History Of Christianity

 

 

HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY

 

Being closer in time to us the history of Christianity serves as the best example how a religion is born and evolves and branches off into a hundred sects over so many disagreements, fights, conspiracies and even murders, assassinations and massacres. When one learns about such twists and turns, adventures and misadventures one realises that it is one thing to profess a religion and claim that it is the truth and quite another what the founder of that religion had in mind.  We saw it in Buddhism and Zoroastrianism. Yet the history of Christianity serves as the best (or worst) show case for analysing and demonstrating in minute detail how a founder begins to preach and teach and how his real or self-appointed disciples may make a mess of it in all sincerity or otherwise.

 

We have already seen on several occasions that both Christian doctrine and rituals have had  antecedents and precedents in older paganisms which filtered into Christianity through the mystical offshoots of these pagan religions, like the Mithra and Isis worship. These on top of sayings and acts ascribed to Jesus in the Gospels which for their part show some influence of the mysteries. The most culpable among all Gospels is admittedly that of John.

We shall also have occasion to see how the birth and development of Islam went through similar if far less serious twists and turns and how some sects came about and almost totally transformed it into unrecognisable forms. In the end we hope to see better what went more or less wrong where and when and hopefully offer some humble remedies in the not too realistic hope that something can be done about any mistakes.

 

1.

By all accounts based on existing documents from the Bible down Christianity should not exist as a claimant of the legacy of its chief hero Jesus Christ.  This pure blood Jewish prophet was no different than those few charismatic Jewish prophets before him, like Isaiah. Like them he strongly criticised his contemporary Jews and thereby antagonised their powerful leaders as expected. He in no uncertain terms charged them with hypocrisy, greed and inequity and reminded them religion was about moral self-improvement and spiritual ennoblement. In the course of these policies he strongly implied the metaphoric nature of religious indoctrination and as such used many wonderful parables (fictional moral stories) to drive his points home. Used to high prestige, authority and comforts as well as deeply involved with the colonising Roman establishment in Palestine the Jewish high priesthood resented such criticisms and looked on with horror at this new prophet’s daring challenge of their authority and conduct and the common people’s attraction to him. He called them with appellations like vipers and scorpions and at one point raided and savaged the Temple, expelling the money changers who, in his view, were profaning the Holy Site.

 

He more than once indicated that he was sent to Israel and had acknowledged by implication and with some ambiguity that he was the expected Messiah. He constantly travelled the land and became well-known and occasionally well-received by the humbler compatriots of his like the fishermen, tax collectors and even the prostitutes. This was the result of his showing kindness to all such social humbles and humiliateds for such are starved of self-respect and will worship anybody with apparent self-assurance and intrinsic authority who will compliment them. What his more, his preaching was brilliant and electrifying and his conduct, apart from his bitter language for the haughty and the mighty, was just and simply saintly. It is obvious from the four Gospels that Jesus was after the cleansing of Judaic spiritual landscape in which cleansing he saw the salvation of Israel both here and now and there and thereafter.

 

This is exactly the picture our Qur’an paints of all prophets without exception. In his reported speeches, there is hardly anything to suggest that he was less than this clear and this practical; he hardly talks about his position as more than an obedient servant and messenger of God and knows nothing about what later generations would make of him in their fanciful imaginations. He frankly admitted his subjection to and helplessness before God Whom he called as ‘Father’ ‘a la Judaica’ and himself ‘son’ meaning servant again a la Judaica. Of course we can never be sure that these appellations were really used by Jesus but even if he did it is transparent from the contexts and occasions that he did not mean anything ontological or theological but as just following the semantic customs of the Jews.  To wit, the Old Testament is full of such appellations and for example quotes God saying to David “O David, thou art my son-  today I have begotten thee”!  In practical terms Jesus failed and the salvation of the Jews and also the rest of the humankind had to await another chance from Heaven.

 

2.

