian norm.”

    Ch. 5. The Rise of the New Christianity

    Population growth and contraction look poised to reduce European populations radically while a boom in many southern states continues apace. When turning to religious indicators, all of them suggest that the surge in southern Christianity has barely begun. The picture becomes even more interestingly when population mobility is factored into the equation. Immigration to Europe may well establish a renewed Christian presence on that continent. America looks set to become even more of a Christian nation than it is today, again due to immigration. Southern nations are growing rapidly but Northern states are relatively static. – “The stagnation of Northern and particularly European populations will be one of the most significant facts of the twenty-first century.”  “By 2050, there will be an ever-growing contrast between the age profiles of the global South and North, between the world of the young and very mobile and the world of the old and static.” “In another epochal change, these urban centers will be overwhelmingly Southern.” “A largely secularized First World confronts a rapidly growing ‘South’ in which religion thrives and expands.” But many in the South are moving north. “ “Looking at the spread of mosques across urban Europe, it would be easy to believe that Islam might indeed be Europe’s future religion. Yet a great many other European immigrants are Christian, and they raise the prospect of a revitalized Christian presence on European soil.” The number of Muslims in the U.S., is probably about 4 million or so, much less than the up to 8 million claimed. Many Arab-Americans are in fact Christian. “Any likely Muslim growth through immigration will be far exceeded by the continuing Christian influx from Africa, Asia, and above all, Latin America.” – “Christian predominance is likely to be still more marked in decades to come.”

    Ch. 6. Coming to Terms

    In ‘Coming to Terms’ Jenkins surveys how churches in the Two-Thirds world `inculturate’ the gospel in their cultural contexts. Though the results are sometimes alarming to Western Christians, Jenkins’ view is rather more sanguine, claiming that most of these adaptations are well within the parameters of recognizably Christian faith. As demographic changes favor the Southern churches, their patterns of life and worship-often visceral supernatural in their orientation-are bound to become the dominant ones in a new Christendom. “The rising churches usually preach a strong and even pristine Christian message.” “Another new ‘missionary century’ may dawn, although next time, the missionaries would be traveling northward.”

    Ch. 7. God and The World

    Jenkins’ seventh chapter prognosticates about the varying models of church and state that can be expected as important southern countries become demographically. The predictions are not all reassuring to heirs of a strong tradition of separation between the two. Americans keep church and state separate, but such a distinction is incomprehensible in much of the world. ‘Not only is Christianity flourishing in the Third World, but so are distinctively Christian politics. “Northerners are going to find themselves ever more out of touch with the religious dimensions that shape the new world, and literally unable to communicate with the new people of faith.” – “In one possible scenario of the world to come, an incredibly wealthy although numerically shrinking Northern population espouses the values of humanism, ornamented with the vestiges of liberal Christianity and Judaism.” “Meanwhile, this future North confronts the poorer and vastly more numerous global masses who waves the flags…of ascendant Christianity and Islam. …the have-nots will be inspired by the scriptures and the language of apocalyptic, rather than by the texts of Marx and Mao. In this world, we, the West, will be the final Babylon.” –  “The North would be secular, rational, and tolerant, the South primitive and fundamentalist. The North would define itself against Christianity.”

