High Stakes (16 page)

The book of Revelation goes on, with this unknown John being taken up into heaven and seeing God on his throne with twenty-four elders about with crowns on their heads and also four living creatures—a lion, calf, eagle and some type of creature with the face of a man. You can already see how bizarre this tale is, for the creatures have eyes before and behind and each has six wings. We then read about the author seeing a scroll at the right hand of God with seven seals. No one can open the scroll except Jesus, and the author sees him as a lamb. The book then relates how Jesus breaks the seals and lets loose the four horse men of the Apocalypse, among other things. We then have seven angels with trumpets, which they sound, and destruction rains upon the earth. We then have the author John eat the scroll that had seven seals, and he supposedly is then a prophet.

We then have various beasts come into play that are supposed to be manifestations of Satan, and John gives his number as 666. The mark of the beast was really referring to Nero, whose address was 666, and some historians say it was also his name in Hebrew (which has number values for letters). Regardless, many feel that this refers to the Roman emperor Nero and many look on him as the Antichrist. The Antichrist has been thought to be everything from a secret society to the Church to bar code technology. Many think that all technology is the prelude to the Antichrist. In early times of the Roman Empire, no one could buy or sell unless they were from the house of Caesar. Again we see symbolism overriding the underlying true political story line of what was going on. The beast is the social regime that eats people alive, just as we could create a beast to represent our taxes that we feel are eating us alive.

The book continues to describe various hideous beasts representing the power of Satan and how mankind is destroyed with plagues. Then we have Jesus coming down to do battle with Satan and Satan is defeated and chained up for a thousand years. John then gets into the Judgment Day, where God supposedly judges all men.

When will Christ come and save the believers and strike down the unbelievers? This question has been asked for centuries, and there have been many who have predicted the answer. So far, no one knows and no one has been right. The Judaic people have waited for their Messiah since their very beginnings, and Israel has been attacked and conquered numerous times. When Israel was granted its independence in 1948, to many this event started the countdown of the battle between Christ and the Antichrist. Some people point to earthquakes and natural disasters and say the end is coming. Some felt that 1988 would be the end, and some say 2012 is the end because the Mayan calendar ends then.

William Miller, a poorly educated farmer who became a self-proclaimed preacher, revived the apocalyptic movement in 1831 by predicting the end of the world by March 22, 1844. He became very popular and had a following in the thousands. When March 22 came around there was no end of the world, but a follower said that William had forgotten to add the time for the switch from
B.C.
to
A.D.
and they recalculated the new time for the end of the world to be October 22, 1844. Again the time came and went and to thousands of followers it was called “the Great Disappointment.” Many of Miller's followers eventually became Jehovah's Witnesses or Seventh Day Adventists.

We still have strong apocalyptic beliefs in conservative and evangelical churches today that use the Book of Revelation as a tool. It seems that every time you hear an evangelist, they say the end of world is near. The good will be rewarded when Christ comes and the bad (sinners) will be cast down to everlasting hell (they seem to conveniently forget that Christ said no one could predict the end of days). The ones left behind will be those who didn't accept Christ (then what about all the good people who aren't Christian?). The Judaic people will be persecuted, the world will experience famine and earthquakes and one third of the world's population will die. (This sounds like the Holocaust all over again, and this is not only judgmental but bigoted and again puts forth a God who is partial to certain groups of people). Apocalyptic preachers say that Satan will come to wipe out the earth and then Christ will come and vanquish Satan and take up to heaven all the believers. This type of message is almost like one that could be attributed to the supposed Antichrist, because it is full of bigotry and judgment and allows only Christians to be saved.

The Book of Revelation also supports the Christian concept of hell and a Judgment Day, which is exactly why the early Church wanted it included in the Bible. Hell wasn't even a consideration or even discussed until the Book of Daniel in the Old Testament, which is also one of the most powerful apocalyptic writings of Judaism. This was because most scholars, and again some liberal theologians, felt that people were straying from the Judaic religion or Judaic Law. What better way to keep people in tow than to give them a concept of eternal torture or damnation? Even St. Augustine in his
City of God
condemns practically all sexual activity because it will surely send you to hell. This is amazing, because for years Augustine committed every crime against these rules. So much so that history tells us his mother prayed for thirty years that his soul would be saved. It's interesting also to note that he wrote this when he was very old and probably all feelings of sexuality were used up or he wasn't capable of indulging his vices.

