Do we know whether Jesus was a historical person? If we are honest, we would have to say that we don’t know. We cannot know. The historical data is far too sparse. There is hardly any mention of Jesus as a historical person outside of the Christian sources, and whatever support is found within these Christian sources is indirect at best.

There is also  a plethora of earlier non-Christian mythologies that are closely aligned with the Jesus story. So the Jesus story may be just another in a line of similar mythological stories, all reflecting important inner truths. Or if such a person as Jesus existed, it is likely that the version we have now is highly mythologized and influenced by these earlier stories.

The evidence for Jesus as a historical person would not hold up in a court of law, nor would it be close to convincing in the “hard” sciences.

Yet, most Christians, theologians and historians seem to assume that Jesus was a historical person. Few bring it up even as a topic. Why is it so? Why does it seem to be almost a taboo? A non-topic? Why do some even try to brush it away by calling the possibility of Jesus as a non-historical person a “thoroughly dead thesis” when the historical data is so sparse?

Are they concerned about the implications for Christianity? Are they concerned about questioning assumptions that are shaky in the first place? If so, the solution seems a simple one: Develop - or find - an approach to Christianity that does not depend on Jesus being a historical person. The Jesus story is a powerful story in itself, as a basis for religion, a source for ethical guidelines, and a reflection of an inner process we each may go through in different ways. None of that is dependent on a historical Jesus.

If religion is about truth and honesty, this seems to be one of the first places we need to be honest and truthful.

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The appearance of a shy 24-year-old on a Ukrainian TV talentshow this year has caused a nation to revisit its painful wartime past.
- more in this article from The Guardian

The Oscar-winning documentary film about the successful career and assassination of San Francisco’s first openly gay man to be elected to office.

David Attenborough’s most recent documentary. Well worth watching.

Again, simple on the surface but it has profound implications the more clearly it is seen - and lived.

We are all living our past.

This personality, with all its likes and dislikes, is a product of its history. It is a product of my personal history, that which is more or less unique to this individual. And it is a product of culture, evolution, and how this universe happens to be put together. There is really nothing personal about it. It all comes from somewhere. Anything this human self does has infinite causes, stretching back to the beginning of the universe and out to its widest reaches.

Also, all my stories are based on my past, and these guide how I orient and act in the world now. They are about the past, whether they appear to be about the future, past or present, and I live from them - whether I believe in them or take them as guides only.

There is a great liberation in seeing this, to the extent it is investigated in daily life and in more and more areas of my life.

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What will happen in 2012?

Will the mysterious planet Nibiru enter the local solar system and wreak havoc with Earth?

Will the sun rise in conjunction with the milky way and strange things happen?

Will the completion of the thirteenth B’ak’tun cycle in the Long Count of the Maya calendar coincide with a major shift in collective human consciousness?

Will nothing special happen, proving the folks holding those beliefs as cooks?

2012 - like UFOs and other good projection objects - is fertile ground for exploration.

First, what are the practical effects of taking certain stories about 2012 as true or as guidelines for actions? Do I relate to others and myself differently? Do I become more or less engaged? Do I become more receptive or more entrenched in holding certain perspectives and identities? These stories are just tools anyway, so what type of tools are they and what are the effects of using them?

Then, whatever stories I hold about 2012 or others’ beliefs about 2012, I can find it all right here.

I can notice that it all happens within my own world of images. My own stories about it and what I see in others, the wider world and in 2012 is all happening within my own world of images.

I can find the characteristics and dynamics I see in others, the wider world and in 2012 right here as well. How do they happen right here, as I hold onto these stories? How do they happen in my life otherwise?

I can notice all as happening within and as awakeness.

Another way to explore this is to identify and inquire into my beliefs around 2012 and others holding certain ideas about 2012.

2012 is doomsday. 2012 means a major shift in human consciousness. People who think 2012 is doomsday or means a shift in consciousness are flaky cooks, with little or no grasp on reality and science. I know what will happen. My views are right. I am right, they are wrong.

When 2012 arrives, I can notice what happens whether my expectations are met or not. If my expectations are met, do I take it as proof that I was right all along? That I am better than others? If my expectations are not met, do I try to explain it away? Do I take it as an opportunity for inquiry?

