Who were the Gnostics? Christian commentators described them as dualists who pitted ‘divine spark or ‘light’ against the of the material world. Christianity painted many Gnostics as heretics for claiming to be Christ’s true followers while denying his singular divinity.
Its claim of a world as a mistake and shadow of the Christian creation myth (if not Christianity as a whole), favors a gloomy view of the world. Carl Gustav Jung warned that if societies do not attend to their collective shadow, a world crisis can result. Our era is one of failing civilizations and broken social covenants, is fraught with the dangers of unleashed economical, military and social chaos. We each can do our part to safeguard each other by understanding black swans.
Are we witnessing a rediscovery of Gnosticism? I’d say yes. Increased academic attention (beginning with the discovery of the Nag Hammadi scriptures in 1945) and the ensuing popular interest have produced utter confusion. It is often difficult even to tell what is meant by the word. Not only Gnosis is gnostic, classical Gnosticism of Valentinus, Basilides, but the heretics are gnostic, the Neoplatonic too, Nazism was gnostic, Islam (at least Sufism) if not also seen of heretic origins, existentialism and psychoanalysis is gnostic too. Certainly the early C. G. Jung can be seen as one.
Evil world
Confused Religions
This metaphysical dream is utterly incompatible with Christianity. The world was made fundamentally good, as the first pages of Genesis remind us. Though Creation has been corrupted by sin, its essential goodness could not be totally destroyed; being corrupted is not the same as being completely corrupt. Both Gnostics and those Christians seeking a rapturous rescue from the world have misread the architecture: our bodies are not “prisons” to be escaped, renovated, destroyed ad lib., but temples of the Holy Spirit.
So the Corinthians heard from St. Paul, whose much-abused spirit-flesh distinction Irenaeus clarifies: “the weakness of the flesh” can be “absorbed by the strength of the Spirit”; the two may then inherit the kingdom together.[1] Our resurrected “spiritual bodies” are not spiritual in substance, but in the sense that they are moved first by spirit and not by flesh. In the Christian metaphysical dream, matter is subordinated in order to be glorified – neither abolished nor discarded, but perfected.
But affirmations of the world’s created goodness require a leap of faith, and thus a rejection of knowing spiritualism and dogmatic materialism; the normativity of this stance tolerates neither.
Certainly it is true that gnostics who ridiculed the idea of bodily resurrection frequently devalued the body, and considered its actions (sexual acts,for example) unimportant to the “spiritual” person. According to the Gospel of Thomas, for example, Jesus says, “If spirit came into being because of the body, it is a wonder of wonders. Indeed, I am amazed at how this great wealth [the spirit] has made its home in this poverty [the body].” I have written here an here of the Chartensians in Southern France, which I consider a as typical medieval Neo-gnostic movement.
Now, any leap of faith has a mystery at its core. But the ‘mystery’ of Gnosticism is less a reasonable affirmation that can be accepted in love than a hopeless and anti-individual agnosticism, ever subject to opportunistic revision. Neo-Gnostics and cultural revolutionaries give us an imagined freedom from norms while imposing – consciously or not – worse commitments. It is the same liberty that defines the right to construct one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life – a sunny ambiguity the employed to extend the right to end and create life.
The Hypostasis of the Archons, recounting Sophia’s tale, says the universe started out “like a miscarriage.”[2] In a world built on stillbirth from the womb of an aeon, or on the freak chance of meaningless matter from nowhere, destruction in our own mothers’ wombs just blends into the landscape. A flight to the pleroma or an escape into “pure pleasure” will not rouse us from this metaphysical nightmare. The threefold promise of Creation, Incarnation, and Resurrection may.
Many argue with same truth in it, however, the established Christianity, that affirmed the threefold promise is merely a cultural construction: it is in fact ‘the greatest marketing sucess a a religion viewed as a product’ or in a Jungian sense a clever use of collective archetypes some of them of Egyptian origin.
The Pauline faction, being both moralistic and power-hungry, desorted the “Christian legend” to launch history’s most successful project of mass mind-control and cultural hegemony.[3] Meanwhile, Christ’s potentially human life with the Magdalene, had to be suppressed; his identification with Yahweh gave the project its trump card. Small bands of dissenters, however, preserved the truth – until Rom – East and West stamped them out.
Divine spark
Divine Spark
Pagels, a professor at Princeton, has devoted her career to the writings of these noble Gnostic underdogs, most of which have only been re-discovered beginning in the 1940s. 2006, Pagels proclaimed that the newly found Gospel of Judas would continue “exploding the myth of a monolithic Christianity and showing how diverse and fascinating the early Christian movement really was.”[4]
Among their most ‘diverse’ elements, Pagels observes, is a vaguely Eastern strain: “the ‘living Jesus’…speaks in sayings as cryptic and compelling as Zen koans.” Whereas “Orthodox Jews and Christians insist that a chasm separates humanity from Its creator,” such that “God is wholly other,” Pagel proffers “the secret of gnosis” with more than a hint of Jung’s individation: “self-knowledge is knowledge of God; the self and the divine are
The Ego, the Self and Jesus – Individuation and Transcendence
identical.” Jesus, no savior, is a mere “guide” showing us the way to a “spiritual understanding” rendering leader and follower “equal—even identical.”[5]. I have written about individuation and the Self here. Gnosis is non-creedal; indeed, the events recounted in the Christian canon are anything but literally true. Belief in the Virgin Birth is an “error,” says the Gospel of Philip, and Christ’s resurrection is metaphorical: “he rose up first and [then] died.”[6]
Self-actualization is just the beginning. Some Gnostics could even be read as bring back the supressed female spirituality – wise women. Valentinians, for example, drank not Christ’s blood in their sacraments, but a mother-spirit’s.[7] Salvation was through “Immortal Androgynous Man”; in the Wisdom of Jesus Christ, his “female name is…‘All-Begettress Sophia’ [Wisdom].” The divine narrator of The Thunder, Perfect Mind frequently adopts a feminine voice; Sophia resurfaces as the self-awareness of a depersonalized One in the Secret Book of John, where Jesus also calls himself “Mother”.[8] There’s a Gospel of Mary with the Magdalene as the favorite disciple, and in Philip Jesus kisses her, leaving the other disciples scandalized, or perhaps jealous.[9] Indeed Sects devoted to these traditions were more inclusive to women and even had priestesses. So Gnostics look almost like looking for their anima (and animus).
Gnostic heretics
The most exhaustive (and hostile) commentary on the early Gnostics comes from St. Irenaeus, the second-century bishop of Lyon. On some points he confirms the popular account of their liberal practices in his condemnation of them. Gnostics would “yield themselves up to the lusts of the flesh with the utmost greediness, maintaining that carnal things should be allowed to the carnal nature, while spiritual things are provided for the spiritual.”[10] Carpocratics even claimed that salvation demanded the experience of everything, and rather than storing up treasure in, say, virtue, it was sexual experiences they were keenest on collecting. But so what? “God,” at any rate, “does not greatly regard such matters.”[11]
Today such a statement is hardly controversial. But the bishop levels other charges – manipulation, brainwashing, adultery, polygamy, intimidation – some of which sound like the very cultish practices we do still condemn. They also sound like charges that some pro-Gnostic writers bring against orthodox churches.
To be fair, Irenaeus is polemical in its purpose to stamp Gnosticism out. But the texts of the Gnostics themselves confirm his account more than not. Their value of women, for example, turns out to be very inconsistent. In the Gospel of Thomas, Simon demands of his guru, “Let Mary leave us, for women are not worthy of life.” Instead of reprimanding him, Jesus reassures him: “I shall lead her to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every woman who will make herself male will enter the kingdom of heaven.”[12] In a number of texts, “the bondage of femaleness” must be shed for “the salvation of maleness”; even metaphorical interpretations do not celebrate differences, but only obliterate them.[13]
In fact, no one should be comfortable in any human body. Elsewhere in Thomas, Christ says that soul, flesh, and body are each “wretched.”[14] Matter, Christ tells Mary, will all be destroyed.[15] The Secret Book of John consistently refers to the body as a “prison” that degrades the soul, trapping it in cycles of transmigration and reincarnation so long as it lacks salvific gnosis. For Carpocratics, this belief justified the pursuit of carnal knowledge; for others, the harshest asceticism.[16] If they were sometimes ascetics and sometimes aesthetes, it was because the body didn’t matter: anything could be justified or condemned, and almost everything was, depending on what magnified ‘light’. A sort of Gnostic dualism about the texts exists today: the bad is from the Orthodox patriarchy, whereas the good is Gnostic cafeteria ethics, wich maps well onto today’s conventional narrative.
The world a mistake
But whether Irenaeus is right damming the Gnostic myths and truth-claims the bottom line today is, their cosmology deserves a hearing. What did Gnostics teach about the world’s origins?
The Gnostic story of Creation is begins before Adam and Eve. According to this doctrine, there is an unknowable being called the “True Father.” He created a being called Sophia. It is an impersonal father-principle whose emanations filled the divine pleroma, or spiritual realm, with dyads of sexual, sentient aeons. The most important aeon – of course, it’s the wise Sophia – but because Sophia was forbidden to know the True Father, she became angry and created a monstrous god named Yaldaboath or Yahweh (the most sacred Hebrew name for God) – further in her anguish, matter fell stillborn and formless from her womb.[17] Her torment, “by means of a defect,” produced a scheming demiurge, viler but duller than Plato’s.[18] It then formed the universe, and with it corporeal mankind, from the undesired matter: “material substance had its beginning from ignorance and grief, and fear and bewilderment.”[19] Philip puts it bluntly: “the world came about through a mistake.”[20] Recalling the pre-incarnate, star-riding souls of Plato’s Timaeus, the Wisdom of Jesus Christ says we existed as “drop[s] from Light and Spirit” before being trapped in bodies; it is gnosis that breaks our chains and lets us be subsumed into the same impersonal substance of the father-principle whence our drams of divinity were drawn.[21]
Zeitgeist and Gnostic worldviews
SatanCenter
Yet the Zeitgeist and Gnostic worldviews share more than an ill-fitting ethical overlap and a common enemy. For, despite certain peculiarities, their metaphysical dreams of the (new) world unite them. The current world is essentially not good.Who can blame them for this view? Goodness in the material world implies a normativity and an absolute grounding in nature, to which both Gnostics and Zeitgeist are allergic. Out acts in the flesh are irrelevant at the deepest level, since matter is devoid of intrinsic value. The strictest principles we can apply are those of pleasure/pain and that of superiority/harmdoers – individuals perceived attributes. Our refuge is in surregate religion, understood as knowledge, and the sacrosanct orientation of the global will.
Perhaps the newspeak say it best. Alive, the body seems to be what matters. But while the material is denied its intrinsic worth, the mind cannot avoid immaterial experiences like choice and thought: something persists which can say, “What my body is doing is irrelevant.” Our reduction of any life to coperate and economic ressource has really chased us outside of our body, an intellectual and voluntary abstraction of the Ego from itself, the Self. And so, even alive, the body and the soul turns out not to matter.
And it matters even less when wie are in transition from life to death or vice versa. At death, or during pregnancy artifacts might as easily be used as spare parts as be patented. We are quite finished with our bodies when we die, we’re probably finished, period. Almost like the Demiurge (demigurge) starts all over again. In a time, when I have to watch a catholic priest during Chrismas Mass , pacing around the altar, and shouting five times – wir schaffen das (Yes we can), there is almost a perverse comfort in it.
[1] Irenaeus, Bk V, Ch. IX, 1-2.
[2] Hypostasis of the Archons, 94:8-19.
[3] Pagels, Elaine. The Gnostic Gospels. New York: Vintage Books, 1979, p. xii. xv-xxiii. avaiable as pdf
[4] Pagels. “The Gospel Truth.” New York Times. April 8, 2006.
[5] Pagels. The Gnostic Gospels, pp. xv-xxiii.
[6] Gospel of Philip 22
[7] Pagels, Elaine. “The Suppressed Gnostic Feminism.” New York Review of Books. November 22, 1979.
[8] The Secret Book of John 10 and 3, respectively.
[9] Gospel of Mary 5:5, Philip 59.
[10] Irenaeus of Lyon. Against Heresies, Bk. I, Ch. VI, 3.
[11] Ibid., Bk. I, Ch. XXV, 4; Ch. XXVIII, 2.
[12] Gospel of Thomas 114.
[13] First Apocalypse of James 41:15-19; cf. Clement of Alexandria, Excerpts from Theodotus, 79, and commentary in Hippolytus, Refutation of All Heresies, 5.8.44.
[14] Thomas 84, 87, 112
[15] Mary 4:22-23.
[16] Secret Book of John 23, 26; Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Bk. I, Ch. XXV, 4.
[17] Irenaeus, Book I, Ch. IV, 3.
[18] Ibid., Bk I, Ch. XVI, 3.
[19] Ibid., Bk. I, Ch. II, 3.
[20] Philip 105.
[21] Wisdom of Jesus Christ (verses unnumbered; p. 118 of the Berlin Gnostic Codex).
Memorial of the site where over 200 Cathars were burned alive, having refused to renounce their faith.
I just came back again from the haunted and magic Languedoc-Roussillon, where I followed the footsteps of the Esclarmonde de Foix and the heretic Cathars. This essay will focus on Esclarmonde de Foix. Cathars, Catharism and its connection to the holy grail seen through the eyes of Otto Rahn, a shady self proclaimed archaeologist, who had been driven into suicide by the Nazis:
Where did the Cathars come from and what were their beliefs?
Was Otto Rahn (“Crusade Against the Grail”), a kind of Indiana Jones, killed for failing to find the Holy Grail in the Cathar land?
In her mystic and symbolic importance, was Esclarmonde de Foix (1151 to 1215), not only a “Cathar Bona Femna” (Good Woman), but also a “Ketzerpäpstin” (heretic counter pope)?
In Languedoc-Roussillon Cathar castles, Templar Abbeys and Châteaus inspire powerful myths, major mysteries, complex religious history, symbols of psychological relevance and – also significant pseudo-history. There are lots of stories about the Crusades and the mysteries of Sacred France connected to it. Or, as in the case the holy Grail, downright fabrications and conspiracy theories. So my journey became a transformational journey visiting places with magic and mysticism in addition to hiking, camping and photographing. I choose as base camp a wonderful Bed&Breakfast in sight of the last Cathar stronghold Montségur and close to Foix. As always, please be aware that this is an essay on my impressions and their reflections on history, culture and psychology, not a scholarly work. Readers of my articles know, that I have an soft spot for intuitive, but holistic interpretation of historical schisms, heretics and cross cultural transmission of myths and knowledge. Catharism holds all those secrets, and more, the egnima of Catharism can be felt still in southern France.
My encounter with a French writer
Chalet in France
We stayed in sight of Montségur’s castle, in the hamlet of Mijanes, which is situated 650 m above sea level in a clearing at the end of a small road. The house is an old stone farmhouse, beautifully restored in order to preserve the built’s authenticity. At street-level, the old hay barn completely open to the south, gave the opportunity to develop a large community room with separate entrance and fireplace. Very bright, it opens onto a gallery with large sliding doors. Two hectares of meadows surround the house with lots of room for sheep, chicken and a dog called Hector. After a few tries, he got along with our dog. Around, the forest offers beautiful walks and the lack of light pollution nice astronomical pictures and nice sights of the sunset over Montsegur.
The house has “only” room for two guests, its wall of the rooms’ corridor is fully dressed with a bark and natural pigment wallpaper from New Caledonia. The other room was occupied by a French couple, a writer and a retired teacher, who we met during breakfast. The writer happened to be Jose Dupre, who wrote about the German anthropologist Rudolf Steiner, Catharism and Déodat Roché, with whom he maintained a close relation and friendly collaboration during nearly 10 years. Not only a writer, but an expert in his field. Jose Dupre saw interestingly Déodat Roché as a bon homme, a modern Cathari Parfaite or perfect.
Roché’s career was an interesting one, from Martinism – esoteric Christianity, concerned with the fall of the first man – and the Gnostic Church he promoted his own understanding of perennial religion while remaining an active and influential Mason leader for a small formal group of disciples. Via the work of Rudolf Steiner, “Christianity as Mystical Fact” in 1921, the then 43 years old Déodat Roché discovered a modern “Manichean spiritual stream, and received the advice to meditate on the main stages of the life of Jesus Christ from the representation of John’s Gospel. This looked for Roché like a living link with the meditative tradition, which had been maintained by the Cathars.
He became well known through his writings, which were – especially in the 1960s and 1970s – a major source for the renewal of interest in Catharism, marketed into
French view of Otto Rahn
The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail (1982) and thence into The Da Vinci Code (2003). He was a Gnostic, who lived like a contemporary Carthar lifestyle according his friend Jose Dupre – “Un cathare au 20e siècle”.
During a conversation, I naively showed to Jose Dupre a vintage copy of Otto Rahns book which started an interesting if not agitated discussion. Otto Rahn is not forgotten in France, but highly disputed if not despised, and his views are of Chatharism and Esclarmonde considered as pure speculations. Jose Dupre told me some details of Déodat Roché, who died in 1978 at the age of 101 years He was a philosopher and seeker who sought contact with people of very different spiritual orientation like Otto Rahn, Simone Weil, but never to lost sight of Christian-Gnostic Manichaeism. Even his appearance – slim, ascetic and benevolent facial features – reminiscent of a figure of early Christianity, such as Origenes, whose writings are more interesting than many “esoteric” contemporaries.
The heretic papessa Esclarmonde de Foix
Esclarmonde was identified from the German mystics Otto Rahnas a historical precedent of the protector of the Grail “Repanse de Schoye” of Eschenbach’s “Parzival”, which included the Grail in the mountain of Munsalvaesche (Montségur), to protect him from the armies of Lucifer.