All the major religions have a concept of heaven and hell, but each differs from the others in one or more ways. The Judaic term for hell is Sheol, but it is more of a dark place where the body and soul reside, almost as in a holding place until the world ends and the Judgment Day commences. At the time of judgment good souls will go to heaven. In the religion of Islam, Jahannam is their term for hell and Jannah is their term for paradise or heaven. The Judgment Day is referred to as Qiyamah, which Allah can enact at any time. Muslims believe that souls that go to Jahannam (hell) reside there only for a certain time, depending upon the gravity of their bad deeds. They also believe in a savior called the Mahdi, who will come and, with Jesus Christ, help to defeat the ad-Basjal (their term for a type of Antichrist). The Hindu term for hell is Naraka, but it is more a state of demotion for the soul. The soul becomes lower in spirituality and advancement if bad deeds are done and then karma will be enacted and they will live their next life in a lower class or form. The Hindu word for heaven is Swarga, which, again, is a state of advancement for the soul and the soul no longer has to reincarnate.

Then we have Dante's Inferno in
The Divine Comedy
coming along that gives us the nine degrees of hell. This book was widely read and used by the Church to be an adjunct to the Bible. Missionaries historically would use the fear of hell to convert people of other lands or those who had strayed. Hell became a much more powerful tool than heaven or God or Christ, for it converted the uneducated masses with a promise of eternal damnation if they didn't join the Church.

The Church, becoming alarmed that this was too harsh, decided to implement Purgatory. This gave people a stepping-stone to wait upon, rather than having no other option than to go directly to hell. The Church also created Limbo for unbaptized babies or people who were not sanctified by being baptized. Nowhere in the Bible do you read about Purgatory or Limbo, and neither the early Bible, nor even the Judaic scrolls, ever mention hell.

Now, with that in mind, we get back to this unknown John who has a dream, and because it fit into the fear theme of what the early Church and its popes put forth, they place it into the Bible; not realizing that someday the people would become more literate in the world and figure out that the Book of Revelation was a symbolic treatment of the politics of the day. Many educated people who read it come away with the very real thought that this author John was absolutely insane and surely needed help.

If we look at the Bible as somewhat historical, all these books written at different times in different places were really a potpourri of stories and legends and traditions and all finally ended up together in a volume of controversy and many inconsistencies. Almost all the books in the Bible are written with a different style signifying different authors, and since no one knows who wrote these books, there is a lot of conjecture about them and whether or not they were highly edited.

The first five scrolls of the Judaic Bible known as the Torah, which are also the first five books of the Old Testament, seem to be the most intact and unedited. They were reputedly written by Moses, or at least dictated to some scribe writing down his words. I have personally studied almost every version of the Bible, including Douay-Rheims, King James, Jerusalem, Lamsa, etc., and even they differ in the deletion of books and even interpretation. To add the Book of Revelation was perhaps an action designed by the early Christians to have their own apocalyptic literature rather than to rely on the Judaic literature that was apocalyptic in nature. I guess it's the same principle as Paul being the only one who came up with the premise that Christ died on the cross for our sins. Although, as I have stated, Paul never met Jesus or heard him speak, the early Church forever after took Paul's idea as gospel. I find it amazing, since Jesus never said he was going to die for our sins.

Catholic canon law also stated that no one could get into heaven until Christ's death on the cross. Which means that they think God kept all the good souls and even saintly people in some kind of limbo until Jesus died on the cross, or better yet, none got into heaven even after his death because none of them were Christians when they died. How mankind can come up with these “laws” is far beyond what I believe is even logical and makes God again humanized; and to even take it further, makes Jesus greater than our Creator.

The Apocrypha was part of the early Church's teachings and “Bible” at one time, as were other religious writings. Then, suddenly, these writers, whose works were originally accepted as infused by God and taught to the masses, are now deemed heretics. Can you imagine yourself back at that time in the midst of a conclave of early Christian leaders and bishops who were bickering over what books would be included in the Bible and being presided over and ruled by a pagan Roman emperor!

