AWAKEN 4 – Your God Connection
Our Mission
To challenge the narrative of the evil takeover of humanity that is engulfing the world and to bring about a new dawn of spiritual awareness and enlightenment. To realise the true destiny of humanity that God intended.
Aim
For people to come together in truth, spirit, love and community, a new enlightenment for a new age.
Starting point
I call spirituality your God connection, that comes from within you, it reveals the basic qualities of humanity. Spirituality teaches you to be kind, how to help and love fellow human beings regardless of their religious beliefs or political ideologies. In other words, spirituality is a way of understanding your inner being.
Deepak Chopra puts it simply. “Religion is the belief of someone else’s experience; Spirituality is having your own experience.”
I am not challenging anyone’s beliefs here, I am writing this post as a standalone post, a record of my own journey, and validating in my mind the connection I believe between God and Spirit and where the Jesus figure fits into this relationship which can then underpin our aim of bringing people together in truth, spirit, love and community, a new enlightenment for a new age.
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Background
The Christian narrative is that Jesus was an historical figure who was a prominent moral and religious teacher and had the most devoted disciples and followers. Jesus used parables and healing as a means to build a large following in the areas where he preached. Jesus so threatened the religious and political power structures of his day, that he was arrested, tried, and crucified as a criminal.
It was some decades later that Paul, (previously Saul) used Jesus’s teachings, and upon a belief of a spiritual resurrection founded a new religion in Rome called Christianity that has had a profound effect on humanity for the last 2,000 years.
There is a problem with this narrative in that the historical Jesus is almost impossible to find. The first century had over 40 historians the most of any century and there is hardly any mention of a Jesus figure. Where Jesus is mentioned, Josephus for example most scholars believe this recording was a much later Roman interpolation.
Christianity was not a new concept in the first century AD, the doctrines of a ‘Christian’ life had been taught and practiced for many centuries. It is also important to note that the Jesus story of a virgin birth, born on the 25th of December, 12 followers, healing, miracles, tried, and put to death on a cross and resurrection at the age of 33 was not unique by a long way. Other deities across history had virtually the exact same life story. Examples the Egyptian Horus, Buddha, both were a long time before the birth of Jesus.
So, then what is the Jesus story? (This is my perception; you will make your own).
The Jesus story is an allegorical story of a Christian life, that applies to every single person that wishes to experience their God connection, we can all be Jesuses.
Allegory definition: a story, poem, or picture that can be interpreted to reveal a hidden meaning, typically a moral or political one.
There has been a battle between good (God) and evil (devil) from day one, since the story of Adam and Eve, (again allegorical). Every faith which became a religion will share the same ‘Christian’ values, Christianity does not have the number one authority on this.
The allegorical Jesus became the literal Jesus as a means of communication to the masses. The bible is allegorical and the scholars who wrote and compiled it made it clear it was an allegorical story to be studied and interpreted and meditated on, it had profound meaning.
The Old Testament was a compilation of different stories taken from ancient history, Babylonian, Egyptian, Persian that predated Judaism, where name changes were made and reworked as a new Judean religion, which became scripture and law. Most of the characters and events of the Old Testament are again allegorical with hidden meaning.
Christian doctrine as other faiths, contains a lot of profound good stuff, if you live a Christian life (insert other faith here) you get to engage with a higher consciousness, (your God connection), where through spirit you connect with reality and truth, which is the clarity which I refer to many times.
The not so good bit – the great disconnect.
The allegorical faith ‘leader’ was woven into a literal story, eventually deified (in the second century) with a cast of characters that probably never existed that became a religion that could go worldwide. This mass control as in the case of the New Roman version of Christianity then loses the essence of the individuality of the journey and the real meaning of a personal divine relationship with God. Christians were taught to believe that the Kingdom was Heaven, the place of eternal rest, bliss, and reward that awaited all faithful Christians in the afterlife.
It is important to note here that once the new Roman Christian religion and cannon had been ratified (fixed in place), in the fourth century by the bishops, all other Christian faiths (and there were many) were eventually systematically and ruthlessly persecuted, by the one true Christian church, forcing any vestiges to go underground. This should be a showstopper, an eye opener as to the how mass control is maintained, even in the 21st Century (nothing changes), it’s just a word change to cancel, any opposition.
