|
by
Acharya S
from "The
Christ Conspiracy - The Greatest Story Ever Sold"
1999
from
TheArchive Website
Spanish version
German
version
In our quest to ascertain the origins of Christianity and the nature
of its founder, we have explored a number of themes and aspects of
culture from around the globe.
We have also briefly touched upon the
controversial subjects of sex and drugs, which are usually omitted
or avoided in the present type of analysis. However, these subjects
are in fact very important in determining the development of human
culture in general and religion in specific. Indeed, they constitute
yet another part of the mysteries.
For centuries, the impression given by religionists is that to be a
moral person, one must not only forgo but disdain sexuality, viewing
it as if it were a curse from the devil rather than a “gift from
God.”
The same can be said of drugs, at least
of the variety that has anything to do with altering consciousness,
even if such drugs are in the form of “Godgiven” plants. Hence, the
picture of a religious or righteous individual is basically someone
who must have (heterosexual) sex only with one person within a
sanctioned marriage, if at all; to be in a constant state of
procreation; and to remain as sober as “a judge.”
To those who think life is to be
enjoyed, rather than endured, this picture represents a dull,
robotic state, to say the least.
The reality is that there have been times on this planet when
cultures have recognized sacred sexual practices and sacramental
plants not only as gifts from “God” but also paths to “God,” or
“Cosmic Consciousness,” as it were. Indeed, sex and drugs have been
considered from time immemorial as devices to create union with the
divine, which is a major reason behind the negative spin put on them
by religionists, who insist that only they, “Jesus” or some other
entity can be avenues to the divine.
In actuality, it is the
priest’s task to create an artificial separation between human
beings and the omnipresent “God.”
However, as even “Paul” says, “an
intermediary implies more than one; but God is one”; thus, the
priest as intermediary is contrary not only to common sense but also
to Christian doctrine, which is one of the many reasons the masses
were forbidden for centuries under penalty of death to read the
Bible.
These sacred sex and drugs practices
have thus presented a threat to power-hungry priests and their
political flunkies, because, as stated, they require no intermediary
between the practitioners and the divine. If an all-powerful,
dictatorial state religion was to succeed, it would need to destroy
this concept of sacred sex and sacramental drugs from the human
psyche and replace it with fear and guilt, such that those who had
sex, for example, would be driven to cleanse themselves of their
perceived sins by confession or other priest craft.
The exploitation of humanity’s weakness
regarding sex in particular worked nicely for priestly conspirators,
since they could rail against it, knowing very well that people
would continue to have it, such that the guilty would then be forced
to return repeatedly to the Church for absolution from “sins.”
Despite their best efforts, however, the various religionists could
not eradicate the widespread spiritual practices utilizing sex and
drugs, even under penalty of death.
In reality, they held these
practices for themselves while hypocritically preaching their evils
to the masses and exhorting abstinence from them. As noted, along
with the knowledge of astrology, the use of sex and drugs actually
has formed part of the esoteric religion or “mysteries” hidden from
the masses by the brotherhoods and secret societies that create
exoteric and vulgar religions for the masses.
Indeed, these “sacraments” constituted a significant part of the
mysteries, as many schools and cults have used sex and drugs in
their initiation rites. One such widespread sex-related rite is
circumcision, albeit it is an anti-sex one. Although it is widely
perceived to be a Jewish custom, circumcision dates back to at least
2300 BCE in Egypt and is also found in other parts of Africa, as
well as in Fiji, Samoa, Assyria, Phoenicia, Mexico and South
America, prior to the introduction of Judaism and/or Christianity.
In Egypt, it was the priests only who
were circumcised, but Israel was a “priestly nation,” so all of its
males were to be circumcised. In contrast to this anti-sex
mutilation, however, have been a number of pro-sex, as well as
pro-drug, rituals. Even though they have fervently attempted to set
themselves apart from the rest, pretending to reject these concepts
about sex and drugs, esoteric Judaism and Christianity have also
utilized these rites and rituals.
Obviously, there is a downside to sex and drugs, as there is with
virtually every human experience.
However, mature cultures and
individuals have possessed the ability to utilize these powerful
devices wisely, and the taboo status itself makes them dangerous, in
that they no longer come with the “instruction manual” of
initiation.
Also, there is an enormous difference
between sacred sex and promiscuity, as well between the plant-drugs,
or “entheogens” (“generating God”), and the potent extracted
chemicals causing such turmoil today.
Sex and the
Ancient World
Prior to its vilification, sex was venerated from the earliest times
of human history, not only for erotic and spiritual or “tantric”
reasons, but also because it was the act of reproduction.
As it is today, fertility was very
important to the ancients. In fact, the fecundity of the earth was
identified with the fertility of the human being. Thus, the rain
falling upon and fertilizing the womb of Mother Earth was considered
the sperm of Father Sky. In effect, sex-worship was nature-worship,
and nature-worship extended to the heavens, where the stars
themselves were even named for trees, as noted.
Nature was all-important to the
ancients, as they realized they were not only dependent upon it but
also inexorably linked to it. Jackson describes the nature-worship
that developed from this perception:
The Savior-God religions, Christianity included, are based on the
worship of nature. Nature may be defined as the material universe
and the forces at work in the cosmos, which operate independently of
man.
Among the varieties of natural religion were:
-
the worship of
the earth, of trees, and other plants
-
of volcanoes, mountains,
water,
and wind
-
of animals
-
of stars, planets, the moon, the sun, the sky,
etc.
The myths of the various human cultures, in fact, ubiquitously
reflect this connection to and reverence for nature, especially in
regard to the birth process, which was obviously the single most
important event in a life and which introduced the human being into
the natural world.
The reproductive organs and genitalia have thus
been a source of tremendous interest.
