Jesus Christ
Jesus Christ is most widely known as the central figure around which the religion of Christianity was founded. Christians, the principal followers of Jesus Christ, accept Jesus Christ as the literal Son of God sent into the world by God to sacrifice himself on the cross as blood-atonement for the sins of the world. There were no Christians, of course, before the ministry of Jesus Christ began, and the teachings of Christianity may be said to have begun at the moment, as recorded in the Gospels, that Jesus Christ began to preach to the people who were the descendants of Jacob, whom God called Israel, known today as Jews.
The Holy Bible
The Holy Bible is the scripture that Christians believe to be the inspired or revealed Word of God. The Holy Bible has two sections: The Old Testament and The New Testament, both containing books. The Old Testament is considered by Christians to be the God-inspired writings composed before the coming of Christ. The New Testament is considered by Christians to be the God-inspired writings composed since the coming of Christ. The four Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke and John—located within the New Testament are considered within the Christian world to offer the most definitive accounts of the life of Jesus Christ, especially the first three Gospels. Though Christians accept the Old Testament as divinely inspired, the New Testament represents the primary and most important part of the Bible to them. The books of the New Testament consists of:
- The four Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John
- An historical narrative called the Acts
- The letters of the Apostle Paul: Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 Thessalonians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, and Philemon
- Epistles: Hebrews, James, 1 Peter, 2 Peter, 1 John, 2 John, 3 John, Jude
- The Book of Revelation
- The Apocrypha, which is included in the bibles used by Roman Catholics and Orthodox Christians: 1 Esdras, 2 Esdras, Baruch, Bel and the Dragon, Ecclesiasticus, 1 Maccabees, 2 Maccabees, 3 Maccabees, 4 Maccabees, Greek additions to Esther, Judith, Letter of Jeremiah, The Prayer of Manasseh, The Prayer of Azariah and the Song of the Three young Men, Psalm 151, Susanna, Tobit, The Wisdom of Solomon.
Though Christians consider the Old Testament of the Holy Bible to be a valid part of the “Word” [the word of God as represented by the entire Bible], the New Testament supersedes the Old Testament in importance and in authority. As an example, the Old Testament law banning the consumption of pork is considered by most Christians to have been relegated to the Biblical Israelites only until the time of the arrival of the Messiah, Jesus Christ.
So, with the advent of the New Testament, this Old Testament ban on the eating of pork does not apply to the Christians. Many fundamentalist Christians and especially fundamentalist preachers, for instance, readily cite Galatians, Chapter 3 in which the Apostle Paul very carefully explained what has now become the major doctrinal essence of Christianity at large: that faith supersedes law.
In Galatians, Chapter 3, he assured them that this new understanding of a faith-based belief in Jesus Christ is legitimate by pointing to the faith and righteousness of Abraham. And since Christians are the “children of Abraham,” they should have no trouble with Paul’s explanation that faith in Jesus Christ supersedes the laws of the Old Testament.
Paul then pointed to a promise and prophecy about the future, given to Abraham by God in the Old Testament, that all nations would be blessed through Abraham. As such, “God would justify the heathen through faith,” placing faith squarely above the law. Then, in an apparent swipe at the Jews, who had not accepted Paul’s understanding, he stated that the law represents a curse for them; that they were bound by God to follow that law as a curse as long as they did not accept Christ. Then Paul reminded the Galatians of the Old Testament verse that stated, “He that is hanged is accursed of God”:
“His body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but thou shalt in any wise bury him that day; (for he that is hanged is accursed of God) that thy land be not defiled, which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an inheritance.”1 (Bible, Deuteronomy 21: 23)
After reminding the Galatians of the above verse, he then states that the very act of Jesus Christ’s crucifixion served as a removal of the law’s curse from those who accepted Christ. In short, in addition to God sacrificing his son for the sins of the world, He also made him the absorbing recipient of curse (since Jesus was “hanged” on a “tree,” i.e., crucified) so that humanity would be relieved of the law:
“Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree: That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.”2 (Bible, Galatians, Chapter 3: 13-14)
For the reader who is having difficulty understanding this summary of Paul’s explanation I strongly advise you to carefully read Galatians, Chapter 3, and note that the explanation of Paul regarding this new doctrine appears to be a very adroit attempt by Paul himself to fashion the doctrine of Christianity. Indeed, critics of Christianity state that Paul, not Jesus Christ, was the true founder of doctrinal Christianity.
