THE DARK SIDE OF CHRISTIAN HISTORY

The Dark Side of Christian History

The Dark Side of Christian History by Helen Ellerbe: Morningstar and Lark, Orlando Florida, 1999 ISBN 0-9644873-4-9

     This is the sort of book that I had to force myself through. It was not so much the purported subject matter but rather the author's not-so-well-hidden agenda. This is not an overview of the crimes of the Roman Catholic Church and the Protestant churches except insofar as these can be slotted into Ellerbe's real purpose. This purpose is to argue against Christianity and for pop-religious New-Age "spirituality" with a thin veneer of corrupted feminism. The author makes her intentions abundantly plain in the Introduction for fostering "sexism, racism, the intolerance of difference and the 'desecration' of the natural environment". It would be hard to find such a crystal clear expression of trendy leftism outside of the academy. Social class is conspicuous by its absence. So is the concept of hierarchy in general, the role of government and individual freedom (beyond sacred differences deified by a subculture). There is a vague bow to "self-determination" but no indication that this might extend to the infidels outside of the politically-correct charmed circle. It almost certainly doesn't.

     The author genuflects in her introduction to the fact that there were "alternative Christianities" in the early centuries of the Church. As might be expected from the blindfolded world view of the 'New-Age' she lavishes particular praise on the Gnostics. She also mentions the Essenes. As might be expected her knowledge of these theologies is incredibly superficial, probably drawn from other neo-mystic books that bear the same resemblance to reality as Stalinist propaganda does. The Gnostics, in the majority of cases amongst their crazy-quilt writings, were far more "anti-nature" than any orthodox theologian could ever be. Despite the lies of the orthodox their beliefs were quite ascetic, and their "hidden knowledge" consisted of an over-elaborated mythology the knowledge of which was supposedly the key to escaping the inevitably corrupt world. I know...consistency and facts are part of that great evil "science" that also has to be abolished for the dreaded New Age to dawn. Ellerbe gets well into this later.

     The author goes on to belabour the misogynist nature of early orthodox Christianity. No doubt true, but the Christological content of the early disputes is simply ignored. It's of no interest to her purpose. The economic interactions of Church and state in the Roman Empire are slighted in favour of ideological argument (or assertion). This assertion continues through the first part of the book, and the author's only digression from passing over heresies other than her favourite ones is a condemnation of the Church's disapproval of Origen's idea of reincarnation. There is little doubt that this is part of the author's ideology/theology. We also get a discussion of sex, free will and compulsion/authority though, once more, innocent of what the people at the time considered important. History is supposed to be history, not an ideological "read-back".

     Ellerbe then passes on to medieval times. She states rather than proves that it was the influence of the Church that led to the decline of the West in this period. Sort of extending Gibbon way beyond his wildest ambitions. She goes so far as to say that the practice of "bleeding" in medieval times was due to "the Monks". Go figure ! She mentions many of the "sins" of the medieval Church and misses many more. No doubt Christianity was not a "creative force" in this period, but the author implies that it was responsible for the vast picture of western decline. Barbarian invasions are, of course, irrelevant. The reality was that Christianity and its influence were contradictory , as the Marxists are fond of saying. Some of its actions were beneficial and some were malevolent. Such fine distinctions, however, escape the author.

     The author cites the monumental corruption of the medieval Papacy, something that is well established. The very corruption of the Renaissance Popes, however, was progressive in its own way. The logic of the times also dictated that the Papacy become a secular power, and many of its crimes were for "reasons of state" rather than the abstract motivations that Ellerbe likes to move in. In the end the Church was pretty much a mirror of the secular powers that it alternately fought and allied with, no better nor no worse. The atrocities that happened were typical of the age and might have been worse under some other sort of ideological "guidance" such as that of a more Gnostic Church. Ideology at the time was very much subservient to power politics.