In the ancient world, phallic and yonic
symbols were seen everywhere in nature:
Furthermore, many
nonsexual words can be traced to roots meaning “womb,” “menses,”
“vagina,” “phallus,” “penis,” or “semen.”
Sexual symbols were also reproduced abundantly in art, architecture
and other cultural artifacts, including religion. In fact, it would
probably not be an overstatement to say that every religion/cult has
had something to do with sex, including the popular religions of
today. Indeed, within organized religions such as Judaism and
Christianity phallic and vulval symbols abound that are no longer
properly understood by the people.
Yet, these sexual symbols hold occultic
power; hence, they have been profusely incorporated into temples and
cathedrals.
Judaism and
Sex
Many people today perceive such symbols, concepts and practices as
odd if not deviant, because they have been taught that the
polytheistic cultures who overtly practiced them were “bad” and
“sinful.”
The common folk have also been taught to
believe that the Jews and Christians have been very moral and have
had little to do with sex.
For example, it is erroneously perceived
that the Old Testament heroes and patriarchs were impeccably moral
individuals who never engaged in anything remotely smacking of
sexual deviation and perversion.
-
First of all, during the time of
biblical peoples, humans were as obsessed with sex as they
are now, particularly where they were repressed.
-
Secondly, what is considered
deviation or perversion has from the very beginning of
humankind been dependent on cultural perspective, varying
with different ages and places.
-
Furthermore, often what has been
approved by general consensus has also been considered to be
“right in the eyes of God/dess.”
As noted, prior to the monopolizing
patriarchy there were widespread matriarchal cultures, every bit as
“godly,” but with different interpretations of sexuality.
Peering between the biblical covers, we find that many of the book’s
characters are in reality depicted as engaging in behaviors that
would be considered by current standards to be sexual deviation.
From early on in the biblical drama we encounter incest, with even
Moses himself being a product of it.
Later, the righteous Lot is
made drunk and then seduced by both his daughters, who bear sons
from their incestuous trysts.
Rape is another prominent biblical
theme, engaged in frequently by the Yahwists, whose history
according to the OT (Old Testament) is based on the slaughter of other cultures and
the kidnapping and rape of their young girls. In fact, a number of
the “great” patriarchs and heroes have sex with “concubines,” a
fancy name for these young girls kidnapped and made into
prostitutes.
Of course, Solomon was the most
conspicuous consumer, with 1,000 wives and concubines, not a true
story but used to demonstrate the manliness of his purported
progeny.
But, if having so many wives and
concubines is not adultery, we wonder what is and just what one
would call Abraham’s relationship with Hagar, his wife’s handmaiden,
by whom he has a child, or Jacob’s various dalliances with Rachel,
her sister Leah and their maids, by whom he has children.
In the story of Jacob and Rachel, in
fact, are found not only sexual deviation, by Christian standards,
but also drug use, in that Rachel’s “son’s mandrakes” are “sex
plants” or “fertility fruits.”
In addition, adultery is practiced even
by the great king David, as in the second book of Samuel. Like Noah,
who got drunk and let it all hang out, we also find David exposing
himself in front of a crowd. And, at Number 25:15, the Israelites
even participate in an orgy.
Furthermore, although apologists have attempted to explain away its
eroticism as having something to do with “the Church” and its
“bridegroom,” the
Song of Solomon is indeed a sexual poem, with
references to female genitalia, including as a “pomegranate”:
Solomon himself impersonated the phallic god Baal-Rimmon, “Lord of
the Pomegranate,” when he was united with his divine bride, the
mysterious Shulamite, and drank the juice of her pomegranate.
Of the Song of Solomon, Walker further remarks:
We now understand that the whole
poem is a work of sexual mysticism, modeled on traditional
Sumero-Babylonian wedding songs that combined the erotic with
metaphors of vegetable fertility - for this was the ultimate aim
of the king’s marriage to the priestess-queen who represented
the earth and its fruit.
The Song of Solomon was retained in
the biblical canon only by a convoluted exegesis claiming that
its lascivious double entendres represented the love of Christ
for his church... In the Song of Solomon it is no patriarchal
deity that makes the decision to open the enclosure, but the
priestess-queen herself who says, “Let my beloved come into his
garden, and eat his pleasant fruits.”
The Song of Solomon, in fact, represents
one of the saner perspectives of sex in the Bible.
Indeed, despite the licentiousness by
biblical heroes, so neurotic is the attitude towards sex that when
Onan spills “his seed,” God strikes him dead, a tale lampooned in
the “Monty Python” song:
“Every sperm is sacred, every sperm
is great. If a sperm is wasted, God gets quite irate.”
Apparently, Onan’s sperm was more
valuable than Onan himself.
So obsessed with the spilling of the
seed is
YHWH that it is prescribed that,
“no man who has had a nocturnal
emission shall enter the sanctuary at all until three days have
elapsed. He shall wash his garments and bathe
on-the-first-day...”
Thus, “wet dreams” constitute a
transgression against the Lord.
The Phallic
Cult
One rather bizarre biblical perspective, also held by preHebraic
cultures, is “the Lord’s” peculiar obsession with the foreskin,
which is viewed as the most important token of the covenant between
“him” and “his chosen.”
In fact, the word “circumcision” is used
nearly 100 times in the Bible, and one must wonder at this
obsession, as well as at the idea that either the Lord so screwed up
in creating man that man needs to fix his handiwork, or the Lord
finds this piece of flesh so significant as to base his most solemn
vows upon it, thus revealing a homoerotic fetish.
So obsessed are the biblical peoples
with the foreskin that in exchange for the hand of his daughter,
Saul demands the foreskins of 100 dead Philistines from David, who
enthusiastically indulges the request by bringing Saul 200
foreskins.