Christians view the coming of Jesus Christ as a fulfillment of the entire Old Testament and of all the prophets. He is believed to be the long-awaited Messiah who was spoken of by Old Testament prophets. So Christians view Jesus Christ as the literal fulfillment of all religious history. Note that since Christianity is rooted in the Old Testament, known within Judaism as the Tanach (which includes the Torah, the first five books of Moses), and since its followers consider the Old Testament to be one part of the word of God (the New Testament being the other part), its view of religious history begins in the first book of the Tanach, Genesis. This is precisely where religious history begins within Judaism. As such, though the adherents of Sanatana Dharma (Hinduism) believe that their scripture, the Vedas, predates the books of Judaism, those scriptures are not, obviously, considered by Christians in their religious cosmology. [Please note that while the generally accepted time period for the appearance of the Vedas has been recorded by scholars at between 1300 and 1000 B.C., Hindu teachers themselves do not accept that date, believing instead that the Vedas appeared at about 5,000 B.C.]
I have covered the issue of accepted books of the New Testament of Christianity. But aside from these accepted books of the New Testament, there are other books that purport to contain authentic information about Jesus Christ and his teachings. And there are also other rejected books of the Old Testament. However, as this discussion surrounds Jesus Christ, I will confine myself to books written after his advent. Here I will interweave both a very brief history of some of the source documents of early Christianity, as well as mention some of the books not included by Christians in the books of the Holy Bible. The reader should not assume the following to be a complete coverage of the subject of the books of the Bible or the compilations of the books of the Bible.
Codex Sinaiticus
The Codex Sinaiticus is a Greek manuscript of the Old and New Testaments, and was discovered by Constantine Tischendorf in the year 1844 at the Monastery of St. Catherine at Mount Sinai. It is considered to contain the oldest complete copy of the New Testament. Tischendorf was visiting St. Catherine’s Monastery under the benefaction of Frederick Augustus, King of Saxony. While there, he discovered, in a waste basket, forty-three leaves of the Septuagint, containing portions of I Paralipomena (i.e., 1 Chronicles), Jeremiah, Nehemiah, and Esther, and he was allowed to take them. But he was not allowed to take the books of Isaias, as well as I and IV Machabees. He later published the leaves he had been allowed to take under the name, Codex Friderico-Augustanus.
In subsequent journeys he discovered more manuscripts that contained most of the Old Testament and a complete copy of the New Testament. Experts have placed the Codex in the fourth century. Though its origin cannot be determined, experts speculate that it came from Rome, Southern Italy, Egypt and Caesarea.
Oxyrhynchus Papyrus
In 1897, Bernard P. Grenfeld and Arthur S. Hunt discovered some fragmentary sayings of Jesus Christ on parchment leaves, written on both sides, in extremely small text. These were discovered at a placed called Oxyrhynchus, now called Behnesa. These fragments contain some sayings from The Gospel of Thomas and, as such, are considered apocryphal (i.e., of doubtful authenticity by Church authorities) because they do not conform to the generally accepted Gospel texts. Some suggest that the Gnostic Christians (see “Gnosticism and the Nag Hammadi Library” below) who hid these fragments did so for fear of persecution and that the authorities would destroy their texts.
Gnosticism and the Nag Hammadi Library
In December 1945, an Arab peasant was digging near a boulder in an attempt to locate fertilizer for his fields when he came across a very large, red earthenware jar. Hoping to find a treasure, he smashed the jar to pieces. Inside he discovered more than a dozen old books of papyrus that were bound together in golden brown leather. What this Arab peasant had discovered were the actual Gospels of the Gnostic Christians, a very early branch of the Christian community.
It is very important to note that in the beginning decades of Christianity, there existed no single and unified doctrine of the new faith. There existed no orthodoxy that had fashioned one commonly accepted definition or practice of Christianity. There was no one Church “united under Christ.” In short, Christianity was a religion trying to find itself, and there existed various Christian communities, with diverse understandings and interpretations, that were even vying with each other for supremacy. During that early period, the Gnostic Christians were one of those communities, and they were a strong force and one of the prevailing movements at that time.
