The Jesus Mysteries
 | This article has multiple issues.Please helpimprove itor discuss these issues on thetalk page.(Learn how and when to remove these template messages)
|
 The cover ofThe Jesus Mysteriesfeatures a gem of Dionysus/Orpheus.[1] | |
| Author | Timothy Freke & Peter Gandy |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Three Rivers Press |
| Publication place | United Kingdom |
| Media type | Hardback |
| ISBN | 978-0609807989 |
The Jesus Mysteries: Was the "Original Jesus" a Pagan God?is a 1999 book by British authors Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy,[2]which advances the argument thatearly Christianityoriginated as aGreco-Roman mystery cultand thatJesuswasinvented by early Christiansbased on an alleged pagan cult of adying and rising"godman" known asOsiris-Dionysus,whose worship the authors claim was manifested in the cults ofOsiris,Dionysus,Attis,andMithras.
The authors propose that Jesus did not literally exist as an historically identifiable individual, but was instead asyncreticre-interpretation of the fundamental pagan "godman" by theGnostics,who the authors assert were the original sect of Christianity. Freke and Gandy argue thatorthodoxChristianity was not the predecessor to Gnosticism, but a later outgrowth that rewrote history in order to make literal Christianity appear to predate the Gnostics. They describe their theory as the "Jesus Mysteries thesis".
Thesis[edit]
Freke and Gandy baseThe Jesus Mysteriesthesis partly on a series of parallels between their suggested biography ofOsiris-Dionysusand the biography of Jesus drawn from the fourcanonical gospels.Their suggested reconstruction of the myth of Osiris-Dionysus, compiled from the myths of ancient dying and resurrected "godmen," bears a striking resemblance to the gospel accounts. The authors give a short list of parallels:[3]
- Osiris-Dionysus is God made flesh, the savior and "Son of God."
- Hisfather is Godand his mother is amortal virgin,7 month pregnancy.
- He is bornin a cave or humble cowshed on 25 December before three shepherds.
- He offers his followers the chance to beborn againthrough the rites ofbaptism.
- He miraculously turns water into wine at amarriage ceremony.
- He rides triumphantly into town on a donkey while peoplewave palm leavesto honor him.
- He dies atEastertimeas asacrifice for the sins of the world.
- After his death hedescends to hell,then on the third day herisesfrom the dead and ascends to heaven in glory.
- His followers awaithis returnas the judge during the Last Days.
- His death and resurrection are celebrated by aritual mealof bread and wine, which symbolize his body and blood.
According toThe Jesus Mysteries,Christianity originated as a Judaized version of the pagan mystery religions.Hellenized Jewswrote a version of the godman myth incorporating Jewish elements. Initiates learned the myth and itsallegoricalmeanings through the Outer and Inner Mysteries. A similar pattern of "Lesser" and "Greater" Mysteries was part of the paganEleusinian Mysteries.Mithraismwas structured around seven serial initiations.
Freke and Gandy suggest that, at some point, groups of Christians who had only experienced theOuterMysteries was an exoteric push under Constantine in the 3rd Century, to align and organize the Roman state religion. Where those who opposed, along with the extensive mass destruction of supporting text, were silenced, with all trace of opposition to the Roman designated state religion destroyed.
Any encountered groups who had retained the Inner Mysteries, whom "Literalist Christians" [as Freke and Gandy] call the "Gnostics”, were discredited and labeled as unorthodox for claiming that what the Literalists considered false knowledge and false initiations, when in all actuality was a prime example role reversal, as the Gnostics, per the Gospel of Thomas, was written and evidence linked establishing the Gnostics earlier in time than the documentation found within the New Testament as we know it.
Freke and Gandy claim that the Literalists won out whenthe emperor Constantinesaw the political merit of 'one empire, one emperor, one god', practically exterminated the Gnostics, and saw to it that 'Literalist Christianity' became the officially-approvedRoman Catholic Churchand its modern descendants.
