Posts Tagged ‘christ’
The Virgin Mary is from the town of Qana in Lebanon; Book Review; (March 17, 2009)
The reverend Father Youssef Yamine has recently published a book in Arabic “Jesus Christ was born in Lebanon”.
The manuscript is of 730 pages and divided into four big chapters:
1. The other Bethlehem in the district of Phoenicia,
2. Who is Christ historically?
3. The Bethlehem of Canaan in the New Testaments, and
4. Christ was born in the district of Phoenicia, and the Virgin Mary is from and was born in Qana (Lebanon).
This voluminous book is packed with documentation, references, maps, and archeological facts. I will reserve details in a series of notes at the end in order to recount smoothly the biography of the extended family of Jesus.
The story of the birth of Jesus goes as follows.
Joachim Omram and Hanna, the parents of the Virgin Mary, were from the village of Qana (ten kilometers south-east of the city of Tyr and at an altitude of 85 meters). This town of Qana was called Qana of Upper Galilee and was within the district of Phoenicia during the Seleucid and early Roman Empires). Joachim was one of the eminent personalities in the town of Qana and the region. He was a priest and had been frustrated because he could not secure any descendents.
Joachim (Yuwakeem) took his sheep to a remote area and fasted and prayed for 40 days. Hanna was also frustrated with this extended absence and decided to take off her black cloth and washed her hair and went out in the garden.
Hanna received an apparition that she will soon get pregnant and that Joachim is on his way home.
Mary was born in Qana and her parents dedicated her to the Great Temple on Mount Carmel (Mount Carmel was also in the district of Phoenicia).
When Mary was 3 years of age, she was interned in the monastery of the Great Temple in Carmel. Mary was one of the 12 virgins of the elite families in the region to be dedicated to serve in the temple and she was named “The Pigeon of Eel (God)“. (The Jews in Judea never allowed girls to serve in temples).
Joseph (future husband of Mary) was also from Qana and one of Mary’s relatives; he was one of the superintendents at the temple and he cleaned, painted and did the various tasks of maintenance.
Mary and Joseph got married and Jesus was born in the village of Bethlehem Tifone by the Carmel, close to the famous city of Dora by the seaside and north of current city of Haifa, within the district of Phoenicia (not in the Bethlehem of Judea).
Mary visited her aunt Elizabeth in Galilee who was 6 months pregnant. Jesus was presented to the Great Temple of Mount Carmel for sanctification. Jesus was lost in the same temple discussing with the priests when he was 12 of years. Jesus studied in the schools of Mount Carmel.
Joseph and Mary lived in Bethlehem by the Carmel. The town of Nazareth did not exist yet and the area was called Nazareth. When Joseph died Mary returned to her hometown of Qana where her father and grandparents were buried.
Jesus spent his youth in Qana.
Jesus was called “Jesus of Mary” to distinguish him from the other Jesus. Mary was also called “the sister of Jacob“: Hanna had remarried after the death of Joachim and gave birth to 4 offspring; the eldest son of Hanna was apparently Jacob.
In the wedding of Qana, where Jesus showed his miraculous power of transforming water into wine, Mary was in her own town and it is Jesus who was invited and came up from Lake Tiberias to join the wedding.
After the wedding, Mary and the brothers of Jesus (Jacob, Joseph, Simon, and Judah) followed him down to Cafarnaom (Capernaum) by the Lake and stayed there for a few days and then joined Jesus’ party from then on.
Qana of Upper Galilee (The Galilee of Nations) was the location where the disciples gathered for a while after the dilapidation of the first martyr Etienne.
Note 1: Mary received the “Good Tiding” from the Archangel while serving in Mount Carmel. Jesus was elevated to Heaven on Mount Carmel. The first church was built on Mount Carmel.
A church was constructedt in the town of Qana by the disciples and the Moslems venerate the tomb of Joachim called “The tomb of the prophet Omran“.
Qana was an important town for many centuries before Christ, and it became the main resting place of the disciples before venturing any further.
When Israel bombarded south Lebanon in 1996 for 15 days, one of the missiles made a large crater, 4 meters off the tomb of the prophet Omran. The excavations uncovered a buried church and the tombs of the family of Omran.
Note 2: Qana is famous today because Israel massacred over 100 civilians and gravely injured 120 when her bombs targeted a UN compound in Qana in 1996. Israel hit that same town again in 2006 and killed 50 more civilians.