You could almost laugh at the ridiculousness of it all, except for the fact that it is so tragic. Tragic in the sense that humankind was deprived of the true outlook on their God…tragic in the sense that they were deprived of the true Jesus Christ and his teachings…tragic in the sense that a pagan Roman emperor had the last say in the early Church's agenda of conversion by fear for conversion's sake…tragic in the sense that so many writings were edited or deemed heretical to satisfy the Church's quest for wealth and power…tragic in the sense that humankind, by the influence of the Church, has been made to suffer a dogma of untruth and fear…tragic in the sense that the actions of the Church have protected secrets that have perpetuated one of the greatest hoaxes on humankind…and most of all, tragic in the sense that religious teachings today put forth a God to be feared who is judgmental and puts people in an everlasting hell—not our real God, who is all-loving, all-merciful, all-forgiving, all-powerful, omnipotent and a God who would not let any of His/Her creations be destroyed or suffer everlasting torment in the religiously inspired fantasy of hell.

Humankind have created a conception of God based on their own imperfections. God is the ultimate goodness and it is completely illogical to think that God is perfect and all-loving and then to turn around and give God imperfect qualities, such as anger or wrath, which send people to an everlasting hell. All of us must question the goodness of ourselves rather than condemning others. It really is a battle within ourselves against the temptations of negativity that we face almost daily in our lives.

A
S I WROTE
this book I did not have any fear; but I also realized that in telling the truth about Our Lord Jesus Christ, I would be in direct conflict with so much Christian doctrine as it is put forth today, and of course the hierarchies and followers of that doctrine. Yet if you read deeper with your heart open, it is a true belief not only from years and years of theological research, but from a common or logical knowledge of who and what our dear Lord was and also what he did and accomplished.

Jesus Christ was a Jew, and as such his audiences were mainly comprised of people who were of the Judaic faith. When he put forth his teachings they were naturally steeped with Judaic overtones and Judaic laws of the time, but his teachings were so universal in nature that they bridged all peoples and all faiths. For example in Matthew 22:36–40 we read,
“Master, which is the great commandment in the Law?” Jesus said to him, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like it, ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.' On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.”
We see that here he is responding to a question from a doctor of Judaic law, and Christ's answer is completely within the framework of Judaic law and yet…it is also a universal answer that can incorporate any man and any religion on the face of the earth.

If we took this teaching of Christ at face value and accepted it wholeheartedly, we would eliminate all bigotry and hatred and judgment and condemnation of our fellow man. There would be no persecution of different ethnic and racial groups, or groups that practiced a different religion or groups that were homosexual. It is an act of the greatest hypocrisy to preach these teachings on the one hand and then to turn around and condemn and persecute a racial, ethnic, religious or homosexual group on the other. I personally have seen this done by a supposedly famous religious leader of a conservative Protestant church on television when he bashed homosexuals…a leader who pro fesses to believe in and preach the words of Jesus Christ. He evidently doesn't follow the second great commandment that Jesus puts forth in the just-related passage from Matthew. This type of person is what we could call a hypocrite in the truest sense. Hypocrites in general do not practice what they preach and are usually very judgmental and condemning and sometimes persecuting in their nature.

Jesus also had a lot to say about hypocrisy throughout the four gospels. If you substitute the phrase “any religious leader” for the words Scribes and Pharisees, you can see how the following verses in Matthew 23:1–17 are a universal teaching meant for all religions:
Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to his disciples, saying, “The Scribes and the Pharisees have sat on the chair of Moses. All things, therefore, that they command you, observe and do. But do not act according to their works; for they talk but do nothing. And they bind together heavy and oppressive burdens, and lay them on men's
shoulders; but not with one finger of their own do they choose to move them. In fact, all their works they do in order to be seen by men; for they widen their phylacteries and enlarge their tassels, and love the first places at suppers and the front seats in the synagogues, and greetings in the market place, and to be called by men ‘Rabbi.' But do not you be called ‘Rabbi' for one is your Master, and you are brothers. And call no one on earth your father; for one is your Father, who is in heaven. Neither be called masters; for one only is your Master, the Christ. He who is greatest among you shall be your servant. And whoever humbles himself shall be exalted. But woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you shut the kingdom of heaven against men. For you yourselves do not go in, nor do you allow those going in to enter. Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you devour the houses of widows, praying long prayers. For this you shall receive a greater judgment. Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you traverse sea and land to make one convert; and when he has become one, you make him twofold more a son of hell than yourselves. Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘Whoever swears by the temple, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the
temple, he is bound.' You blind fools! for which is greater, the gold, or the temple which sanctifies the gold?”