     Ellerby passes a severe judgement on the Protestant Reformation. She denounces the common Protestant theories of free will (or lack thereof) and original sin without recognition of the disputes within Protestantism about such matters. She dates, strangely enough, the concept of an unitary God as opposed to a multiplicity of saints from this era. The veneration of saints is identified with the pantheistic, many faced. view of divinity that she favours. Yes, it is a bit of a stretch. She also notes the supposed rise of a more severe asceticism  which presumably is connected to the ideas of predestination and denial of free will. Once more remember the Gnostics that she has a superficial acquaintance with for how it could have been worse.

     In Chaper 8, The Witch Hunts: The End of Magic and Miracles" the author really hits her stride. Whatever she imagines the "witch craze" was actually a reversal of early Church opinion which opined that most of what was called "witchcraft" was ignorance and superstition. Pretty true actually, though such "witchcraft" was considered orthodox when properly covered with a Christian veneer. The campaign against "witchcraft" was never so extensive as the author imagines.

     The Inquisition played a prominent role in the "witch hunt". Whatever the author says however, the main motive behind this was self-interest and bureaucratic expansion. The so-called "witches" only came into the purview of the 'Holy Office' during its decline when it was running out of real victims. The author (deliberately ?) refuses to examine the extent of the Inquisition's dealing with "witches" and how they compare with its total business. She relies only on anecdote and insinuation. Whatever Ellerbe's sympathies the mass of Inquisitorial victims were "heretics" rather than "witches" if for no other reason than that the estates of heretics were a better source of plunder. I guess, however, that this would spoil the author's narrative of a contest of ideas as opposed to one of interests.

     In Chapter 9 Ellerbe makes her purpose quite clear again with the title 'Alieniation From Nature', Uh huh ! She makes the ideological assertion that a Christian view of the world as "sinful" (once more a step down from her beloved Gnostics) led to some sort of "separation" that became a leitmotif of western society. Oh well, I guess that the vast majority of people who lived in rural areas until recent decades were "obviously" alienated because of this presumed ideology. Just to be obvious the author u8ses this opportunity to sing a little paean to pre-Christian paganism. This was supposedly "non-alienated". Yes, I'm sure !

     The author moves on to the modern age in Chapter 10, 'A World Without God'. In this chapter the author outdoes any of her Jesuit opponents by attempting (and failing in my opinion) to twist facts and logic to say that the modern science that has disproved so much of dogmatic religion is itself a mere development of said religion. Yes, it is quite a stretch, and an accusation that sticks much more to New-Age religiosity than to any secular viewpoint. But if logic and facts are "bad things" and (cough, cough) "alienating" then you can "prove" anything you so damn well please.

     Of course we come face to face with the usual chintzy mystic "proof" of such a thing via a misinterpretation of the quantum world that the author has only a child's version of. Sighhhh ! It seems to occur pretty well everywhere in such a world. The author quotes a person named E.H. Walker to this effect;

     "...the universe is 'inhabited' by an almost unlimited number of conscious, usually non-thinking (oh, non-thinking consciousnesses - mm), entities that are responsible for the detailed working of the universe"

     Once more, uh-huh. God, or gods if you like, as cosmic obsessive compulsives. Ellerby fails to see the humour is such a statement. For those who are interested you can look up this "authority" that the author quotes. For instance you can see his tax-dodge "Cancer Institute" via 'Charity Navigator' where the "fund-raising" expenses are quoted as $10,149,158, the cost of "Administration" (mostly his widow actually) as $457,040 and the tiny, little beast of "programs" at the end as $290,174. There again you can look Walker up on Wikipedia. This long time US military researcher no doubt did his research in an "ant-sexist, anti-racist respect for 'difference' and the natural environment" manner. It has to be true by the worldview of the author because he is "spiritual". I hope his victims in the Third World appreciate such a refined soul.

     I guess the reader can estimate how much I disliked this book. From the opening when she presents her opinion that controlling people through "dictating and controlling their spirituality is the most (sic) insidious and damaging slavery of all" her agenda is quite clear. In a backhand way this book presents a bare-bones account of the "dark side" of Christianity, but the historical facts are treated superficially because of the much more important (to the author) need to fit them into her ideology. It would have been better to present a more thorough history rather than spend effort in trying to hammer square pegs into round holes.