The early church (community of believers), was formed around St James, the brother of Jesus and included all the closest disciples and those joining them. It was another Jewish group and in full observation of the Law of Torah. There was not the slightest tint or hint to suggest that the new group wanted anything other than Jews leading more pious lives as taught and exemplified by the new prophet Jesus who now was believed to be the expected if failed Messiah. All was not gloom and doom though; Just before his departure Jesus had promised them that another saviour would be sent to them to pick up from where he Jesus had left and named him as the Paraclete. Since he did not speak Greek but Aramaic this name Paraclete should be something else in Aramaic. Jesus seems to explain him in other terms as well, like the Spirit of Truth and the Holy Spirit but then goes on and describes him as a man into whose ear God would pronounce and in whose mouth put his word.  This almost explicit reference to a subsequent messenger from God is passed over by later Christians for reasons only they can explain. Yet, we have evidence that some later Christians saw this new envoy from God as a prophet to sort out the mess left by the Christ’s hasty and precipitous departure and one Montanus claimed this title of Paraclete for himself and for a while did a lot of business with it.  We shall have occasion to describe him a bit more later.

 

This early church was in for a trial and a shock though.  A certain young Pharisee (religious scholar) named Saul was about to knock on their door for acceptance in appearance but for hijacking the new sect in a way that could not be stopped.  He had not met Jesus and knew next to nothing about him, yet he ended up claiming that he knew Jesus better than Jusus knew himself, as we shall soon see.

 

He began his career as an implacable enemy of the church of Jesus. Armed with an arrest warrant by the High Priest to seize all Jesus followers and see them punished he went from town to town inflicting his harm.  Then, as he claims, on his way to Damascus to execute his orders he was suddenly knocked down by an invisible power which then identified itself as “I am Jesus whom thou persecutest”. He was overwhelmed and converted there and then and took himself right at the door of the disciples headed by St James. He proclaimed his conversion but could not entirely convince the necessarily sceptical and cautious elders; in the end thanks to the intercession of St Barnabas he was unwillingly and tentatively admitted. He was sent as he asked to preach the Gospel but with Barnabas to watch over him. The two set out to make long journeys and visits but it became soon apparent that Saul’s tunes was anything but the church’s.  Increasingly he was trying to persuade the Jewish Jesus believers that the Law was no longer binding because by dying on the cross the Christ had already paid all liabilities under the Law.

 

What is more, he made a speciality of meeting and converting gentiles to his new sect, his sect because it was no longer the teachings of the historical Christ about which Saul knew almost nothing and in fact could not care less.  Barnabas was alarmed and eventually the two split up and Saul who renamed himself with the Greek-Roman name Paul abandoned all pretence to be a member of the apostolic church and travelled all the way to Rome with stopovers in all major towns to spread his sect and to found local communities (churches) answerable to himself. En passante a few words may be said about a gospel attributed to this Barnabas. In rather modern times a gospel was found in the library of Vienna composed in Italian and claiming to be a translation of an original written by Barnabas.  It gives a fully Muslim version of the gospel stories in the New Testament which is only too good to be true.  Two Oxford scholars, namely man and wife Raggs translated it into English and published it as one of the Oxford University titles.  It is claimed that it soon disappeared from all bookshops because the church was alarmed and had to do everything possible to stop its spread. Our Pakistani brothers say that they obtained a copy all the same and they re-published it in Pakistan. It is a very popular and rather widely read book among the more enthusiastic Muslims. Yet, everything is not well with it.

 

Firstly, in the Pakistani edition the name of our Prophet sws is fully given-  Muhammad sws.  This is the first blunder. Allah says in the Qur’an that the name Jesus AS used for the prophet to come after him was ‘Ahmad’ and not ‘Muhammad’ sws. This mistakeke may be committed by our brothers or by the Raggs or by the original author of this dubious gospel.  Secondly the story of how Mary conceived Jesus and bore him etc. agrees more with the existing gospels than the Qur’an.   This may indicate that the original writer of this gospel was a Christian convert to Islam and took his revenge on his old religion by either inventing a new gospel or modifying an existing one to make it more Islamic but knowing not quite well what the Islamic position was he could only improve upon the existing four Christian gospels as well as he could.  Still, this Gospel of Barnabas has such great literary merit and spiritual clout that it cannot be dismissed out of hand. It looks as if  some really great material has been unnecessarily adulterated by some cheap forgeries to close any gaps between a version more agreeable to more naïve Muslims and the true version; for there must be a true version since we have ample evidence that a gospel attributed to Barnabas was already in circulation as early as the fourth century.