The act of circumcision is all the more strange when its origins are
not made clear.
Among other reasons, including
purportedly serving to make men more docile and socially acceptable,
circumcision was said to be done in imitation of the female’s
menstrual blood,
“being performed on boys at the age
when girls first ‘bled,’ and even being described among some
peoples as ‘man’s menstruation.’”
Another ritual used to create such
“femaleness” was castration, necessary for a man to,
“assume religious authority among
the priestesses of the Goddess.”
As Walker explains,
“All mythologies suggest that,
before men understood their reproductive role, they tried to
‘make women’ of themselves in the hope of achieving womanlike
fertility.”
This phenomenon was widespread enough
among the Semites to warrant address by “the Lord,” as was penile
amputation, such that those who had been thus mutilated, evidently
either naturally or artificially, were to be excluded from God’s
elect:
“He whose testicles are crushed or
whose male member is cut off shall not enter the assembly of the
Lord”
(Deut. 23:1).
Yet, at Isaiah 56:45, the “infallible”
Lord again contradicts himself and says that eunuchs who keep his sabbath and hold fast his covenant will be given a,
“monument and a name better than
sons and daughters... an everlasting name which shall not be cut
off.”
Obviously, all this biblical talk about
circumcision, foreskins and testicles, as well as “members,”
“loins,” “thighs,” “stones,” “secret parts” and “private parts,” is
a reflection of the true nature of the patriarchal religions.
As Potter says, circumcision is, in
fact,
“a barbaric custom of primitive
phallic religion.”
He also states:
There were undoubtedly phallic
elements in Yahwehism up to the time of the prophets and later,
some of which were adopted from Canaanite religion and some of
which were original in it, but the central meaning which the
name
Yahweh had for Moses was evidently something like The
Living God of Life. That included naturally a certain
sponsorship of sexual relations, as numerous Old Testament
passages indicate.
Indeed, within the patriarchal religions
the phallus has been an object of worship, although this fact has
been hidden for a variety of reasons, not the least of which are its
basic homosexual or homoerotic implications.
In fact, the male genitals were so
sacred to the Israelites that if, in defense of her husband, a woman
grabbed the “private parts” of his enemy, she would have her hand
cut off (Deut. 25:1112).
So important were the male genitalia
that solemn oaths were sworn by them, as is reflected at Genesis
24:9, where Abraham’s servant swears an oath by,
“putting his hand under the thigh of
Abraham his master.”
The terms “thigh” and “hollow of thigh”
used a number of times in the OT are actually euphemisms for
“penis,” and the putting of one’s hand “under the thigh” and
swearing an oath is a secret society “handshake”:
...an Israelite who was swearing an
oath would customarily solemnize it by grasping the penis of the
man to whom he was making the affirmation... Before the death of
Israel (Jacob), he called his son Joseph to his deathbed, and as
Joseph grasped his father’s penis, Israel made his son promise
that he would take his remains out of Egypt...
[Gen. 47:2931]
Regarding this practice, Walker
elaborates:
Patriarchal Semites worshipped their own genitals, and swore binding
oaths by placing a hand on each other’s private parts, a habit still
common among the Arabs. Words like testament, testify, and testimony
still attest to the oaths sworn on the testicles.
Walker also explains another biblical phallic euphemism and custom:
Biblical writers called the penis a “sinew that shrank,” lying “upon
the hollow of the thigh.” This was the sinew that Jacob lost in his
duel with “a man who was a god.”...
The garbled story of Jacob and the
godman was inserted chiefly to support the Jews’ taboo on eating a
penis (Genesis 32:32), formerly a habit of sacred kings upon their
accession to the throne.
The genitals of the defeated antagonist
were eaten by the victor, to pass the phallic spirit from one “god”
to the next.
Furthermore, the “pillars” and “groves” of the biblical peoples were
in fact lingams, or phalluses, and yonis, or vulvas, and the
“household idols” of the patriarchs and heroes were smaller phallic
symbols.
For example, at Genesis 28:10 and 35:14
Jacob himself is represented as engaging in the very ancient
practice of anointing the sacred “pillars,” or phallic symbols,
which was quite common in Israel.
Hebrew
Homosexuality
In addition to these episodes of fetishism and homoeroticism is the
peculiar story in the first book of Samuel about the great king
David and his enemy Saul’s son Jonathan, who apparently falls in
love with David:
And Jonathan stripped himself of his
robe that was upon him and gave it to David, and his garments,
even to his sword, and to his bow, and to his girdle... And Saul
spoke to Jonathan his son, and to all his servants, that they
should kill David. But Jonathan Saul’s son delighted much in
David...
Jonathan and David are then depicted
kissing each other and weeping together.
Later, it is not David who is killed but
Jonathan, after whose death David moans,
“I am very distressed for you, my
brother Jonathan; very pleasant have you been to me; your love
to me was wonderful, passing the love of women.”
The biblical passages certainly seem to
be expressing something homoerotic.
Of course, these scriptures must be
overlooked by moralists, because the general biblical impression of
homosexuality is extremely negative. Yet, we also discover that
Israelites do in fact engage in “harlotry” with boys and that “male
cult prostitutes” (“sodomites”) are used even during Solomon’s reign
(1 Kings 14:24; 15:12) and remain in use centuries later when Josiah
goes after them.
The Hebrew word for these male cult or
temple prostitutes, “qadesh,” is the same as “qadash,” which means
holy, sacred and consecrated. Obviously, the preYahwist Semites had
a very different opinion of these “sodomites.”
Ironically, the term “sodomite” was used
by detractors to describe phallus-worshippers, i.e., the patriarchy.