Divide and conquer.
What then happens very quickly is that each faith (religion) thinks it is the only true faith and they go to war to crush the non-believers. This is all planned as a means of dividing society, populations and countries into groups and playing one off against the other as a means of maintaining instability in the world. The rest is history, I don’t need to go into detail here because you know that millions upon millions have been slaughtered over the centuries for their faith. This is partly the reason that in the 21st Century, an age of our new enlightenment (because we think we know everything!) turns many people away from any faith connection and therefore people identify as agnostic or atheist instead.
Definition:
Agnostic - a person who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God.
Atheist - a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods.
Which when you think about it in the context of those who want to control us it is exactly what they have contrived for humanity, ‘lost in a sea of noise’ spiritually completely disconnected, divide and rule, which makes people fearful, docile, and malleable to any new mandate. What do you think?
Other Christian faiths.
Gnostic Christians.
There were many Christian faiths in the first century AD, and the Gnostics as we call them now were just one of them. Gnostic comes from the Greek word gnostikos, meaning “one who knows,” in turn based on a word for “knowledge,” gnosis. Gnostics typically believed that salvation is achieved by a revelation that awakens knowledge of the divine, spiritual nature of humankind.
Gnostics believed they were the original Christians and were fervently anti-material, believing in Christ consciousness and the kingdom of God within. Gnostics focused on attaining spiritual knowledge and personal inner enlightenment that could bring understanding.
Gnostics believe that there was a first being (“the One”) which emanated a plurality of archons (powers) that led to the creation of the physical universe and humans. But human beings contain an original “divine spark” (a piece of the “One”) which was trapped in material bodies. The goal of Gnosticism (“knowledge”) is the reunification of one's spark with the godhead. “Messengers of light” offered ways to achieve this unity, the most important being the Jesus Christ allegory and message.
The Roman Emperor Constantine at the Council of Bishops in 325AD outlawed Gnosticism. All scriptures were confiscated, and proponents of the faith persecuted. It was not until 1945 and the incredible Nag Hammadi treasure trove in the Upper Egyptian desert that historical writings of the Gnostics have resurfaced, such was the eradication of scripture of all alternative Christian faiths.
Note here It is a little-known fact that there is a truly massive underground Vatican library where all those very earliest writings and gospels that were confiscated over the first four centuries are probably being stored. Completely sealed off from the general public.
The Early Gospels.
Gospels definition: ‘The teaching or revelation of Christ.’ ‘The record of Christ's life and teaching in the first four books of the New Testament.’
The allegorical Jesus becomes the literal Jesus, his teachings were life affirming and profound, including the added miracles and the resurrection story. Over the next 300 years after the death and resurrection of Jesus there were hundreds of Gospels written, causing new sects and churches to follow a certain Gospel. The Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Hebrews, the Gospel of the Egyptians, are but three examples.
It is important to note here that the Gospels purported to be Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John that became the four canonical gospels of the New Testament were not mentioned in the first century AD, it was not until AD 180, near the end of the second century that they were first mentioned.
The Gospel of Thomas
The Gospel of Thomas is an ancient collection of sayings attributed to Jesus that records the memory and teachings of a very early school of Christianity, the Thomas school. According to their tradition, the founders of the Thomas school were members of Jesus’ own family. The story of this gospel is really the story of the community of Jesus’ earliest followers and the peculiar spirituality they proclaimed to be Jesus’ own.
Over the centuries the Thomas school declined and with the later persecution from Rome of any non-approved Gospels the message and gospel of Thomas was lost to the greater public. At Nag Hammadi in Upper Egypt in 1945 the only complete version of the Thomas gospel was found buried at the foot of a cliff, the buried manuscripts date from the 3rd and 4th centuries. The Gospel of Thomas, once restored to the world, cased a great deal of interest, both scholarly and popular. Far more than any other Gospel available to us today, Thomas presents a Jesus uniquely suited to our contemporary culture. By reading the Gospel contemplatively and opening oneself to the shifts in perspective it nudges us to make, it can utterly transform how one sees the world – and oneself.
The Kingdom of God?