CANADIAN ANARCHIST MOVEMENT-TORONTO:

SAVE THE LIU FAMILY HOME:

Molly has seen this situation before. Just like vultures, various churches gather about a dying person, carefully and slyly manipulating that person into signing over their estate to the church. It's a good tax free scam if you can get away with it. The Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP) is helping out the family of a recently deceased person in the Toronto area who have been victimized by this trick. Here's the story....

...........................................

PLEASE HELP SAVE THE LIU FAMILY HOME‏
PLEASE HELP SAVE THE LIU FAMILY HOME

THE CHINESE GOSPEL CHURCH, 450 DUNDAS STREET WEST (AT HURON)

THIS SUNDAY, JUNE 29, AT 10.45 AM

Below is the text of a leaflet we plan to distribute outside the Chinese Gospel Church in Chinatown. A family's home is being taken from them by a hugely well resourced church and charity, who have a very interesting understanding of how to apply the Christian Gospel.Please come out and support this family.

THE CHINESE GOSPEL CHURCH IS TRYING TO TAKE AWAY THE LIU FAMILY'S HOUSE

Please Help us Save their Home!

In 2004, eighty two year old Margaret Liu, weakened by a series of strokes, was in hospital and close to the end of her life. She had written a will leaving her modest house to her daughter Louise and her permanently disabled son. But, not long before she died, without her family being aware of it, she signed a new will leaving the home to a charity linked to the Chinese Gospel Church, the Chinese Christian Herald Crusades (Canada).

Margaret was in a very vulnerable condition at the time she signed this new will. Her daughter, who had cared for her in her later years, finds it impossible to believe that she would have chosen to leave her children without this home if she had been able to think clearly. During the years she had worked to pay for and maintain the property, her intention had always been to leave it for her own family.

We don't know what discussions took place between Church representatives and Margaret Liu in the days before she died. We do know, however, that they are more than ready to press their claim tot he Liu home regardless of any moral issues that arise. They are dragging the family into court and have the resources to fight a legal battle, while Louise Liu, currently a full time student, has no money to pay for legal representation.

The family will face great hardship if they lose their home while this Church and multi-national charity will survive and thrive without taking the property. We don't think that an organization that preaches the Christian Gospel can justify what it is doing to the Liu family. If you agree, we are asking for your help. We are asking you to:-

1. Contact the Church and let them know you want them to withdraw their claim to the Liu home. They are at (416) 977-2530.

2. If you want to be involved the effort to help this family, contact us.

3. Let us know if you, a family member or someone else you know has had a similar experience to the one facing Louise Liu.

Thanks for any and all support.

Save the Home of the Liu Family Committee

(416) 856-0814

defendingourhome@yahoo.com

MYTHOLOGY:

VIRGIN BIRTHS IN MYTHOLOGY:

It's that time of year again when people are expected to abandon common sense and believe in human parthenogenesis, or at least one instance that supposedly took place about two milenia ago. The doctrine of the virgin birth of Christ was formulated as an essential doctrine of the Church under the third canon of the Lateran Council held under Pope Martin 1 in 649. This doctrine was foreshadowed in the Nicene Creed, adopted under Emperor Constantine which states that Jesus was "born of the Virgin Mary". Catholic doctrine asserts not only the virginity of Mary at the time of the conception of Jesus, but also her perpetual virginity thereafter. The first assertion may have some scriptural backing- with the liberal use of apologetics of course- but the latter has no basis in the New Testament. It is, however, accepted as necessary dogma by the Roman Catholic Church.