Note 3: I may conjecture that Mary retained the title of Virgin because she earned it serving as one of the virgins in the Great Temple. There is this tradition in the Levant to bestow the title of nun and priest for even those who later relinquished their sacerdotal duties.
Note 4: I may be bold to offer another conjecture. Joachim was sterile and Hanna was impregnated by her relative who later became her second husband.
Note 5: Jesus was not Jewish. His family and ancestors were forced by the Jewish King Arestopoulos to abide by Moses’ Law and be circumcised since the year 103 BC.
The Jewish historian of the Jews Josephus never mentioned Jesus or the crucifixion: Jesus was not considered a Jew!
Note 6: Jesus was highly educated. He could speak Aramaic, Hebrew, Greek and Latin. He studied Law and taught Law at the university in Sidon (Lebanon)
Note 7: The name Jesus is also called Emanuel (Amanueel) which mean “Eel (God) is among us”. Thus, “God was made human“.
Note 8: The astrophysicist Reznicoff confirms that the Comet Halley that showed the way to the sages crossed Galilee and not Judea.
Note 9: Jesus was born in the year 7 BC and Caesar’s census was done in the year 10 BC, 3 years before Jesus birth.
Note 10: Herod the Great learned about the birth of the “King of the Jews” from the magies as he was boarding a ship in Akka (Acre) to Rome.
No historian ever confirmed the mass killing of males of two years and less during the reign of Herod.
Note 11: There are indications that Jesus entered Jerusalem for the first time when he was crucified.
No wonder that Jesus experienced a cultural chock when he witnessed business and usury transactions within the temple.
Jesus got hold of a whip and chased out the merchants and turned their tables over and declared: “It is said that the temple is the house of God and not a cavern for thieves”.
Note 12: Jesus was also called Rabbi (Rabuny) which means teacher in Aramaic. Jesus said to his disciples: “Do not let anyone call you Rabbi since you have only one teacher in Christ and you are all brethren”
Note 13: Jesus wore the same long white robe that the Essenes sect of Mount Carmel wore; the consecrated members were called “The White Brethren” and they were famous as healers.
The Essenes had many branches in Galilee and a prosperous one in Alexandria (Egypt) and had places for welcoming travelers and the sick.
John the Baptist, who never left the region of Galilee, baptized with water as of the Essenes traditions and baptized Jesus.
Note 14: Israel bombed Qana twice: Once on April 18, 1996 on a UN refugee compound and a second time in July 2006.
#قانا | 18 نيسان 1996
Islam: the two messages of Jesus and Mohammad (February 3, 2009)
A challenge to all theologians: Islam is one of the Christian sects.
Islam means submission (to God, the one and only). This is a challenge to all theologians, religious researchers, and philosophers of all religious denominations (monolithic or not). My hypothesis is: The religious message of the Prophet Muhammad, during the first 13 years of proselytizing in Mecca, is identical to one of the Christian sects. Let me suggest the following procedure or protocol:
First, select all the religious Christian sects from the first to the Nicee council in 425; then select the remaining Christian sects after Nicee to the split between Rome and Byzantium around the year 1000, then the Christian sects that were formed between 1000 to the Martin Luther schism, then all the modern Christian sects from Protestantism, Calvinism, Baptism, Methodism, Episcopalian, Armenians (Catholic and Orthodox), and all the sects in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and elsewhere.
Second, develop taxonomy of attributes in order to categorize all these Christian sects.
Third, allocate all the sects to one of six categories or more if need be.
Fourth, select the verses in Islam that correspond to the period before the flight of the Prophet Muhammad to Medina or Yathreb
Five, assign each verse in that period to the taxonomy of step two.
Six, allocate the message of the prophet Muhammad in one of the categories chosen in step three.
The foundation to my hypothesis stems from reading a manuscript titled “Islam in its two messages: Christ and Muhammad” The author of the book is late Antoun Saadeh, a Lebanese of Christian Geek Orthodox denomination; the book was written in 1942 and Saadeh proves that Islam is almost identical to the message of Christ when we analyze the verses of the Koran pronounced during Muhammad proselytizing of his message before the legislation period for the new community in Medina.