One example of Gnosticism’s early strength, around the middle of the second century, was the consideration of its great teacher Valentinus for election as the Bishop of Rome. But, though Valentinus was very influential, by the end of his life he was branded a heretic.
The Gnostic Gospels are fifty-two sacred texts. That they are strongly believed by scholars to have been compiled very early in the beginning of Christian history places them, in some minds, at a level equal to the New Testament books, in terms of their consideration as legitimate Gospels of early Christianity. Orthodox Christians, of course, do not consider the Gnostic scriptures to be valid scriptures for Christians.
The word Gnosis, from which the word Gnosticism stems, derives from Greek. It means “knowledge” or the “act of knowing.” This “act of knowing,” in the minds of the Gnostic Christians, consisted of a deeper level of “knowing” than exists on the rational level. It was considered a form of knowing that came from some deep source within each human being that is referred to as a spark. From this source, this spark, one could attain direct, personal and absolute knowledge of the authentic truths of existence. Of course this idea runs totally counter to today’s generally accepted Christian doctrine, as that doctrine dictates that the only way one can reach the ultimate authentic truth, i.e., God, is through Jesus Christ alone. This doctrine stems from what Christians deem an authentic saying of Jesus Christ that is located in the Gospels:
“Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.”3 (Bible, John 14: 6)
Another doctrine of the Gnostics that deviates from contemporary orthodox doctrines of Christianity surrounds the issue of revelation. Christian theology dictates clearly that all revelation ended with the advent of Jesus Christ. God would not offer revelation to any human being after Jesus Christ. The only way to reach God (though He Himself still would not directly communicate with a human being by way of spoken revelation, as He had communicated with Moses and other prophets) is to accept Jesus Christ as the Son of God. The Gnostics, on the other hand, believed that divine revelation was an ever-present, ongoing force that was accessible to any human being. Gnosis was thought of, in fact, as a creative experience of revelation that could foster an ongoing progression of understanding (“To know oneself is to know God”). This understanding of Gnosis precluded the possibility of the development of an inflexible doctrine amongst Gnostic Christians.
Gnostic Christian teachings also differ from today’s Christianity regarding the nature of human beings. Christianity teaches that all humanity is inherently sinful due to the “original sin” committed by Adam and Eve in the Garden. With regard to Jesus Christ, this becomes quite significant. Christianity teaches that it is precisely because of humanity’s inherent inability to avoid sin on its own that the vicarious blood atonement for these sins, through Jesus Christ’s death, was needed to cleanse humanity, save them from eternal damnation in hell, and allow them to enter paradise after death.
Gnostic Christians, however, believed that humans were not bound by such original sin. Humans were composed, at their core, of the very substance of which God Himself is composed. As such, by struggling to achieve Gnosis, humans could attain their own salvation. Thus the need for the vicarious blood atonement in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross was alleviated.
Perhaps this understanding of the Gnostic Christians came from one of their Gospels, The Gospel of Thomas, one of the Gnostic Gospels found in the Nag Hammadi Library:
“Jesus said, “I am not your teacher. Because you have drunk, you have become intoxicated from the bubbling spring that I have tended.”4 (Gospel of Thomas, 13)
“Jesus said, “Whoever drinks from my mouth will become like me; I myself shall become that person, and the hidden things will be revealed to him.”5 (Gospel of Thomas, 108)
The above verses strongly suggest [“the hidden things will be revealed to him”] the idea that Divine Revelation is achievable by an ordinary human being—something, of course, Christians of today would not accept, even though the above verses from a Gnostic book of scripture are attributed to Jesus Christ. In fact, the above verses represent nothing less than pure heresy to the Christian Church, and it is no wonder at all that this Gospel was violently condemned by the burgeoning orthodox Christian Church. And this condemnation was issued despite the fact that the Gospel of Thomas has been variously dated between the middle of the first century to the middle of the second century, with some citing an even older origin. The Gospel of Thomas served the Church as a source document for the four canonical Gospels.