Many have asserted that the myth of a virgin birth was a "borrowed concept" from surrounding pagan cultures, in particular from Mithraism, popular at the time of the early years of Christianity. Christian exegesis often attempts to put a prophetic gloss on the supposed event by citing Isaiah 7:14 , though most scholars agree that the "prediction" of a virgin birth of a Messiah in this passage was more than slightly distorted by Mathew (1: 22-23). The opposite theory, that the doctrine of the immaculate conception was a direct borrowing from pagan concepts, may, however, overstate the case. The fact is that the original literature from which the canonical New Testament was drawn (often by the violent suppression of conflicting texts) were written in an atmosphere in which certain ideas were taken as "givens". The mythology of a virgin birth was easily incorporated into the texts, not from any direct borrowing but rather from the authors taking the popular ideas of their time as an unquestioned framework to put their stories in. It is hardly different today. Only the tiniest intellectual elite of the Christian world knows just how common "virgin birth" stories were at the time of early Christianity. If they knew this fact they might question the whole doctrine that has built up around the immaculate conception over the centuries. But this source of questioning is not available to the average person today.

Comparing and contrasting is necessary to form intelligent opinions on many matters. What follows is a short list of some of the virgin birth mythologies from across the world. Those current in the Roan world at the time of the composition of the New Testament accounts are marked with an "@". Others are simply introduced with an asterix. What I hope the reader can see is the very common appearance of this myth across many human cultures, often with the concomitant idea of "impregnation by a god" such as that of Mary by the Holy Spirit.

@Mithras, the main object of the Mithraic cult in the early Roman Empire. Born on December 25th, according to legend.

@The philosopher Plato, supposedly a son of Apollo via the virgin Amphictione.

@Romulus and Remus, birthed of the vestal virgin Rhea Silvia, supposedly raped by the god Mars.

@Perseus, supposedly born of Danae by Zeus. Actually adduced as "evidence" by early Christian apologists to "prove" that their idea of virgin birth was not so strange.

@The Emperor Augustus, supposedly conceived via a virgin birth of his mother Atia by the god Apollo.

@Zoroastrian myths that the sperm of Zoroaster was preserved in the waters of Lake

Kansaoya to later impregnate a virgin who was to become a prophet and a savior.

@Many of the pharaohs of Egypt were believed to have been conceived of virgin births via impregnation by Amon-Re.

@Dionysus, supposedly born of the virgin Persephone via impregnation by Zeus. Persephone also reportedly gave birth to another son, the hero Jason, without resort to a godly sperm donor.

@The Egyptian god Horus was reportedly the parthenogenic offspring of the goddess Isis.

@Apis, the sacred bull of Memphis, was supposedly the offspring of a cow impregnated by a god the guise of a ray of moonlight.

@The supreme god of the Egyptians, Amon-Ra, was himself supposedly of a virgin mother Net, and had no father.

*Maumoon Abdul Gayyoom. Lord of the Maldive Islands. Reportedly born three times, the last two of virgin births.

*Deganawidah, a hero of the Hurons who reportedly planted the Tree of Peace at Onondaga. Greatest failure- not telling the Iroquois about said tree.

*Huitzilopochtli. Aztec god of war and the sun, conceived when a ball of feathers fell on his mother Coatlicue when she was cleaning a temple. This ball was supposedly Mixcoatl, god of the hunt. The Spaniards under Cortes were later to perform a similar "fluff job" under the name of this god. This resulted in the Aztecs being much more thoroughly "fucked" the second time around.

@Attis, a Phrygian god, was born of the virgin Nana who was impregnated by holding either a ripe almond or a pomegranate to her breast.

*Hunahpu and Xbalanque, Mayan hero twins supposedly, according to the Popul Vuh, conceived via the severed head of one of the original sons of the creators, killed for playing a ball game that was too noisy. Virgin mother- Ixquic.

*Laozi. Also known as LaoTzu. Would undoubtedly be very upset if he was able to see what succeeding generations had made of him, the author of the Tao Te Ching. Supposedly conceived when his mother gazed on a falling meteor.

*Montezuma (of the Pueblo Indians, not the Aztec Emperor of the same name). Supposedly conceived by a virgin after she either ate a pinyon nut or fell out of a tree onto her belly.

The above is merely a short list of the many world myths about virgin births. What can they say to us other than to avoid pomegranates, moonlight, swans, golden showers, almonds, pinyon nuts, climbing trees, feathers and, of course, toilet seats ? Either that or to always wear tent dresses and have the address of the local orphanage handy. They can say to a Christian who hasn't examined the dogma of their beliefs that they should perhaps examine at least one of these dogmas with a bit more of a critical eye.