The historical Esclarmonde (” Light of the World ” in Occitan) was born around 1150 as daughter of Roger Bernard I, Count of Foix and who fathered also another Esclarmonde (The Bastard). Esclarmonde and her brother, Raymond-Roger grew up in the Cheateau de Foix at the foothills of the Pyrenees mountain range at the center of the triangle of Carcassonne-Toulouse-Andorra. She married Seigneur de l’Isle-Jourdain. Their six children’s children included Bertrand, Baron de Launac who later inherited the County of Foix. She was widowed in October 1200, and from this time turned openly to the Cathar Church.
In 1204 she became a Parfaite, a member of the Cathar Elect by the Consolamentum from the hands of the Cathar Bishop Guilhabert de Castres. She would become almost a female pope of the Cathar faith, combining temporal power and transcendental authority. She moved to Pamiers and later decided to fortify the Castle at Montségur against likely assaults by the French Catholic Crusaders. Otto Rahn claims that Montségur was the famous the castle of the Gral’s legend. In 1207 she organized the Colloquy of Pamiers, the last public debate between the Cathars and the Roman Catholic Church, whose representatives were led by Dominic Guzman (later Saint Dominic). It was at this debate that Esclarmonde, an educated Occitan, famously spoke up. The of the Roman Church lost in these intellectual and theological debates as often. At one point, being reminded of the cruelty of the Church by Esclarmonde Dominic admonished her: “go to your spinning madam”. It is not proper for a woman to speak in a debate of this sort”. The following year, 1208, despairing of success through intellectual and spiritual means, Pope Innocent III would launch the Albigensian Crusade.
Montsegur
Certainly the Cathar and Esclarmonde challenged the central power structure of the Roman Popes. The popes of that period were very powerful and interfered quite broadly in the affairs of secular monarchies. But it was also a church that was troubled by corruption and lack of clerical celibacy and moral decency.
Because she refused to submit to the Roman Church, the pope put a price on her head; even so, she managed to evade not only the crusaders and the papal legates but also a series of bounty hunters. There was evidence that she was in the area around Dun until 1212, but the Chateau de Foix, Esclarmonde’s brother’s estate, from was 1214 to 1218 in the hands of the papal legate, who turned it over to the feared and hated Simon de Montfort.
When Raymond-Roger went to Rome to try to retrieve his lands in 1215 at the Lateran Council, the pope reproached him about his sister’s activities. By then she had become the symbol of the resistance against the crusaders’ occupation and the papal inquisitors, as she encouraging the resistance fighters, providing them useful information, and refortifying castles. She became so cunningly, that in time the Crusaders were to call her La Renarde de Foix (the Fox of Foix); the Occitans called her La Grande Esclarmonde (Esclarmonde the Great), and her frequent appearances all over the land gave the people hope and inspiration. In 1218, Raymond-Roger did eventually win back his castle, not through any justice or intervention of the pope, but rather by force of arms. Rumors tell, that for more than 30 years, Esclarmonde lived as a fugitive on the run, sleeping sometimes in caves and keeping a hair’s breadth ahead of the inquisitors and bounty hunters. There is one mention of her in 1232. But it was only a brief appearance, and then she vanished once more.
Her death is said to be 1215, but no-one knows the exact time or place of Esclarmonde’s death— she was rumored to have died in one of the caves where she took shelter—but her memory lives on. Jules Massenet wrote his opera Esclarmonde about her life 1889. In 1911 in Foix, a committee tried to erect a statue to her memory, but the bishop of Pamiers, Jean-Marie Vidal, did all in his power to have the project stopped. Esclarmonde, for she remains “one of the strongest symbols of the Occitan woman’s attachment to religious freedom” and an inspiring role model for courage and strength against tyranny and despotism everywhere. Esclarmonde of Foix has become something of a role model, after her name – almost forgotten for seven hundred years – but made known again by Otto Rahn in the twentieth century.
Otto Rahn the Indiana Jones, who worked for the Nazis
Very little is certain in the short life of Otto Rahn. But one of the few things one can with any confidence say about him is that Rahn, small and weasel-faced, with a hesitant, sly smile and oily hair, was the inspiration for Harrison Ford’s most famous role, Indiana Jones. Like Jones, Rahn was an archaeologist, like him, he fell foul of the Nazis and like him he was obsessed with finding the Holy Grail – the cup reputedly used to catch Christ’s blood when he was crucified. Rahn was a dreamer, who entered into a terrible Faustian pact: impressed with his first book “Kreuzug gegen den Gral” (Crusade Against the Grail), Heinrich Himmler committed every resource imaginable to realize his dream and a formidable salary. There has been just one catch: in return, he had to find something that – if it ever existed – had not been seen for almost 2,000 years, which he write must be buried in southern France. He didn’t, so Rahn’s obsession ended up costing him his life.
Rahn was born in 1904 in Michelstadt (Germany) and made Abitur (German university entrance qualification) in Giessen 1922. Through one of his religion teacher, he became fascinated by the history of the Cathars. At an early age became fascinated with the Holy Grail and the famous German archaeologist, Heinrich Schliemann. Schliemann had found what he believed to be the ruins of Troy on the western coast of Turkey. Rahn used later the 13th-century epic Parsifal as his guide to finding the Holy Grail. He started studying 1922 law, but switched and completed his university studies in literature and philology 1928.
Research trips
During his stays in Geneva and Paris 1928 he researched medieval scripts. In Paris he met an esoteric circle of literati and scholar like the Toulouse poet Magre, who both believed that the manuscript of the mysterious Bogomil Bishop Nicetas the Château de Monségur was preserved. It was thought to be hidden during the Albigensian Crusade as part of the legendary Cathar treasure in the underground cave of Ornolaca in the south of France, Languedoc. Through Magre, Rahn met the spiritualist Countess Miryanne Pujol-Murat and became her protege. She claimed to be a descendant of Countess Esclarmonde de Foix and a member of a Gnostic Church.
Grail quest with Antonin Gadal
From 1929 Rahn undertook as part of his study, travels in southern French Languedoc, where he researched among other things caves, and the ruins of Montsegur. In 1930 he undertook a journey to the valley of the Ariege. In France, he investigated the medieval heretic movement, especially the Cathars and Albigensians. On his first explorations he befriended Déodat Roché, a follower of Rudolf Steiner, and the local historian Antonin Gadal. Gadal developed an intense friendship Rahn, and become his mentor and patron, and both worked extensively in the following three years together. From late autumn 1931, Rahn settled in the small spa town of Ornolac-Ussat-les-Bains, in which Antonin Gadal lived, with whom he remained friends over the coming turmoil and difficult years until his untimely death. From 1930-1932 Rahn explored from his home the southern French Pyrenees together with Antonin Gadal.
The more Rahn, a serious scholar read Eschenbachs Parsifal, the more he became convinced that the Cathars, the medieval Christian sect, held the secret to the Grail’s whereabouts. In 1244, shortly before the Cathars were massacred by a Catholic crusade, three Cathar knights had apparently slipped over the wall of Montsegur Castle in the Languedoc area of France. With them, together with the Bogomil manuscripts, was a cup reputed to be the Holy Grail.
Rahn arrived at Montsegur in the summer of 1931. He didn’t find the Grail, but he did find a complex of caves nearby that the Cathars had used as a kind of subterranean cathedral. If he’d been of a less optimistic bent, he might have shrugged his narrow shoulders and gone home. Rahn, however, wasn’t the going-home type. Certainly he was on the right track, he wrote a book called Crusade Against the Grail in which he described his quest.
Otto Rahn and the Nazis
It was because of this book, that Rahn met his Mephistopheles Heinrich Himmler, the head of Hitler’s SS. Not only had Himmler read Crusade Against the Grail; he loved it. All Rahn had to do was find the Holy Grail. Everything but a Nazi he seems to have been blithely unaware with what what he was letting himself in for. A few weeks later a close friend (Rahn was gay) ran into him wearing the black uniform of an SS Sturmbannführer and asked him what on earth he was doing. ‘A man has to eat,’ Rahn replied sheepishly. ‘What was I supposed to do? Turn Himmler down?’
He wrote another book, with the none too catchy title of Lucifer’s Court: A Heretic’s Journey in Search of the Light Bringers, which detailed his further efforts to find the Grail. The book had one open anti-Semitic passage, which was not from him. By now it must have dawned on Rahn that he was dealt with extremely nasty folks.
Otto Rahn’s mysterious death
wilder-kaiser
What gives Rahn’s dilemma peculiar piquancy, is that there’s evidence to suggest that he was Jewish himself – although it’s not clear if he was aware of it and gay. Bravely, if naively, Rahn began to move in anti-Nazi circles. As naive as it was brave, he applied to Himmler to resign from the SS – an organization you could only resigned from feet-first. And so he did. There are stories that Rahn had links with British Intelligence. He ended up dead like Faust. One evening in March 1939, he climbed up a snow-covered slope in the Tyrol mountains and lay down to die. He is believed to have swallowed poison, although no cause of death was ever given. The following day Rahn’s body was found, frozen solid. He was 34.
Nigel Graddon, author of a new biography of Rahn, “Otto Rahn and the Quest for the Holy Grail: the Amazing Life of the Real Indiana Jones”, believes that Himmler’s disenchantment with Rahn was a result of his failure to find the Grail.
The Cathar heresy
The Cathar heresy was a major challenge to the Roman Catholic Church. The Cathars rejected the Roman Catholic church structure and considered themselves the only true Christians. The Thirteenth century was at a high point of their power and influence. Unless in other countries, the itinerant preachers in southern France received extensive support of the local nobles.
The Cathars rejected the old testament of the Bible. They called themselves “veri christiani” (true Christians) and defended of a dualistic world view, which contained Marcionites elements. Catharism promoted values of equality, neighbourliness and charity, and turned its back on the pomp, hierarchy and worldly wealth of the Catholic church. It did not have a founder or leader, nor did it take root in one place. It may have originated in the Middle East i.e. Persia, and spread to Europe via Constantinople, the Balkans and Italy. It inherited elements of Sufism, Gnosticism and Zoroastrianism, fused with the mentioned dualist perspective: a universe of Good versus Evil; Light versus Darkness; a Good God of the spiritual world and an Evil God of the material world. By the eleventh century, there were Cathar believers all over Europe, including England. But one of the places, in which the Cathar church really flourished, and the place with which the word Cathar is now strongly associated, is southern France.
Among several books on Albigensians another name for Catharism, that of Jacques Madaule is free of sectarianism, although noticeably not without sympathy for the phenomenon. It claims to adhere to the results of scientific research and the French writer I met, was worried that the speculation by the Otto Rahn damages their credibility.
The riddle that gives us this first great medieval movement against the Roman Church, has so many aspects. The central questions are:
How was it possible for an early Christian movement from far remote to propagate beliefs and partly hostile moods and practices in the superior Languedoc, home of the Troubadours and an advanced cultural refinement?
Why was their doctrine preferably found among the nobility of the country and their followers?
Why did Rome react so harshly under Innocent III against this doctrine and practice of nonviolence?
Why did the Inquisition decades after the defeat of the Albigensian army still searched for the “good people”?
How do we understand the proven fact, that quite many representatives of the Southern French aristocracy and Bishops were Roman Catholics, but were also persecuted and repressed?
When one considers that there have been in northern Italy and on the Rhine Cathars and that Northern Italy temporarily offered even refuge to the persecuted, the matter is even more mysterious. To equate the Cathars with early Protestants is wrong. Those Heretics were Gnostics. Their dualist teachings, their tolerance, their mild life practice their gentility were the flower of a different culture or time. The denial of the incarnation of Christ meant in the Middle Ages the negation of all spiritual and worldly social fabric created by the councils of the forth century.
The Chathars and the Templars
The Templars have never taken part in the fight against the Cathars which raged around during half a century in Europe. They even accepted them into their order. There are hints that the Templars possessed original manuscripts of the apostle Johannes, from Marcion origins (old christian heresy). In the original country of the Cathars, the Southern French province of Languedoc, two-thirds of the population were exterminated in this western “crusade”. Repeated requests, to act, had been strictly rejected by the Templars. They had very good reasons. The Cathars based some of their writings of Marcion, which Templars had found in Jerusalem. In the most popular publications about the Templars, one can read nothing about it. So the Templar’s order in ecclesiastical regard was not homogeneous Christian anymore. Some of the Templar’s secrets living up to the present day. The Cathars most probably handed over sanctums and valuable texts to the Templars.
What the knights thought at that time and felt, we are not able to imagine. The knighthood kept wisely that knowledge under strict secrecy. Later, Hugo of the Champagne procured some first Cathars writings, contents to which the accounts of the Eschaimin texts fitted. The sign of the Marcionites Gnostics was the red Thorn cross – exactly as later that of the Cathars. After the legend the mother Christ had tinkered from four thorns of the crown of thorns a small cross. This thorn cross became later the origin of all knight’s crosses. Till then the Templars had a simple Roman Cross in use. From now on it became the Red thorn cross on White.
The Myth of the Holy grail
Myths may be divided into three classes: those that are connected with the quest for certain power symbols, of which the Grail is only one, those that deal with the quest of the hero in a Jungian sense; and third, those that deal with the nature and history of the symbols.
These wordily stories were interpreted in the light and spirit of medieval Christianity and mysticism, but in essence were contradictive to the Cathar dualistic rejection of the real world.
The Holy Grail is generally considered to be the cup from which Christ drank at the Last Supper and the one used by Joseph of Arimathea to catch his blood as he hung on the cross.
Guyot, a Provençal poet who flourished in the middle of the twelfth century, is said to be the originator of the story. Much ink had been spilled around the possible Eastern origin of the Grail legend based on an Arabic book by an astrologer, Flegitanis found in Toledo, Spain, which contained the Grail story. “Flegitanis” sounds certainly not like an Arabian proper name, but more like the Persian felekedânêh (“astrology”). Some believed the legend originated in the mind of Guyot himself, but there is, however, there is some reason to believe that the story might have been brought from the East by the Knights Templar.
In earlier sources and in some later ones, the grail is something very different. Chrétien, for example, speaks of “un graal,” a grail or platter and thus not a unique item. Wolfram von Eschenbach’s Parzival presents the Grail as a stone which provides sustenance and prevents anyone who beholds it from dying within the week.
Parzival is a medieval German romance written by the poet Wolfram von Eschenbach in Middle High German. The poem, commonly dated to the first quarter of the 13th century, centers on the Arthurian hero Parzival (Percival in English) and his long quest for the Holy Grail.
As for the Grail, that too lives on, with claimants and contenders continuing to turn up in the most unlikely places. As one said at the time, ‘The Grail is like Everest: you climb it because it’s there.’ Or not there, of course.
The Chathars and the Holy Grail through Otto Rahns Eyes
Rahn’s studies and his extensive research in the French archives of Montsegur (Eastern Pyrenees), it eventually led him to believe that he had found the mysterious Grail, that for the first time, was mentioned by the Provencal poets of the 12th century Guyot, the inventor of the Holy Grail. So proclaimed Rahn that in the history of the Cathars so meaningful Montsegur Castle with the Castle of the Grail Montsalvatge (Mont Salva sealed) from Wolfram von Eschenbach epic Parzival is identical. Otto Rahn had put forward the theory, that the Cathars were the guardians of the Grail, which he described as a stone of light. He claimed also that Pope Innocent III. had initiated Albigensian war, actually as a crusade against the Grail. Those theses originate mainly from Antonin Gadal, a teacher, who researched after his retirement after the historical heritage of the Cathars and gained a reputation as a Neukatharer-expert. He was interested in the French history and the Cathar heresy and explored it also climbing into many caves. Gadals paleontological studies of the caves in the valley of the Ariege and his extensive research in the southern French Languedoc finally made both believe, that he had come to the mysterious Cathar treasure. They likened it to the Grail, which the inventor of the Grail legend, a Provencal poet of the 12th century Guyot , mentioned. Gadal infected Otto Rahn in his assumption that the Cathar treasure is hidden in the caves of Sabarthes and encouraged the research of the Middle Ages Montsegur Castle, which he likened to the Grail Montsalvatge (Mont Salva sealed) from Wolfram von Eschenbach epic Parzival held.
The Albigensian Crusade and Inquisition
The 11th century was the century of monks and knights, but also of a second wave of religious disputes like in the first two centuries, the century of heretics. While waves of Crusaders were fighting in Palestine, the common people of Europe were experiencing a crisis of faith. They could not find God in the churches, with their corrupt clergy.
In a bizarre parallel to the fourth century, Rome tried to quell the heresy by a string of councils and sent out priests, but that did not help. Since Catharism represented a clear and present danger to Catholicism, Innocent III sent a call for another holy war March 1208, summoning all Christian nations to launch a Crusade against a country of fellow-Christians. The Pope’s appeal came four years after the sacking of Constantinople by a Crusaders’ army, already the fourth against the Saracens a much harder enemy, than initially thought. The Albigensian Crusade can clearly be described as the first act of genocide in Europe. Starting with the sack of Béziers, historians estimate that the persecution of the Cathars in Languedoc caused half a million deaths. In cultural terms, the suppression of the Cathar heresy and the consolidation of French power in Occitania led to a complete strangling of Catharism in mediaeval Europe.
The temporal enemy was Raymond VI, Count of Toulouse, a cousin of the King of France, a feudal sovereign whose authority extended over the regions of Agenais, Quercy, Rouergue, Albigeois, Comminges and Carcassès, not to mention the County of Foix. In the owner of all the territories where the langue d’oc was spoken.
The nobility was weakened on the battlefields of Palestine, during the various local campaigns they had to conduct proving futile. The Crusades itself were gradually appeared to be a dead end.