The Gnostic Christians also seemed to differ with orthodox Christians about the Kingdom of God, with the exception of the canonical Gospel of Luke, 17: 20-21, which attributes a saying to Jesus about the Kingdom of God that parallels the Gnostic concept. Today’s Christians—especially Christian fundamentalists—view the Kingdom of God as a reality that will be established here on earth with the return of Jesus Christ in the last days, and Jesus Christ will reign as the Supreme Head of the Christian Kingdom of God. This conception is vividly portrayed in the Biblical book called The Revelation (The Revelation of St. John the Divine), in which Jesus himself is portrayed as returning in power and glory.
But the Gnostic Christians saw the Kingdom of God differently. Their understanding of the Kingdom of God stems from their Gospels, one of which, The Gospel of Thomas, contains the following verse attributed to Jesus Christ:
“His disciples said to him, ‘When will the kingdom come?’ [He said] ‘It will not come by watching for it. It will not be said, ‘Look, here!’ or ‘Look, there!’ Rather, the Father’s kingdom is spread out upon the earth, and people don’t see it.”6 (Gospel of Thomas, 113)
It is worth comparing the above verse to a saying in Luke attributed to Jesus Christ:
“And when he was demanded of the Pharisees, ‘When the kingdom of God should come?’ He answered them and said, ‘The kingdom of God cometh not with observation: Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you.”7 (Bible, Luke 17: 20-21)
Gnostics believed the Divine spark that was within all human beings was the light that would enable them to see the Kingdom of God right here on earth. Gnostic Christians sought to restore their identities as manifestations, or images, of God, and through this restoration actually experience and see the Kingdom of God on earth now, rather than at some fixed point in the future upon the return of Jesus Christ.
Another very interesting difference between Gnostic Christians and today’s Christianity, though it may seem at first glance not to involve any issue that impinges on fundamental Church doctrine, is the issue of Jesus’s purity. As especially depicted over the centuries in Christian European art and iconography, it is a state that precluded the possibility of his becoming involved with a woman sexually, even in marriage.
Conversely, not only did the Gnostics believe that Jesus Christ engaged in sexual activity, most probably in marriage, but they believe that he did so with, of all people, Mary Magdalene, the woman who is described in the canonical Gospels as an adulteress. She was due to be stoned by a crowd until Jesus intervened on her behalf with what is now one of his most famous sayings: “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.” The idea that Jesus Christ, the “Son of God,” would have had sexual relations with anybody, let alone an alleged notorious adulterer, represents nothing less than the height of heresy in orthodox Christian doctrine. That doctrine teaches that Jesus was certainly too “pure” to be involved in an act that was regarded by some early Church fathers to be “dirty.” But deeper still is what Christians perceive as the heretical suggestion that Jesus Christ would engage in sexual intercourse, thus participating in an act with an inherently [original sin] sinful woman that would transmit that woman’s original sin to an offspring. In short, the Gnostics believed Mary Magadelene to have been the consort of Jesus Christ. The Gnostic Gospel of Philip states:
“…the companion of the Savior is Mary Magdalene. But Christ loved her more than all the disciples, and used to kiss her often on her mouth. The rest of the disciples were offended...They said to him, ‘Why do you love her more than all of us?’ The Savior answered and said to them, ‘Why do I not love you as I love her?’”8 (Gospel of Philip, 63.32-64.5)
[Though this is not the section of this book that deals with the issue of Jesus in Kashmir, it is very interesting to note that there seems to be another source, an actual physical grave, that points to a possible relationship between Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene. This grave is mentioned in Professor Nicholas Roerich's, The Heart of Asia9, published in 1930. The grave is located north of Ladak in the neighboring Tibetan province of Sinkiang (now called Xinjian), about 60 miles from the city of Kashgar. The tomb is believed to belong to a certain Mary who was one of Jesus’ companions on his way to Kashmir. In the Apocryphal Gospel of Philip, it is stated that three women never left Jesus’ side: Mary the mother of Jesus, Jesus’ maternal aunt, also named Mary, and Mary Magdalene.]