THE NEW SANCTUARY MOVEMENT:
(AND THE NEANING OF DIRECT ACTION):
The latest issue of Time magazine (July 30- Aug.6) has an article on the New Sanctuary Movement in the USA. This coordination of faith groups is a response to the increasing repression and harshness that so-called illegal immigrants are facing in the USA these days. It's a wide coalition of groups ranging the spectrum from the Unitarians, the United Church of Christ, the Episcopalians and the United Methodists to Lutherans, Roman Catholics, Presbyterians, Quakers, Evangelical Christians, Jews, Muslims and Sikhs. Like the sanctuary movement of the early 1980s when the US government attempted to deport refugees fleeing repression and wars in Central America this movement offers sanctuary in churches for immigrant families under immediate threat of deportation and all sorts of other help for those not in an immediately critical situation.There is actually no legal right to sanctuary in churches, but authorities are almost always unwilling to raise the public stakes by violating the customary rule of sanctuary.
The most recent growth of this movement to follow the gospel's edict to "shelter the stranger" stems from a March, 2006 Lenten message of Cardinal Archbishop Roger Maloney of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles in which he urged his priests and other faithful to disobey Bill HR 4437 should it become law. This bill passed the House of Representatives where it was introduced but later failed in the Senate. It would have criminalized any aid given to an illegal immigrant even if the giver was unaware of the legal status of the recipient. It put the onus to know on the giver of charity and essentially outlawed charity towards undocumented aliens in the USA.
(Molly Note: The article in Time Magazine gives the date of this instruction by Mahoney as 2005 while the website of the NSM gives it as March 2006. Time has made a mistake in this case. Their confusion is a result of the fact that HR 4437 was introduced in 2005 and passed on Dec. 16th of that year- a little early "Christmas gift" from the ruling class of the USA to poor people in that country. Molly has one of her recurrent fantasies stimulated by this, a retelling of A Christmas Carol with Ebeneezer Bush in the starring role and the ghost of Ronald Reagan come to warn him to mend his evil ways. The ghost will be dragging a chain made of nuclear missiles, boxes labelled either "To Iran" or "To Nicaragua" and various other unsavoury items. But more on this later in the year)

The New Santuary Movement continued to organize throughout on January 29th, 2007 they met in Washington DC to set up coordination of their various efforts. The Time article refers to the "founding" of the NSM as being in May of 2007, but once more it errs as what the NSM calls 'The Convening' in January is a more accurate date for the "founding". The consensus of the meeting includes the following guiding principles and goals:
Guiding principles or values:
-Faith platform: focus on faith-based moral principles
-moving immigrants from victim to witness
-diversity
-ensuring the dignity of those we serve and those who oppose us
-open public witness being willing to take the consequences of our actions
Goals:
-To protect immigrant workers and families from unjust deportation
-to change the public debate
-to awaken the moral indignation of the country
-to make visible immigrant workers and families as children of God

The website of the NSM gives much more information on their organization and goals. There are similar initiatives in Canada for immigrants and also for deserters from the American armed forces, but the religious efforts are considerably sparser and uncoordinated as compared to those in the USA. Anarchist efforts such as the No One is Illegal coalition do fine work here but lack the ability to offer people subject to deportation the sort of sanctuary that religious groups can.

What the Time article lacks in chronological accuracy it makes up for in situating the NSM in a wider context of what be termed "the struggle for America's soul". In particular it discusses how America, as one of the most religious nations on Earth, has "two wings" to its faith communities and how this initative from "the left wing of religion" overtakes the neo-conservative wing that has had far more publicity in the past. A particularily interesting comment is how, in the case of immigration, the left Christian position is far more biblically based that the conservative position. In the Old Testament, for instance, God speaks of being "the God of the aliens" 103 times. Right wing pundits can find no passages to challenge this. Molly has seen in the past little while how the power of the right wing manipulators of Christianity is gradually being eroded, even within the segment of the church known as "Evangelicals", by a slowly developing movement for a new social gospel. always meant to comment on this. Hope to say more later. Nowadays it is not only the traditional "liberal churches" that are questioning the designs of the American state but also some rather unexpected(to orthodox leftists) critics from different theologies. Have a look at the article if you can, and check out the NSM website.

