Holy Blood, Holy Grail

[Khatruman]

At Borders I've seen about 4 or 5 books pop up recently to debunk the Da Vinci code including The Da Vinci Hoax and Cracking The Code... and I just kept thinking "Grow up, it's a book."

Absolutely!!! One of the points I hoped to make with this post was that I wasn't interested in proof of the historical accuracy of Magdalene's role, I am more interested in the notion of the feminine goddess as a part of Christianity.

It is like Christianity to want absolute, unwavering proof. One idea that leads me to see Magdalene's suppressed role is the emphasis that most orthodox churches, such as Catholicism, demand that, in order to be a true follower, you MUST accept that Jesus died on the Cross and was resurrected in three days. Most Christian churches require in the service that the congregation repeat these beliefs every week. It is as if they are almost brain washing you on these "facts." This is what I find so different from Judaism. Judaism, in fact, encourages speculation. There is an entire history of text which is speculation about alternate ways of looking at Holy text. Ideas such as the role of Lillith as the first woman before Eve have grown out of these texts. Forgive me, but I cannot remember the word for this speculation.

With Christianity, once someone engages in speculation, (for instance, Kozensakis' speculative The Last Temptation of Christ) there is an outcry amongst the heads of the church, a call of sacrilege and blasphemy to deviate in any regard from the accepted Gospel.

I think that speculating in regards to Magdalene may allow people to see the repression of the feminine in our patriarchal churches. God is the Father? Where is the Mother principle? The emphasis on holy men being celibate, the whole profaning of the act of sex, which is the very act of creation itself, the subservience of the woman, who embodies the mystery of creation itself, the insistence that the mother of Jesus must be pure and "unstained" by the act of human conception... all of these ideas so deeply devalue the importance of women!!! All I ask is a little balance. And note: I am saying this as a full-blooded virile man!

 

[Alissa]

... all of these ideas so deeply devalue the importance of women!!! All I ask is a little balance. And note: I am saying this as a full-blooded virile man!

Amen Brother-Man~! Sing it Loud, my Brother~!!!

I read Templar Revelation. I enjoyed it very much. There are times when the authors jump to a few conclusions that I wouldn't necessarily make, but the book is unarguably highly researched, and discusses all the issues you're raising, Khat.

To their theory, if I can try to summarize the Goddess tradition, as linked to Mary Magdalene, who is theorized here as Jesus' wife, in all senses....

There is much about Jesus life that goes unrecorded. That he could have spent a good deal of his childhood, and formative years, in nearby Egypt is presented. Egypt's traditions of Isis/Osiris worship include death and rebirth rituals -- with the female acting as Isis and reviving her male counterpart, Osiris incarnate, from his death after three days.

The connection to Mary's part, in being the one recorded who "finds" Jesus at the tomb, newly arisen, supposes that she actually was the one who revived him, using Egyptian ritual, and therefore... acting as the Goddess in the part.

(I'm trying to summarize what other authors have better presented in an entire *book* of information, but I hope I'm still getting the jist of it across).

 

[le pendu]

Thanks for the quick synopsis Allissa.

I'll have to read the book to get the fuller story. Theories concerning the "missing" years of Jesus have been discussed for a long time, including suggestions that he may also have gone to India or China.

I guess like so many things when studying the development of Christianity, it all comes down to who you believe he was, what you believe he was doing, and most importantly, what you believe the viewpoint was of the people who wrote about him at after his death. There can be little doubt that Mary Magdalene was deeply important to the story of Jesus. The fact that she is included in the Gospels forty or more years after the (assumed) events signifies that the stories of her had taken deep root.

Much of my viewpoint has been shaped by reading about the formation of the church by authors like Elaine Pagals, and members of The Jesus Seminar. The Jesus Seminar publishes "The Five Gospels" (The 3 synoptics, John, and Thomas) as well as "The Complete Gospels" which includes the Gospels of Thomas and Mary, The Sayings Gospel Q, The Secret Gospel of Mark, and twelve other Gospels from the first three centuries. Great stuff if you're looking for information outside of the Canon.

What makes "The Five Gospels" such a great book is that it IS a "red letter edition", but the lettering is based on the opinions of some of the (debatably) best biblical scholars around. They voted on each sentence attributed to Jesus and gave it a rating of Red (That's Jesus!), Pink (Sure sounds like Jesus.), Gray (Well, maybe), and Black (There's been some mistake). Every sentence is footnoted and explains the arguments for and against the rating of the sentence. Wanna hear opposing ideas on whether Jesus actually said something and what he probably meant by it? This is the book for you. This book enabled me to learn how historians and scholars evaluate the Gospels and how the Gospels were written for particular audiences at particular times.

Elaine Pagels is a wonderful authority on the Gnostic Gospels, and addresses the feminine in the bible in her book "Adam, Eve, and the Serpent"; I think all of her books are great. Also, books by John Dominic Crossan such as "The Birth of Christianity", or Robert Funk can help to get a grasp of what the world was like at the time of Jesus.

For instance.. he might not have needed to go to Egypt to learn pagan concepts and rituals of the Dying and Rising god (Osiris, Tammuz, Dionysus.. etc).. this was all over the land he was living in. Jesus was less than 4 miles from a very large Hellenic city, in the midst of being developed, called Sepphoris. Remember too that his world was occupied by pagans, the Romans. If he was attracted to this knowledge, it was probably accessible, although, as I've stated before, I think chances are that he was a revolutionary Jew, not a pagan.