    Ch. 8. The Next Crusade

    Jenkins acknowledges that a world in which powerful adversaries take religion far more seriously than does today’s sophisticated North should keep strategic analysts alert. Simple parents like myself imagining the world in which my son will come of age already plans immigration for him out of Europe.“Religious loyalties are at the root of many of the world’s ongoing civil wars and political violence, and in most cases, the critical division is the age-old battle between Christianity and Islam.” (163) “The parochialism of Western public opinion is striking. When a single racial or religious-motivated murder takes place in Europe or North America, the event occasions widespread soul-searching, but when thousands are massacred on the grounds of their faith in Nigeria, Indonesia, or the Sudan, the story rarely registers. Come lives are worth more than others. In addition, a kind of religious prejudice helps to explain the silence about nations like the Sudan.  “No less than 10 of the world’s 25 largest states in 2050 could be profoundly divided between Islam and Christianity, and judging by present trends, any or all of them could be the scene of serious interfaith conflict.” -. “A number of European nations face huge disparities between very fertile immigrant groups and relatively static old-stock populations, and religious instability could easily result.” – “The fundamental question here is whether Islam and Christianity can coexist.” “What is most disturbing about the Sudanese experience is that it shows how, in the new religious climate, existing non-Muslim minorities can be reduced or even eliminated. The same bitter lesson may be in progress in…Egypt, the home of the ancient community of Coptic Christians.” -. “Some of the likely winners in the religious economy of the new century are precisely those groups who have a strongly apocalyptic mindset, in which the triumph of righteousness is associated with the vision of a world devastated by fire and plague.” “The situation could become so sensitive that a global catastrophe could be provoked by the slightest misjudgment –just like 1914.”

    Ch. 9. Coming Home

    Events since the late 90s have given the author some hard facts to work with. The southern churches are almost all theologically and culturally more conservative than their northern partners. But are they so distinct so as to be incapable of re-evangelizing secularized Europe and the USA?  A fundamental issue: How will the global North change in response to the rise of a new global Christianity? Will its religious character remain Christian, perhaps with a powerful Southern cast? Or will it entirely lose its Christian character?” . “While traditional Christianity is weakening in large sections of the North, it is indeed being reinforced and reinvigorated by Southern churches, by means of immigration and evangelization.

    Ch. 10. Seeing Christianity Again for the First Time  

    In the last and best chapter analysis is exchanged for what becomes almost an indictment of northern Christian scenario. From the view 2050 A.D., the persecution and poverty of which so much are made in the New Testament literature is also the context of the majority of today’s Christians (not to mention those who await their moment a half-century hence): “For whatever reason, Western investment in missions has been cut back dramatically at just the point it is most desperately needed, at the peak of the current surge in Christian numbers.” and “For the average Western audience, New Testament passages about standing firm in the face of pagan persecution have little immediate relevance…. “Millions of Christians around the world do in fact live in constant danger of persecution or forced conversion, from either governments or local vigilantes.”

    When he says, “Looking at Christianity as a planetary phenomenon, not merely a Western one, makes it impossible to read the New Testament in quite the same way ever again”,   he has a particular strong point pointing out the Book of Revelation.  and that nevertheless,  “Christianity is flourishing wonderfully among the poor and persecuted, while it atrophies among the rich and secure.” I agree to the assertion,  “Christianity is never as weak as it appears, nor as strong as it appears. And whether we look backward or forward in history, we can see tat time and again, Christianity demonstrates a breathtaking ability to transform weakness into strength.”

  • Revelation of Saint John – Seeing it for Southern Christian Churches.

    Revelation of Saint John – Seeing it for Southern Christian Churches.

    The Revelation of Saint John scarcely merits the title. Far from being a revelation, it is the most disliked book of the anti-religious Westerners and even in some parts of the Western Christian Churches. An apocalyptic book describing the revelation Jesus Christ gave to John.  It connects the  beginning of the Bible (Genesis 1-11)  describing the downfall of mankind and his separation from God by giving the hope they are reconciled through Christ. When I read the book of Jenkins, a professor of history and religious studies at Penn State, “The next Christendom” a remark stroked me to look at the Bible through the eyes of a souther church under severe persecution. The Revelation of Saint John was either written following the persecutions of Emperor Nero (but before the destruction of Jerusalem in AD70) or during the persecutions attributed to Emperor Domitian at the end of his reign AD81-96. It was when the seemingly all-powerful Roman Empire with its cult of emperor-worship was persecuting the followers of Jesus Christ. For modern Christians in Nigeria, Egypt, Sudan, Pakistan or Indonesia it is quite conceivable that they will be forced to renounce their faith upon threat of death. Even in societies not in state of extreme violence, there is a lingering sense of threat, a need to be alert, to avoid provocations. States, governed by anti-Christ martyrdom, and forcible removal are not only powerful religious symbols but quite possible outcomes of practicing faith. To quote Nestor Miguez, “the repulsive spirit of violence, race hatred, mutilation and exploitation roam the street of Babylon in Latin America (and the globe)”.  In this context, (and others I might add), the Book of Revelation just makes sense, in its description of a world ruled by evil demonic powers.  Jenkins  final chapter starts by considering Christianity in relation to the future, with particular regard to the new centers of population and the allocation of religious resources to the South. It points out that, for various reasons, including a lack of priests or clergy, the interest and commitment of many Northern/Western churches toward the global South is far less than it once was and that this problem is particularly serious in the Catholic Church. It also points out that Christianity, despite being and likely to continue being the largest religion in existence, now receives short shrift in Western education, especially as regards the voices of autonomous Southern Christianity. That  Southern Christianity gives a new perspective on something very familiar: the way that the newer churches read the Bible, which makes Christianity look like a wholly different religion from the faith of the prosperous advanced societies of Europe or North America.