Since Christianity is an amalgam of many sects that split into schisms in the last two thousand years, then I figured that, from a scientific perspective, it would be more appropriate to differentiate Christianity according to sects. It would also be fitting to study Islam by analyzing the various Moslem sects; though the variations would be based more on the legislations and Hadith than the fundamental spiritual content during the first 13 years of the message.
The Nazarene: An unpublished coherent biography (December 16, 2008)
Preamble: Over a hundred of different manuscripts (Bibles) have been written on Jesus and his message in the early days of Christianity and before the four New Testaments (that were written by Mathew, Luc, Mark and John) that the Council of Nicee (Turkey) in 325 decided to select as the official representatives of the story of Jesus. (Ironically, the selected Bibles were written in Greek; maybe the language was one of the main factors for retaining them). There are evidences that the Bible of Mathew was originally written in Aramaic before being translated into Greek. Many of these early manuscripts were written by the disciples of Jesus and close companions like Barnaby (the spiritual guide of Paul and who accompanied Paul in his first apostolic trip in the interior of Turkey), Thomas (not necessarily the twin brother of Jesus who established the first Christian community in the port of Deb on the Indus River), Philip, Bartholomew, and others. There are many folk tales that are to be considered as more valid than the canonical “truths or facts”.
What we know is that Jesus had his Bar Mitzvah in Jerusalem and he sat among the priests and had a discussed with them. In between this event and his preaching adventure (over 25 years) the Church has nothing to offer but that Jesus obeyed his parents. Even the story of his birth until his Bar Mitzvah is not reliable and could be considered as one of the acceptable version.
It is said that Jesus was 33-year old when he was crucified; that is the minimum age because Jesus was older and probably close to be forty. How Jesus spent the time in between (a span of at least 20 years) and where did he live and grew to maturity? As is the custom in Judaism, boys were married at 13 and Jesus was not to be an exception but he had an outlet to tradition: Nazareth was a hotbed for the Essenien Jewish sect located in Qumran (not far from the western side of the Dead Sea).
The Essenien sect (cabala) lived in a closed community; women were not included, and the members vowed celibacy; they were vegetarians, ate together, distributed their wealth to the whole community, and each member worked according to his skills. The members wore a unique white dress code in summer and another outfit in winter. The members of this community were known to be excellent healers. This sect was also labeled the “Baptist”, the “Nazoreen” and “Ossene” (the Strong). The teachings of Buddhism had reached this community two centuries ago because King Ashoka of India had dispatched Buddhist monks to this region. It is very plausible that Jesus opted to join the Qumran community to avoid being wed. The Essenien caste had branches in Alexandria (Egypt) called Therapeutic or healers and also in Syria.
John the Baptist was Essenien. The fact that the canonic testaments reveal that John the Baptist didn’t recognize Jesus at the first sight might suggests that the two men didn’t meet in the community of Qumran at the same periods or that Jesus had left the community long time ago: Jesus was a traveler and not a community dweller. There are evidences that Jesus was a wide traveler, knew many languages and was highly versed in religions and other legal aspects of the land. It is very plausible that Jesus visited Alexandria, Syria, and even reached India; he lingered in India and Persia before returning to Syria and Galilee.
A manuscript named “Himis” was discovered in Kashmir, close to the city of Leh, which described the “Lost years of Jesus”. In that manuscript it is referred to Jesus as Issa (an Aramaic name that the Arabs adopted) who traveled to most of the Holy Cities in India such as Djagguernat, Radjagriha, and Benares, and was frequently chased out by the clergies (sacerdotal officers). The manuscript relates multitudes of pronouncements and teachings by Issa that are compatible to the canonic Bibles. Issa fled to Kashmir, Afghanistan, and Persia. It is plausible that a Christian sect in the vicinities of Kashmir wrote that narrative. It is also plausible that Jesus survived his wounds and headed eastward: the shroud of Milan have marks of a body still hot and not of a cadaver. I frankly cannot see why this story should be thrown out; countless adolescents tour the world nowadays; it was even more common in those times for young people trekking to learn and attend renowned schools.