The Gnostic view of a very human Jesus Christ coincides with the theory of Jesus in India, and both views present a challenge to the Catholic Church’s prohibition of marriage for its priests. For if Jesus Christ did marry, as the Jesus-in-India theory dictates [there even exists a man, Basharat Saleem, who claims to be a living descendant of Jesus Christ—see Kaiser's, Jesus Died in Kashmir: Jesus, Moses and the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel10] then, of course, his example would have to be stated as the true Christian example, and his example would override Church law.
The Dead Sea Scrolls
There exists a controversy surrounding a figure mentioned in the Dead Sea Scrolls who, some suggest, might have been Jesus Christ himself, even though the Dead Sea Scrolls are generally associated with pre-Christian history.
The scrolls were discovered in a group of caves near Khirbat Qumran in Jordan, at the northwestern end of the Dead Sea, in the year 1947 by an Arab shepherd boy. Further scrolls were discovered between the years 1947 and 1956 when a thorough search was conducted of the local caves. Altogether, 600 Hebrew and Aramaic scrolls, of leather and papyrus, were found. These texts are said to date from between 200 BC and 100 AD, and were written, it is believed, by a previously unknown Jewish brotherhood that established itself at a place called Qumran. The scrolls include instructions regarding the brotherhood’s disciplinary code, commentaries on the Bible, hymnals, writings about the apocalypse, parts of every book of the Old Testament (except Esther), copies of the Book of Isaiah, a number of books of the Apocrypha and the Pseudepigraph (Tobit, Sirach, Jubilees, portions of Enoch, and the Testament of Levi), none of which, incidentally, had been included in the Hebrew canon of the Bible. This is now a massive study, so I will confine my coverage to the area concerning a possible link between Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Before exploring the connection of Jesus Christ to the Dead Sea Scrolls, a short note is important here. An international team, headed by a Dominican Monk, Father De Vaux, was set up to study the Dead Sea Scrolls. Despite the excitement of such a find, there appeared to be little urgency on the part of the team to complete the translations, and this created a huge storm within the international community. Charges began circulating that the team was attempting to hide something. These charges came from some scholars of Christianity.
By the year 1968, a good number of the scrolls had been translated and published. But about 75% of the material had not yet been published. As a result of intense and mounting international pressure during the 1980s, photographs of the Dead Sea Scrolls became available to the general public in September of 1991. That is when the Huntington Library (Los Angeles) opened up its microfilm section. In that same month, the scholars of the Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati, Ohio, announced that they had used a previously published Dead Sea Scroll concordance in order to create a computer-generated copy of one of the unreleased scrolls. This long delay over the publication of the Dead Sea Scrolls naturally fueled intense speculation over, not only the contents of the Scrolls, but also the motives of Father De Vaux’s team.
Though there is no direct mention of Jesus Christ in the Scrolls, it is noted by some that his possible presence in the Scrolls cannot be ruled out due to the fact that the Qumran community used encrypted terminology designed to protect the identity of certain characters. For example, the actual names of characters in the Scrolls are not mentioned, but attributive names, such as the Liar, or the Meek, or the Righteous are used. It is said that many of these terms have Biblical parallels.
Scholars have compared the descriptions of these characters and begun to equate some of them with what they believe might be known characters that are mentioned in the standard New Testament. The Righteous Teacher, mentioned in the Scrolls, is believed by some to have been James the Righteous, the brother of Jesus. The Righteous Teacher was the leader of this Qumran community. This Righteous Teacher, the Scrolls relate, was betrayed by someone identified as the Wicked Priest, now thought by some to be Apostle Paul. Paul claimed that he had a vision of Jesus Christ that inspired him to carry Christianity to the Gentiles.