Semitic
Bestiality
In addition to the phallus-worship, biblical peoples engaged in
bestiality, such a temptation evidently a serious problem, since the
Lord had to condemn it several times over a period of hundreds of
years, demonstrating an ongoing habit of the “chosen” shepherd
tribes.
In other words, that this perversion was
common is obvious from the fervid exhortations against it.
As Akerley says in
The X-Rated Bible:
It is axiomatic that one can gain
true insight into how prevalent a deviant sexual practice is in
a given culture as well as how threatening it is to that culture
by the degree of severity of the laws which exist against it.
Judging by the fact that the Hebrew law decreed death for zoophilia, forbidden intimacies with animals were commonplace
indeed among the Israelites.
Judaism and
Women
The problem with the sheep-loving and lingam-worshipping desert
tribes was their extreme hatred of women, who have been slandered
with the accusation of being sinful, sexual creatures who corrupt
otherwise sinless men.
Biblical misogyny is reflected in the
stories of Lot and of the Levite in Judges, for example, where men
are so important that, in order to protect them from bisexual mobs,
Lot and the Levite throw out their women: in the case of Lot, his
virgin daughters; and in the case of the “good” Levite priest, his
sex slave, or “concubine,” although his host initially offered the
mob his own virgin daughter.
The Levite’s concubine, of course, is
gang-raped and left for dead. Her “compassionate” master finds her on
the doorstep, yells at her to get up and, when he discovers she is
dead, sheds no tear but immediately cuts her body into 12 pieces and
sends the parts to the various tribes.
Now, this story must be taken literally,
according to bible literalists, so we must conclude that the Levite
did indeed engage this appalling behavior, which would be considered
a heinous crime in today’s society but is perfectly okay for one of
God’s ancient priests!
Furthermore, while exalting the male genitalia, the OT repeatedly
portrays women as having defiling menstrual cycles, during which
they must be isolated. Prior to this misogyny, however, the
menstrual blood was considered sacred because women were viewed as
the creators of life; in fact, as noted, the wine and cup of the
Holy Grail were originally Pagan symbols of the blood and womb of
the woman.
Of course, the degradation of the woman
accompanied the vilification of the Goddess, and the biblical attack
on the Goddess and female sexuality was tireless:
The religion of
Astoreth, Asherah or
Anath and Her Baal - and the accompanying female sexual autonomy
- were the enemies. No method was considered too violent to
bring about the desired goals.
With this violence came horrendous,
oppressive laws against women, who basically became property. Raping
virgins was the preferred biblical way to acquire such property, but
if the rape victim was already married or betrothed, she was killed.
The oppression of women, of course, had
much to do with men wishing to be certain of paternity, which
evidently was, as Stone says, the,
“reason that the Levite priests
devised the concept of sexual ‘morality’: premarital virginity
for women, marital fidelity for women, in other words total
control over the knowledge of paternity.”
Things did not improve much for the
status of women with the introduction of the “new superstition” of
Christianity, which continued the assault on women and which refined
sexual repression.
Christianity
and Sex
Because of such fervent repression, Christianity is perceived as
having nothing whatsoever to do with sex.
In reality, rather than the picture of
peaceful, celibate devotees commonly portrayed, early Christians
themselves were viewed as sexual deviants and perverts.
That this perception was a problem is
verified not only in the writings of the Church fathers but in the
canonical
Letter of Jude, in which the author is concerned with the
impression given by men who were “blemishes” on Christian “love
feasts”:
For admission has been secretly
gained by some who long ago were designated for this
condemnation, ungodly persons who pervert the grace of our God
into licentiousness and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus
Christ... just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities,
which likewise acted immorally and indulged in unnatural lust,
serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire.
Yet in like manner these men in their dreamings defile the
flesh... These are blemishes on your love feasts, as they boldly
carouse together, looking after themselves...
Walker explains the meaning and origin
of these mysterious Christian “love feasts”:
Agape or “love feast” was a rite of
primitive Christianity, adapted from pagan sexual worship.
Another name for the agape was synesaktism, that is, the
imitation of
Shaktism, which meant the Tantric kind of love
feast involving sexual exchange of male and female fluids and a
sense of transcendent unity drawn there-from.
Early church
fathers of the more orthodox strain described this kind of
worship and inveighed against it. Some time before the seventh
century, the agape was declared a heresy and was suppressed.
Some of the Gnostic Christian sects
utilized ancient sex rituals considered vulgar by the orthodox
Christian cultists and used by them to discredit Gnosticism.
A number of these practices were in fact
open to honest charges of lewdness, vulgarity and perversion, but
the orthodox Christian movement certainly has not been devoid of
such behavior, nor have been the adherents of any ideology known to
mankind. Over the centuries many perversions have gone on behind
monastery walls and church doors, including the ongoing abuse of
young boys and girls, sexually assaulted or raped by “celibate”
priests.
This abominable behavior is actually a
result of sexual repression, which produces obsession and sickness.
Furthermore, while the inhabitants pretended to be celibate,
Christian nunneries were turned into whorehouses that serviced
monks, among others. In fact, it was an apparently common practice
for the compromised nuns’ babies to be tossed into ponds near the
nunneries or buried in basements.
As Blavatsky relates:
Luther speaks of a fishpond at Rome,
situated near a convent of nuns, which, having been cleared out
by order of Pope Gregory, disclosed, at the bottom, over six
thousand infant skulls; and of a nunnery at Neinburg, in
Austria, whose foundations, when searched, disclosed the same
relics of celibacy and chastity!
While it may be argued that Luther was
biased, apparently other such sites were discovered in Blavatsky’s
time in Austria and Poland.