What was new type of Crusade? The aristocracy of this period was as cosmopolitan as before the first World War. Italian and Spanish poets composed in the langue d’oc, and German Minnesinger took lessons from the Troubadours. Against a methodical system of oppression was established from West Rome. The circumstances which led Innocent III were of some justification for the Pope’s appeal. Every single district throughout the Count’s countries was a hotbed of heresy; and on 14th January 1208 Brother Peter of Castelnau, the Papal Legate, had been assassinated at Saint-Gilles — which was a capital crime. It did, however, justified a declaration of war, since the Church was not, in theory, a temporal power, but intervening in the life of an Emperor still a valid option.
But when the Pope pronounced his excommunication against the County of Toulouse, he knew that was not the case. Raymond VI’s mistake was that of ruling a country where the spiritual authority of the Church was in decline. The murder of Peter of Castelnau, has been said ‘was worse than a crime: it was a mistake’, most likely not of the Count himself, who just declined to take part in the league of Southern barons, to hunt down heretics. The Papacy had no armies in its pay and could not force the French King to launch a Crusade, and in the event failed to persuade him, but could attract a ragged and greedy team of Rome’s mercenaries. The propaganda drive was so successful that the King of France found himself forced to change his stand. It was a large army, which made a considerable impression and devastated the country in what would be called today an act of ethnic cleansing or genocide. Except, that not only heretics were killed, but also Catholics and Jews, as evident in the Massacre at Béziers. “Caedite eos. Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius. (“Kill them all, God will know His own)” was a phrase allegedly spoken by Papal legate and Cistercian abbot Arnaud Amalric prior to the first major military action of the Albigensian Crusade.
The Fall of Montségur and termination of Catharsis
The last stand of the Cathars took place at Montsegur 1241, literally the safe or ‘secure’ mountain. The siege lasted more than two years and there were battles and skirmishes fought every day.
According to Magre, many of the great heroes of chivalry fought and died there. “Men such as Lantar, Belissen and Caraman”, and the beautiful Esclarmonde d’Alion, also known as “Esclarmonde the Bastard”, sword mistress of the south. Through two winters the defenders of Montsegur held out against the Pope, against the Spanish inquisition, the Teutonic knights, the kings of France and last but not least Simon de Montfort – effectively against the world.
The castle fell to treachery just before the spring equinox in the second year of the siege, when shepherds from the neighboring village of Camon showed the Teutonic knights, who were accustomed to the icy Alpine conditions, the secret path up the sheer side of the mountain by which the defenders smuggled in their supplies and on March 16th, the last of the Albigensians, some 225 surviving men, women and children were dragged down the mountain in chains to be burned on the Camp de Cremat.
The castle’s history as, above all, a symbol of resistance made it impossible for the conquering orthodoxy to Christianize or take in the Holy Roman faith as they did at Montserrat and countless other pagan sites such as Montserrat, Lourdes or Fatima.
It is surprising that the outside world has thus far avoided the subject matter of a clear Catholic genocide. When the ‘Cathars’ do surface in films, they are usually portrayed in the inquisitions terms as fanatics or devil worshippers. Otto Rahn’s positive account, Crusade Against the Grail, was the first to be published outside France, and translated in the English. Despite the title, surprisingly little reference to the Grail itself is made in Otto’s opus. Besides, as before mentioned, nobody seems to know what a Grail is, theories range from the sacred bloodline or ‘Sangraal’ described in Baigent, Lincoln and Leigh’s fanciful bestseller The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail, Bran’s cauldron, the lost Gospel of Saint John, the Book of Nicetas, a graven tablet or a ‘hard, dark stone’, symbolic of Christ’s suffering according to Wolfram von Eschenbach’s Parsifal or the Indian Lapis as Otto Rahn suggested.
Conclusion
In what was then the largest French provincial newspaper, the Dépêche de Toulouse printed 1933 a lead editorial that tore a veil in front of the secret history of Occitan South.
A foreigner, even German, who had until then encountered arrogant silent rejection, suddenly showed that the bloody tragedy of the crusade against the Albigensian Church had not disappeared from the awareness of citizens of Southern France nor from the world.
What was the reason that the repressed and buried layers suddenly came to light? It was a speculative, scientifically immature book of a completely unknown young German named Otto Rahn, who wrote boldly, almost provocative “The Crusade against the Grail, the tragedy of the Cathars”. He took his life under strange circumstances in 1939, alone in the snowy mountains of the Wilder Kaiser, after he had maneuvered through an unexplained cooperation in entanglement and danger with Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS. How is it possible, that an unknown German usurped the historical past of Muret and Montségur?
Otto Rahn was from the Marburg area, in which long ago, a judge, Konrad from Marburg had been assigned as an inquisitor to stamp out an heretic offshoot of Catharism, until his assassination.
Rahn had presented prehistoric evidence of the caves of the Pyrenees area, that ancient Persian religions, Gnosticism and Manichaeism of post-Constantinian period had been entrained earlier than historical sources claimed, the heretic church known as Albigensians spread over later over the entire Languedoc, the county of Toulouse across to Beziers, Montpellier, Narbonne and to Catalonia and Ax. The boldest of Rahn’s thesis was, that the Grail legend was nothing more than mythologizing the Cathar belief of their heretical Sacrament and the famous and infamous Mountain Montségur in the lonely Pyrenees, the historical archetype of Montsalwatsch in the great poems of Chrétien de Troyes and the 13th-century work Parzival by Wolfram von Eschenbach and The Ring opera’s of Richard Wagner.
It was understandable raising eyebrows in those years, that a German took the French a centerpiece of history and turned it into something like an anti-Roman gnostic anti-Pope myth.
Now the French historical research Catharism has of course been more repressed than neglected. Jacobinism and Enlightenment as the official doctrine had no room for medieval religious wars and so-called Crusades. Meanwhile the situation has changed thoroughly. In the Tarn valley underground places of worship were discovered which suggested strange astral symbolism. Montségur, especially the burial ground (champs cremats), where the last fighting faithfuls have been burnt in 1244, was investigated and buried ceremonial objects found.
Of course, we it is known, that there is something like a heretic movement against Rome in French South has formed; science also knows, that originally domestic Bogumiles in Bulgaria represent the link from the Christian centuries to Catharism; we know of the crusade against Albigensian by Pope Innocent III and that the “secular sword” of Anglo-Norman baron Simon yon Montfort and the subsequent Inquisition by the Dominican Order and its founder Dominic de Guzman have eradicated literally Albigensian sect. Nevertheless, there is a certain fuzziness.
The reasons are diverse. In fact, the prosecution has produced a lot of documents, but in particular those relating to doctrine and worship, destroyed. The heretics had been driven back together with their cult in the Pyrenees caves. However, a number of important documents have found in the recent past. Ironically, scholarly Dominicans are significantly involved in these discoveries and important chronicles were found in the Vatican.
What we do not know, comes from the fact that the Catharism continues, and in a sense the old heretic church remains to this day. Only in 1950 the Cahiers d’Etudes cathares were founded. The writer I met, called his late professor a typical “perfait”. Actually, there may be men out there, who up to the present day, form an Episcopate of the “Pure”.
Indeed the original meaning of the word Cathari, came from the Greek katharos, “pure”). The Cathari professed a neo-Manichaean dualism—that there are two principles, one good and the other evil, and that the material world is evil. Embarrassingly often the medieval Catharism is seen as the frontrunner of Anthroposophy, Rosicrucianism, occult directions or New Age movement. Certain analogies must be stated, like the historical the historical and current anti-Roman movement particularly in Germany.
Otto Rahn Kreuzzug gegen den Gral. Die Tragödie des Katharismus Gebundene Ausgabe – November 1955
The Cathars, France MSM 2006
Christiana Reemts, Origenes: Eine Einführung in Leben und Denken Broschiert – Dezember 2003
Hans-Jürgen Lange, Otto Rahn und die Suche nach dem Gral Taschenbuch – 1999
The Other God: Dualist Religions from Antiquity to the Cathar Heresy (Yale Nota Bene), Stoyanov, Yuri
The Cathars: The Rise and Fall of the Great Heresy by Sean Martin
The Knights Templar: The History and Myths of the Legendary Military Order by Sean Martin
Gnosticism and Early Christianity by R. M. Grant
Jesus Wars Harper, 2010 by Phillip Jenkins
C.G. Jung, Aion Untersuchungen zur Symbolgeschichte
The Rise of Christianity: How the Obscure, Marginal Jesus Movement Became the Dominant Religious Force in the Western World in a Few Centuries by Rodney Stark
The Lost History of Christianity: The Thousand-Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia–and How It Died by Philip Jenkins
Historia Mundi Volume IV, Lehnen Verlag, Die Kirche zur Zeit der Apostel und Märtyrer
The Cults of the Roman Empire, Robert Turcan
Les sites templiers, Jea Luc Barbiere
Montsegur Le trace du Chateau
Bernard Hamilton: The Albigensian Crusade. Historical Association, London, 1974.
Milan Loos: Dualist Heresy in the Middle Ages. Academia M.Nijhoff, Prague, 1974.
This is a new message not only, but especially for Catholic Church officials in Rome and Germany. Many of them have long cultivated a lifestyle oriented toward strict dogmas, spiritual void and a career within the church, as despised from the former Pope Benedict XVI. But now that his successor arrives at meetings in an old car, they have seen this as non-fundamental shift. Pope Benedict was alienated, as many Roman Catholics were, by the busy Church bureaucracy. A cozy State Church, living well from concordat, sings along with the entrenched party politicians. It took Pope Francis a while to address “ailments” of the Vatican Curia and the spiritual deaf Western Church. Francis begged this Christmas pardon for the “shortcomings” of senior church leaders, as well as the “several scandals” that had “caused so much harm”. Like Pope Benedict XVI in his famous speech in Freiburg a few years ago, Pope Francis denounced the worldliness of ladder-climbing clerics, those who indulge in hypocritical double lives, and lamented a sense of “spiritual Alzheimer’s” of his clerics. 2014 is a somber year. As you can see, I included Pope Francis’ Twitter timeline, but until today few of his tweets were newsworthy. I am still at odds with his communication style and not sure where he is going. Anyway, the 15 alignments are a long – correct – list, but somewhat not very concise:
Feeling immortal, immune or indispensable. “A Curia that doesn’t criticise itself, that doesn’t update itself, that doesn’t seek to improve itself is a sick body.”
Working too hard. It is the disease of those who, like Martha in the Gospel, “lose themselves in their work, inevitably neglecting what is better; sitting at Jesus’ feet.” The Pope said that Jesus called on his disciples to “rest a little”, because neglecting necessary rest brings anxiety and stress.
Becoming spiritually and mentally hardened. “It’s dangerous to lose that human sensibility that lets you cry with those who are crying, and celebrate those who are joyful.”
Planning too much. “Preparing things well is necessary, but don’t fall into the temptation of trying to close or direct the freedom of the Holy Spirit, which is bigger and more generous than any human plan.”
Working without co-ordination, like an orchestra that produces noise. “When the foot tells the hand, ‘I don’t need you’ or the hand tells the head ‘I’m in charge.’”
Having ‘spiritual Alzheimer’s.’ “We see it in the people who have forgotten their encounter with the Lord … in those who depend completely on their here and now, on their passions, whims and manias, in those who build walls around themselves and become enslaved to the idols that they have built with their own hands.”
Being rivals or boastful.“When one’s appearance, the colour of one’s vestments or honorific titles become the primary objective of life.”
Suffering from ‘existential schizophrenia.’ “It’s the sickness of those who live a double life, fruit of hypocrisy that is typical of mediocre and progressive spiritual emptiness that academic degrees cannot fill. It’s a sickness that often affects those who, abandoning pastoral service, limit themselves to bureaucratic work, losing contact with reality and concrete people.”
Committing the ‘terrorism of gossip.’ “It’s the sickness of cowardly people who, not having the courage to speak directly, talk behind people’s backs.”
Glorifying one’s bosses. “It’s the sickness of those who court their superiors, hoping for their benevolence. They are victims of careerism and opportunism, they honour people who aren’t God.”
Being indifferent to others. “When, out of jealousy or cunning, one finds joy in seeing another fall rather than helping him up and encouraging him.”
Having a ‘funereal face.’ “In reality, theatrical severity and sterile pessimism are often symptoms of fear and insecurity. The apostle must be polite, serene, enthusiastic and happy and transmit joy wherever he goes.”
Wanting more.“When the apostle tries to fill an existential emptiness in his heart by accumulating material goods, not because he needs them but because he’ll feel more secure.”
Forming ‘closed circles’ that seek to be stronger than the whole. “This sickness always starts with good intentions but as time goes by, it enslaves its members by becoming a cancer that threatens the harmony of the body and causes so much bad – scandals – especially to our younger brothers.”
Seeking worldly profit and showing off. “It’s the sickness of those who insatiably try to multiply their powers and to do so are capable of calumny, defamation and discrediting others, even in newspapers and magazines, naturally to show themselves as being more capable than others.”
Is that really the whole problem?
Jorge Mario Bergoglio, now Francis, is the 266th pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church. At the time, when he was a new pope, we thought our prayers were answered – a non-European was elected. A Jesuit who appears spiritual, taking charge, connecting , ascetic, conservative, even holy. His first appearance was breathtaking. He seemed to knows how to run a tight ship as Jesuit. In choosing Francis, 76, the archbishop of Buenos Aires, the cardinals seemed to have sent a powerful message that the future of the church lies in the global south, home to the fast growing bulk of the world’s Catholics not in the bickering, secular church of Europe. See Phillip Jenkins: In the long run Christ wins out – the next Christendom. 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.” That is not what I see today. We see persecution and terror.
Pope Francis is a Jesuit, an order which fell in disgrace under Johannes Paul II but were brought back in the folder by Benedict XVI. The famous intellectual and tough missionary order, “gods Marines”. Jesuits, founded 1534, helped Counter-Reformation and have always stood on the side of enlightenment. This is a great continuity from the spiritual pope Johannes Paul II and the outstanding theologian Benedict XVI, who wanted to connect science and Catholicism – but at the same time in Europe to rather have a smaller church than a worldly, opportunistic organisation which runs after the Zeitgeist.Pope Francis was known to be conservative on spiritual issues . He somewhat muddles through abortion, same-sex marriage and supports celibacy. However, according to the National Cathedral Reporter’s John Allen, “he’s no defender of clerical privilege, or insensitive to pastoral realities.” He assailed priests who refused to baptize children born out of wedlock, calling it a form of “rigorous and hypocritical neo-clericalism.” Bergoglio has also displayed sympathy for HIV-AIDS victims — Thera are reports that in 2001, Bergoglio visited a hospice to kiss the feet of a dozen AIDS patients. Bergoglio often rode the bus to work, cooked his own meals and regularly visited the slums that ring Argentina’s capital. When he considers social outreach to be the essential business of the church, is that not spiritual deaf also?.
Conclusion
He accused fellow church leaders of hypocrisy and forgetting that Jesus Christ bathed lepers and ate with prostitutes. “Jesus teaches us another way: Go out. Go out and share your testimony, go out and interact with your brothers, go out and share, go out and ask. Become the Word in body as well as spirit,” Bergoglio told Argentina’s priests once.
He strongly opposed legislation introduced in 2010 by the Argentine Government to allow same-sex marriage, calling it a “real and dire anthropological throwback”. Exact quotes vary, but The Guardian UK quotes Bergoglio as saying of an Argentinian marriage bill:
“Let’s not be naive: this isn’t a simple political fight, it’s an attempt to destroy God’s plan.”
The biographer Rubin obtained an extremely rare interview of Bergoglio for his biography, the The Jesuit. He said this:
“Is Bergoglio a progressive – a liberation theologist even? No. He’s no third-world priest. Does he criticize the International Monetary Fund, and neoliberalism? Yes. Does he spend a great deal of time in the slums? Yes,” Rubin said
.
What is his stand today on the family ? What on capitalism running havov? What on persecution of Christians?
Happy families are essential for the Church and for society. #prayforsynod
“Francis rebuilt the church” a quote to St. Francis from Pope Francis. I somewhat still have to see it. Pope Benedict the XVI said: “There is so much noise in the world! May we learn to be silent to listen in our hearts and before God”. Fans of the Philosopher Pope Benedict XVI, saw their influence waning, as much of what had been valuable and important to them is now frowned upon from the Church bureaucracy more openly. On the other hand the so-called reformist camp, a sorry lot of old men, weak in spiritual achievements and virtues, has yet to explain itself. Benedict and his predecessor, John Paul II, systematically opposed them. Now the remaining liberal priests are only gradually coming out of the woods and the role of Pope Francis is not clear (to me). Benedicts XVI ’s speech to lay Catholics 2011 in Freiburg was frank and to the point:
Allow me to refer here to an aspect of Germany’s particular situation. The Church in Germany is superbly organized. But behind the structures, is there also a corresponding spiritual strength, the strength of faith in a living God? We must honestly admit that we have more than enough by way of structure but not enough by way of Spirit. I would add: the real crisis facing the Church in the western world is a crisis of faith. If we do not find a way of genuinely renewing our faith, all structural reform will remain ineffective. See here for full speech.
Some say Sufism, or Tasawwuf as it is known in the Muslim world, is Islamic mysticism; others say it is the primordial mystical tradition, much older than Islam, using Islam as a structural frame as Gnostics usually did. In this article, we will use Jungian concepts, Sufi poetry, and myths to explore the relationship of female Archetypes and the Sufi path. Although the leaders of tariqas and participants in public dhikrs are (almost) always men, there have been some well-known Sufi women adepts, e.g. Rābiʿah al-Baṣrī, and many others, less well-known. Women participate considerably in popular Sufism, especially in visits to the tombs of walis, mulids.
Perhaps Sufism is best defined as an universal path to union with God through self reflection – individuation. In Jungian psychology there are many concepts that illumine the relationship between soul and Absolute, human and God: the ego as the center of consciousness and the Self as a path to god; the individuation process whereby the ego increasingly realizes its source and dependence upon the Self; the alchemical conjunction of ego and Self.