    The Revelation follows a threefold division.

    The first part comprises the seven exhortatory letters.

    The leading idea in the second part is the wisdom of Christ. It is symbolized by the book with seven seals. In it are written the eternal decrees of God touching the end of the world, and the final victory of good over evil. No one except Jesus, the lamb slain for the sins of the world, is worthy to break the seals and read its contents.

    The third part describes the power of Christ over Satan and his kingdom. The lamb defeats the dragon and the beast. This idea is developed in a drama of five acts. In five successive scenes we see before us the struggle, the fall of Babylon the harlot, the victory, and final beatitude.

    The Book of Revelation is full of symbolism. Some of the symbols are outlined here together with their possible interpretation, both contemporary and eternal:

    THE SERVANTS OF GOD

    THE PREGNANT WOMAN – possibly representing God’s chosen people, both Jew and Christian; possibly the mother of the Messiah and the Church

    JESUS CHRIST, THE MESSIAH – possibly the male child born to the pregnant woman. Also THE LAMB and THE RIDER ON THE WHITE HORSE (but not the rider of Revelation 6:2, one of the four Horsemen of the Apocalypse)

    THE CHURCH OF CHRIST; also THE BRIDE

    ARCHANGEL MICHAEL – the Protector or guardian angel of Israel (Daniel 10:13,21; 12:1)

    THE SAINTS – God’s people, Christians, the saved

     POWERS OPPOSED TO GOD

    THE DEVIL or SATAN – possibly the Star fallen from heaven, the Angel or star of the Pit, Angel of the Abyss; personified as “Abaddon” (destruction) in Hebrew or “Apollyon” in Greek.

    Also THE DRAGON, the red dragon, the primeval Serpent who is called the devil or Satan, the Adversary, the Accuser

    HELL or THE GRAVE – the fathomless pit, the Abyss, “Sheol” or “Abaddon” (destruction) in Hebrew, “Hades” or “Apollyon” from the Greek; the place of the dead, where fallen angels are imprisoned, eternal separation from God

    DEMONS, EVIL SPIRITS – the locusts or scorpion locusts (Contemporary translation – the Parthian Empire across the River Euphrates, major threat to the Roman Empire)

    THE ANIMAL FROM THE SEA – the Beast from the Sea, an anti-God power, an authoritarian godless state (Contemporary translation – the Roman Empire)

    THE PROSTITUTE OR HARLOT; also “BABYLON”, THE WOMAN ( Contemporary translation – the city of Rome, eternally – the centre or centres of any world power)

    THE ANIMAL FROM THE EARTH – the Beast from the Earth, an anti-god power, state-sanctioned, state-dominated religion ( “high priests” )

    A NOTE ON TIMES

    “TIME, TIMES AND HALF A TIME” – “one year, two years and half a year” from Daniel 7:25, the 3 1/2 year period 168-165BC when the Jerusalem Temple was desecrated.