All this leads into the subtitle of this blog. What is the meaning of direct action ? Basically it is identifying a problem and then taking direct action, either collective or individual, to remedy the problem. Seems simple, but it actually isn't. It contrasts with "indirect action" which is lobbying an authority or attempting to change the personnel in that authority so that they rather than a group or individual affected by the problem will take action to correct the problem. Direct Action is often taken as a subject of unquestioned belief amongst anarchists. It's assumed that it is not only the best course of action at all times and in regards to all problems but also that it is the only method that ever solves a problem. This is obviously not true, and a more rational and less ideological modest anarchism would admit this while retreating to the word "usually" and laying stress on "the law of unforseen consequences", also known as TANSTAFL (there ain't no such thing as a free lunch), in that carring out problem solving by "indirect action" has other effects seperate from the immediate problem in question and often leads to less than optimum solutions.
That's all well and good and probably deserves more discussion than I have given it above. A much more grevious problem, however, is the great confusion that exists amongst too many anarchists who can't see the difference between direct action and a militant posturing. What the churches mentioned above are doing is direct action in its purest sense. Some of what they do either challenges or violates laws. Some of it does not (but would if bills such as HR4437 were to be passed). Direct action does not depend upon illegality to be so defined. A housing or food coop, for instance, is also direct action in its purest form.
Neither does the aspect of illegality or especially a violent attitude and actions make indirect action magically into its opposite. Arranging regular riots whenever certain members of the ruling class meet to plot evil -with a 100% certainty of failing to prevent any such planning on the part of the ruling class- is, at best, petitioning with a brick rather than a ballot. In may be seen as a media circus to influence others, but only a true believer could believe it is effective in this regard. The money spent on organizing, travelling to and defending the arrested in such circuses would be far better spend buying air time for ads. Worst of all it can, and to a large extent has, become nothing but an identity badge for those who not only don't care about reaching the unconvinced but would be very disturbed if their self image was disturbed by their ideology becoming more "normal". The sadness of some of the attempts to give examples of "success" in regard to these events (they cost the state X dollars for security, they prevented a third understudy to the 2nd assistant ass-kisser to the vice director in charge of boot licking from attending, etc.) is actually quite pity provoking if seen from outside.
Direct action presumes at least a good chance that the plan will succeed. Not necessarily a guarantee (nothing is certain in this world), but at least a real chance. When there is pretty much a 100% certainty that it won't succeed it is no long direct action. It is, at best, the symbolic action that advocates of violence like to disparage. At worst it is far less than that, existential justification perhaps.
Molly for one is quite pleased that large numbers of people, most of which have never heard of anarchism, are adopting its methods at least in part. She is displeased that some anarchists seem determined to stray from them.

all

POLITICAL DOCETISM:

Molly is presently reading 'The Politics of Jesus' by Obery M. Hendricks. This book is a "left Christian" piece of apologetics for considering the message of the Bible as one of social justice rather than individual morality. Reverend Hendricks is a professor of Biblical studies at the New York Theological Seminary and an ordained elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church. The argument of the book is extensive, and Molly hardly has the space to present all of it here- besides, I'm not finished reading it. Some parts of it are convincing. Others are less so.