Sufis understand themselves as the only heir of a spiritual heritage, which had been split in many religions and sects. Like Tao, Sufi is eternal, and uses words like “drunkenness” or “grape” or “heart” … As Rumi puts it: Before garden, vine or grape were in the world Our soul was drunken with immortal wine.
I also found, to my astonishment, Sufism is addressing the greats belonging to a variety of cultures: Rumi, Shakespeare, Goethe and other influential thinkers and poets. Goethe’s West-östlicher Divan, or West-East Divan, is a work with deep roots his knowledge of and love for Sufism. I regret to say, that Sufis even caught up with C.G. Jung, and the concept of individuation. C.G. Jung was aware, that any spiritual aware religion – for example Sufism and Catholicism – inherently resembles a psychoanalytic healing.
Boundaries of Sufism
Sufism in a hurry
Well, in any case lets define the boundaries first, but be aware that my understanding of Sufism is deeply influenced by Idries Shah and the interpretation of it by C.G. Jung. This article is not an attempt to feminize Islam, but to explore Sufism from this particular point of view.
See above a slide show with some basic concepts of Sufism. You may press buttons to change slides manually or switch to full screen.
Sufism is a dimension of Islam rather than a sect of Islam. Its mysticism and monastic order are hosted by Islam, but originating and reaching beyond Islam. The abstinence from pleasure, wealth, and prestige sought by most Sufi Masters, and their retiring from others to worship alone has of course a striking similarity to Christian monks. Sufi orders (Tariqas) can be found in Sunni, Shia and non-Islamic (or hardly Islamic) groups. Like the Christian monks Sufis were influential in spreading their belief, particularly to the furthest outpost world in Africa, India and the Far East.
Doris Lessing, stated once: “I found Sufism as taught by Idries Shah, which claims to be the reintroduction of an ancient teaching, suitable for this time and this place.” Arthur J. Deikman, a professor of psychiatry, expressed the view that Western psychotherapists could benefit from the perspective provided by Sufism”.
Sufis are emphatic, that knowledge should be learned from teachers and not exclusively from books. They view deceiving and fanatic fundamentalists seeing Sufis as haram and deceiving scholars as evil spirits, no wonder that these attempts to destroy Sufi heritage.
Tariqas can trace their teachers back through the generation. Modelling themselves on their teachers, students hope that they too will glean something of the Prophetic character. Although Sufis are relatively few in number they have shaped thought and history. Through the centuries Sufis contributed hugely to literature for example Rumi, Omar Khayyám and Al-Ghazali’s is quoted by Western philosophers, writers and theologians.
This new voice of the Abrahamic tradition attempted to reestablish the recognition of the Unity of Being. It tried to address the imbalances that had arisen by the three religions of the books, advising respect and honor for the feminine as well as for the graciousness and harmony of nature.
From the early days onward, women have played an important role in the development of Sufism, which is classically claimed to have begun with the Prophet Muhammad, but Sufisms’s roots are most likely older. Within some Sufi circles, women were integrated with men in ceremonies; in other orders, women gathered in their own circles of remembrance and worshiped apart from men. Some women devoted themselves ascetic, apart from society, others chose the role of benefactress and fostered circles of worship and study. Many of the great masters had female teachers, students, and spiritual friends who greatly influenced their thought and being. The Sufi Master Ibn Arabi (see below), tells of time he spent with one elderly woman mystic, Fatimah of Cordova: “I served as a disciple one of the lovers of God, a gnostic, a lady of Seville called Fatimah bint Ibn al-Muthanna of Cordova. I served her for several years, she being over ninety-five years of age… “
Panentheism
panteistic god
Given thediversity ofschoolsand the diversity ofreligious and philosophicalideas of theirmasters, it is very difficult to pin down theSufithoughtsdefine. By some scholarsSufismis considered a perfectpantheisminthesearch for knowledgeandreunion with theDivine.I prefer, therefore, not necessarilyto speak of anyreligiousdoctrine in Sufism, as the Sufibelief systemexceeds them Sufism is freebecause of its mindset–of every religious limit.Rather, itseems to mean attitude, an enlightenedphilosophy of the individual search for God. Ibn al-‘Arabi (Ibn’ Arabi) (se also below) is the most rigorous Sufi panentheism. Many theologians were scandalized by the apparently blasphemous expressions that occur in his writings, and taxed him with holding heretical doctrines,e.g., the incarnation of God in man (ḥulúl) and the identification of man with God (ittiḥád). Centuries passed, but controversies continue. To Ibn al-‘Arab everything, that exists is a part of and a manifestation of the Oneness of God. Humans are part of God. To him the idea of a separate self is the result of ignorance. Ibn al-‘Arabi was born in Spain, in AD 1165. At the age of twenty he was initiated into Sufism. From the 1190s he engaged in three decades of travels as a wandering scholar, poet and mystic, visiting the Maghreb, Egypt, Arabia, Syria and Asia Minor and finally settled in Damascus. Ibn’ Arabi ascribes the source of his inspirations to an angel, which, in Jungian terms, is an archetypal inhabitant of the unconscious. Angels are particularly regarded as the messengers or intermediaries between God and the human world. With respect to the psyche, as intermediaries and messengers, angels are the very permeability of the division between the two zones of the psyche. Unconscious content, which cannot be directly apprehended by the conscious, is translated into terms the conscious can comprehend: language. Intermediaries between conscious and unconscious are necessary because, as Jung points out, [. . .] “psychic contents cannot be observed in their unconscious state, and moreover the psyche cannot know itself. The conscious can know the unconscious only so far as it has become conscious “( C. G. Jung). Insofar as God is beyond the categories of human thought and beyond language and concept, He is unknowable, unutterable. Commensurately, the Sufi experience of God is referred to as knowledge of the heart. The Sufi calls “knowledge” his own experience – in all areas of the senses and in the experience of own transcendence. Important is the strength and the ability to leave the social frames of that limitation, religion to which we belong; then, suddenly, the consciousness understands the true core of any religion. Any religion.
Sufi literature
We owe a lot FriedrichRückert(1788-1866) , whowas a Germanpoet, translator, and one of the foundersof the GermanOriental Studies. LikeHeine andGoethewasFriedrichRückertaGermanSufiethics. As a translatorof poetryRückertdevoted himself to thetransmissionof countlessSufiverses intheGermanlanguagepoets. 1818, the sameyear, asGoethedrew up aWest–Eastern Divan, the eloquentyoungpoetcame to Viennaandbegan studyingoriental languages.With its“dual talent, poeticandphilological“, RückerttranslatedArabic and Persianpoetry, notably the Sufi mysticism, amazinglyaccurate.
Ibn ‘Arabî – Sufism and heresy
templars
Ibn `Arabî (1165-1240) has been one of the most influential Sufi authors, who deeply influenced the west. He wrote in Persian and Arabic clearly not only for the purposefully for a global readership of all beliefs, but was quite at odds with scholarly interpretations of religious thoughts. ThroughSpainand Sicily, andin part by theTemplars Cristian and Sufi thoughts interrelated.The Sufis in the East,like theChristian mystics in the West were attractedtherefreshing, deep old knowledgeof the Orientalworld. None of themapparently did not fear the dangerof heresy, and many of themleda double life, so to speak: on the one hand,they livedasdevout Christians or Muslims, on the other handthey thoughtasSufischolars. In the 12thcenturythe masterSuhrawardilived inAleppo.He wrotethe work“The knowledgeofenlightenment” andwas murdered byorder of theorthodox Scholars.Theypublicly burnedhis writing, but some copieshave survived: Suhrawardi refers to theSufitraditionas identical withthe esotericteachings of the oldEgyptians, theGreeks andthePersians.Later theEnglish scholarRogerBacon, whospreadthis knowledgein Europe.Baconconfirmedinhis writings thattheSufiideas came from theancient Egyptianera and later inheritedPythagoras, Zoroasterand Socratesthoughts.The Sufishave alwayscalled“The Lovers”.
sufism
But behindthe concept ofLovehidesratherthe pursuit of truth, for the knowledge. In his book“The Sufis” Idries Shahgives a briefhistoryof the great masters Ibn `Arabî and Sufi. IdriesShahfindsmany parallelsbetweenFrancis andthe Dervishes: theclothingwith hood andwide sleeves, theexchangeof seculardresses withacowland theFranciscanideaof the “holyprayer” and Francis‘ typicalWelcome:“Pace a voi” –“Peacebe with you”–whichis an Arabicgreeting
Idries Shah suggests, based on the Spanish Priest Asin Palacios, that Dante had drawn on Ibn ‘Arabi’s writings for his Divine Comedy. That has to be interpreted differently not as a de-christianizing of Dante, as the central theme of“comedy” isthe Trinity, that very concept, which distinguishesChristianityfrom Islam. Not only thispoemas suchhasa Trinitarianform, but also theprocess, by whichthe pilgrimDante(and with it the reader) through purgatoryascends toheaven,“proves”the Trinity.Through the processof self-perfectionof the pilgrimDante, whograduallyrealizesthe divine lawsof the universe,hereached theentranceto the world ofscience,to paradise.The Earthly Paradiseturns outat the endof the bookabout Purgatoryas achimera, andas apolemicalcontrast,the realparadiseunfoldsas aprocess, by whichthe individualunderstandsthe divine laws, as a science. Dante’spoem seems a proof of Jun’s individuation and the Sufi paths though. Both relate to the Christian ideaof theimagovivaDei.
In the 13thcentury, the“Scuola siciliana“, the Sicilianliterary movement was established at the courtof the Hohenstaufen. Frederick II ofHohenstaufen,apupil of the Templars,founded thisinstitution. The German Emperor Friederich II (Frederick)spoke and wroteArabicperfectly, and thesoldiers of hisbodyguardwere allArabs.Sicily, then incharge of theKnights Templars was thecenter of theArabsciences.TheGermanEmperor wasa close friend ofthe Sultan ofEgypt,al-Kamil, the very same Sultan, whohad also receivedtheSt. Francis ofAssisi.
Rumi – Sufism and individuation
In his book “The Sufis” Idries Shah gives a unique history of the great master Rumi. This is a typical example of Sufi central theme – love – therefore I would like to quote it here:
„Ein Mann kam zur Tür der Geliebten und klopfte. Eine Stimme fragte: – Wer ist da? – -Ich bin es -, antwortete er. Da sagte die Stimme: -Hier ist nicht genug Platz für mich und dich.- Und die Tür bliebgeschlossen. Nach einem Jahr der Einsamkeit unt Entbehrung kam der Mann wieder und klopfte. Von drinnen fragte die Stimme: – Wer ist da?- – Du bist es -, sagte der Mann. Und die Tür wurde geöffnet.“ (Jalauddin Rumi)
The connection between the Troubadour movement and Sufis had been established long ago. The term “Troubadour”, the “Finder” can be originally derived from an Arabic root “rbb”, as this certain Sufi community, whose members are the “slaves of love”, played viola. And from the Arabic word for “Viola” came the European “Troubadour”. The Sufishave alwayscalled“The Lovers”. But behindthe concept ofLovehidesratherthe pursuit of truth and knowledge.
How is it that a thirteenth-century Sufi master, like Rumi should become the darling of the West and Amazon Kindle books, in times with interest in neither poetry nor spiritual discipline? His works include a massive collection of lyric poems (ghazelsandrubaiyat) as well as the six-volumeMathnawi, a collection of rhymed couplets that weaves together a rich fabric of stories, humor, and spiritual teaching. In our Western literary tradition and empty churches we have lost this union of the sensual and the spiritual. Our own cultural history has discarded: religion and literature. The Sufis, especially, were neither puritanical nor sensual indulgent. In Rumi we have a model of the potential harmony between the physical and the spiritual, the animus and the anima, the Ego and the Self, the human and the Divine. Two examples from Essential Rumi by Coleman Barks
When I am with you, we stay up all night, When you’re not here, I can’t get to sleep. Praise God for these two insomnias! And the difference between them.
And an excerpt …
Could this be our real master?
The lover is forever like a drunkard whose secrets spill out,forever mad, frenzied, and in love.
To be self-conscious is to worry about everything, but once drunk, what will be will be.
If you desire the self, get out of the self.
Leave the shallow stream behind and flow into the river deep and wide.
Don’t be an ox pulling the wheel of the plow, turn with the stars that wheel above you.
Sufism and psychology
Source: Khalil Andani’s Concept of Tawhid in the Isma’ili & Sufi Thought
In Arabic, the words for ‘eye, ‘fountain’, and ‘self or identity (Self or Ego)’ all emerge from the same root.The specialty of having the same consonance for different words has given poets many opportunities for connections and word play, and Ibn ‘Arabi made masterly use of it.Gardens of paradise are beautiful metaphors for the heart; its center being this spring, which waters and vivifies all in the garden. Spreading out from this centre, according to this cosmological diagram (from Miguel Asin Palacios’ 1931 book on Ibn ‘Arabi – El Islam cristianizado) he compares the Ibn ‘Arabi’s vision of paradise to that of Dante: Self and Ego arr central concepts.
Every discipline – temporal or spriritual – in the world has among its practitioners, those who engage the faith beyond the common boundaries of doctrine and dogma, seeking an unmediated relationship with reality and selfrealization. Sufism, as can be discerned from the writings of Ibn’ Arabi and Jelaluddin Rumi, can be discussed in the terms offered by C.G. Jung in his theories of the structures and functions of the human psyche. In Jung’s terms, Sufism can be seen as an example of how a healthy, integrated psyche might function, and what a living mythology might look like. Sufism as a psychological system has postulated the discoveries of Freud or C.G.Jung centuries before: the Sufi sheikh Ghasali wrote down the sexual knowledge of Freud around 1200 AD and C. G. Jung’s findings on psychological archetypes and the collective unconscious were formulated by the Sufi Master Ibn Arabi. C.G. Jung might have known that therefore and wrote: „What we hold for a specifically western invention, namely the psychoanalysis and those of her outgoing suggestions, it is a beginner’s attempt in comparison to that what is old-skilled art in the east.“ He meant the Far East, but also the Middle East as he was well aware of the findings of the Nag Hammadi library (famous for the “fifth” Gospel of Thomas favored by the Sufis). C. G. Jung has shown a pronounced and informed interest in Gnosticism an Middle Eastern knowledge. Sufism emphasises on the knowledge of transcendence arrived at by way of interior, intuitive means as Jung’s individuation. The importance of the Nag Hammadi library, discovered in upper Egypt in 1945, was pointed out by C.G. Jung. His Book “Antwort auf Hiob” (Answer to Job) is a downright answer to the Bible´, but in accordance of Sufism’s answer to rigid religions. In the light of such recognitions, one may ask: “Is Sufism a religion or a psychology?” The answer is that it may very-well be both, just like Jung’s thought may be interpreted religiously. One of the aeonial beings who bears the name Sophia (“Wisdom”), referred to by C.G. Jung many times, is of great importance to the Gnostic world view and resembles closely the story of the human psyche that loses its connection with the collective unconscious and needs to be rescued by the Self. Analogies of this sort exist in great profusion.
Sufism and syncretic Gnosticism
Myth of the Baphomet derived from its usage in Provence the centre of the Cathar Church in France,
We do not know for sure, why has Sufism so much common with Gnosticism. The reason is maybe, that both of these systems implanted their mystical ways, in the prophetic religion (Judaism,Christianity or Islam,) or in a deeper sense how to individually unite with God. We can also admit that the Gnostic Christianity could have influenced the early stage of Islam, particularly Arianism.
The Sufi and also Gnostic view on the created world is sometimes very negative.“The world is a dunghill, and a gathering place of dogs; and meaner than a dog is that person who does not stay away from it.” Sufi could not participate in secular affairs and he must know, that world is a merely an illusion. Even Jesus (highly considered by Sufis) said in the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas: “Whoever has cometo understand the world has found (only) a corpse, and whoever has found a corpse is superior to the world.” We can clearly say that Gnostics and Sufis are not interested in the world or they despise it. Not only, the world is seen in the negative light, but also the work of the heavens and the time. According to the Gnostics, the mundane world is influenced and ruled by the lower heavens – seven spheres with one planetary ruler( archon).
Gnosticism From ancient Oriental religion? Zoroastrian, Mesopotamian, Indian? From heterodox Judaism? Apocalyptic, mystical? From heterodox Christianity? From late Hellenistic philosophy? Neoplatonism?
While Sufi teachings have been influenced by various religions, their practices also bear close similarities to those of Hinduism and other mystical religions of the East. The Sufi orders are led by shaikhs, who play the same role as Hindu gurus. Most Sufi orders still consider the five pillars of Islam to be essential, and practice them piously, however, they go far beyond this, aiming to spiritual awakening. Central to all of these practices are ritual “invocations of the Divine Name,” also known as dhikr, which can be done either silently or in a chant. Here similarities with Hindu mantras are unmistakable. The evidence of Sufi borrowings from other Eastern religions such as Hinduism and Zoroastrianism is certain. The similarities in teachings and ritual are overwhelming. It is no surprise then that the goals of Sufism reflect their pantheism and monism. Of course it is one of the characteristics of living traditions that they are ultimately oral. The spark that kindles the enlightenment is rarely captured on paper: it shifts its emphasis and context with the times and the individual. In matters of the heart and soul, it is the experience of love or of the Self that resonates – not dogmas or theories. This aspect of Sufism is the hardest to convey: In Sufism, great importance is given to the complete human being, the one who is considered activated. It is through the guidance of such a human being that the inner process unfolds. Any particular beliefs in dogmas dissolve as the complete one assists the seeker to fall fully into his or her relationship with God and to recognize the importance of that essential experience.