Secondly, I have personally seen in the Church of St. Barnabas in Cyprus in which the saint is believed to buried in fact. The paintings over the tomb of the saint depicts him embracing a book claimed to be his gospel and the story line tells that he had asked to be buried with his gospel on his bosom.  And why not?  If Mark or Luke could put to writing their stories of Jesus why not Barnabas who was a member of the Apostolic church in Jerusalem under St James brother of Jesus?  Yet, the eventual version of it published by our brothers suffers from a number of serious defects some of which may be due to their ignorance and over-zeal. Outside unnecessary embellishments if not falsifications this gospel is a literary and spiritual masterpiece. It also provides another and this time modern example how misguided religious zeal can provoke that scriptural deviation called a pious fraud. Of all things, this kind of behaviour is the last thing a Muslim should consider let alone commit.

 

To return to our story: The disciples at the Jerusalem (Apostolic) church under James and then Peter, in an eventual sense,  did not fare as well as this audacious and  enterprising missionary which was selling his own product and operating in the vast gentile market stood infinitely higher chance to make far more converts. In the beginning though it did not look so; the Jerusalem church was making steady if modest advance among the Jews throughout Syria and Palestine but great trouble was in the hatching to deliver them a blow.  Exasperated by Jewish conspiracies and rebellions against it the Roman government felt it had to remove this threat as radically as it would take. About a generation after the demise of Jesus the Roman armies swept to Judea, killed and enslaved all who resisted and in fact did everything they could to cleanse the land from all Jews.  Fanatical militant sects like the Essenes put up a very heroic resistance but to no avail. In the end they killed all their dependants and themselves before the Romans could enter and capture their strongholds. That of course served the Romans well. They also left no stone on stone and took especial vengeful pleasure in razing and burning to ground the Temple. Jews were to be homeless for the next two millennia and the Jerusalem church could only survive in its offshoots in the Middle East. These Law observing Jewish believers are known to history as the Ebionites (the poor, ‘fuqara’ in Arabic) and died out at about the 6^th century CE.  Paul’s church though survived precariously for three centuries, went through many more heresies to render itself more digestible and then acceptable to Rome and triumphed by the conversion of emperor Constantine in the 4^th century.

 

3.

According to the Acts it was Paul who took Christianity to Rome and legend adds Peter to this Roman sojourn with the two acting together.  They were eventually martyred during the purges of the Christians by Nero and buried there.  Christianity recovered however and a bishopric or see of Rome was founded with the bishops of Rome claiming to have taken the role over from Peter himself.  On Peter’s alleged burial ground they subsequently built the St Peter’s Cathedral.  This Roman see was the first realm of the bishops of Rome oversaw and thanks to the prestige of Rome as the capital of the empire, over time the bishops of Rome, assuming the title of ‘pope’ (father) and then imitating the religious title of pagan Roman emperors as the head of Roman clergy they began to call themselves ‘pontifex maximus’ (the great bridge-maker, i.e, between man and gods) and like the Roman emperors claiming jurisdiction over all the Roman world the popes claimed jurisdiction over all Christendom. Accordingly they called their church Catholic meaning all-inclusive.  In the process they almost totally Romanised Christianity by adopting and adapting almost all Roman pagan priestly habits and practices as well as fixing Christian holy days on the same Roman dates; For example the birth of Christ was copied from the birthday of the Roman Sun God on December the 25th.  Similarly the day of the Sun God, namely Sunday became the new Sabbath instead of what Jesus himself kept- on Saturdays!

 

4.

The motives of Constantine in adopting Christianity have puzzled both Christians and  historians alike.  Initially at least the Christian clergy, although overjoyed by the event, never stopped to entertain their doubts given the emperor’s continuation with his pagan life and his allowing pagan religions and temples to exist and function. As for the historians, their rather common opinion has been that Constantine was impressed by the unstoppable spread of Christianity and tenacity and resilience of its members in the face of all persecutions and brutalities against them. He felt that the future lied with Christians and given their strength of conviction and heroism it would be most wise to join and then exploit them in the interests of the empire. If that was the case, the move proved a great diplomatic coup and statesmanly success and today’s grand European Union is a testimony to Constantine’s genius. But he still had a lot of troubles and headaches ahead of him; his troubles were just beginning in other words.

