Jaxi-ary 1, 1887.] 



♦ KNOWLEDGE ♦ 



40 



^ ILLUSTRATEg^MAGAZINE "^ 

 SciENCE,lITERATURE,& ARI 



LONDON: JANUARY 1, 1887. 



THE BEGINNING OF CHRISTIANITY. 



Ev RicuARD A. Proctor. 



N the fullowing summary of facts ami expression 

 of opinion I reply to the question addressed 

 me, as mentioned under " Gossip " in the last 

 number of Kxowi.edge, by a courteous clerical 

 correspondent : — 



First, it is simply a fact (be the explanation 

 what it may) that not one of those wi iters, 

 .ind notably neither Josephus nor Philo — who might have 

 been expected to record many of the most remarkable events 

 associated with the life of Jesus the Christ (or Anointed) 

 in the Gospels according to Matthew, Maik. Luke, and 

 John — make any mention of those events, though several 

 were such as belong to the domain of history. Accepting 

 even all the passages which have long been recognised as 

 interpolations (seme of them of the clumsiest sort), this 

 remains true. Nay, if such passages are accepted, the 

 difficulty is considerabl}' increased. 



SeconrUi/, it is sinijily a ftvct (be the explanation what it 

 may) that in the two sections of the New Testament which 

 have been shown to have been x-eally written by those whose 

 names are associated with them, viz., the four unmistakably 

 genuine letters of Paul (who had never met Jesus) and tlie 

 L'ook of Revelations by John, "the servant of Jesus" 

 (who knew Jesus well, and shows himself strongly — one 

 might almost say fiercely — anti-Pauline), we find scarcely 

 any reference to the details of the life of Jesus Christ. The 

 resurrection is the only point insisted upon by Paul ; and, 

 strangely enough, he insists on it in such a tone as to impl}- 

 that in his time not only the general doctrine of the restn-- 

 rection of the dead, but the resurrection of Jesus, was dis- 

 jmted by many even in the Christian comnmnity. (Paul's 

 anxiety on this point is remarkable, be the explanation 

 ■what it may.) No light falls on our problem from this 

 quarter. Nor are we helped if we regard all the epistles 

 attributed to Paul as really his, rejecting decisive evidence 

 that soree among them cannot have been written by the 

 great apostle of the Gentiles. 



Tltinlli/, it is sinii)ly a fact (bo the explanation what it 

 may) that all those more remarkable details associated, long 

 after even the fall of Jerusalem, with the history of Jesus 

 the Christ, for mention of which we vainh' look in the pages 

 of contemporarj' wiilers, are found in the lecords of solar 

 heroes, or of men to whom, long after their death, the 

 characteristics of the sun-gcd were attributed — generally 

 among nations who had long since given up, or had even 

 absolutely forgotten, their old sun-worshipping religion. 

 This is true of every such detail, from the Annunciation to 

 the Ascension. 



Fourthly, it is simply a fact (be the explanation what it 

 may) that all the miracles described in the New Testament 



are such as had in old times been alwa}s regarded as specially 

 solar. Because the sun brings light, it had been taught 

 that the sun-god causes the blind to see ; because the sun 

 restores winter's dead to life, the sun-god raises the dead ; 

 because the sun restores sickly and diseased vegetation to 

 health, the sun-god heals the sick; because the sun turns 

 the waters which fall on the earth into the rich juice of the 

 vine, the sun-god turns water into wine; becau.se the sun 

 causes the seeds which fall on the earth to bear fruit, thirty, 

 sixty, and even a hundredfold, therefore the sun-god feeds 

 the world richly out of little ; because the sun kills feeble 

 vegetation, the sun-god blasts the barren tree ; because the 

 sun rises above the sea-horizon, the sun-god walks upon the 

 water ; and because as the sun reappears after the darkness 

 of storm, calm presently is restored, the sun- god stills the 

 tempest. 



Fifthli/, it is simply a fact (be the explanation what it 

 may) that all the festivals eventually adopted, both in the 

 Eastern and Western Church, are not only related to 

 astronomical events, but still constantly regulated by them 

 — the movable festivals mostly depending on tlie equinoxes 

 and the moon, while the fixed festivals are associated with 

 the solstices. One might add such peculiarities as the twelve 

 apostles, who like the twelve patriarchs (unmistakably), and 

 the twelve apostles of Gautama, suggest a manifest association 

 with the twelve zodiacal signs or solar months ; while the 

 seventy disciples of Christ, like the seventy disciples of 

 Gautama, and divei-s others sets of seventy, suggest a 

 kindred a.ssociation with the ancient lunar year of five times 

 seventy days. But the determination of Christian, as of 

 Jewish, Mohammedan, and Buddhist festivals and fasts by 

 the critical phases of the sun and moon, is the fact of pro- 

 foundest .significance. 



Sixthh/, it is simply a fact (be the explanation what 

 it may) that the natural events related in the four 

 Gospels which were retained (when two score and more were 

 rejected), are in nearly every case found to correspond 

 straugelj' with events referred to or fully related as actual 

 facts in the writings of Josephus and others ; but 

 as facts belonging to the histories of several difTerent 

 persons, not one of whom can be identified with Jesus 

 the Anointed Teacher, though several of them bore the 

 (then common) name of Jestis. Even so strange a circum- 

 stance as the crucifying of three persons, of whom two died 

 but the third was restored to life, actually happened to the 

 knowledge of Josephus, who describes the event in the most 

 natural and touching manner, but it happened long after 

 the time of Pontius Pilate, and the three who were crucified 

 were Josephus's ])ersonal friends. Indeed, so far as this 

 personal experience was concerned, the historical Josephus 

 of the family of Asamoners may be said in this story to 

 have filled the part filled in the other by Josephus of 

 Arimatbea. Even more perplexing is the reference by 

 Josephus to a man named Zacharias son of Baruch (who 

 was a sort of prophet, inasmuch as " he went over," 

 Jo.=:ephus tells us, "all the transgressions of the people 

 against the law, and made many lamentations upon the 

 confusion to which they had brought public affairs "). 

 whom the people slew "in the middle of the temple." 

 This h;ippened about thirty years after Pontius Pilafc 

 was recalled to liome — accoiding to Josephus, for con- 

 demning to death a man who had led the people out 

 to Motint (ierizim under false pretences, and whose 

 record in this and other respects is (|uite unlike the 

 histor}' of Jesus, the Anointed Teacher of the Gospels. 

 The strangeness of the story lies iu its odd agreement 

 with the reference made by Jesus (according to a much 

 later account than Josephus's) to a prophet (described as 

 the last of those slain by the Jews) whom Jesus — according 