What Molly wants to bring to light here is the use that Obery makes of the heresy of 'Docetism'. This was a heresy held by most gnostics and later the Manicheans that the actual physical body of Christ was an 'illusion', that Jesus only "seemed" human, and that, especially, his crucifixion and death were an illusion. At its extreme end this shades into the Platonic "cave metaphor" that all of existence is illusion. A western version of Maya if you will. (Molly aside; almost all the philosophical thoughts that can be thought occur in all traditions. Those that claim some "uniqueness" for a given philosophical or religious tradition reveal far more about their own desires for prestige than they do about the reality of such traditions) The gnostics were particularly elitist about this whole matter, following in the footsteps of Plato's elitism. The parting of the veil of the illusion was to be accomplished via the "hidden knowledge" that the gnostics were presumably privy to. This whole scam is more than slightly familiar as it echoes in endless variations down through human history. For those who are interested see the Wikipedia article on Docetism and also the more extensive Catholic Encyclopedia article on same. Molly has little stomach for the controversies of Christology here and now. The sword of Constantine decided these long ago, and medieval crusades against Albigensians and Burgomars merely wrote finis to the epilogue. Modern disputes about these matters are merely dim echoes of what could have been. As an aside the Qur'an teaches the same dogma, that the crucifixion of Jesus was an illusion.

The important part here is that Hendricks makes the point that right wing interpretations of the New Testament assume a sort of "political Docetism" that even if the interpreters hold orthodox Christian views they still try and make an unrealistic separation between the Christ of their choosing, concerned only with personal morality, and the real Jesus as a human being embodied in a real social, political and economic context as a 1st century Jew in a country colonized by the Roman Empire and viciously exploited by both the conquerors and their quislings ie the priestly aristocracy of Judea. Hendricks takes off from this in situating Jesus and his works and sayings in a much more radical interpretation that brings out the egalitarian and "justice seeking" aspect of the Christian message. As I said I am more convinced by some of Hendricks' arguments than I am by others, and I am particularly disappointed by the book's ignoring of its predecessors in both the Catholic left and the Protestant Social Gospel.

Still I find the use that Hendricks makes of the term 'Docetism' to be very much a good tool for looking at a lot of political thought. On the right the neo-cons and the shrinking Christian right hold to Docetist heresies. They believe that the real national and corporate interests that lead to wars and conflicts within societies are merely "illusion" and that it is some metaphorical "clash of civilizations" or "good versus evil" that drives history. They refuse to look at reality. They ignore real economic threats to families in favour of an illusionary ideological spook of some left wing conspiracy against "family values". Their politics is a politics of illusion.

Not that the "left" cannot be equally deluded. Through most of the 19th and 20th century the radical left was defined by Marxist illusions of great dialectical forces struggling for some "synthesis" that was presumed to be inevitable even if it was falsified by Marx's literary executor, Bernstein, over 100 years ago. The pseudo-scientific pretensions of Marxism, the bastard child of the Hegelian academy, were exposed long ago, but the lure of ignoring reality for a world of comforting abstractions was far too great. According to Marx and orthodox Marxism real history was an "illusion" that was exposed by the "hidden knowledge of dialectics" to be merely form in the working out of world history ala a scheme more desired than proved.

The spectre of Docetism infects the anarchist opposition as well. One merely has to consult the convoluted oracles of "primitivism" and "post leftism" to see it at work. Real struggles of real people are read, often via a very obvious covering of half digested convoluted rhetoric and pseudo-intellectual "analysis" that attempts to give an illusion of profundity to what is very crude in its reality, as "signs" of some great and overwhelming "collapse of civilization" or whatever. Contrary "signs" ie the full spectrum of reality are more than conveniently ignored. To each their own narrow, claustrophobic, world.

The ultimate, of course, is the academic fad of "post-modernism", a meme that infects fascists, Marxists, liberals and anarchists alike without apparent predilection for any ideological body. Only the American style of conservative seems to be immune, protected by an exoskeleton of ignorance, as intellectual conservatives who are aware of their roots,especially the fascist roots, are just as susceptible to this fad as the most naive 3rd year Marxist poly-sci student. This is the ultimate in Docetism as it not only says that "reality" is illusion, but that all talk about reality is similarly illusionary and that one can read in whatever meaning one wants to into the "discourse" of a "text". At its basis this depends on a Stalinist interpretation of "correctness" ie whatever one can force by political intrigue (or in Uncle Joe's interpretation by having more tanks).