Christ didn't stop there, he goes on in Matthew 23:23–28 to say:
“Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you pay tithes on mint and anise and cumin, and have left undone the weightier matters of the Law, right judgment and mercy and faith. These things you ought to have done, while not leaving the others undone. Blind guides, who strain out the gnat but swallow the camel! Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but within they are full of robbery and uncleanness. Thou blind Pharisee! clean first the inside of the cup and of the dish, that the outside too may be clean. Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you are like whited sepulchers, which outwardly appear to men beautiful, but within are full of dead men's bones and of all uncleanness. So you also outwardly appear just to men, but within you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.”

Hypocrisy was a favorite target of Jesus because of its untruth and deception. We find hypocrisy of one form or another throughout our lives, but in the area of religion it does run rampant. When religion puts forth an all-loving and merciful God and then turns around and says to fear God because of His/Her wrath, this is hypocrisy…for they say that God is all-loving, merciful and perfect and put that out as truth; then they turn around and betray that truth by saying God is wrathful, vengeful and condemns some of his creations to an everlasting fiery pit to suffer eternally. Just using basic logic, you can't have an all-loving and all-merciful God who then turns around and shows no mercy or love in punishing forever those He/She supposedly loves and shows mercy to.

We also run into religious hypocrisy in the condemnation and judging of supposed “sinners.” All religions have differing outlooks on what they consider “sin” and all give various “sins” different classifications of severity. We even have some Christian churches put forth as sin the following: wearing makeup, wearing jewelry, dancing, watching TV, attending movies, women in two-piece bathing suits, mixed swimming, playing cards, smoking, listening to rock music, men wearing beards, unmarried couples kissing, drinking wine in moderation, using a Bible other than King James version, and drinking coffee or tea. When an average adult reads this list, many might laugh at how ridiculous it seems to be, but to certain churches people who do these things are “sinners.”

Sin, as I mentioned earlier, is also judged by its severity. In certain religions, adultery by a female (it doesn't seem to apply to the male in most cases) can mean a death sentence. In the case of females in general, sexual sins seem to hold the most stigma, while males get off much more lightly. Many conservative churches still feel that the female is a potential Jezebel who can seduce men with her feminine wiles (hence no makeup, no lipstick, no jewelry, no two-piece swimsuits, etc.). In some cases of sin the female has an advantage, such as in murder, for women are much less likely to get a death sentence than men. Sins in religions are much more likely to daily address the sins of morality rather than crime, especially when it pertains to sexual morality. I guess religions feel that if they can control the sexual morality issues, they can then work on other issues of morality.

I had a woman who used to come regularly to see me as a client. She was a very sweet and caring person, honest, loving and from all outward appearances a very pretty and classy lady. She was also a high-class prostitute. When I told her psychically what she did for a living, she just nodded affirmatively and then told me that she enjoyed her profession, would quit one day when she had her nest egg, marry and hopefully have two children. She was completely nonchalant and very comfortable, and I immediately knew why—she was a good person. Many religions would have strung her up from the nearest tree, so to speak, but she wasn't hurting anybody and did volunteer work at a local hospital. I have always hated the word sin because it is a truly subjective term. Morality is geographical, as women in primitive cultures go around barebreasted and might have several husbands or vice versa. To them it is a traditional way of life and again it harms no one. I have always put forth that what separates a sinner from a nonsinner is motive. If you have the intent to hurt someone, or mean to do harm to someone, you can be judged by your fellow man for criminal intent to maintain social order. But as far as judgment in a religious sense is concerned, no one can judge another soul…that is between that soul and God. I personally don't believe in the concept of religious judgment because I know we have an all-loving God who would not hurt or punish anyone. I believe that the only judgment we go through is when we judge ourselves on the Other Side.