So some scholars identify this struggle between the Righteous Teacher and the Wicked Priest to be the exact struggle that took place around the year 50 AD, between the Apostle James and the Apostle Paul, over the direction of Christianity. Others point out that Jesus Christ, not James, is probably the Righteous Teacher of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
The Dead Sea Scroll account of the struggle between the Righteous Teacher and the Wicked Priest states that the Wicked Priest had joined the Qumran community from outside. But he later left the community and began teaching a corrupted version of the teachings of the Righteous Teacher. The Wicked Priest actually attacked the Righteous Teacher in an apparent attempt to kill him. This story exactly parallels the criticism against Christianity advanced by Christianity’s modern opponents, including revisionist Christian scholars: that Paul corrupted the original teachings of Jesus Christ in an attempt to make it easier for Gentiles to become Christians, by abolishing the Mosaic law. Thus, it is charged, Paul created his own version of Christianity—the version that is now prevalent in today’s world. James, on the other hand, instructed his Christian followers to preach only amongst the Jews. Indeed, opponents of modern Christianity refer to the following Biblical verse attributed to Jesus Christ as their proof of Paul’s transgression in going to the Gentiles:
“These twelve Jesus sent forth, and commanded them, saying, ‘Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not: But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.’”11 (Bible, Matthew 10: 5-6)
Contemporary critics of Christianity often refer to it as “Paulism,” sometimes alluding to the struggle between James and Paul as proof that, contrary to the teachings of Jesus Christ, Paul established Jesus as God. (Paul obviously won this struggle, at least on a worldly level, since his concept of Christianity prevailed.) The Kerygmata Petrou is a series of reports on the journeys and sermons of the Apostle Peter. In support of this struggle-and-deviation theory about James and Paul, critics of Christianity quote a verse from this document. In it, Peter admonishes Paul for deviating from Christ’s teaching, and expresses doubt that Paul ever saw Jesus in that now-famous, road-to-Damascus vision.
“How can he [i.e., Jesus] have appeared to you, while you think contrary to his doctrine? But if you have been declared an apostle through a vision of an hour, [then] proclaim his teachings and don’t quarrel with me who has been with him.”12
It will be interesting to keep an eye out for any future developments regarding the Dead Sea Scrolls and a possible connection to the teachings of Jesus Christ. Of course, if the parallels drawn between James and the Righteous Teacher, and Paul and the Wicked Priest are correct, then it raises the question: What were the true teachings of Jesus?
The Secret Gospel
This Gospel was discovered in 1958 by Dr. Morton Smith in Mar Saba, near Jerusalem. Dr. Smith had been invited to the Greek Orthodox monastery of Mar Saba to catalogue its collection of manuscripts. While searching through this material, he came across a letter from Clement of Alexandria to Theodore. The letter mentioned a secret gospel of Mark that contained certain additions for special followers of Jesus Christ. Clement says in the letter that this version of Mark, which is followed by the Carpocratian sect, is “more spiritual.” Dr. Smith postulated that the quotations in the letter were most probably from the original Aramaic version of Mark’s Gospel.
The Nazarenes (The Ebionites)
“Nazarenes,” or “Ebionites,” were the name of the very early Christians, and included the relatives and disciples of Jesus Christ. They were, in short, the first followers of Jesus.
The Nazarenes did not consider Jesus Christ to be the Son of God in the sense that Christians of today understand that title. They often referred to him as the “son of man.” With regard to the title, “son of God,” the Nazarenes understood that title to refer to Jesus’ spiritual state, in that he had totally submitted to God and, thus, become a “son” of God. This may, indeed, explain why other characters in the Old Testament are also referred to as “son of God”:
“And thou shalt say unto Pharaoh, ‘Thus saith the Lord, Israel is my son, even my firstborn.”13 (Bible, Exodus 4:22)
“I will be his Father and he [Solomon] shall be My son…”14 (Bible, II Samuel 7:14)
“I will declare the decree: the Lord hath said unto me [David], Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee.”15 (Bible, Psalm 2:7)
I hope the reader fully understands that what I have presented here is an overview. The history of the compilation of the books of the Bible, as well as the subject of its source documents, is massive. My goal is to offer enough to whet your appetite and provide the menu to do further research on this important figure in religious history, Jesus Christ. Hence, you have seen a small sampling of documents within orthodox Christian doctrinal tradition that mention Jesus Christ. You have also been exposed to several of the non-canonical Christian documents—some of which can be dated back as far as any of the books of the New Testament—that offer an alternative view of Jesus Christ and his mission.
Who was Jesus Christ? Was he the Son of God, as orthodox Christianity teaches? Was he the Prophet-Messiah sent only to the Israelites, as the Nazarene/Ebionite Christians and others believed? Or was he a religious revolutionary intent upon bringing the Kingdom of God down to earth to the people as a personal experience, as the Gnostic Christians believed?