Of course "movements" built on the illusion that all is illusion don't last very long for obvious reasons unless they tie themselves to a class system that grants the possessors of the "hidden knowledge" real and actual power to kill in reality(Tibetan Buddhism ?). Should the traditional left, Marxist or otherwise, continue to wallow in nonsense it will be replaced by a new left, perhaps based on the realism of Evangelical leftists such as Hendricks who are much closer to reality. To put it bluntly, the whole idea of traditional Christian theology with its trinitarianism and other contradictory beliefs is less of an assault on reason than many things held "sacred" by the left. There are indeed many 'Protestants' on the left who try and drag it back to reality. Molly is one of them. May we escape the inquisition of a traditional left in power.

To continue with 'Misquoting Jesus', the author gives examples of two triads of reasons why the text of the New Testament was modified. The first triad is in the chapter entitled 'Theologically Motivated Alterations of the Text', and he gives examples of the way the text was modified by "proto-orthodox" copiers both before Christianity achieved state power (when the copyists were amateurs) and after (when they were professional scribes). The three 'heresies' which led the orthodox to falsify the text of the Bible that Ehrman mentions are 1)the "adoptionists" who believed that Jesus was not really "the Son of God" but rather was "adopted" by God as his son. I don't know if any of the Eastern Churches presently hold this view, but it would be interesting to see how close they come. The ancient example were the Judeo-Christian sect known as the Ebionites. and 2)The Docetists, the precise opposite of the adoptionists in that they believed that Jesus was NOT a flesh and blood human (unlike the adoptionists who believed that he was ONLY such), but rather that his humanity was mere appearance. The most prominent Docetist was a man named Marcion whom a lot of the "church fathers" polemicized against. The final 'heresy" were the "separatists" who, unlike the above two schools held that Jesus had indeed BOTH natures-human and divine- but that they were totally SEPARATE, and that the Divine nature infused the human nature of Jesus and later abandoned it at the time of the crucifixion. Only to later resurrect the human Jesus.
All of these heresies were actually more rational, in my opinion, than the later trinitarian doctrine that became Christian orthodoxy. The author gives a number of examples of where the text of the NT was modified to accord with the polemics of the orthodox.
More on non-theological reasons for text modification in the next post.

I have almost finished reading 'Misquoting Jesus' by Bart D. Ehrman (Harper ,SanFrancisco, 2005, ISBN 13:978-0-06073817-4 or 10:0-06-073817-0). the subtitles is "The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why".
The author was originally educated (?) at a fundamentalist training school, passed from this to an evangelical college and finally became a legitimate scholar. The book is partly a story of his journey to a vocation that he obviously loves and also a basic introduction to the textual analysis used by Biblical scholars, as opposed to fundamentalist apologists.
Ehrman gives a few basic examples of how the text of earlier versions of the Bible have been recovered through literary detective work and comparison of manuscripts, quotations. He also goes through a brief history of the art of Biblical scholarship.
Interesting points so far include
-the story of the woman taken in adultery, one of the most popular today-let he who is without sin cast the first stone, etc.- is a later addition.
-the 'Johannine Comma' a later addition to the Gospel of John that seems to justify the doctrine of the trinity was also an add-on.
-the King James version of the bible(1611) was essentially based on very faulty texts. The above two incidents and also the last 12 verses of Mark entered into the King James version via the fact that the Greek version that it was based on, that of Erasmus (1515) who had very few manuscripts to consult. One of those he did consult was forged to "settle" a dispute with other theologians as to the Johannine Comma. They essentially forged a copy with this insert after Erasmus had promised to include it in his edition if any such ms in Greek could be found.
-A comparative study of variants as to text by John Mill who in 1707 published an edition of the Greek New Testament which noted about 30,000 (!) variations amongst the 100 or so Greek manuscripts that he consulted. Ehrman later notes that there are presently more than 5,700 mss known, and the present estimates of variant readings range from 200,000 to 400,000.
-The Codex Sinaiticus is NOT housed in a monastery in the Sinai. It was swindled out of there via promises that its discoverer Von Tischendorf's patron, the Tsar of Russia, would reward the monastery. At the time of the Bolshevik Revolution the new government sold this ms to the British Library where it is housed today.
More later on this book