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Since the movie about Max Manus is coming to the theaters in Norway these days, there is a resurgence of interest in the Norwegian resistance during WWII. A couple of things has puzzled me about it. One is why the communist resistance continues to largely be ignored, even after the fall of the Soviet Union and so many years after the war. The other has to do with how the Norwegian resistance is sometimes talked about, as if it had more - or different - impact than it really did. (Not that I am a historian.)

A recent essay in Aftenposten addressed the last issue and led to some controversy.

But it seems that this too doesn’t have to be so complicated.

The Norwegian resistance acted in genuinely heroic ways, giving everything - including often their lives - for a free Norway. Their existence lifted the morale and gave a sense of purpose and hope to many in Norway. And their actions did have an impact, although often local and limited.

It is also pretty clear that their activities were often no more than a nuisance to the occupying forces. Mosquito bites. Not contributing significantly to the outcome of the war. And quite often, the Nazi retaliation against civilians (executions) was predictable and maybe not justified by what the resistance achieved.

As they say in Norway, it is possible to keep two thoughts in the head at the same time. We can greatly appreciate and value their efforts and sacrifices. (If I had lived then, I hope I would have joined them.) And we can also acknowledge that their actions led to needless loss of civilians, and didn’t contribute significantly to the outcome of the war.

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A movie about Max Manus, one of the resistance men in Norway during WWII. My family has a cabin a few hundred feet from one of his hiding places during the war, and I read his books as a kid, so he was one of my childhood heroes. 

Here is an interview with him and Jan Baalsrud from 1951.

Who would have thought that kidney stones could be so entertaining? It is quite an adventure to have one, as I have discovered. And the history of kidney stones is surprisingly interesting as well. It illustrates that you can take any subject, even the most mundane one, and discover how it branches out into some very interesting areas….

The medical history is fascinating. The psychology around pain is rich and meaty. Kidney stones have been a topic in the entertainment industry, as above. And kidney stones have changed the course of history on more than one occasion.

For instance, at the Wikipedia’s Kidney Stone Formers page, we learn that Napoleon III may have lost the Franco-Prussian war due to a kidney stone, and that a vanishing kidney stone is one of the miracles used to promote sainthood for Mother Theresa.

I have enjoyed watching Terry Jones‘ (yes, the Monty Python guy) documentaries about the Crusades, Medieval Lives, and the Barbarians. They are all very well done, and give a different perspective than the traditional historical view, for instance pointing out that the way we see barbarians today is largely Roman propaganda, still effective 1500 years later.

(Watch the Crusades, Medieval Lives and the Barbarians online.)

Another excellent documentary is When the Moors Ruled in Europe, showing how the Renaissance - and what we know as modern European culture - was born out of the Islamic Golden Age. (Watch it here.) Islam and Islamic culture has traditionally been seen as an enemy in Europe, and this is a good antidote to Islamophobia and a way to nuance the picture somewhat.

We all know that history is “often what people want us to think happened” as Terry Jones says. History is constructed by those in power, often to protect their own interest.

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From New York Times today:

JERUSALEM — A three-foot-tall tablet with 87 lines of Hebrew that scholars believe dates from the decades just before the birth of Jesus is causing a quiet stir in biblical and archaeological circles, especially because it may speak of a messiah who will rise from the dead after three days.

If such a messianic description really is there, it will contribute to a developing re-evaluation of both popular and scholarly views of Jesus, since it suggests that the story of his death and resurrection was not unique but part of a recognized Jewish tradition at the time.

Of course, the Jesus story has parallels with not only Jewish myths, but also myths from other earlier traditions of that time and region.

Some examples are given in The Jesus Mysteries by Tim Freke and Peter Gandi where they outline the following parallels of the Osiris-Dionysus and Jesus stories:

• Osiris-Dionysus is God made flesh, the savior and “Son of God.”
• His father is God and his mother is a mortal virgin.
• He is born in a cave or humble cowshed on December 25 before three shepherds.
• He offers his followers the chance to be born again through the rites of baptism.
• He miraculously turns water into wine at a marriage ceremony.
• He rides triumphantly into town on a donkey while people wave palm leaves to honor him.
• He dies at Eastertime as a sacrifice for the sins of the world.
• After his death he descends to hell, then on the third day he rises from the dead and ascends to heaven in glory.
• His followers await his return as the judge during the Last Days.
• His death and resurrection are celebrated by a ritual meal of bread and wine, which symbolize his body and blood.