Despite its antisex attitude and pretensions, Christianity
incorporated many sexual images, including the ancient and
ubiquitous lingam symbol, evident in the church steeple, and the
yoni or womb, symbolized by the church nave. From the earliest
times, in fact, temples and churches themselves served as wombs,
into which the priest, with his phallus-shaped hat would enter,
beseeching the Deity for fertility and fecundity.
As Allegro says:
The temple was designed with a large
measure of uniformity over the whole of the Near East now
recognizable as a microcosm of the womb. It was divided into
three parts: the Porch, representing the lower end of the vagina
up to the hymen, or Veil; the Hall, or vagina itself; and the
inner sanctum, or Holy of Holies, the uterus.
The priest,
dressed as a penis, anointed with various saps and resins as
representing the divine semen, enters through the doors of the
Porch, the “labia” of the womb, past the Veil or “hymen” and so
into the Hall.
However, like Judaism, patriarchal
Christianity was primarily a phallic cult.
Walker describes the
pervasiveness of the phallus in Christianity:
A hint of the broad extent of
phallic Christianity in England appeared after World War II when
Professor Geoffrey Webb, of the Royal Commission on Historical
Monuments, investigated a bomb-damaged altar of an old church and
found a large stone phallus within it. Further researches showed
that the altars of approximately 90% of English churches built
before 138 had hidden stone phalli.
The phallus was also called “perron” or
“Big Peter” and represented, as we have seen, St. Peter, the “Rock”
or stone lingam, of which the Christians were also anointers.
As Walker says,
“Christian phallus worship went on
undiminished into the Middle Ages and beyond.”
Along with the phallus-obsession came
the issue of circumcision, as well as castration, popular in the
widespread
cult of Attis/Cybele during Paul’s time and given the
green light by “Jesus,” who is made to say of castration,
“He who is able to receive this, let
him receive it”.
(Mt. 19:12)
In fact, a number of Paul’s teachings
revolved around the mutilation of the male genitalia.
As Walker relates:
Paul hinted that he was one of the
“new creatures” in Christ, neither circumcised nor
uncircumcised. A man would have to be one or the other, unless
he altogether lacked a penis...
He scorned the “natural” (unmutilated)
man for his lack of spirituality:
“The natural man receiveth not
the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto
him” (1 Corinthians 2:14)...
Paul wrote to the Galatians:
“I
would they were even cut off which trouble you” (Galatians
5:12).
The word rendered “cut off” also meant “castrated.”
Indeed, over the millennia, many people
have taken such exhortations to heart, believing that their
mutilation would gain them special powers and favors in heaven.
In Russia has existed for hundreds of
years a cult called
the Skoptsi, who in frenzied rituals brutally
cut off their genitalia, including testes, penises and breasts. This
mutilation predates Christianity in Russia but has been found within
Christianity for centuries, justified by scriptures, and these
Skoptsi are not an aberration, as castration was common among the
early Christians, including some of the Christian fathers.
As Akerley relates:
Contemporaneous with Origen was a
sect which was so enthusiastically addicted to the practice
that, in addition to requiring castration of all its members,
they also castrated any guest who was rash enough to stay under
their roof. The sect, known as Valesians, performed their
castrations with a hot piece of metal, referring to the act
appropriately as a “baptism of fire.”...
The tonsure of the early priests of
Christianity is a recognized symbol of castration and the
skirted cassock worn by priests is, at least in part, an
imitation of the many religions competing with early
Christianity which required that their priests don female attire
only after they were castrated.
So enthusiastically did
Origen embrace
such concepts that he castrated himself, much to the admiration of
several Christian proponents:
Origen was highly praised for having
castrated himself. Justin’s Apologia said proudly that Roman
surgeons were besieged by faithful Christian men requesting the
operation.
Tertullian declared,
“The kingdom of heaven is thrown
open to eunuchs.”
Justin advised that Christian boys be
emasculated before puberty, so their virtue was permanently
protected. Three Christians who tried to burn Diocletian’s
palace were described as eunuchs.
Eusebius, however, called Origen’s self-castration a “headstrong act” and said that Origen had taken
Christ’s comments about,
“eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven”
in “an absurdly literal sense” and that Origen was “eager both
to fulfill the Savior's words and at the same time to rule out
any suspicion of vile imputations on the part of unbelievers.”
Eusebius’s comment about the castration
serving to “rule out any suspicion of vile imputations” surely
refers to sexual activity, possibly homosexual, imputations that
over the centuries frequently were slung between competing sects,
both Christian and Pagan.
At the same time as they were emulating women through castration,
the Christians, like their predecessor Jews, were trying to destroy
the Goddess:
...Bible revisions tended to erase
earlier deities, especially female ones. After the centuries of
choosing and revising canonical books, nearly every trace of
female divinity had been eliminated from Christian literature.
As stated, however, temples and churches
themselves represented the vulva and womb, and Christianity was not
devoid of feminine symbolism, even though it tried to suppress it,
except where it benefited the Christian hierarchy occultically.
For example, one of the most common
feminine symbols is the mandorla or
vesica piscis, an almond-shaped
symbol representing the female genitalia and used to frame images of
Jesus, the Virgin Mary and assorted other Christian saints. Likewise
the rosary is an ancient symbol of the Goddess, the Queen of Heaven,
as roses represent female genitalia.
In addition, female figures displaying
oversized yonis were common on churches and cathedrals throughout
Europe but were later obliterated by prudish church officials.
In reality, behind the scenes of the
patriarchal cults, feminine symbolism is common, but it does not
express an admiration for female humans; rather, Christian female
symbolism is an attempt to usurp the supernatural powers of the
“Goddess,” or female aspect of creation. In fact, so obsessed was
the patriarchy to “destroy the works of the female” that it declared
an all-out war on them, the results of which were as tragic as they
were absurd, as hundreds of thousands of “wise women” were tortured
and murdered in the centuries that followed.