Here is a great website by PBS, created for a series they did years ago called "From Jesus to Christ". It is about the early formation of the church. It has lots of wonderful information, and some of it is on Women in the Church, including Mary Magdalene:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/first/women.html

and an excerpt from The Gospel of Mary:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/maps/primary/mary.html

best,
robert

 

[Umbrae]

Hey Khat buddy…Go to your local library and use the ILL. They hate it when you pull the ILL card on them, so do it.

If you teach English or history, check out the Mann book – read until you find yourself laughing hysterically. Indeed we have freedom of the press – you can publish anything – regardless of truth (use it in next years lesson plan – serious here).

Rex Deus was interesting, and is more about the bloodline of Christ than Mary of Bethany (Magdalen) (Hopkins – Simmans – Wallace Murphy). Math and Mona Lisa is so-so.

For me, I’m not picky about Mary of Bethany…I wanna know about sacred geometry…so I’ll pass Mary books on to you, and if you find a good Sacred Geometry book – let me know.

Dance on Dude…

 

[HOLMES]

hmm

i think it is interesting the feminie is coming back (it was surpressed as we all know ) and that evidence that jesus went to india after his "ressecution " and lived to be 120 and had a family.

"on a side note, doens't that make the last signon or however it is spelt from the movie dogma possible ?"

what i am looking for is a good book that talks about the aquarius age , about where we will go .

as this is what i think will happen
1. the femine christ will come
2. it will be focused on new ideas "open your mind to the mother ?"
3. what will it come to prove ? since jesus came to be the ultimate example of forgivness, and prove that we can overcome death ?
4. the prophecies for this must be hidden somewhere,
5. the balance will come. the emphasis will be on the earth mother as well.

but besides that, i do believe that the words of jesus has been mostly lost, added to, or just put into his mouth, three years of work and we get only those quotes ? and if he did one miracle,, he must of did more then what was in the bible. ?

(speaking of which what is the best closest translation of the bible ? i looked at amazon and they seem to reccomend this one
the new jersulam bible
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/t...=/ref=cm_lm_asin/102-3250602-6340160?v=glance
the holy bible english version
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/t...=/ref=cm_lm_asin/102-3250602-6340160?v=glance)

one thing i am doing now is taking all the jesus movies and comparing them eheh.
in the greatest story ever(1965) told at least two people are called mary,, the sister of lazurus, and yes,, the prostitue,
in the king of kings, the prostitue scene never took place,, but mary went to mother mary and said to her ," can you speak to jesus for me, i am not worthy" to paraphrase, which gives us all the inclincation that she was the prostitue.
(i saw jesus of nazath long ago and don't recall it that much)

 

[Moongold]

I have recently purchased the Templar Revelations but not yet read it. It is available as a cheap paperback, Khatrumann: Corgi Books, 1998.

I have for some time been interested in the Egyptian Goddess, Isis (my avatar). I suspected that there were parallels betweeen the Isis / Osiris myth and the story of Christ. The Templar Revelations expands on that a little, The book suggests that Christianity is simply a repackaging of the Isis /Osiris myth but the latter is far more attractive.

I am trying to discover as much as I can about Isis at present. and am delighting in it. I'm reading Jean Houston's book: The passion of Isis and Osiris and have another called The mysteries of Isis by de Traci Regula which I bought second hand.

I read some time ago that Isis was associated with the triangle and feel there has also been some suggestion that she is part of the mysterious trinity sometimes associated with the godhead. Jung believed that the Catholic Church elevated Mary, the Mother of God, to her current status (the Assumption into Heaven) because they realised they needed to recapture a sense of the sacred feminine. To use contemporaray idiom, he thought it was a stroke of brilliance on behalf of the Church.

We are all searching for a stronger exemplar of the sacred feminine, yes? I am so thrilled to be having this conversation. Thank - you all.


Moongold

 

[Moongold]

I've just commenced The Templar Revelations . It's gripping and I think I'll put aside verything until I finish it.

 

[Aoife]

"The Templar Revelations" makes much of the da Vinci painting of 'The Last Supper', suggesting that 'St.John' to the right of Jesus might be Mary Magdalene.

http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/504271_john.html
Pretty convincing, eh?

edited to fix url

 

[Woof]

Imagine me jumping up and down and point back to what Le Pendu said and yelling:
"WHAT HE SAID, WHAT HE SAID!!!!"

Khat, I'm also in the middle of Holy Blood, Holy Grail and am not going to finish it. I am having problems with the tone of the book as well as the scholorship and find it a bit fishy. But it doesn't matter; Elaine Pagel's The Gnostic Gospels is an excellent starting point for if you're interested in some of what the early church excluded from cannon and designated as heretical. Much of it shows how women had a much stronger role in very early Christianity. This book caused a paradigm shift in my view of religion and the church. (By the way, anything Pagels writes is fascinating and well researched.)

Thanks all, I've just added a bunch to my wish list!
Woof

 

[Red Emma]

Holy blood, holy grail

Dear Unbrae,

The ILL card?

Respectfully,

R. E.