 

5.

No sooner Constantine sat as the first Christian emperor on his throne at the newly dedicated capital city of Constantinople he was shocked by the murderous factionalism plaguing the church.  In other words the sight of Christianity from the outside had little semblance to a look from inside.  Outwardly they are perennially and unjustly persecuted heroes and saints. From inside it was a total shock; these virtual saints were in fact above no human failings or depravities;  they plotted as thoroughly and maliciously as their pagan contemporaries, they fought and killed each others with even more gusto than the pagans and what is more they most certainly were experts in causing a storm in a spoonful of water. The reason should  be obvious to the ex-pagan wily emperor-  there was too much at stake in the Christian church. Sorry to say, like all paganisms it had soon thrown up a vast and powerful priesthood arranged on time-honoured best pagan traditions, which like them, was ready to share power with any imperial regime on at least equal terms. For the church leaders great material and social benefits were available and at stake; for example, a bishop collected the religious taxes and gifts on behalf of his bishopric which was as large as a county in certain cases.  He was honoured by all, including the local lord and in case of a discord the lord and bishop stood roughly equal chance in beating the other.

 

This left some differently talented and ambitious churchmen out; such types could not come up with the same daring and conspiratorial skills of the more politically talented and oriented rivals; instead they had more imagination than political skill and had to set up their own territory in other ways within or if necessary without the church, in order to satisfy their egos hungering for power.  For example, in the 2^nd century a certain Phrygian ascetic Montanus claimed that he was fed up with the corruption in the church and among the Christians and demanded a return to the original purity of the religion; he claimed to be a prophet and he and his two female disciples, Priscilla and Maximilla, joined him falling in trance and prophesying.  For his part Montanus played  his role with such multi-Oscar winning fashion that his followers declared him the Paraclete promised by the Christ.

 

He warned that the end was near and a new Jerusalem would descend from heaven upon a neighbouring plain to give good Christians their new eternal home (you see, Palestine was too far away).  He advised his followers to abandon all worldly chores and assets and gather at the described site at the described day to await and watch he descent. Pending this last and triumphant salvation his people abandoned all their economic activites and even their parental responsibilities and when at long last they moved out to gather at the meeting place whole regions were depopulated and ruined. Nothing happened though. Characteristically for all such Messianic claims the Montanists refused to acknowledge delusion and set about believing the same things as if nothing happened, readily believing their leaders that it would happen as expected next time.  When the Roman governor of the area began another persecution of Christians these Montanists thronged him asking for martyrdom in his hands, being so eager to go to Paradise. He gladly executed some but the task was too great and he could not afford to spend so much time and resources on the request. Fed up and disgusted he forcibly sent the survivors away telling them “You wretched miserables, aren’t there ropes to hang yourselves from or precipices to jump into?”

 

This episode shows us at east three regularly happening religious delusions. One, it is always possible that no matter what scripture or genuine prophecy says some too ambitious people will claim to be new prophets or promised Paracletes or Mahdis. Two, these can put up a brilliant performance which will prove irresistible to large numbers of people, and three, they will issue Messianic or eschatological promises which not ony fail to materialise in a most ridiculous way but also the deceived believers will not admit their delusion and will quite happily go back to await the next similar prophecy and its fulfilment. This pattern of events repeated itself so many times in history that many spiritual deludeds or charismatic conmen cannot resist re-heating and re-serving the same formula in order to have their days of glory and possibly also profit. Although generally more sanguine and less gullible Muslims also have had their own share of such delusional or defrauding experiments and experiences this line of spiritual exploitation remains mainly a Christian speciality.  The Muslim exploitative speciality is Jehad which concept and institution is sometimes regarded by some politically ambitious but otherwise sidelined people as their only hope to realise their dreams of rulership.