The socially approved knowledge of argumentation is not valid – unless we have found it out ourself. The Sufi calls all things meaningless, if they are old or new, big or small, important or insignificant, because all things are separated in reality forms one and not. All things („the evident“) are merely bridges to the true reality. Rituals, symbols are representatives, are to reflexion of an internal truth they can be exterior dead and stereotyped; but they show that who can see a way to the internal truth. There is no external sign (like the Christians Cross or the Crescent of Islam) from which one could say this symbolises the Sufi being. Sufis use the most different symbols, quite knowingly that these are just represented phenomena.
Sufism and female archetypes
Fatimah – the primordial woman
Fatimah Zehra wife of Ali
Fatimah, beloved daughter of the Prophet Muhammad, is the most prominent female in the Islamic tradition. Islam is aniconic. In other words, images, effigies, or idols her are not allowed, although verbal depiction is elaborate. She is regarded as a primordial woman, a symbol of divine womanhood giving her many holy names. Shias revere the person of Fatimah, mother of the line of inspired imams who embodied the divine truth for their generation. She was the wife of the fourth Caliph, wife of Ali, mother of Hasan and Hussein and defended Ali’s cause, fiercely opposed the election of Abu Bakr. Fatimah is often associated with Sophia, the divine wisdom, which gives birth to all knowledge of God. She has thus become another symbolic equivalent of the Great Mother. When Fatimah, enters the throne all 124,000 Prophets stand in respect. Around the world men and women of Islam and Sufism look to Fatimah for comfort and inspiration. Because of her special beingness of personality and beyond, Fatimah is considered by many Muslims as divine in origin and several variations of a major hadith describe how she was conceived on the night of Mi’raj (ascension).
I heard the Apostle of Allah say, ‘I am a tree, Fatimah is its trunk and Ali is its pollen. Hassan and Hussein are its fruits, and our followers are its leaves. The roots of the tree are in the Garden of Eden, and its trunk, fruits and leaves are in Paradise.’ – Sacred tradition of Islam on the authority of ‘Abdu ‘r-Rahman ibn ‘Awf’
Fatimah tul Zehra (Fatimah the Radiant, Fatimah the Brightest Star, Fatimah-Star of Venus, Fatimah-The Evening Star), the daughter of the Prophet, is the secret in Sufism. She is the Hujjat of ‘Ali. In other words, she establishes the esoteric sense of his knowledge and guides those who attain to it. Through her perfume, we breathe paradise. Though she was his daughter, the Prophet Muhammad called her Um Abi’ha (mother of her father). While Fatimah Zehra was Muhammad’s daughter, the Rasulallah (Prophet of God – Muhammad) understood that his gnosis was bestowed upon him from the Divine Feminine.
In his allegorical book Herrman Hesse’s “The Journey to the East” searches for a mystical woman named Fatima. Given that this is the author of Siddhartha, one might suppose that the league represents a group of individuals in search of eastern mysticism. The book has clear spiritual overtones.
Sophia – Sufism’s goddess of wisdom
At the very core of Sufism there is a vision of the gnostic Sophia. The philosopher Muid ad-Din ibn al-Arabi (1165-1240) saw a young girl in Mecca surrounded by light and realised that, for him, she was an incarnation of the divine Sophia. She is part of many mystical and religious currents and mentioned often by the psychoanalyst C.G. Jung.
Torah/Old Testament: Sophia is the Greek word for wisdom which is a “she” who personifies integrity, honesty, clear perception, the power by which kings and princes rule, and the creative power present with Yahweh at creation. (see also C. G. Jung’s Answer to Job about the “anamnesis of Sophia” referring to the recollection of God of Wisdom.)
Ancient Wisdom Goddesses: Isis as the “Black One.”
Iranian Sufism: Sophia is Perfect Nature, the object of ecstatic ideation, which was described in an 11th century text as “the philosopher’s angel.” (Cf. H. Corbin, Man of Light in Iranian Sufism.)
Gnosticism: Two Sophias, higher and lower: Ogdoad and Sophia Achamoth, the generative wisdom of the world. (Cf. also “The Thunder Perfect Mind” in Nag Hammadi Library.)
Alchemy: Sapientia (Latin for Sophia, Wisdom). Moon, tree, ogdoad, alchemical salt. (Cf. Jung’s writings on alchemy.)
Christian Black Madonnas in churches throughout Europe: may represent Sophia (often likened to Mary Magdalene) in exile, blackened by association with either the sun, solar principle, or the earth, as in alchemy, black earth.
Western mystical /philosophical/ humanistic tradition: Dante, Boethius, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Rudolph Steiner . . .
Nietzsche: “Supposing truth is a woman . . .” (Beyond Good and Evil)
Jungian psychology: anima development in male psychology; individuation concept.
Sophia__Wisdom
Sophia (Greek for “wisdom”) comes from Hellenistic philosophy (Platonism) and is important in Gnosticism, Orthodox Christianity and Christian mysticism. Sophia is honored as a goddess of wisdom by Gnostics, as well as by some Neopagan, New Age, and feminist-inspired Goddess spirituality groups. In Orthodox and Roman Catholic Christianity, Hagia Sophia (Holy Wisdom), is an expression of understanding for the second person of the Holy Trinity as seen in the Book of Proverbs 9:1, but not a goddess.
The earliest Gnostic forms of Sophia emphasized her power and influence on earth and in the human psyche. In the ancient text of Hypostasis of the Archons, found at Nag Hammadi, it is written that Sophia preexisted and gave birth to the male godhead. She chastises his arrogance when he says there is no other god before him. She claims her spiritual authority. She says “you are wrong, Samuel” (meaning Lord of the blind) and stretches forth her finger to send light into matter. She then follows the light down into the region of “Chaos.”
This power of Sophia within the earth realm was seen in early visions: “I am nature, the universal mother, mistress of all the elements, primordial child of time, sovereign of all things spiritual, queen of the dead, queen of the immortals, My nod governs the shining heights of heaven, the wholesome sea breezes, the lamentable silences of the world below. I know the cycles of growth and decay.”
Black_Madonna_of_Einsiedeln
Certainly Sophia has been derived by the Great Mother(s) from whom all life arises and is sustained. The Great Mother was worshipped from 25,000 to 5,000 BC. Themes of the intertwining of nature and spirit, and the paradox of life and death are everywhere in images of the Great Feminine. Muid ad-Din ibn al-Arabi believed that women were the most potent icons of the sacred, because they inspired a love in men, which must ultimately be directed to God, the only true object of love. Ibn al-Arabi argued that humans have a duty to create theophanies for themselves, by means of the creative imagination that pierces the imperfect exterior of mundane reality and glimpses the divine within.
The faculty of imagination is commonly associated with the Divine Feminine. The Sufi poetry teaches the feminine qualities of joy, love, tenderness and self sacrifice on a path of true knowledge derived from the spiritual heart. The spiritual rebirth of the individual is not unlike the trial and tribulation of physical childbirth, according to the Sufis. They take the principle of divine love and use it to facilitate the process of alchemical transformation from mundane human to spiritual being. Sophia is the mystical companion, which belongs to no race or religion exclusivly: ‘My place is the placeless, my trace is the traceless. ‘Tis neither body, nor soul, for I belong to the Soul of the Beloved.’40 Certainly, the Divine Feminine is so marginalized in Islam, that one might be forgiven for believing it to be totally absent.Both Mary and Fatimah are reverenced within esoteric Islam, for they are both mothers of the Logos, the Word. Fatimah inherits the role of Spenta Armaiti, within Shi’ism, for she is the mother of a lineage of imams. She is seen as symbolic of the ‘supracelestial earth.’ She is considered to be the source of the imam’s wisdom because she is lawh mahfuz or ‘the hidden tablet; upon which God has written.’ One of her titles in Ismaeli Shi’ism is Fatimah Fatir, or Fatimah the Creator, which recalls the Sophia Ergane of Proverbs.The nature of both the Black Goddess and Sophia are brought out in Islam. The exoteric fulminations about women, so similar to those found in Christianity and Judaism are, of course, negative polarizations of the devouring Goddess, yet this exists side by side with the positive image of the Ka’ba, Islam’s Black Madonna, preserves the veiled tradition of Sufism.
The Peacock Angel and Sufi’s Iblis
PeacockAngel
Considered a mystery by Orientalists, the Cult of the Snake and Peacock in Iraq was founded on the teaching of a Sufi Sheikh, Adi, son of Musafir, in the twelfth century, although they date their origin back 6,000 years or more.The Yezidi faith is syncretic and combines elements of Judaism, Christianity, Sufism, Manichaeism and the Persian Zoroastrianism faith in parallel and selectively.
In Arabic, ‘Peacock’ also stands for ‘adornment’; while ‘Snake’ has the same letter-form as ‘organism’ and ‘life’. Hence the symbolism of the cryptic Peacock Angel Cult—the Yezidis—is a way of indicating ‘The Interior and the External’, traditional Sufi formula. The Cult has adherents in the West, but was largely unknown, before CNN put the spotlight on them, because of their recent persecution (together with the Christians).
In the Gnostic tradition (in which both Yezidi and Sufism have some roots), the Peacock Angel is analogous to the first son of the Goddess Sophia, who in the process of creating and governing the universe divided herself into seven rays or “sons.” Her seven sons were coeval with and governed one of the seven colors, tones, planets, etc. The peacock was the first form of the Supreme God and one of the Seven Great Angels, named Tawsi Melek or Melek Tawus (the Ildabaoth of the Gnostic’s).
Aroused snake by the entrance to a Yezidee-temple. It is blackened by soot.
However the Angel’ other name — Shaytan — means “devil” not only in Arabic, even in German Scheitan means Satan. Therefore Yezidi, have often seen as Devil worshippers, also through the manifestation the Peacock Angel as as a snake. This is analogous with the gnostic understanding of the Serpent on the Tree in the Garden of Eden – interpreted in Christianity as Satan. Furthermore, because to the connection to the Sufi Iblis tradition, some equate the Peacock Angel with their own unredeemed evil spirit Satan. Iblis is a supernatural being — either a fallen angel or a diabolical fiery creature known as a jinn. In his disobedience against God and his role as tempter of mankind, again resembling the rebellious Satan in the Christian tradition. In fact, they are more remnant of pre Christian religion: the peacock angel being the mysterious Phoenix. The picture above shows an aroused snake by the entrance to a Yezidee-temple. It is blackened by soot. Yezidees (today almost a million believers) think, that in the last judgement the devil will be reconciled with God, and even play an important role in the final judgement of man.
Mary – Sufism’s divine mother
Mary – Divine Mother Maria-Hilf-Kirche. Murnau was the chosen residence of the famous painters – Blaue Reiter
Mary, mother of Christ, is regarded as the most marvelous of all women, a high adept and living example of the pure and holy life. Later commentaries describe Mary as an intervening force between God and humanity. When Muhammad retook Mecca, he removed many frescoes and images from Kaaba, that he considered inauspicious but he specifically left on the walls a fresco of the Virgin Mary and her child.
In one of the most powerful Hadiths ( prophetic sayings of Muhammad) it is reported that Muhammad said, “Paradise is at the feet of the Mother”. Muhammad was escorted by the archangel Gabriel (a masculine force) but the vehicle upon which he rode was the Buraq, a white horse with wings and the face of a woman, clearly suggesting a symbol Goddess or Divine Mother.
A Sufi Ode to the Divine Mother
On the face of the earth there is no one more beautiful than You Wherever I go I wear your image in my heart Whenever I fall in a despondent mood I remember your image And my spirit rises a thousand fold Your advent is the blossom time of the Universe O Mother you have showered your choicest blessings upon me Also remember me on the Day of Judgement I don’t know if I will go to heaven or hell But wherever I go, please always abide in me.
While Sophia has noteworthy archetypal qualities, she lacks in some of the most virtuous aspects. Within the areas they lack in virtue and morality, the Virgin Mary, who is from Christian religions, make up for them. The Virgin Mary is the mother of Jesus, the Son of God. Mary is not the wife of God though. She was chosen by God to give birth to Jesus. “And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bring forth a Son, and shall call His name Jesus” (Luke 1:31). Mary represents everything good in the world. She has never been touched and is clean and pure. The Virgin Mary represents the woman that man wants. “She will conceive…a Son”. Mary is the subservient to man. She is not represented with any symbols, excepts for her pureness. She does not have any mystical powers, except for her conception of child without sex. The Virgin Mary is represented as a woman that has been graciously touched by God himself, and gives birth to the Messiah, Jesus Christ. Yet she is still a “handmaid of the lord”(Luke 1:38). The church, the creator of this story, was apparently concerned with the idolization of the Virgin Mary and wrote:
God came down from heaven, the Word clothed Himself with flesh from a holy Virgin, not, assuredly, that the Virgin should be adored, nor to make her God, nor that we should offer sacrifice to her name, nor that, now after so many generations, women should once again be appointed priests…Let no one adore Mary. (Epiphanius 49)
Here we can see man coming into the monotheism, where Christian belief is today. The Virgin Mary does represent a mother archetype, although it is not as prevalent as Demeter and Isis. Mary’s character is more housed, in a way that can be controlled and can be put into guidelines. Just as times before, man wants what he can not have. In Mary’s case, the forever virgin.
Man needs to realize that men and women are different, and each has wonderful traits. Though many of these archetypes are brought on by the unconscious mind, which is the portion of one’s psyche which is outside of awareness, those thoughts should be left at the realization that they are thoughts. These goddess or mother archetypes are brought into our societies to teach man and woman the values in each other. To restore balance in one’s lives. Demeter, she helped to explain strange occurrences in Greece as well as reveal the importance of woman’s traits to give life. Isis, she kept the Egyptian nation strong and united during her reign by being everything at once. Mary, she has had mercy brought into the Christian beliefs against the sometimes stern male God. All three characters are important throughout history, and have managed to keep their legends alive.
Conclusion
The West is, as Herrman Hesses wrote 1920 in “The Longing of Our Time for a Worldview”. We, in the West, “understand” Sufism, like the group of blind men (or men in the dark) who touch an elephant to learn what it is like. Each one feels a different part, but only one part, such as the side or the tusk. They then compare notes and learn that they are in complete disagreement. Some see Sufism as Neo-platonic, some connected with Manicheanism, some see Sufism as heretic Christianity and others as Persian sect (the latter three all may be interpreted as Gnosticism). To me, Idries Shah’s presentation of Sufism as a form of timeless wisdom, that predated Islam makes sense. Sufis are connected with sacred sex and the movement of troubadours; quite a few important Sufi scholars were women. Sufism has often called the concept and denomination to love. Clearly the role of the Divine Feminine, its principle has been described and explored at length in the tradition of Sufism. Sufism emphasizes passionate, mystical and individual adoration of God. Many Sufis (and other mystics in other religions) seek a spiritual union between themselves and the divine principle not unlike that between a child (the Sufi) and his mother (God) or a bride (Sufi) and the husband (God).
Bibliography
Idries Shah The Sufis 1964, Translated 1980 „Die Sufis“, Diederich’s Gelbe Reihe
Philip Jenkins Baylor University, History of Christianity: The Thousand-Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia — and How It Died
“The Other God”. Yuri Soyanov, Yale University Press, 2000
I encountered this fairly good paper and Hesses essay after I finished my article, which also investigated the fact that spiritual Sufi training is very similar to the process of Individuation.
Spiritual Sufi Training is a Process of Individuation Leading Into the Infinite
This paper was presented to the VIII International Conference of the International Transpersonal Association at Davos, Switzerland, Sept 1st, 1983, by Irina Tweedie
A recurring thought in books about The many faces of Jesus is the thought that every time created its own Jesus. Jesus, like the virgin birth, the crucifix and resurrection, is a major symbol in the Jungian sense of the word, an abstract archetype one can fill with our own multiple meanings recognized in very culture, even non-christian. Now if we look for the many faces of Jesus, we may get access to him as a person, scholarly (theologically), from contemporary views, from other main religions, from sworn enemies of any religion and from the father of symbols – C.G. Jung:
Mny Faces of Jesus
Jesus – seen archetypal
Jesus – seen biographical
Jesus – seen as private person
Jesus – seen from masculinism
Jesus – seen from feminism
Jesus – seen from world religions
Jesus – seen from Buddhism
Jesus – seen from Hinduism
Jesus – seen from Islam
Jesus – seen as cultural construct
Jesus – seen from the Egyptian god Aton
Jesus – seen from the Roman Mithras Cult
Jesus – seen from the Roman Isis Cult
Symbols of Christianity
Astronomical interpretation of mystery cults – Astral Religions
Historical evidence of Christianity
Conclusion
The historical Jesus almost gets buried under his construction, even the catholic church rarely refers to him as real historic person in recent writings. Sometimes it seems that Jesus in the Gospel was also such a creation realizing the striking similarity of New Testament symbols with the Egyptian pantheon and myths. Those faces is what this article is all about. The best I have read in that regard about Jesus is from C.G. Jung, so lets start with him. Warning, this is just an essay but a rather lengthy one.
The Faces of Jesus
Jesus – seen archetypal
The Ego, the Self and Jesus – Individuation and Transcendence
C.G. Jung says that humanizing Jesus is a regress, which ultimately leads to Arianism, rejection of trinity and Ebionitism, the idea that Jesus was a human being and not at all divine. This is a view god which is based more on the Old Testament or on Islam than in Christianity. Arianism does believe that Jesus Christ is less divine and is inferior to God the Father. Obviously if you look in the Jesus Wars, the regress in homoiousie is evident, since the early heryes denied the complex divine and human coexistence of the Caledonian Creed.