In the Jesus story of the New Testament, Jesus insisted that the Kingdom of God was not a political reality that would someday arrive, but a spiritual reality that was already present. This lies at the heart of our search for meaning and is also at the core of Jesus’ sayings as recorded in the Gospel of Thomas. The Kingdom of God is a state of unitive consciousness when we are fully present with all things, where we are able to live in a state of total awareness and oneness. It is a spiritual reality that is already present for those who know how to perceive it. By living in the Kingdom, we find peace for ourselves, and we can extend that peace to others, not by demanding that they see things as we do, but by simply not expecting anything of them.
What Jesus was really offering was not a new religion but the very opposite of religion, a living spirituality dependent not upon any church or dogma, but on the unmediated experience of mystical union common to all true spiritualities.
Your unique Individuality.
It is human nature that we seek, we seek all our lives for meaning, I certainly have, it’s part of the journey of discovery, in my opinion. Christian values are timeless which many people can subscribe to, they were around from day one, people decided whether to take the red pill or the blue pill. The red pill, your unique journey is exactly that, you are the one (NEO), you have a God connection inside you, (the Kingdom), you are Jesus. You live your life, giving, caring, and sharing, doing no harm and you connect with others. You aim (our aim), to come together in truth, spirit, love and community, a new enlightenment for a new age.
The historical Saul who became Paul
It is Paul’s school which eventually became the dominant form of Christianity. According to the biblical book of Acts, he was originally known as Saul. He originally believed the Jewish Christians to be dangerous heretics and sought to purge Judaism of their numbers. Saul famously converted to Christianity on the road to Damascus, when he was struck from his horse by a blinding light and heard the voice of Jesus, “Saul, Saul, why do you prosecute me.” – “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.”
Paul is key here to the forming of a new Roman Christianity, Paul’s great insight was to wed three disparate elements into one more-or-less coherent system: the history of the Jewish people and Jewish scriptures, the story of Jesus and the gnostic myth of the saviour coming down from heaven. This was different in many respects to the earlier Christianity.
Paul believed in the resurrection of Christ, with a spiritual body. His idea of the resurrection, like of Clement of Rome, was that the spiritual body arose from the decay of the natural body. It is manifest that when Paul saw Jesus, he saw what appeared to be a spirit; since it was after the time when alleged, Christ had ascended in the body.
There is no evidence that Paul during his life knew anything of the canonical gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John), nor is there any reason to believe he had ever seen a gospel in which Jesus denied being a spirit, after the resurrection. Paul believed that the resurrection and ascension were one and the same thing, a manifestation from the spiritual world.
Paul believed that Christ, after his resurrection, or ascension, communicated to his disciples, by the agency of the Holy Spirit, through intercession with the father, supernatural gifts; “charismata;” and these gifts were imparted by the laying on of hands.
At this time in first century Rome the Roman citizens practiced a polytheistic religion, and the monotheistic faith of the Christians seemed alien and a threat to the majority of the Roman people. Christians were being rounded up, persecuted, and put to death in the arenas in their thousands.
The exact details of Paul’s death are unknown, but tradition holds that he was beheaded in Rome and thus died as a martyr for his faith. His death was perhaps part of the executions of Christians ordered by the Roman emperor Nero following the great fire in the city in 64 AD. It is known that St. Paul was imprisoned in Rome and wrote several of his epistles (letters) during his captivity there. The date for his death is thought to be AD. 67 or 68. It is also possible that Paul did not exist and was fabricated by the new Romans church to validate a living Jesus figure.
Apollonius of Tyana
It is significant to point out here that there was an historical figure that has been documented in the first century called Apollonius of Tyana. He was a Greek neo-Pythagorean philosopher, ascetic teacher, and miracle worker. His teachings and legend influenced both scientific thought and occultism for centuries after his death. Apollonius went around performing miracles and healing people, he had followers and was very well-travelled and lived to a grand old age of 96, “He was a contemporary of Jesus”. Were bits of the Jesus story taken from the life of Apollonius, or was the Apollonius figure also a fabrication, clearly the truth has been hidden from us?
Marcion
In 144 AD. Marcion of Sinope (85AD – 160 AD), a shipbuilder, an early Christian gnostic theologian and evangelist, and the son of the bishop of Pontus, also a follower of Paul gathered all the authentic scriptures he could find at that time to create the very first Christian bible.