Walker relates another result of this
warfare:
Suppression and concealment of the
female sexuality is always a primary goal of patriarchy.
Christian Europe even officially denied the existence of a
clitoris and forgot the words for it, which is why the ancient
Greek term is still in use.
The church taught that women should
not feel sexual pleasure, so the female organ of sexual pleasure
became unmentionable.
The Sacred
Prostitute/Harlot
Prior to the demise of the matriarchal cultures and degradation of
sexuality thus brought about by the patriarchy, priestesses of the
Goddess frequently were teachers of love and sex; hence, they were
given the moniker “sacred prostitutes.”
Ancient cultures often believed that the
way to "God" was through the Woman, and they also knew that sexual
repression was a social time-bomb, such that they considered sexual
expression an initiation into not only the mysteries but also
society itself.
Echoing this wisdom, St. Thomas Aquinas
said,
“Take away prostitutes from the
world, and you will fill it with sodomy.”
For such essential duties, sacred
harlots were considered holy women, the role, as we have seen, of
Mary Magdalene.
As Walker relates:
Ancient harlots often commanded high
social status and were revered for their learning. As
embodiments of the Queen of Heaven, in Palestine called Qadeshet,
the Great Whore, the harlots were honored like queens at centers
of learning in Greece and Asia Minor. Some even became queens.
The empress Theodora, wife of Justinian, began her career as a
temple harlot. St. Helena, mother of Constantine, was a harlot
before she became an empress-saint... Temple prostitutes were
revered as healers of the sick. Their very secretions were
supposed to have medical virtue.
Like their Jewish predecessors, the
Christians denigrated this sacred sex practice, turning the
Goddess’s priestesses into “whores.”
As Walker further states:
Because whores occupied a
significant position in paganism, Christians vilified their
profession. Churchmen didn’t want to stamp out prostitution
altogether, only amputate its spiritual meanings.
In reality, some of the most exalted
biblical women were sacred harlots. Indeed, the lineage of Jesus
himself is traced to these priestesses and holy women:
The four female ancestors of Jesus who are enumerated in the
genealogies of Matthew are not only non-Hebrew, they are all four
forms of the harlot. Thamar plays the whore with Judah to become the
first female ancestor of Jesus, or the Lion of Judah. Rahab of
Jericho is frankly designated the harlot, and she is the second
female ancestor. Ruth, the Moabitess, whose history is so tenderly
told, is the third.
The fourth is Bathsheba, wife of Uriah
the Hittite, the prostitute of David.
The degradation of the sacred harlot and prostitution has taken a
tremendous toll on the status of women over the centuries, reducing
them to servants, baby-machines and sex slaves.
For example, Walker states:
Outside the Judeo-Christian
tradition, prostitution often became a fully legitimate
lifestyle. Black Africans never fully accepted missionaries’
views on the matter.
White men’s laws deprived African women of
their property and their monopoly of farming, trading, and
crafts by which they supported their children. African women
suffered a devastating loss of self-respect, for in their
society a woman without her own income was regarded with
contempt.
While many people think that the world
has become more moral with the repression of sex, this notion is
simply not true.
Walker also relates the general end product of the
denigration of sex and women:
A change in the attitude toward rape
was one of the contrasts between the ancient world and the
medieval one in western Europe. The Romans and Saxons punished
rapists by death.
Normans cut off a rapist’s testicles and
gouged his eyes out. The gypsies’ Oriental heritage demanded the
death penalty for the rapist. Hindu law said a rapist must be
killed, even if his victim was of the lowest caste, an
Untouchable; and his soul should “never be pardoned.”
The Byzantine Code decreed that
rapists must die and their property must be given to the victim,
even if she was no better than a slave woman. Christian laws
changed the picture.
Serfs’ wives, sisters, or daughters
were always sexually available to their overlords under the new
regime. Peasant brides were raped by the baron before being
turned over to their bridegrooms - probably to be raped
again.
The Church made it illegal for any wife to refuse sexual
intercourse unless it was a holy day when marital sex was
prohibited. Therefore, marital rape was encouraged...
From
the Inquisition’s torturers,
who usually raped their victims first, to Victorian doctors who
attacked female genitals with leeches, many kinds of rape could
be traced to what has been called “virulent woman-hatred in
fundamentalist Christianity.”
Recent studies show that most rapists
were professed members of a religious sect and learned to regard sex
as evil, in the traditional Christian manner.
Furthermore, contrary to popular belief, the idea of a sacred
marriage originated in prepatriarchal, Pagan cultures and was
anathema to the early Christian fathers, who abhorred matrimony.
The destruction of the “works of the female” also had the effect of
propelling the world into centuries of bloodlust and warfare.
As Walker further states:
[War is a] primary patriarchal
contribution to culture, almost entirely absent from the
matriarchal societies of the Neolithic and early Bronze Ages.
Even when Goddess-worshipping was beginning to give way to cults
of aggressive gods, for a long time the appearance of the
Goddess imposed peace on all hostile groups...
Patriarchal gods tended to be
warlike from their inception - including, or even particularly,
the Judeo-Christian God. Stanton observed that the Old
Testament’s account of God’s nature, purpose, and activities on
behalf of his Chosen People boils down to “a long painful record
of war, corruption, rapine, and lust.”...
But Christianity was
never a pacifist religion... All-male Christianity was
disseminated by violence.
The result of this degradation of the
female includes the destruction of the planet itself, the Great
Mother Earth.
As Walker also relates:
... the Middle East [is] a true
Waste Land: the great desert which eastern mystics attributed to
Islam’s renunciation of the fertile Great Mother. Western pagans
also maintained that if the Mother should be offended or
neglected, she might curse the land with the same desperate
barrenness that could be seen in Arabia Deserta and Northern
Africa.