The gospels are clearly non-historical, painting an image of Jesus, to emphasis his being as human and god, with a particular audience in mind. I dare to say, the Gospels are the earliest and most beautiful faces of Jesus, deliberately created for effect. I think therefore, it is clear that Jesus lived but its historical details are less important than the archetypal symbols he invokes. The gospels already hide his real being behind metaphysical constructs. The whole fertile ground of the Middle East and its religions are already visible creeping up. However, Jesus became an ultimate archetype of the collective unconsciousness in the West and the East as we shall see. C.G. Jung actually saw all attributes of the hero myth in him: strange origin, holy parentage, endangered birth, narrow survival, early maturing, mastering death and separation, miracles, early death, symbolic way of death, postmortem deeds. To Jung the symbolic of the Gospel is a Marriage Made in Heaven : Trinity Finally Becomes a Quaternity. And Jesus is eventually the symbol of the Self and individuation, as I have written here.
Jesus – seen biographical
life of Jesus according to john
I think Jesus became such a strong symbol and archetype, that his biography is less important. Unlike most biographies, the Jesus Christ narrative of the gospels does not begin with his birth, or even with his conception. There are even few hard historical records proofing his very existence, as describe below. Clearly a charismatic movement can’t be started without the leader, so existed. The new archetype of Jesus, created by the gospels and St. John are so strong however, that his life before his preaching does not matter only those last two years. The essence of the powerful Jesus archetype is his death and resurrection. This is the most unique selling prepositions in comparison to other world regions. Another is that there were no heirs, was no real family, it was inconclusive if he had wife and kids, and no priest class based on heritage in Christianity after him. Jesus was an outcast, indifferent to family, money, property or rank.Unusual for the Middle East. It is not true that his followers were only the pure, often they had high ranks – but the attraction was logos the word.
Let’s say the narrative of the gospel are a somewhat trustworthy biography, therefore I like to recollect it very briefly:.
At an early age, Jesus and his family fled to Egypt because an angel warned Joseph in a dream of impending danger. When they returned from Egypt, they settled in Galilee, in the town of Nazareth.Then there is a big gap, only at one point touched by the gospel of Luke. At the age of twelve, Jesus traveled to Jerusalem with Mary and Joseph to celebrate the Feast of the Passover and went missing nut the they found him talking with the priests and teachers. Based on the Writings found in Quaram 1947, one may assume that he belonged and was educated by the desert brotherhood of the Essenes, who lived on the north-west of the Dead Sea.
At approximately 30 years of age, Jesus entered into the public space. John the Baptist had preached of the coming Messiah, preparing the way for Jesus’ ministry. John baptized Jesus. After this, Jesus went into the wilderness for a time of fasting and prayer . Then the devil came to him and tempted him unsuccessfully. Jesus began to preach a message of repentance, and from among his followers hand-picked twelve disciples, or the apostles. The teaching and preaching of Jesus convicted, challenged, or encouraged those who heard it. Jesus performed many miracles of healing and restoration, as well as miracles designed to teach a lesson. Then he provided the way of salvation from sin by way of the ultimate sacrifice, his crucifixion , followed by his resurrection from the dead after three days. The philosopher Karl Jaspers counts Jesus one of the most important men in humanity, together with Buddha, Socrates and Konfuzios. See below, how little we know from the historical Jesus.
Jesus – seen as private person
Nowhere in the gospel there is a hint that Jesus felt uncomfortable with women or vice versa, but quite the opposite. He was not a puritanical asket but almost a free spirit. His attitude towards women in adultery and prostitutes – if some of them were prostitutes indeed at all – was understanding and feeling good about their companionship. Women were free to become his disciples and in general Mk 10.7-8 says: That’s why a man leaves his father and mother and gets married.He becomes like one person with his wife. Then they are no longer two people, but one. If you refer to gnostic or non-religious writing this goes even further. Yale Divinity School dean Harold Attridge asked the question about an erotic relationship recently in a short piece piece prepared in response to The Da Vinci Code based on his interpretation of the Gospel of Philip, one of the codices discovered in the 1940’s in Upper Egypt near the town of Nag Hammadi. The Gospel of Philip has caused quite a stir for several reasons. It says Jesus’ companion (also translated as “consort”) was Mary Magdalen, and that he “loved Mary more than the rest of us because he used to kiss her on the ____ [hole in the text].” Philip also speaks of a “stainless physical union” which has great power. Early scholars translated the ‘union’ phrase as “undefiled intercourse,”. One wonders like many with the French scholar Jean-Yves Leloup, that the Gospel of Philip may speak of actual intercourse, and not the ritual kiss that “passes the peace.”
Jesus – seen from masculinism
Confusede? Jesus seen from masculinism -PsychologyToday
No, I didnt’ make up the word. There has to be a balancing between the masculine and feminine energy in Christianity. That is why feminism is a dead end: because they cannot give up what some have called “feminist dualism”. Having said that clearly the Vatican and Christianity owes women their impact as a world religion. “I and my Father are One” – says Jesus…..what does this mean? It explains more than the Trinity and Caledonian Creed: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. They are all One yet they are separate as well. It als means, God is the Father, Jesus is His Son, and both feel good about this. Today most sons (and often fathers) say, “I and my Father are Not One – we are at variance or at odds “. This is a problem of the industrial revolution, but even before, the Catholic Church did well with Mary. I mean here Holy Mary but also Mary Magdalene. Lets face i,t the love of mother is perceived as unconditional, whereas father’s love was always connected with an important fact of socialization – conditional love. Today the father imago is created almost exclusively by mothers or hostile media. But the Catholic church, depicting Jesus as innocent blue eyed nice guy did not help either. The Church discarded the Shaman energy discard mal energy, still found in the fraternity of monks with the power to proselytise. Jesus thought highly of John the Baptist, the Wild Man. Only after he had been imprisoned he went North to found his movement.
I mean really, much of Church teaching is alien to a dualistic (gnostic) understanding like God/Satan, good/evil, sacred/profane, pater/nun. In Jesus one would think, there would also be ‘masculinism’ to counter balance ‘radical feminism’ but certaily also a male only hierarchy, todays pharisees. A lot of they published opinion on that, however, is not Christian, it’s not very Catholic either, but just profane voices out of the spiritual void to undermine Jesus’ one Holy, Catholic, Apostolic and not only the indeed very female Church. I have my doubts, we will ever get a sermon from Pope Francis denouncing radical feminism. I suspect the fact that will ever happen is the biggest proof radical masculinism is alive and well in the Roman Catholic Church.
Jesus – seen from feminism
Feminism
Contemporary feminism believe that the “true” history of Jesus – without idolatry – will decide, if an own feminist religion must be constructed or a feminist Christianity may evolve. Obviously the have a problem with Jesus as a man and perceive especially priesthood as patriarchical relict. Pagan myths of the goodness who rests the dead hero in her lap are projected to historical women from Mary Magdalene. Taking the gospel as history, indeed Many of Jesus’s followers were female. They were not included in the 12 apostles, but the community surrounding him was far larger than that. Women were also among his key supporters. I find myself in an interesting tension. I think overtly feminist views, especially those of the atheist-feminist circles miss the point but I do see may see as a shift from early Christianity towards a patriarchal religion.
Jesus – seen from world religions
Jesus – seen from Buddhism
After individuation, or the suffering and the death of the Ego (the I) on the cross, we reach our self. A Buddhist might say, welcome, we already here, we don’t even know the concept of Ego. It seems therefore the Cruzification must be disturbing for Buddhists.
Jesus – seen from Hinduism
Hinduism sees Jesus as a teacher, as the understand the relation between god and human an individual matter. This personal experience of one’s relationship with God is considered authoritative, for some, even more so than scripture. As an other religion, Hindus see the figure of Jesus Christ through the categories of their own world view. Time is not seen by Hindus in linear terms but in cyclical terms. As a human being one is subject to the round of birth, death and rebirth called samsara. The manner of one’s rebirth is governed by one’s karma.Two further issues must be considered. It is believed that from time to time God incarnates, particularly when evil seems to be gaining the upper hand within the world. So Jesus is seen as:
Moral Teacher: Jesus is a great man and true guide to God
Incarnation: Jesus is as one with God and humankind’, stressing ‘divine humanity and absorption into God.
The Unbound Christ: Jesus is not bound by Christian dogma, or Western Church’s tradition, not bound by formulations which restrict, nor bound to that institutions.
Jesus – seen from Islam
Islam sees Jesus, as said before as a mere messenger and lesser prophet. They doubt that he died on the cross (Jusuf Ali’s translation):
“We killed Christ Jesus the son of Mary, the Messenger of Allah”;- but they killed him not, nor crucified him, but so it was made to appear to them, and those who differ therein are full of doubts, with no (certain) knowledge, but only conjecture to follow, for of a surety they killed him not.”
St. John Damascene’s critique of Islam was contesting Muhammad’s Arianist contention that only the appearance of Jesus was crucified, not the actual body of Jesus. “In Dante’s Inferno, Canto XXVIII puts Muhammad and Ali in the Circle of the Schismatics, not that of Heretics. The angel slashes at the damned schismatics to symbolize their tearing of the Body of Christ. Meanwhile, quite a few levels higher up, the heretics are interred alive in flaming coffins. Islam is seen from Christians as a heresy, and a recrudescence of Arianism as well as a weird forerunner of Jesus in feminism (which also denies the incarnation), but is reckoned a schism in the Inferno.
This issue somewhat different with Shiites and quite different with Sufism, who refer to Jesus as wise ascetic man with secret knowledge.
Jesus – seen as cultural construct
Jesus as cultural Construct
There is a Peter Joseph’s Internet film series, Zeitgeist, which asserts that Jesus never existed and is in fact a mythical character, in a Jungian sense a symbol (derived of collective archetypes), based on the Egypt sun god Aton. Some of what the Internet film asserts , essentially a New Age product, is true. Unfortunately, this is mixed with material that is only partially true and much that is plainly and simply bogus. He sees all the motifs and characters of the New Testament as coded astrological or solar references. The argument that Jesus was a mythical construct has been made and nowadays often commercially motivated — there are a number of people claiming that the accounts of Jesus as recorded in the New Testament are simply myths borrowed from pagan folklore, such as the stories of Osiris and Mithras. The claim is that these myths are essentially the same story as the New Testament’s narrative of Jesus Christ of Nazareth. As Dan Brown claims in The Da Vinci Code, “Nothing in Christianity is original.” To discover the truth about the claim that the Gospel writers borrowed from mythology, it is important to (1) unearth the history behind the assertions, (2) examine the actual portrayals of other gods being compared to Christ, and (3) expose any logical fallacies being made. The claim that Jesus was a myth or an exaggeration originated in the writings of liberal German theologians in the nineteenth century.
They essentially said that Jesus was nothing more than a copy of popular dying-and-rising gods in various places— Mesopotamia, Syria, Asia Minor, and he trinity of Isis, Osiris and Horus in Egypt and asserted that there is no evidence for a historical Jesus. I am Christian, but I think this misses the point. The thesis ignores the messianic/apocalyptic aspects of the New Testament writings, that indeed a charismatic person is needed to kindle a spiritual movement. Religions are ritualized spiritual systems, but also cultural constructs which influence each other. Successful religions utilize archetypes and symbols, often consciously or unconsciously borrowing of each other like great artists. In the book – The lost history of Christianity – Philip Jenkings provided many insights of the Eastern Christians, particularly since he makes clear, that also religion history is written by the victor or winner. Religions deteriorate, vanish or die. Religions get killed and when that happens they leave ghosts or vanish without traces.That is very evident in the short-lived cultural revolution, which led to the worship of Sun God Aton and it failing after twenty years. This first attempt to a monotheistic religion also did not come out of thin air, but as I have written most likely from Syria in “Jungian archetypes of Nefertiti and the Heretic Pharaoh Akhenaten”. I suggest strongly, the gospel writers knew and learned from this failure. The gospels always had a target audience in mind.
Jesus – seen from the Egyptian god Aton
Aton
Akhenaten, the pharaoh who carried out a religious revolution which, for a period of about twenty years, replaced the age-old beliefs and practices of the Egyptian religion of about 2000 god and goddesses in human, composite or animal form for one single abstract concept – the sun (Aton). He did away with an elaborate and powerful system of priests, temples, and iconic images in particular with Amun the god of all gods. Its priests were at that time almost as powerful (and rich) as the Pharaoh. Akhenaten alone was the mediator to god and asked to be worshiped, actually with his wife as holy family. He was the son of Aton. Akhenaten, the new capital with temples was built from scratch, like Brasilia, but Akhenaten lasted only 20 years and almost destroyed the Egypt empire.
“O Sole God beside whom there is none”.
Akhenaten has often been brought in connection with Jesus and more often Moses. The worship of idols (symbols of transcendence) eases and ends with with pure monotheism. Strict monotheism prohibits images , rejects any magical acting ceremony and puts the emphasis on the writing and worldly ethical requirement as gods law without constraints of idolatry. The murder of God , also known as parricide , is the main subject in Freud’s Moses and Monotheism religion – the historical truth of religion. Moses is, according to Freud , ” the creator of the Jewish people ” (IX , p 553 ), and he explains this as follows: Moses himself was an Egyptian living in Egypt who imposed to a Jewish ethnic group the already banned again monotheism of Akhenaten as their own religion. Then, he led this people (shortly after Akhenaten’s death ) out of Egypt.
Jesus – seen from the Roman Mithras Cult
mithraic-communion
I recently attended a lecture of an Mithras expert. He explained, that mainstream scholarship speaks of at least three Mithras: Mitra, the Vedic god; Mithra, the Persian deity; and Mithras, the Greco-Roman mysteries cult. There was, however, always a problem with Cumont’s assumption that the Mithraic mysteries derived from ancient Iranian religion, the iconography in ancient Iran was different from the primary fact of the Roman Mithraic cult.lSince the 1970s, scholars have generally argued against Cumont’s master narrative of east-west transfer. whereas recently now render a revised Cumontian scenario of east-west transfer including Armenian religion.
The important icon in the Roman cult was the tauroctony. This scene shows Mithras in the act of killing a bull, accompanied by a dog, a snake, a raven, and a scorpion; the scene is depicted as taking place inside a cave like the mithraeum itself. If the god Mithras of the Roman cult was actually the Iranian god Mithra, we should expect to find in Iranian mythology a story in which Mithra kills a bull. However, the fact is that no such Iranian myth exists: in no known Iranian text does Mithra have anything to do with killing a bull. Franz Cumont, the major expert in the twentieth century had responded by pointing to on an ancient Iranian text in which a bull is indeed killed. However, in 1971 in the course of a Congress Cumont’s scholars at the Congress hypothesized that the Roman cult of Mithras was actually a new religion, and had simply borrowed the name of an Iranian god in order to give itself an exotic oriental flavor. A dam was broken in regards the study of the Mithraic mysteries, its pictorial may not be based on the Iranian myth, but rather something utterly different: namely, an astronomical star map and the cult an new astral religion, for soldiers of the declining Rome as Rober Tucan pointed out.
As one of the competing cults in the second century, Mithraism has been compared to Christianity, pointing to numerous similarities. It should be kept in mind that if elements from Roman, Armenian and Persian Mithraism were utilized, not as a whole ideology but as separate items, that is a very usual behavior of religions, which utilize and occupy archetypes in Jungian sense to prevail. Thus, the following list represents possible independence of Christianity and Mitra/Mithra/Mithras cult.
The Roman Mithra cult has the following in common with the Jesus character:
Mithras was born on December 25th of the virgin Anahita.
He had 12 companions or “disciples.”
He performed miracles.
He ascended to heaven.
The Roman Mithra cult has the following similarities with Christianity:
Mithras represents the “Way, the Truth and the Light,” the Redeemer, the Savior, the Messiah.
He is described as “hears all, sees all, knows all: none can deceive him.”
His sacred day was Sunday.
The Roman Mithra cult had a rite similar to the eucharist meal.
Mithraism had a sort of baptism although with ritual blood.
The Roman Mithras cult has many other attributes not common with Christianity, particularly its central mythical secret, Mithra slaying the bull.
Jesus – seen from the Roman Isis Cult
The cult of Isis was the opposite of the “men religion” of Mithras. As we see later, Jesus bears similarity with Horus, whereas Isis clearly had influence on the archetype of the Holy Mary in Christianity. The cult of Isis entered around the Egyptian deities Isis and Osiris is very likely brought to Rome under Marcus Antonius. It had a popular following up until the fourth century AD, but as Christianity took a firmer hold was completely eliminated by the sixth century. The central image of the cult concerned the myth of the death and rebirth of Osiris. While the rituals of the cult remain a mystery even today, we do know that in the initiation ritual the initiate experienced symbolic “death” and “rebirth,” purified by the Goddess Isis. The cult mainly concerned itself with concepts of material sacrifice (such as fasting and donations of wealth), and rituals involving symbolic death and the revelations of cult secrets. Unlike other mystery religions, there were both yearly rituals and daily services. Rodney Stark suggests that the cult of Isis was the largest competitor for Christianity in the Empire, especially concerning the inclusion of women as priests and worshipers equally. I will go in the next chapter in the details of iconography of the Virgin Mary which often bears similarity to Isis, and Isis’ titles such as the “Queen of Heaven” a reference to the Virgin still used. Finally, Osiris’s promise of eternal life (through his sacrifice) for his followers has clear parallels to early Christian understandings of Christ.
Symbols of Christianity
Christ and Trinity
Certainly Christianity combined a bit of religious syncretism with quite unique selling propositions (see “Isis, Mithras and Jesus: Clash of male and female Archetypes in classical Rome“. All religions did that and some are only cut and past or heretical offshoots. Certainly the Egyptian culture has influenced much of the world over a period of centuries and millennia. The Egyptian religion was, like that of many cultures, polytheistic and pantheistic at the same time and for a brief period even henotheistic, often referred as first attempt to a monotheistic belief system. Religions are based on myths and beliefs, hence must be based on archetypes.