Reception[edit]
Chris Forbes, an ancient historian and senior lecturer atMacquarie UniversityinSydneyhas criticised the work, noting that Freke and Gandy are "not real scholars, they are popularisers." He calls their arguments about Jesus "grossly misconceived, and their attempt to draw links between Jesus and various pagan god-men is completely muddled. It looks impressive because of the sheer mass of the material, but when you break it down and look at it point by point, it really comes to pieces."[4]
Paul Barnett,a bishop and New Testament scholar who has authored several books on thehistorical Jesus,argues that a good proportion of the citations are out of date. "Like the Gnostics, Freke and Gandy have a mystical mindset and therefore oppose Christianity as grounded in history," he wrote. "They hate the idea that the incarnation of the Son of God and his resurrection could have been a matter of actual flesh and blood and time and place."[4]
When theBBCapproachedN. T. Wright,asking him to debate Freke and Gandy concerning their thesis inThe Jesus Mysteries,Wright replied that "this was like asking a professional astronomer to debate with the authors of a book claiming the moon was made of green cheese."[5]
New Testament scholar and secularagnosticBart D. Ehrman,in a 2007 interview with theFortean Times,was similarly asked for his views on the work of Freke and Gandy. Not having read their work, he responded by commenting on the thesis, "This is an old argument, even though it shows up every 10 years or so. This current craze that Christianity was a mystery religion like these other mystery religions-the people who are saying this are almost always people who know nothing about the mystery religions; they've read a few popular books, but they're not scholars of mystery religions. The reality is, we know very little about mystery religions-the whole point of mystery religions is that they're secret! So I think it's crazy to build on ignorance in order to make a claim like this."[6]In his 2012 bookDid Jesus Exist?,Ehrman, now having actually read the book, addresses many of Freke and Gandy's assertions, demonstrating why they do not hold up to scholarly criticism.[7]According to Ehrman's analysis, most of Freke and Gandy's alleged evidence is either fabricated, the result of gross misinterpretation, or merebald assertionbased on the claims of other writers rather than actual historical evidence.[7]Ehrman concludes, "This is not serious scholarship. It is sensationalist writing driven by a desire to sell books."[7]He also remarks that "In both its detail and its overarching thesis, the book often reads like an undergraduate thesis, filled with patently false information and inconsistencies."[7]He then provides a long list of examples of serious historical errors in the book,[7]as well as places where Freke and Gandy's own arguments contradict each other.[7]
James Hannam has noted that one of the artifacts that the authors rely on, a depiction ofOrpheuson a cross, is a fake.[8]
Author and activistRichard Carrierhas stated thatThe Jesus Mysteries"will disease" a reader's "mind with rampant unsourced falsehoods and completely miseducate". Although Carrier himself supports the view that Jesus was not a real person, he has condemned the viewpoints on "ancient world and ancient religion" presented inThe Jesus Mysteriesas ludicrous and without merit.[9]
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- Notes
- ^Guthrie, William Keith Chambers(1952).Orpheus and Greek Religion.London: Methuen. p. 278.
- ^Maurice CaseyJesus: Evidence and Argument or Mythicist Myths?T&T Clark 2014 FREKE, N.T. and GANDY, L.P. p.17
- ^Freke and Gandy,Jesus Mysteries,p. 5.
- ^abThe Jesus Mysteries - a critiqueArchived21 September 2007 at theWayback Machine
- ^N. T. Wright, "Jesus' Self Understanding", in Stephen T. Davis, Daniel Kendall, Gerald O’Collins,The Incarnation(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004) p. 48 "A phone call from the BBC's flagship ‘Today’ programme: would I go on air on Good Friday morning to debate, with the authors of a new book The Jesus Mysteries? The book claims (so they told me) that everything in the Gospels reflects, because it was in fact borrowed from, much older pagan myths; that Jesus never existed; that the early church knew it was propagating a new version of an old myth; and that the developed church covered this up in the interests of its own power and control. The producer was friendly, and took my point when I said that this was like asking a professional astronomer to debate with the authors of a book claiming the moon was made of green cheese."
- ^Bart Ehrman, interview with David V. Barrett, "The Gospel According to Bart",Fortean Times(221), 2007
- ^abcdefEhrman, Bart D. (2012).Did Jesus Exist?: The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth.New York City, New York: HarperCollins. pp. 25–30.ISBN978-0-06-220644-2.
- ^Hannam, James.The Orpheus Amulet from the cover of The Jesus Mysteries.First published 2006, last revised 2009.
- ^"Ehrman on Jesus: A Failure of Facts and Logic".Archived fromthe originalon 17 January 2016.Retrieved2 January2016.
- Books by Freke and Gandy on the Jesus Mysteries theme
- The Jesus Mysteries: Was the "Original Jesus" a Pagan God?(1999)
- Jesus and the Lost Goddess: The Secret Teachings of the Original Christians(2002)
- The Laughing Jesus: Religious Lies and Gnostic Wisdom(2005)
- The Gospel of the Second Coming(2007)
- Critique
- Reinventing Jesus,Komoszewski et al., Kregel,ISBN978-0-8254-2982-8,(2006)