Why is it so? The obvious answer is that the Jesus myth picked up elements of existing myths to make it more familiar to the people of the time.

But another answer, as Freke and Gandi points out, is that these stories are about an inner truth more than an outer - historic - truth. They reflect an inner process of growing and waking up.

And that is why similar story elements not only appear in traditions of that place and time, but around the world in many different cultures, and also in dreams and visions of people today.

None of this really touch whether Jesus was a historic figure or not. He may well have been, and the specific events of his life may or may not have followed the lines of the Jesus story as we know it today.

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I watched The Giant Buddhas earlier today, a documentary about the Bamyan Buddhas shown as part of our local/international archaeological film festival.

It is a very well made movie, weaving together several different stories and perspectives: A Chinese monk traveling along the Silk Road around year 630. A woman from Kabul visiting the Buddhas that her father has visited in his youth. A family living in a cave between the Buddhas, and then relocated by the current regime. A French archaeologist searching for the location of a 300 meter long reclining stone Buddha in the same valley. An Al-Jazeera reporter who filmed the destruction in 2001.

Some of the information is not so well known in the west, such as the claim that Saudi Arabian engineers were called in and helped with the destruction. And that the destruction of the statues was ordered in response to western money coming in to restore artifacts, instead of as much needed aid to the people of Afghanistan. (It may be just a way to blame the west for something people in the west were upset about, but there could also be a grain of truth in it.)

When I first heard about the destruction in March of 2001, I thought of how well it illustrates the essential teaching of Buddhism - impermanence.

If we really get impermanence, if we see it and feel it, over and over, not only in stories of impermanence but as it happens here now in immediate awareness, there is no foothold for identification within content of awareness. And this invites a shift into Big Mind, into finding ourselves as that which experience happens within, to and as.

Exploring impermanence, thoroughly, over and over, as it happens in the sense fields here now, is one of the many ways to discover what we really are, and probably a sufficient one as well.

Also, it is an invitation for me - and us all - to see what stories we cling to as true, and examine them and find that is already more true for us.

It is a reminder that iconoclasm is maybe not so useful when targeted at artifacts, but has more value and meaning if we target the real icon worship: Taking stories as true. Making a thought - a story, an image - into a God for ourself.

And a reminder that we all are at different places in regards to all of this. Some of us take a modern western view on it, emphasizing the value of culture, art and tolerance. Others take a more fundamentalist view, seeing literal iconoclasm as a pretty good idea. And others again see it as a reminder of impermanence, and of iconoclasm having its value if targeted with some wisdom and applied with gentleness.

And if we want to be practical about it, we see the validity in each of those views, work on ourselves with impermanence and investigation of beliefs, and in the world in trying to prevent these things from happening using whatever - hopefully skillful - means seem appropriate.

Btw: Here is a link to the German version of the movie, although it is also available in English.

Even better than the books!

I just received this comment on one of my previous posts:

I thought you did an excellent job of encapsulating the book. However, as you may have noticed, it is no longer available on amazon.com, as it is Out of Print. The good news is that I am offering History of Mysticism (with some additional text in the Chapter on Gnosticism) as a FREE Ebook in PDF format on my website at:  www.themysticsvision.com. Check it out. And, if possible, please publicise its availability.
Best wishes,
Swami Abhayananda (Stan Trout)

As before, I can highly recommend this book. It is among the clearest and most inspiring books on the history of mysticism I have read, and I am looking forward to reading the new sections on Gnosticism.

And what an honor to receive a comment from the author!

If you would like a copy of the free ebook, send an email with “History of Mysticism” in the subject line to abhayanand [at] aol [dot] com

I started reading The Laughing Jesus today, and have also placed a hold at the library on a few other books by Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy. (Thanks to Peter at the excellent The Seer blog for introducing me to them!)

The book helps differentiate inner and outer truths of Christianty, first going through the outer truths about Jesus and early Christianity, and then the inner truth of the early gnostics and gnostics, or mystics, anywhere. The basics of both is familiar to me, but it is presented in a very clear and insightful way, have some angles that are new to me, and is a joy to read.