Christianity
and Homosexuality
As Aquinas said regarding the prohibition of prostitution, the
repression of sex and the hatred of women have indeed led to one of
the behaviors most outwardly despised by Judaism and Christianity:
“sodomy,” or homosexuality.
In reality, in many places in the
ancient world homosexuality was not considered a sin but was
practiced for a variety of reasons. The Christian world, of course,
has never been devoid of homosexuality, and Christianity’s early
representatives were compelled to address it, as in the Epistle of
Barnabas.
In
Barnabas, the writer explains the
“Laws of Diet” as laid down by Moses, including the following:
Among other things, [Moses] also
says, you are not to eat of the hare [Lev. 11:6], by which he
means you are not to debauch young boys, or become like those
who do; because the hare grows a fresh orifice in its backside
every year, and has as many of these holes as the years of its
life.
This paragraph is enlightening indeed,
in that we discover not only that the debauching of young boys was a
problem with the Christians but also that hares grow numerous
orifices in their “backsides!” It is also interesting that this
“dietary law” apparently does not prohibit the debauching of older
men.
Eusebius relates a passage from the works of Christian father
Tatian
concerning the Cynic philosopher Crescens that gives further insight
into the climate of the day:
“Crescens, for instance, who made
his lair in the great city, went beyond everyone in his offences
against boys...”
The use of the term “everyone” is
curious, in that it indicates that the writer himself and his
compatriots were included in this category, rather than being
outsiders.
The statement also appears to express
that this type of debauchery was common and socially acceptable,
such that Crescens was evidently to be reviled not for his
homosexuality itself but for his excessiveness.
As noted, the early Christians had some intriguing secret initiation
rites, as also evidenced by the fragment of a letter purporting to
be from Clement of Alexandria to one Theodore.
In this letter, Clement repudiates the
Gnostic-Christian sect of
the Carpocratians and outlines secret
scriptures that evidently had been originally in the Gospel of Mark,
chapter 10, and contained,
“an account of the raising of a
young man from the dead, a rite of initiation, and a brief
excerpt of an encounter between Jesus and three women.”
In response to Theodore’s questions,
Clement relates the contents of this “Secret Gospel of Mark” as
follows:
And they come into Bethany. And a
certain woman whose brother had died was there. And, coming, she
prostrated herself before Jesus and says to him, “Son of David,
have mercy on me.”
But the disciples rebuked her. And Jesus
being angered, went off with her into the garden where the tomb
was, and straightaway a great cry was heard from the tomb.
And going near Jesus rolled away the
stone from the door of the tomb. And straightaway going in where
the youth was, he stretched forth his hand and raised him,
seizing his hand. But the youth, looking upon him, loved him and
began to beseech him that he might be with him. And going out of
the tomb they came into the house of the youth, for he was rich.
And after six days Jesus told him
what to do and in the evening the youth comes to him, wearing a
linen cloth over his naked body. And he remained with him that
night, for Jesus taught him the mystery of the Kingdom of God.
And thence, arising, he returned to the other side of the
Jordan.
In response to Theodore’s questions,
Clement further relates:
After these words follows the text,
“And James and John come to him,” and all that section. But
“naked man with naked man,” and the other things about which you
wrote, are not found.
The suggestion is, of course, that
Christ and his followers were alleged to have engaged in homosexual
rites.
As Akerley says,
“In the secret gospel, Christ
emerges as a teacher and practitioner of forbidden occult
practices with strong erotic overtones.”
However we wish to interpret this data,
it would not be untruthful to assert that a measurable amount of
homosexuality has gone on behind the doors of monasteries and
churches from the beginning.
In fact, considering how much emphasis is placed on the male in
patriarchal religion such as Christianity, in which monks are
“married to the Church” and passionate lovers of Christ, it is
ironic that homosexuality is overtly considered a terrible crime,
with,
“those who have intercourse with males” being viewed as
“blasphemers” who cannot enter into the “kingdom of heaven.”
Because of the vicious mentality towards
homosexuality, which is purported to originate with the Deity
“himself,” homosexuals were driven to become monastics, in order to
“purify” themselves of their overwhelming, “sinful” desires.
This
penitential sequestration has led to monasteries full of repressed
homosexuals attempting to contain their urges but frequently
failing, which is understandable considering the temptation all
around.
In other words,
monasteries have served
as “communal closets.”
In fact, this practice was common enough to
warrant prohibition in the Secret Instructions of the Society of Jesus, i.e.,
the Jesuits:
If two of ourselves have sinned
carnally, he who first avows it will be retained in the Society;
and the other will be expelled; but he who remains permanent,
will be after such mortification and bad treatment, of sorrow,
and by his impatience, and if we have occasion for his
expulsion, it will be necessary for the future of it that it be
done directly.
The orthodox Christian position towards
homosexuality has been that it is a seductive temptation to be
resisted at all costs, an interesting attitude, because
homosexuality would in truth only be tempting to those who are
initially inclined thus.
Furthermore, a number of the Christian
historicizers and conspirators also had serious problems with sex
and women, such that it would not be farfetched to suggest they were
homosexuals, repressed, closeted or otherwise, like the purported
secret, rich, closeted homosexual fraternity of today called “Gamma
Mu.”
One can find clues as to the
homosexuality within their Christian brotherhood scattered here and
there in the various writings of the early Church fathers, in secret
gospels and allegedly in at least one unexpurgated canonical gospel,
as noted. In any case, it can be argued with 100 percent certainty
that monastic brotherhoods have often been the site of homosexual
activity.