Jesus knew more than three language; Aramaic, Hebrew, Greek (the language of the educated of the time) and Latin since he spoke to Roman centurions and Pontus Pilate. It is also narrated that Jesus lived for a time in Sidon (a Lebanese port) teaching in its famous law school. His mother Mary and part of her family moved to a town nearby when Jesus was a lecturer in the law school. It is no fluke incident that Jesus and Mary attended a wedding in Qana (a town close to Sidon); it is also very rational that Jesus decided to start his message after Qana when his mother removed the cover of secrecy and exposed his supernatural gifts of turning water to wine. Jesus was a high priest in the Essen sect and preached a message based in symbolism and fables and was highly spiritual and staunchly anti-Pharisee. The Jewish cabala sect is a branch of the Essen sect and is founded on the Sumerian theology and myths.
Albert Schweitzer, a theologian, physician, thinker, organ player and Nobel Peace laureate offered his version on Jesus. Schweitzer said, based on the first two Bibles of Mathew and Marc, that Jesus preached his message to the general public in the last year before his crucifixion. Six months, all in all, was the period that Jesus was accompanied by the public; the remaining months he spent them among his close disciple around Caesarea of Philippi.
In the beginning, Jesus accepted the label of a prophet among the prophets but then he reached the belief that he is the Messiah of the Jews. Thus, he sent his disciples two by two to preach the message of the end of time. Jesus was very surprised when all his disciples returned safe and sound; he expected his disciples to suffer terribly and be put to death if the “prophesy of end of time” was to be accomplished. Jesus then decided that God would accept his sacrifice and save his close disciples from atrocious deaths before the first coming of the Messiah. The version of what happened in Jerusalem and Jesus crucifixion can be followed in my article “Judas Iscariot”.
Note 1: Jesus had a large extended family; he had many brothers and sisters and his grandmother Ann married a second time and had many boys and girls. Mathew made a valiant attempt through 42 generations to link Jesus to David. If we have no records of Jesus own family then how could we go that far back in genealogy? The Christian Jews wanted a Jewish King very badly. Actually, several early Christian communities unified the New Testament into one coherent book and had eliminated Mathew’s ridiculous endeavor.
Note 2: The first Christian communities emulated the monastic and ascetic life of the Essenien sect. A few early Christian sects went beyond the ascetic of the Essenians; for example, the author Amine Maaluf, in his book on Mani, mentions a community called in Aramaic “Halle Haware” or white garment clad people; this caste did not eat meat or drink wine or leavened bread; the disciples wore white garments from top to bottom, were scared of fire (symbol of evil), and thus would eat only raw fruits and vegetables grown by the community. Outside food was prohibited and considered “female” food because women were banished from the community and the female names in the scriptures were not mentioned unless the names represented calamities and bad augurs. Travelers of this community carried with them the unleavened bread and produce of their home grown community because outside food was not pure.
Many monophysist Christian sects (Jesus is only divine) like the Jacobite and Nastourian (a name originated from the name Nazareth) had reached China before Islam (around 600 AC); they translated their Bible into Chinese and were permitted to preach their brand of religion and build churches. The Nastourians built churches all along the Silk Road and many of these edifices can still be found in Tibet, Mongolia, China, Afghanistan, and Persia. It is also believed that the Prophet Mohammad learned about Christianity from these sects that were marginalized by the official Byzantine Church.
Judas Iscariot
Posted on: December 11, 2008
Judas Iscariot (December 11, 2008)
I am not hot religiously but I like good, interesting and coherent stories. Judas Iscariot is the son of Simon (Iscariot, the leprosy, the Pharisee) whom Jesus cured from leprosy. Judas is also the brother of Lazarus whom Jesus resurrected from death. Judas is the brother of Martha and Marie Magdalena (Magdala) who poured a pound of perfume on Jesus’ feet when he visited the family in Bethany, near Jerusalem.
Simon the Pharisee was a very rich man and living in the best house and he was a highly respected and visible personality in Bethany and Judea. Simon came from a village called “Kerioth”; it is from this region that Judas Maccabee launched his successful assault on Jerusalem and conquered it from the Syrian monarch Antiochus 4 Epiphane over a century ago; thus this family’s sympathy to the zealot movement (those Jews who were intent on kicking the Romans out of Judea). Simon didn’t have to join any colony of leprosies as was the custom. Instead, as an impure by the Pharisee laws, Simon decided to move to Galilee, away from Bethany, in order not to pressure the inhabitants and to save face and he lived there comfortably.