In terms of the outer truths of Christianity, it shows the parallels between the early gnostic stories of the God man and the life story of Jesus, the lack of historical evidence for Jesus ever having existed in flesh and blood, and examples of the literalist interpretation of Christianity came into being through the usual politics.

(From the little I know of mainstream scholarship on this subject, it seems that their basic thesis is not too far off, but I am sure there are different takes on many of the details. This is not a book for those interested in exact and nuanced scholarship, and that is not the point of the book either.)

The inner truths of Christianity is that of mystics anywhere and any time, and I am reminded of Douglas Harding and the headless experiments in the simple and elegant ways Freke and Gandy write about it.

Finally, the book is a reminder of looking for the inner truth of any spiritual or religious story, independent of its outer or historical truth (or, most often, lack thereof). The historical truth has historical interest, which is well and fine. But the inner truth is about who and what we are, here and now.

It is better if they differentiate history and teaching stories. (From a dinner conversation with friends yesterday, where they got into talking about some of the non-Biblical scriptures such as the gospels of Thomas and Mary Magdalene.)

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I used to be identified with an identity as cultured, which lead me to read a good amount of literature classics, philosophy and art history, watch obscure and sophisticated movies, listen to music such as Arvo Part, Palestrina, Bach, Philip Glass, and so on, and although I genuinely enjoyed it and got a lot out of it, it was also a one-sided life and identification.

During the dark night this identification, as so many others, wore down, and there is now more of an open space for anything… deep and shallow, artsy and popular… it matters less now.

The irony in this shift is that now, finding more fluidity within the wide landscapes of literature, movies and music, I am also more easily able to find the depth in the shallow, and the same dynamics and patterns in all of it. Popular or sophisticated… it is all reflections of the same basic dynamics and patterns of the mind.

There is a depth in the shallow that, although I was aware of it all the time, I held at arm-lengths distance. Now, that it is right here in my life with no distance, I can appreciate it much more.

Conversely, I guess I can say that there is a shallowness in the deep as well, often an identification with a particular identity which sets up boundaries where there really are none, and a self-congratulatory attitude about things that are really not that sophisticated, and sometimes not even that important.

A documentary which shows the journey of Christianity from flavored by amber (fundamentalist, authoritarian, ethnocentric) and earlier to orange (science, rationality, early worldcentric) and beyond.

For someone like me who grew up in a culture that is heavily orange, green and beyond, and where the church is mostly the same, there is nothing new in the approach of this documentary. We learned mostly about the historical aspects of the Bible and Christianity in school, including the authoring of the various parts of the Bible, the politics of selecting the final books, translation issues, and so on.

And since the culture is at orange/green+, this approach was taken for granted… maybe too much so, since there is now an influx of people there who has more of an amber minus background, which creates conflicts and problems they were - and are - not prepared to deal with.

It is still interesting to watch, and maybe especially because it is also a personal journey for the presenter, from amber to orange+ Christianity.

Thanks to Educational Television for finding and posting it!

Strictly scholarly works on mysticism are of course necessary and useful, but it is still a relief to come upon a history of mysticism written by someone where Spirit has awakened to itself. It gives it a freshness, immediacy and clarity that is often lost in the more dry and exclusively scholarly works.

History of Mysticism: The Unchanging Testament by Swami Abhayananda (Stan Trout), is one of these books.

In going through the history of mysticism, from prehistoric to more recent times, he touches upon some of the highlights from many traditions, showing how they all describe the same realization of Spirit as emptiness and form.

(Brahman and Maya, Purusha and Prakrti, Shiva and Shakti, Sat and Asat, Vishnu and Lakshmi, Theos and Logos, Tathata and Samsara, Tao and Teh, the unspeakable Tao and the speakable Tao, El and Elat, Baal and Asherah, Yahweh and Chokmah, Haqq and Khalq, yang and yin, masculine and feminine, and so on.)

This lens gives the book a clear focus and message: there is one theme with minor variations from culture, tradition and personal flavor. It takes some of the many flavors of ice cream and shows that it is all ice cream. (If there is a minor drawback with the book, it is that it becomes somewhat predictable after a while, and that some of the interesting variations are downplayed.)

Still, highly recommended for its clarity, for its excellent overview of the history of mysticism, for its clear theme, and for its ability to inspire.

Note: The book is available for free and in digital form at The Mystic Vision.