One of the most notorious of the “closeted” Christian homosexuals
was in fact King James I, the patron of the
King James Bible, which
is so highly esteemed by evangelical Christians.
As related by Otto Scott, King
James,
“was a known homosexual who murdered
his young lovers and victimized countless heretics and women.
His cruelty was justified by his ‘divine right’ of kings.”
Carpenter sums up the attitude and
destructiveness caused by the repression and vilification of
sexuality, asking:
How was it that the Jews, under the
influence of Josiah and the Hebrew prophets, turned their faces
away from sex and strenuously opposed the Syrian cults?
How was
it that this reaction extended into Christianity and became even
more definite in the Christian Church - that monks went by
thousands into the deserts of the Thebaid, and that the early
Fathers and Christian apologists could not find terms foul
enough to hurl at Woman as the symbol (to them) of nothing but
sex-corruption and delusion?
How was it that this contempt of the
body and degradation of sex-things went far into the Middle Ages
of Europe, and ultimately created an organized system of
hypocrisy, and concealment and suppression of sex-instincts,
which, acting as a cover to a vile commercial Prostitution and
as a breading ground for horrible Disease, has lasted on even to
the edge of the present day?
He continues, contrasting this pathology
with the predecessor Pagan world:
When one compares a healthy Pagan
ritual - say of Apollos or Dionysus - including its rude and
crude sacrifices if you like, but also including its
wholehearted spontaneity and dedication to the common life and
welfare - with the morbid self-introspection of the Christian
and the eternally recurring question “What shall I do to be
saved?” - the comparison is not favorable to the latter.
Judaism,
Christianity and Drugs
Also abhorrent to so-called moralists is the notion of
“recreational” or “spiritual” drug use, even though the history of
such drug use dates back many thousands of years, with numerous
cultures utilizing herbs, plants and fungi for a variety of reasons,
including medicinal and religious purposes.
In fact, countless cultures have
possessed sacred plants, herbs, fungi or other entheogenic “drugs”
that allowed for divination and communion. Such sacred plant-drugs
included the mysterious “Soma,” which was personified as a
teaching-god in the Indian text the Rig Vega, as well as
Haoma, the
Persian version of the teacher-plant.
Opium, hashish and cannabis
also have a long history of use within religious worship and
spiritual practices.
For example, on Sumerian tablets dating
from about 5000 BCE are references to a “joy plant,” believed to be
the poppy, from which opium is derived.
The Chinese recorded the use of cannabis, hemp or marijuana as early
as the 3rd millennium BCE, and cannabis use in India began at least
4,000 years ago. Furthermore, the magi and spiritual “physicians,”
or “Therapeuts,” were wandering drug-peddlers and members of the
fraternity network, in which drugs were used for initiation and
divination. Indeed, there has been plenty of drug use in the Levant
and Middle East, including by biblical peoples.
Although some historians are reluctant to attribute drug use to
Semitic peoples, the Old Testament abounds with references to the
cultivation and administration of medicinal herbs.
There is, for example, a provocative
inventory of favored plants in the Old Testament Song of Solomon
(4:1314)... While many of the apparent references to drugs in the
Old Testament remain open to question, there is little doubt that an
incident recorded in Genesis refers to Noah’s drunkenness from
alcohol.
Alcohol, of course, is a potent drug, but is not frowned upon in
Christianity because it is truly drugging and stupefying, whereas
entheogens, including the “magic mushroom,” have the ability to
increase awareness and acuity.
In fact, there have been many mushroom
cults, going back at least
as far as Sumeria, and, according to
Allegro, et al., much of the world’s sacred literature incorporated
the mushroom in an esoteric manner. Indeed, it has been posited that
the biblical “manna from heaven” actually refers to a psychedelic
mushroom, a notion implying that Moses and his crew were on one very
long, strange trip in their 40 years of wandering in the desert and
living off manna.
Regardless of whether or not manna is
the magic mushroom, the mushroom cults have been real and
influential in history.
Moreover, Maxwell claims that the priests of
Israel were known to use mushrooms:
Many people are unaware that this
kind of hallucinogenic mushroom-taking by the high priest of
Israel was, in point of fact, a very integral part of the old
Hebrew theology and the old Hebrew tradition... [it] still is
used in the Middle East today.
In fact, the high priest of Israel wore a mushroom headdress, as
do officials of the Eastern Orthodox Church to this day,
reflecting the esoteric veneration of this sacred fungus.
Thus, drug use did not end with the
advent of Christianity. Like the Eastern Orthodox headdress, the
ubiquitous architectural dome is also a reflection of the
mushroom cult. In addition, in a ruined church in Plaincourault,
France, is a Christian fresco dating to the 13th century that
depicts the Edenic tree of knowledge as a stem with
amanita muscaria mushrooms branching off it.
Furthermore, drug use was rampant
all over Christian Europe, and even Pope Leo XIII used a “coca
leaf and red wine concoction.”
As Baigent and Leigh say:
... there is little dispute today
that drugs - psychedelic and of other kinds - were used to at
least some extent among the religions, cults, sects and
mysteries schools of the ancient Middle East - as indeed they
were, and continue to be, across the world. It is certainly not
inconceivable that such substances were known to, and perhaps
employed by, 1st century Judaism and early Christianity.
In fact, Allegro’s suggestion that
“Jesus” was a mushroom god is not implausible, considering how
widespread was the pre-Christian Jesus/Salvation cult and how other
cultures depict their particular entheogens as “teachers” and
“gods.”
However, this mushroom identification
would represent merely one aspect of the Jesus myth and Christ
conspiracy, which, as we have seen incorporated virtually everything
at hand, including sex and drugs, widely perceived in pre-Yahwist,
pre-Christian cultures as being “godly.”
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