A scholarly fashion claims that only by coincidence Christ and not the Egyptian Isis or the Persian Mithras gained the upper hand as a world religion. There is some truth in it, but also an utter disregard of the attractiveness of Christianity at that time and uniqueness of its offering. A globalized Roman Imperia created a market of religions. Furthermore the exclusive – or shall I say smart – Christian religious offerings took in account the Romans’religious preferences and the weaknesses of the many competing religions and cults. Its explosive growth was supported by a successful sociological approach and a savvy management style – strategic global, acting locally but centralizing its control over teachings. But most of all on powerful symbols and archetypes. So let us in this article analyze Jesus’ many faces, using Jungian methodology of symbols and archetypes.
The cross
The first assertion which can be made is, that the cross – was a known symbol of Quaternity, explained here, and not only a representation of the instrument of Jesus’ execution. The Christian cross probably represents a melding of the real crucifix shape with the solar cross as a bit of religious syncretism. The cross has been always a symbol of the four cardinal directions and the four winds. Hence, the solar associations of the cross, calls on another archetype as symbol of the Crucifixion. That’s true enough but falsifies nothing.
The resurrection
When it comes to Egyptian sources of the Christ myth, the Isis/Osiris/Horus myth, by Plutarch, goes as follows: Set, the evil brother of the good Osiris, murders that god and cuts his body into 14 pieces. Isis, the wife of Osiris collects and reassembles the pieces, minus one, the phallus (such thirteen the unlucky number). She copulates – without phallus – with the dead god in the form of a bird, conceives Horus and gives birth to him and let him raise in secret. Osiris becomes resurrected from the dead, although only as God of the underworld. When Horus comes of age he does battle with his uncle Set. The physical resurrection of Osiris, even though it is in the underworld, is a significant precursor to Jesus as a dying and rising god, found in many other Indian, Asian and classical myths. Surprisingly, Joseph fails to mention this bit of classical mythology. Horus being born and nursed in the rushes of an island in the Nile is an important parallel to the infant Moses being found among the rushes. The underworld and hell is an old construct.
The virgin madonna
isis-and-nursing-horus the child (black maddonna)
However, besides the resurrection of Osiris, there are other parallels between the Egyptian myth and the New Testament like the – sort of – virgin birth. Isis with the dead body of Osiris prefigures the imagery of the Pieta. More importantly, Christians definitely took over the imagery of Isis and the infant Horus in the form of the Madonna and child. Certainly, the virgin birth and the elevation of the Virgin Mary in the Gospel of Luke reflects pagan influences on the Christ myth, which can be seen in the Lucan Nativity and which sharply contrast to the messianic/Davidic kingship motifs of Matthew. As previously noted. Luke’s Nativity seems to be based on Egyptian panels from Luxor dating to the 18th dynasty and the reign of Queen Hatshepsut.
The panels from Luxor depict the mother of Hatshepsut being told she will bear the divine child. Next, the god Amon-Ra consorts with Hatshepsut’s mother. Then the divine child (Hatshepsut) is adored by gods and mortals. This is probably the source of Luke’s Nativity. Mary is told by the angel Gabriel she will bear the divine child. The Holy Spirit overshadows her. Then angels and mortals (shepherds) adore Jesus. Copulating with Amon Ra was part of the standard Egyptian royal myth of each Pharaoh. Amon Ra, taking his father’s mortal form to have sexual relations with the Pharaoh’s mother here even more important because Hatshepsut, a rare female Pharaoh had to prove rank and heavily decent, because as a female, she was assumed to have ordinary mortal origins.
Christ birthday
The December 25 — is significant, but Mithra in his solar aspect as Sol Invictus (Latin for “Unconquered Sun”). The reason Mithra/Sol Invictus was born on December 25 was that in the Roman calendar of that day, that was the Winter Solstice, the 24-hour period having the fewest number of daylight hours. True, Christianity had a nasty habit to hijack pagan holiday, so the birthday of Mithra as a way of occupying a rival’s holiday.
The three magi
Furthermore there is one astronomical event the Christ myth. This is obvious with the magi following the star in the Nativity story of Matthew. In the original Greek of the New Testament, what is translated as “wise men” is magi, that is, Zoroastrian holy men. The Greek word magos is the source of our words mage, magic and magician. Second, Matthew nowhere says how many magi came to Jerusalem. So where did we ever get the idea there were three of them? Also, if they were actually following a star, it would have led them directly to Bethlehem. The star doesn’t actually lead the magi until they have been told by Herod’s scribes to go to Bethlehem. Only then does the following happen (Mt. 2:9–11). It is in these three gifts, along with the eastern origin of the magi, that we see the key to the actual myth in Matthew’s Nativity, which is political. Throughout Mathews Nativity account, the gospel’s author takes great pains to find fulfilled prophecies showing Jesus to be the messiah of the Davidic line of kings. He is born in Bethlehem because that was David’s home town, and Jesus must be born there to fulfill the prophecy in Micah 5:2, which the chief priests and scribes quote to Herod when the magi ask where the baby is that is born to be king of the Jews (Mt. 2:5, 6). So Bethlehem’s mythic associations have to do with Davidic kingship, not astrology. The three gifts also reflect Davidic kingship, since the Queen of Sheba gave King Solomon rich and kingly gifts (1 Kings 10:10). These included a great quantity of gold and, by implication, since Sheba, or Saba was located in modern Yemen, at the southern end of the Red Sea, frankincense and myrrh. Sheba, or Saba, in Yemen is at the southern end, the point of origin of an ancient caravan route that stretched from Yemen to Damascus called the “Incense Route,” since what was traded from the southern end of the Red Sea were two forms of incense, frankincense and myrrh. Thus, the infant Jesus received from the magi the same gifts given to Solomon by the Queen of Sheba.
The passion myth
Easter in the Passover season was probably originally a festival of first fruits, that is, a seasonal, agricultural festival relating to rebirth. However, Jewish seasonal festivals relating to a cyclic view of time were recast in messianic, apocalyptic terms as historical and related to a linear concept of time. In the case of Jewish belief, I believe it’s safe to say that the linear, historical view effectively eclipsed the original seasonal festival. Since the Christian Passion and Resurrection narratives reintroduce a dying and rising god meme into the holiday, the layering of Easter becomes far more complex. Easter blends apocalyptic messianism, emphasizing Christ’s death and resurrection as the critical turning point in God’s war with Satan, and portraying Jesus as the culmination of Israel’s hopes and dreams, with the dying and rising god motif, and the promise to Christians that they, too, would transcend death. It must also be remembered that the cult of Isis and Osiris, which spread through the Roman Empire about a century before the time of Jesus, was not entirely the same as the millennia old Egyptian fertility cult it had originally been. Rather, it was, in all probability, Hellenized and showed some of the refinements of Greek philosophy. As to the sighting of Easter near the time of the Vernal Equinox, we must remember that the Passion is staged during Passover. There is a complex layering here that is lost if we simply relegate Easter to a celebration of the Vernal Equinox.
The Number 12
Jesus having 12 disciples relates more to Jewish Messianism. The 12 disciples relate to the 12 tribes of Israel, which, though they no longer existed as political entities, were important to the extent that Paul could confidently claim to be of the tribe of Benjamin (Romans 11:1). Actually, there were 13 tribes, 12 plus the priestly tribe of Levites. Each tribe originally supported the Levitical priesthood and maintained the central shrine for one month a year. The division of the tribes worshipping Yahweh into 12 divisions may well reflect influences of the lunar calendar.
Jesus’ crown of thorns
Jesus’ crown of thorns, along with most of the specific details of the Passion — his being clothed in a purple robe and given a reed as a scepter, the mocking and scourging by the Roman troops, even his being put to death — were probably elements of the Zagmuku Festival, coming from Babylon after their captivity there (587–538 BC). Elements of this festival are to be found in the entirely fictional Book of Esther and the celebration of the Jewish holiday of Purim.
Astronomical interpretation of mystery cults – Astral Religions
Age of Taurus, Aries, Fish and Aquarius
Aeons of Zodiac
The dawn of Christianity coincided with the Symbol of the fish and its trouble with dawn of Aquarius. When Jung was dying in 1961, age-old and terminally ill from heart problems, his thoughts circled round the Far Eastern practice of the rebirth. Now, so he entrusted friends, he will probably learn shortly what the Self is all about. In 1958 Jung, in a writing with the title “a modern myth”, he had forecast the coming world order in the sign of the Aquarius: “Now we approach”, he announced, “the big change, with the entry of the spring equinox we expect the coming world order in Aquarius” with “secular changes of the collective psyche”. Jung’ assistant , Aniela Jaffé tied it with transition with the (decline) of the Christianity whose symbol is the fish. She claims, that possibly thousand years ago – as the second part of the Pisces sign was touched, the age of the Antichrist begun whose climax we experience right now.
The precession of the Earth and the Great or Platonic Year
The zodiac is a spherical celestial coordinate system. It designates the ecliptic as its fundamental plane and the position of the Sun at Vernal equinox as its prime meridian in 12 equal parts. In astronomy, the zodiacal constellations are a convenient way of marking the ecliptic (the Sun’s path across the sky) and the path of the moon and planets along the ecliptic. The gradual shift in the orientation of Earth’s axis of rotation changes the apparent position of the vernal equinox through all twelve traditional constellations of the zodiac, at the rate of about 2150 years for one of them (called a Great Month) in a full cycle of ca. 26,000 years (called a Great or Platonic Year). We have entered or will enter the Aquarian Age and looks like the beauty of it lies in the beholder.
The edge established between Pisces and Aquarius locates the beginning of the Aquarian Age around the year 2150. C.G. Jung followed interpretation that the Age of Aquarius will begin in AD 1997 but in the Mayan Calendar / Egyptian Cycle of the Phoenix begins AD 21 December 2012. We live indeed in emotional and intellectual disturbed times. .
The reason of the Great Year is an axial precession of the earth similar to the precession of a spinning top due to gravity. The precession of the Earth’s axis has a number of observable effects. First, the positions of the celestial poles appear to move in circles against the space-fixed backdrop of stars, completing one circuit in 25,772 Julian years (2000 rate). Thus, while today the star Polaris lies approximately at the north celestial pole, this will change over time, and other stars will become the “alignment star” for star gazers. Secondly, the position of the Earth in its orbit changes relative to the backdrop of the stars and therefore also the vernal equinox slowly regresses a full 360 degree through all twelve traditional constellations of the zodiac, at the rate of about 50.3 seconds of arc per year.
Modern astronomy aside, all religions and cultures have recognized the vernal equinox for thousands of years. The date is significant in Christianity because Easter always falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal equinox. It is also probably no coincidence that early Egyptians built the Great Sphinx so that it points directly toward the rising Sun on the day of the vernal equinox. The first day of spring also marks the beginning of the Persian New Year in the 3,000-year-old tradition of Zorastrianism. Other important advanced civilisations of the humanity – Maya, Sumerian, Chaldaean, Egypt’s, Chinese etc. – held a similar idea of the change of Aeon’s and interpreted it in religious and mythical traditions . ‘Aeon’ comes from the Greek and means “long time” originally a name of the old Persian eternity God czar’s van akaran (=time without end). In the numerous mystic schools of the later Gnosis, which heavily influence C.G. Jung, “Aeon”, loses this original meaning and defines those long zodiac periods 0f 2150 years.
The areas of the Platonic Year
So every 2150 years, we enter a new Area. As has been shown, the defection the transition into the Aquarius depends on arbitrarily agreed zodiac borders of the constellations, the change the age cannot be defined rationally or exactly. Thus very different times were calculated up to now for the Age of Aquarius. 2012 aligned with the Mayan calendar) and 2146 were given. The latter number arises if one defines the (Western notation) year 1 A.D. or Jesus as a beginning of this Pisces age. C.G.Jung has dated such a change of “Aeons” in his work, hence, on 1997. Lets have a short look to the ages:
Aeons
YEARS
FOCUS
ARCHETYPES
NOTES
1 Age of Aquarius
(AD 2150 to 4300)
Aquarian age will foster in a period of mass consciousness. Furthermore we saw the appearance of dictators, extreme self-expression. Traits of Aquarius such as being ‘humanitarian’ but at the same time ‘unemotional’ may indicate to the emergence of active trans-governmental organisations and global “solidarity” movements. Alternatively, it may indicate individual New Age spiritual awakening.
Aquarius Symbol of Chaos
12 Age of Pisces
(AD 1 to 2150)
Christianity (Monotheism, Spirituality) The Age of Pisces is characterized by the rise of Christianity (founded 1st Century) and Buddhism (founded 6th to 4th Century BC) due to the “spiritual” nature of Pisces to go beyond the boundaries of the physical world.
Fish Symbol of Christianity
11 Age of Aries
(2150 BC to 1 AD)
Old Testament (War and Fire) When Moses descended from the mountain with the ten commandments (c. 17th – 13th century BC, the end of the Age of Taurus), he instructed the worshippers of the golden calve to be killed. Represents Moses “killing” the bull and ending the Age of Taurus, starting his Age of Aries.
Ram Symbol of Jews
10 Age of Taurus
(4300 to 2150 BC)
Earth, Agriculture: This age is notable for theEgyptian and Iranian Empire. Mithra was the Iranian god of the sun, justice, contract, and war in pre-Zoroastrian Iran. Mithras in the Roman Empire during the 2nd and 3rd centuries ad, was honoured as the patron of loyalty to the emperor wit the “slying bull Icon. They personify structure, solidity, stability and attempts at eternity, ‘strength’ but at the same time ‘sensuality’ may be attributed to civilizations such as Ancient Egypt’s and Persians.
Bull Symbol of fertility cults
9 Age of Gemini
(6450 to 4300 BC)
Trading: During this age writing developed, and trade started to accelerate. Both writing and trade (including messaging) are traditional archetypes belonging to the ruling planet Mercury or Gemini. The wheel, is an archetypes associated with it.
Gemini
8 Age of Cancer
(8600 to 6450 BC)
The Age of the Great Mother: Settlements and Farming: The Neolithic Revolution, including the beginning of civilization, with domestication and farming nomadic people settled down to living in permanent dwellings. Cancer is always associated with ‘protection’ by utilizing an external barrier
Cancer
7 Age of Leo
(10,500- 8000 BC)
The Golden Age: De-glaciation of what now constitutes much of the habitable world. Leo is a Fire sign and is traditionally ruled by the Sun.
Leo
6 Age of Virgo
12650 – 10500 BC
End of last Ice Age. Clay Pottery. First intensive hunter-gatherer culture. First agriculture in near East.
5 Age of Libra
13800- 12650 BC
Lascaux cave paintings. Arrival of humans in America across Bering land bridge.
4 Age of Scorpio
14800- 12650 BC
3 Age of Sagittarius
16950- 14800 BC
2 Age of Capricorn
19000- 16950 BC
Christianity as astral religion
According to this scheme the Age of Taurus (the Bull) was ending or had ended when Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt and was being superseded by the Age of Aries (the Ram). This age was, in turn, superseded by the Age of Pisces, in which we live, but which is now winding down. It will soon be followed by the Age of Aquarius, hence the song by the same name from the musical Hair. The blowing of the shofar, specifically a ram’s horn, and other symbols indicate that Judaism came, initially, out of the Age of Aries. Since Christianity came into being at the beginning of the Age of Pisces, fish symbolism is particularly common in the New Testament. Thus Jesus tells the fishermen he recruits (Mark 1:17), “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Thus he feeds the multitude with loaves and fishes, and thus the fish is a Christian symbol. So, was the fish imagery in the New Testament a reference to the Age of Pisces? When Jesus spoke of the “end of the age,” was he referring to the transition from the Piscean to Aquarian age some 2,000 plus years into the future? More maybe than yes. First we must assume that the story of the golden calf in Exodus refers, as it would seem, to general idolatry. Fish certainly are major images in the New Testament. Yet so are olive trees, fig trees, sheaves of grain, and, particularly, sheep and lambs.
Mithras cult as astral religion
Mithräum Nida (Frankfurt a. M. – Heddernheim)Ärchaologisches Museum Frankfurt am Main
The astromical explanation of the tauroctony is based on two facts. First, every figure found in the standard tauroctony has a parallel among a group of constellations located along a continuous band in the sky: the bull is paralleled by Taurus, the dog by Canis Minor, the snake by Hydra, the raven by Corvus, and the scorpion by Scorpio. Second, Mithraic iconography in general is pervaded by explicit astronomical imagery: the zodiac, planets, sun, moon, and stars are often portrayed in Mithraic art (note for example the stars around the head of Mithras in the carving of the tauroctony illustrated above); in addition, numerous ancient authors speak about astronomical subjects in connection with Mithraism. In the writings of the Neoplatonic philosopher Porphyry, for example, we find recorded a tradition that the cave which is depicted in the tauroctony and which the underground Mithraic temples were designed to imitate was intended to be “an image of the cosmos.” Given the general presence of astronomical motifs in Mithraic art and ideology, the parallel noted above between the tauroctony-figures and constellations is unlikely to be coincidence but of course a coincidence is never a proof in history.
Historical evidence of Christianity
“The Age of Freedom” and political implications
As I said before, the historical Jesus became meaningless but certainly is attractive. The cynical view history – the story of the past, told at present for present purpose has never been so true, The mentioned movie Zeitgeist asserts that Christianity was, in fact, developed by the Romans as a means of social control. He cites the Council of Nicaea in 325 as the beginning of it. I would say the Romans tolerated Christianity as they considered it politically harmless, that is true and it had followers in high ranks. However who wants to understand, why academic Europeans turned to Indian gurus in the sixties and a sacral religion of supra-nationalism today, should rather read Jung than Freud; Jung is a precursor of that capitalism and civilisation criticism which becomes more than valid in view of the menacing economic and spiritual disasters of literally dying societies.
Though there are no parallel verses to this in the New Testament, it also proclaims the imminent end of the world (John. 5: 28, 29):
Do not marvel at this, for the hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his [Jesus’] voice and come forth, those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of judgment.