Jesus cured Simon in Galilee and became very attached to his family; Marie Magdalena visited Jesus in her father’s house in Galilee and had cried over his feet and rubbed her hair on Jesus’ feet in repentance. Simon was curious whether Jesus would realize that Marie was “a sinner” who lived freely from society’s prejudices. Actually, Marie Magdalena, who had left her husband, a scribe in Jerusalem, and joined a Roman officer to the city of Magdala, was saved from being lapidated simply because she was from a very rich family.
Judas was the purse keeper of the apostles and he was rich and didn’t need any lousy 30 pieces of silver to sell his “Master”. Judas was a fervent “zealot” Pharisee; he was a vehement and irascible man and he stated his mind. Judas surely had Jesus’ ears and they discussed at length. Did Jesus’ plan coincide with Judas’? Not necessarily for the long term and not for the same reasons.
Judas was not happy with the Sanhedrin state of affairs: those priests were very cozy with Pilate; Judas the zealot wanted something to be done. Jesus, a high priest of the celibate, secluded, white clad and closed community Essenean caste of Qumran, was not happy with the Sanhedrin: he had the harshest words and diatribes against the Pharisee and the Sadducee sects. Jesus chased the merchants out of the temple; Jesus was on a war path when he ascended toward Jerusalem.
Jesus, the knowledgeable legist in the Jewish teaching, planned his entry to Jerusalem to coincide with the prophesies of the coming Messiah. He was welcomed as such by the whole City. Nicodemus of the Sanhedrin met with Jesus secretly and they talked; something was being prepared. During the “Cène” or Last Supper (commemorated according to the Essenean sect) Jesus dipped a piece of bread in milk and offered it to Judas (symbol of his closest friendship) saying: “Tonight, one of you will hand me over”. That was the code name for Judas to initiate the plan.
The plan was to incite the Sanhedrin to imprison Jesus and offer an excellent excuse for the Jews to revolt. Jesus knew that the Sanhedrin had no rights to put anyone to death, except Pilate. Judas was the catalyst to convince the Sanhedrin that Jesus has been claiming to be the coming Messiah and if they fail to get hold of him than it would be impossible to stop him once out of Jerusalem. Judas negotiated 30 pieces of silver to give credence to his maneuver and of the seriousness of his claims. The Sanhedrin didn’t need Judas to lead them to where Jesus was located: the whole city knew where Jesus stayed. Judas job was to make sure that Jesus was apprehended and then to spread the news for mass revolt. The Jews in Jerusalem welcomed Jesus as a legislature leader and had no patience with another prophet martyr; they sided with the power to be and let go of their “Messiah”.
Jesus had to fall back on plan B. He kept total silence with his Jewish captors in order not to be lead into any further mistakes or divulging names. He spoke to Pilate of a Kingdom not of this world; thus Jesus has no plans to revolt against the Romans. Pilate knew that Jesus plan was not against the Romans dominion as he has discovered that the Sanhedrin angst is real and serious; the Sanhedrin knew that Jesus revolt was to curb their hegemony over the Jews, to review the over 600 rules and regulations shackling the daily behavior of the Jews, and thus to weaken and destroy their businesses. When faced between liberating Barabas the zealot or Jesus Sanhedrin didn’t blink. Pilate also was not happy with a purist Jewish movement: he was very comfortable doing business with this rotten Sanhedrin. Pilate washed his hands on account of a person called Jesus but not on a Jewish purist internal movement, a revolt that would have given him huge headaches.
Pilate divulged the whole scheme in one sentence: he ordered to write on top of the crucifix “Jesus of Nazareth. King of the Jews” It was known that Nazareth was a hot bed for the Essenean sect that planned to become the dominant sect among the Jews.
Judas did excellent on his first job but the dissemination task failed miserably: the Jews turned against Jesus. Judas felt let down by a meek Jesus who didn’t stand up as a legislature leader such as Moses. Judas’ earthly dreams vanished; the arrogant and proud Judas returned the 30 lousy silver pieces; the Sanhedrin used that money to purchase a field since it could not recover impure and tainted money. Judas, the fervent zealot, hanged himself to avoid further investigation, retributions, and for not believing in redemption.
The Jew, Joseph of Arimathy, a rich friend of Pilate was permitted to handle Jesus body. Pilate expressed surprise for a strong young man to die so quickly but he cut on any further discussions: Jesus is dead; go home everybody. That is another interesting story.