 

With many of the major religions in the world concentrating on humankind's propensity to “sin,” they put more emphasis on evil than good. Instead of touting the good deeds that humankind should and could do, they constantly remind their flocks of the bad and evil deeds and inflict guilt to boot. In their negative propaganda, backed up by purported Holy Books that are inconsistent, contradictory and that also emphasize the evils that humankind does, we here on earth are inundated with negative programming. We not only have to watch all the negative news on television programs or read about negativity in newspapers, but we get no solace or respite from our religions. It's no wonder that most of us are stressed, guilt-ridden and exhausted from life. Religion gives us no shelter from the challenges of life and in fact just contributes more by constantly pointing out our sins and giving us guilt.

When my publisher asked me to write this book, I told him that it would be very controversial because with the knowledge and truth that I have garnered over the years, my true representation of Christ would be radically different from that of religion. I hope, if nothing else, whether you agree or disagree, it will set you on a journey to seek your own spirituality and your true sense of knowing who this God-man truly was. Is it true we are all the sons and daughters of God? Absolutely…but with this being said, Jesus was a true and divine report or messenger from God. He would be what we refer to as the first and foremost mystical traveler.

What exactly are mystical travelers? They are entities created by God with the perfection to bring about the word of our true all-loving Creator. They are usually assigned to a specific planet to help the creations on that planet evolve their souls. We also can ask to be mystical travelers, but will not attain (at least not in this life) the stature and divineness of Jesus until our souls reach a state of perfection that warrants that designation. Most mystical travelers, as in the case of Jesus, are created with that perfection already intact within them. All mystical travelers, whether they were created as such or attain that state through the evolution of their souls, take a simple oath that they will live their lives in complete ser vice to God and go anywhere to do any good that God infuses them to do.

My Gnostic Christian Church, Novus Spiritus (New Spirit), was founded because we believe that truly all religions have their own messengers or messiahs and ours happens to be Jesus Christ. In many ways Jesus, above all the others, was the most simplistic in his messages and teachings; but he has also been the most misunderstood, argued over and misrepresented messenger or messiah on earth.

Tragically, how is it possible that the teachings of this God-man have gone so badly awry? He taught parables, love, beatitudes, forgiveness, justice and nonjudgment and put forth at that time the new concept of an all-loving, all-merciful and benevolent God. According to the Bible, in his public life he only traveled in a radius of about a hundred miles, and yet his teachings and influence spread eventually throughout most of the world. What or who was it that took teachings of love, formed them into a religion and then turned around and went out and killed millions with their wars, crusades, inquisitions and persecutions? You probably already know the answer, the early Catholic Church. There has been more horror wrought on humankind in the name of Christianity than of almost all the other religions put together. When early Christianity became the state religion of the Roman Empire in the fourth century, it started to grow by leaps and bounds. With that growth came unbelievable power and corruption.

This kind and caring special messenger named Jesus came into a world maybe not as bad as ours, but very much like ours. A world divided by taxes, the poor, the needy, the rich and the powerful. A world of two warring factions—the Roman Empire and the Sanhedrin, the governing body of Judaic Law and religion.

I'm convinced that Jesus had direct contact with God, with no intermediaries. My guide, Francine, says he had angels in abundance around him and the teachings that he absorbed from tutors in Judaic law as a young boy and from his travels to the Far East also helped him a great deal. But his real guidance came from God.

Certainly as an Essene and Gnostic, Jesus came to show all of us that we have to go through the trials and travails of life that include suffering to learn from life and to magnify our souls. He didn't come to die for our sins (only Paul and the Book of Revelation, which was influenced by Paul, say that), he came to teach and heal and lead an exemplary life doing God's will. His Chart did not allow him, in all his power, to help himself, because he was not a hypocrite, and it also showed that he felt his teachings were the most important part of his life, not his Divinity or power. Although his divinity was magnified in his teachings and power, being incarnated in human form brought out all the frailties and emotions that all of us experience when we incarnate on this plane called Earth. He, like us, fell prey to depression, anger, fear and all the other emotions that we all go through in life in pressing against our written Chart to change it. This manifests in his anger at the moneychangers in the Temple, his fear in the Garden of Gethsemane and his anxiety of feeling alone on the cross when he asked God if He had forsaken him.