The very first Marcionite bible consisted of the Gospel of the Lord (Evangelion) and the original Epistles of Paul (Apostolikon). Within the Apostolikon are Galatians, 1st and 2nd Corinthians, Romans, 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, Ephesians, Colossians, Philemon and Philippians and no Revelations and more significantly no Old Testament.
For your information, because it is not known today, is that the Marcionite Christian Church grew to span the known world, and for centuries its bedrock of the very first bible dominated Christian culture and tradition with millions of adherents. The schism that was created here is that the Marcionites recognised the God of the Old Testament as being in direct contradiction to the teachings of Christ, this garnered many rich and powerful enemies.
After the first Marcionic bible was produced it was presented at Rome, which started the redefinition of a New Testament into the new version of Christianity. The gospels we know today as Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, were first published towards the end of the second century. AD. 180 Irenaeus of Gaul mentions Luke for the first time. AD. 181 John’s Gospel is mentioned for the first time. The Muratorian Canon, believed to date to AD. 200, is the earliest compilation of canonical texts resembling the New Testament. It was not until the fifth century that all the different Christian churches came to a basic agreement on Biblical canon.
The Church of Rome
It is recorded that sometime after Christ's death, the apostle Peter travelled to the city of Rome in order to spread the faith. Rome was the capital of the Roman Empire and the seat of power in the Mediterranean world. Spreading the faith in Rome would, therefore, seem like a logical thing to do if one wanted to spread the message of Jesus to the world.
The word "pope" is derived from pappas, the Greek word for father. Peter was credited as the first pope of the Catholic Church, was therefore regarded as the father of the Catholic Church. Peter was also the first Bishop of Antioch. Dates for the length of his papacy has never been verified, however it has been estimated to have been between 34 to 38 years.
St Peter as he became was executed by the Romans during the reign of the emperor Nero. He is believed to have died sometime around the decade of the 60s in the first century AD. Again no one knows the exact date.
Roman conversion
The seeds had been sown, by the disciples and followers of Jesus and Roman emperors in the second and third centuries were seeing a massive rise in Christian churches across Asia minor, persecution could not stop it. Slowly emperors became more receptive, as more and more prominent Romans left their traditional beliefs behind to convert to Christianity. It was in AD. 313 when the emperor Constantine (AD. 280– 337) issued the Edict of Milan, which accepted Christianity. Ten years later, it became the official religion of the Roman Empire.
The 27-book New Testament was first formally canonized during the councils of Hippo (AD. 393) and Carthage (AD. 397) in North Africa. Pope Innocent I ratified the same canon in AD. 405, but it is probable that a Council in Rome in AD. 382 under Pope Damasus I gave the same list first. This is what the eminent scholar Gerald Massey in 1885 wrote:
The actual birthplace of the carnalised Christ was neither Bethlehem nor Nazareth, but in the heart of Rome.
My Take
Remember, this is an individual journey, you will make your own decisions.
The historical or allegorical Jesus is showing us by example how to lead a life of oneness with God, where spirit is the point of connection. That by becoming the allegorical Jesus yourself and living by his timeless teachings and message it becomes life affirming and transforming. We can also find the answers to this incredible journey we are all on by engaging with the simple message that Jesus was conveying, the love of God. To have a relationship with God, and in having this relationship we are to show our love towards Him by following His commandments so that it becomes a way of life.
That in the kingdom of God, there are no hierarchies, no saints, no sinners, no prophets, or messiahs. That every one of us is filled with light, with truth, and we either choose to live into that truth or we don’t.
There are no judges, no juries, no condemnation, no blame – just fulfilled or unfulfilled potential. We either bring forth the light that is within us, or we do not. Once you resonate at the frequency of oneness you become impervious to the negativity and evil intensions of those that wish to enslave or destroy you. This message is just as relevant today as it was in the first century AD.
I believe it is also our responsibility to share this message with people, which is exactly what I am doing here and, in the months ahead.
God bless you.
Highly recommended reading.
‘The very first Bible 144 AD’ - Marcionite Christian Church
‘The Way of Thomas’ - John R Mabry