Secularism in the West and not bring enlightenment but a soft totalitarian Socialism in partnership with the New World Order of the “Masters of the Universe”. Presumably before the start of the current global mess and violence, the age of the Aquarius promises an era of nonconformity and individualism defined by qualities like tolerance, openness and a non-egalitarian but elitarian world bourgeoisie. I don’t think elitarian is a word, but more feudalism and hidden goals. Hence, the Aquarius Age by worldwide interlinking and globalisation it creates the base to centralize the problems of the humanity worldwide essentially in a post democratic way but there is also a decentralized counter movement. The New World Order or the emergence of a totalitarian trans-national government seem more likely than the anticipated new human millennium the musical anticipated.
A not so secretive power elite with a globalist agenda will eventually rule the world through an authoritarian world government— replacing sovereign nation-states—and an all-encompassing propaganda that ideologizes its establishment as the culmination of history’s progress. Numerous historical and current events can be seen as steps to achieve world domination through financial powers and manipulated decision-making processes. Pope Francis urged the world on 2014 to shed its apathy in the face of what he characterizes as a third world war, intoning “war is madness”, The pope said “even today, after the second failure of another world war, perhaps one can speak of a third war, one fought piecemeal, with crimes, massacres, destruction.” Pope Francis said also these wars are driven by “interests, geopolitical strategies, lust for money and power, and there is the manufacture and sale of arms.”
Both the church and academia have gotten along successfully without the historical Jesus for centuries. The historical Jesus, the human being who walked the roads of ancient Israel, gathered disciples, and was executed by the Romans, is often contrasted with the “Christ of faith,” a supra-historical figure whose presence in the world has enlivened and nourished Christian communities. The latter has always been far more important for most Christians.
Was there a real jesus?
marc-chagall-agape
Many have assaulted on the historicity of Jesus, claiming that, outside the New Testament, there is no indication that Jesus ever existed.
Was there a real Jesus? While the historical evidence is meager, it does exist. In his Antiquities of the Jews, book 20, chapter 9, item 1, referring to the execution of James, Josephus refers to him as the brother of “Jesus, who was called the Christ.” It is quite plain that Josephus didn’t see Jesus as the Christ (Christos, the Greek word meaning “anointed”), he merely recorded that James’ brother was the Jesus who had been called or was alleged to be the Christ .The Roman historian Tacitus said about Jesus early in the second century. Concerning rumors that had spread that Nero had deliberately set fire to the city of Rome, Tacitus says (The Annals of Imperial Rome, Book 1, Chapter 15):
To suppress this rumor, Nero fabricated scapegoats — and punished with every refinement the notoriously depraved Christians (as they were called). Their originator, Christ, had been executed in Tiberius’ reign by the governor of Judea, Pontius Pilatus. But in spite of this temporary setback the deadly superstition had broken out afresh, not only in Judea (where the mischief had started) but even in Rome. All degraded and shameful practices collect and flourish in the capitol.
That Tacitus is obviously a hostile witness makes it much more likely that he accepted Jesus as a real person. Had he reason to suspect he was nothing more than a fabrication, Tacitus would certainly have said so. That author’s claim that Jesus had been executed by Pontius Pilate could only have come from one of two possible sources: Either Tacitus knew this to be true from extant imperial records or he was repeating what Christians themselves had said of Jesus. Were Jesus a mythical character they had invented, they certainly wouldn’t have gone out of their way to invent his being a criminal who had been executed.
Why is there so much attention now to the person of Jesus? Is it part of our interest in people’s private stories, an impulse that multiplies talk shows and sells People magazine? Is it our need to humanize our heroes to make them more accessible? Is it part of the search for roots, and our desire to reclaim our pasts in a way that contributes meaning to our present? Is it simply part of humankind’s enduring interest in religion, which takes many forms, but never really fades? The answer is probably a bit of each.
Truth is the story of the past told at present for present purpose.
In fact, the current wave of books constitutes a third quest for the historical Jesus. The first largely Protestant quest — from the late eighteenth to the late nineteenth century — breathed the air of the Enlightenment, presenting Jesus in utterly rational terms, explaining his miracles as natural phenomena, and depicting him as a teacher of timeless wisdom. It came to a close with Albert Schweitzer’s book, The Quest for the Historical Jesus, published in 1906. He concluded that the historical Jesus must be a “stranger and an enigma.” The Jesus designed by nineteenth-century rationalists never had any existence. Furthermore, what little we could know about this Jesus was irrelevant to theology. Jesus means something to our world because a mighty spiritual force streams forth from Him and flows through our time also,” wrote Schweitzer, “This fact can neither be shaken nor confirmed by any historical discovery.” The current generation of Jesus researchers have similarly bracketed questions of theology.
The second quest was centered in Germany in the 1950s and 60s, led by Ernst Kasemann and others who were influenced by and in reaction to the towering New Testament scholar Rudolf Bultmann, who argued that most the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ life grew out of the mythos of the early church. These scholars argued that Christian theology could not be cut off from history and developed a set of criteria for deciding what is historical in the gospels. Although their existentialist theology now seems dated, many of their rules for assessing historicity continue to be utilized, for example by the current “Jesus Seminar,” a group of scholars re-examining the synoptic traditions and particularly the sayings of Jesus. They have produced The Five Gospels, a work that evaluates the four canonical gospels and the non-canonical Gospel of Thomas for authentic sayings of Jesus.
Despite how often the question of recovering the Jesus of history has been declared hopeless, it has nevertheless generated a vast literature. What distinguishes the latest crop of Jesus scholars from their predecessors is that they understand Jesus within the context of Jews and Judaism in the first century. This generation also has access to more materials. The Dead Sea Scrolls, only recently available to a wide range of scholars, do not mention Jesus, but they do illuminate a brand of apocalyptic thought and expectation alive in the first century. The urgency of the impending apocalypse that John the Baptist and Jesus preached has been muted by 2,000 years of church history, but the Dead Sea Scrolls remind us that many expected the end of the world would be violent and imminent.
In addition to the information from the Qumran materials, recent archaeological finds correspond to details of the Gospel stories of Jesus. The skeleton of a crucified man was discovered in Israel on Giv’at ha Mivtar. His ankle bones were pierced and his legs broken, giving evidence of the nature of Roman crucifixion. In 1990, archaeologists discovered an ossuary containing the bones of Joseph Caiaphas, the high priest who interrogated Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew and is mentioned in the Gospels of Luke and John.
A number of different portraits of Jesus have emerged. Marcus Borg portrays Jesus as a religious ecstatic, a teacher of wisdom and a social prophet, focused on the present. “Jesus’ relation to the Spirit was the source of everything that he was”, Borg claims. Burton Mack describes Jesus as a Jewish Cynic, a popular sage who shocked people into understanding with his sharp and disturbing sayings. Like Borg, he sees Jesus as focused on the present state of the world, a dispenser of timeless truths. Crossan pictures him as a preacher of radical egalitarianism, addressing a peasant society suffering in political and economic straits, offering a message of healing: “You are healed healers, so take the kingdom to others, for I am not its patron and you are not its brokers. It is, was, and always will be available to any who want it.”
As these scholars further hone their theories, certain issues dominate the emerging picture of the historical Jesus:
Jesus preached the kingdom of God, not himself. This kingdom is about God, not Jesus himself, and is on earth. It addresses two main concerns of peasants: bread and death. I am not surprised, that the he historical Jesus and the Jesus of the early church bear little resemblance to one another. Even more tenuous is the connection between the historical Jesus and later Christianity. Contemporary Jesus scholars seem to agree one can be a good Christian without knowing a bit about this Jesus of history. The flesh-and-blood Jesus in the late ’20s of the first century gave way to the reconstructed and interpreted Jesus of the gospels in the 70s and ’80s and was superseded by the “Christ of faith” of the later church. When believers speak of their faith in Jesus, it is this last figure to which they refer.
Jesus’ view of himself also differed widely from the early church’s. Whether he saw himself as the Messiah is debatable, but he almost certainly did not see himself as divine. His followers, and even a non-believer like the Jewish historian Josephus, recall Jesus as a healer, exorcist, and miracle worker. Interestingly, his detractors neither call him a fraud, nor say the miracles were faked, but attribute his powers to Satan or demons.
Except for a few of the women, the bulk of Jesus’ followers abandoned him at the time of his death. Nor did his family seem to support him during his ministry. At one point (Mark 3:20-2 1), they think he is possessed.
Remarkably, Jesus’ death did not mark the end of his movement. His followers continued to believe in his message of God’s Kingdom. Other apocalyptic leaders have arisen throughout the course of Jewish history. When Jesus’ followers, probably in hiding somewhere, heard he was dead, it did not spell the end of his group. Somehow, hope persisted and was transmuted into a force that changed history. Anyone who looks at maps of established churches in the late first, second, and third centuries cannot help but marvel at the rapid spread of Christianity. There are treasons for that: History of Christianity: Success factors and USP’s. The persistence and extraordinary growth of Jesus’ following after his death no miracle. Indeed, the transformation of some disappointed followers of Messianism into a dynamic movement is one of the fascinating stories of history as Rodney Stark has written about in “The Rise of Christianity”
Jesus & Mary Magdalene were ‘married with children,’
Yet another story
I love the stories of Mary Magdalene, no only from a Jungian point of view. That Jesus was a devoted family man with two kids and Mary Magdalene for his wife, new history book always based on an ancient manuscripts claim every other year also 2014.
Claims that Jesus was married have been published before. One of the latest cases was the 2012 discovery of an Egyptian papyrus fragment, which some scholars believed to be the first explicit reference to Jesus being married. There most plausible and enigmatic story is connected with the Cathars. In “A Jungian journey through a land of heretics and Mary Magdalene” I have written a bit of it. The anti-CatharErmegaud deBeziers and Durand de la Huesca wrote that the Cathars secretly taught that Mary Magdalene was the wife or concubine of Christ;and also that she was the woman ‘taken in adultery’ who Christ had saved from the Jews who wanted to stone her. According to his story, after Jesus’ death (or ascend into heaven) she flew and moved to France. Petit Provence is the region in southern France adjacent to Aude andHerault where Mary Magdalene and the others came ashore at St.Maries de la Mer. A painting of Mary Magdalene is at the Church in LesSaintesMaries de la Mer, which is west of Marseille showing the boat carrying Lazarus, Martha, Mary Magdalene and a young girl named Sarah. Also the sister of the Virgin Mary and several others are shown on the boat. Often the jar in Mary Magdalene’s hand signifies the blood of Jesus. Left is the painting of the Crucifixion from the Basilica Sainte-Marie-Madeleine et le Couvent Royal, in St.Maximin. This is where Mary Magdalene was buried. She is shown at the foot of the cross in a very beautiful almost intimate pose.
Sandro_Botticelli_Lamentation over dead ChristSandro_Botticelli_Lamentation over dead Christ _ecerpt Mary Magdalene
From this allegations has arisen something of a conspiracy theory: It has it that knowledge of Christ’s alleged relationship with Mary (and perhaps proof thereof) passed from the Cathars to the Knights Templar. It was to remove the threat of this great secret, potentially damaging as it supposedly was to the Church, that the Catholic establishment suppressed the Templars, a century after the Albigensian Crusade. Although the theory probably has a particular appeal to those with a latent penchant for goddess worship in both cases, eliminating of the Cathars and the Templars was pure politics and greed. Many esoterics have additionally speculated that Mary Magdalene was herself of royal blood, or a priestess of some Isis/Ishtar cult, and that the Cathars and Templars regarded her almost as the embodiment of the feminine aspect of the divine and the personification of holy wisdom (Sophia to the Gnostics). Another theory has Mary and Jesus founding a dynasty, which fused with the Merovingian line.
I saw Mary Magdalene statues or paintings in almost ever church. extensively in Rennes-le-Chateau. It must be remembered that she was a legitimate Catholic Saint. Her supposed relics had been claimed by the Benedictine Monks of Vezelay in Burgundy, Central France. The cult was in evidence there from the mid eleventh century. The abbey claimed that the relics had been brought there centuries before by a monk who had retrieved them from their original shrine near Aix in Provence, where Mary had supposedly been lain to rest after spending 30 years living as a hermit in a remote cave called la Sainte Baume .Mary Magdalene is usually thought of as the second-most important woman in the New Testament after Mary. Mary Magdalene traveled with Jesus as one of his followers. She was present at Jesus’ two most important moments: the crucifixion and the resurrection. Within the four Gospels, the oldest historical record mentioning her name, she is named at least 12 times more than most of the apostles. In the New Testament, Jesus cleansed her of “seven demons”,[Lk. 8:2] [Mk. 16:9].
Conclusion
RENNES-LE-CHATEAU Mary Magdalene
The images of Jesus throughout history are as varied as the people who have embraced him, the Son of God, the Divine Word by whom the world was created, the Passover sacrifice on behalf of the people, the Suffering Servant who takes on the sins of the world, the lesser Prophet, or more recently, Jesus the liberator of the oppressed, the New Age Sun God of the heretic Pharaoh Akhenaten, or a simple tabloid Jesus in love with a woman. The careful reader reader might have noticed, not only in this essay, that I am even fond of the myth around Mary Magdalene. However, each Zeitgeist and generation sees in Jesus a reflection of itself, but the Jesus archetype as cultural pattern C.G. Jung likened to the Self has been alive for 2000 years and is here to stay. That is the essence of C.G. Jung’s archetype, to be in the collective memory, constantly be reborn as symbol. And that is the power Christianity utilized to win and still has. I touched on the lecture about the Roman Mithras cult recently; interestingly almost the complete audience were rather, rather mature women and men. They listened approvingly like they would have done hundred years ago to a sermon, nodding happily on every suggestion that Christianity might have borrowed from Mithras Cult, like this would somewhat invalidate Christianity. However, archetypes are not owned by any religion, every religion uses archetypes in its narrative. They quote each other like another cultural achievement – great art. An exception of the rule is the archetype of Jesus – a god became human, died and became alive again and went to heaven. This archetype is destined to stay, even if after Christianity eases in the mental fog and violent turmoil of radical globalization and neo-feudalism. Religions get created, prosper and die, archetypes transcend history and reality but are stunningly real.
Bibliography
The Other God: Dualist Religions from Antiquity to the Cathar Heresy (Yale Nota Bene), Stoyanov, Yuri
The Cathars: The Rise and Fall of the Great Heresy by Sean Martin
Gnosticism and Early Christianity by R. M. Grant
Jesus Wars Harper, 2010 by Phillip Jenkins
C.G. Jung, Aion Untersuchungen zur Symbolgeschichte
A History of Egypt from the Earliest Times to the Persian Conquest, James Henry Breasted Kindle-Edition
The Religions of Ancient Egypt and Babylonia A. H. (Archibald Henry) Sayce Kindle-Edition
Malcolm Barber & Keith Bate (translators & editors), The Templars: Selected Sources (Manchester Medieval Sources Series, Manchester University Press, 2002)
The Rise of Christianity: How the Obscure, Marginal Jesus Movement Became the Dominant Religious Force in the Western World in a Few Centuries by Rodney Stark
The Lost History of Christianity: The Thousand-Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia–and How It Died by Philip Jenkins
Historia Mundi Volume IV, Lehnen Verlag, Die Kirche zur Zeit der Apostel und Märtyrer
The Cults of the Roman Empire, Robert Turcan
Haskins, S. Mary Magdalene: Myth and meaning, (1993) New York, NY: Riverhead Books
The Cathar religion represents a major medieval resurgence of Gnosticism, and we offer an important collection of Cathar Texts, including the complete manuscript of the Lyon Ritual, Interrogatio Iohannis, and The Book of the Two Principles.
While the Nag Hammadi Library represents the richest source of classical Gnostic texts, many other primary Gnostic documents were discovered in the century prior to the Nag Hammadi find. These are cataloged in the Classical Gnostic Scriptures and Fragments section.
Of associated interest is the Christian Apocrypha and Early Christian Literature, a section containing other important Christian texts surviving outside canonical tradition, some of which manifest Gnostic influence.
The G.R.S Mead Collection contains over a dozen volumes written by G. R. S. Mead (1863-1933), one the greatest early scholars of Gnosticism. These works provide an invaluable evaluation of texts relating to Gnostic tradition available before discovery of the Nag Hammadi collection.
The Nag Hammadi Library, a collection of thirteen ancient codices containing over fifty texts, was discovered in upper Egypt in 1945. This immensely important discovery includes a large number of primary Gnostic scriptures — texts once thought to have been entirely destroyed during the early Christian struggle to define “orthodoxy” — scriptures such as the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Philip, and the Gospel of Truth. The discovery and translation of the Nag Hammadi library has provided impetus to a major re-evaluation of early Christian history and the nature of Gnosticism.
We have add extensive resources on two centrally important texts from Nag Hammadi: The Gospel of Thomas and The Secret Book of John. Multiple authoritative translations of several Nag Hammadi scriptures are included in the collection.
Valentinus and Valentinian Gnosis. Valentinus was one of the most influential Gnostic Christian teachers of the second century A.D., and was the only Gnostic considered for election as Bishop of Rome (Pope). He founded a movement which spread throughout Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. Despite persecution by developing orthodoxies, the Valentinian school endured for over 600 years. A large number of texts in the Nag Hammadi collection are influence by Valentinian tradition. Due to its importance, we have a large section of the library dedicated specifically to Valentinus and the Valentinian Tradition.
The Dead Sea Scrolls Collection
The Dead Sea Scrolls Collection in the Gnostic Society Library is one of the largest and most referenced Dead Sea Scroll resources on the internet. During the middle years of the twentieth century two important but very different collections of ancient religious texts were unearthed in Palestine and Egypt: the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Nag Hammadi Library.
