Raja wrote:

> "...or whether the Jesus Mythology was a tool of the Priest
> hood to bring Jewdayism to the forefront as the leading
> religion, and as a tool to bring about OT prophecy. Here is
> some more fuel for the fire."
>
> Here's some water, Shamanaut;
>
> The Jesus character wasn't created as such, Jesus walked the
> earth for real, and the Essenes were the ones who expected and
> excepted Jesus as the Messiah. And as you should know, the
> Judaic faith doesn't accept Jesus as the Messiah; check out
> C.A.s Thread;
> [www.grahamhancock.com]
>
> Jesus in past life records;
> <[www.grahamhancock.com];
>
> Amy

This is an interesting discussion.

Judaism doesn't accept Christ as a Savior for a couple of reasons. First, the term "Messiah" means simply "the anointed one"--it was a term given to the future King of Israel, who had to be of the Davidic line. It means no more and no less than that. It certainly didn't mean the literal and physical Son of God.

Anointment was usually reserved for two classes of people: kings and priests, although prophets like Isaiah were also called Messiah.

Quote

The Hebrew word for “Messiah” is “Moshiach” The literal and proper translation of this word is “anointed,” which refers to a ritual of anointing and consecrating someone or something with oil. (I Samuel 10:1-2) It is used throughout the Jewish Bible in reference to a wide variety of individuals and objects; for example, a Jewish king (I Kings 1:39), Jewish priests (Leviticus 4:3), prophets (Isaiah 61:1), the Jewish Temple and its utensils (Exodus 40:9-11), unleavened bread (Numbers 6:15), and a non-Jewish king (Cyrus king of Persia, Isaiah 45:1).

[jewsforjudaism.org], p 29.

Essentially, when Christ failed to bring about the prophecy, the early Christians really had to work hard to reinvent the idea of Messiah. And the physical and literal Son of God thing is what we got.

So, giving him the title Messiah meant he was either a king or a priest, which brings up some interesting lines of inquiry in and of itself. Which was he? Is it possible that when Pontius Pilate asked Jesus, "Are you the one they call the King of the Jews?" (paraphrased), he wasn't kidding?

Quote

2And they began to accuse him, saying, "We have found this man subverting our nation. He opposes payment of taxes to Caesar and claims to be Christ, a king."

--Luke 23:2

Second, the Apostles were not Christian--they were Jews! The "resurrection" was a later fiction invented by Paul (most likely) because he didn't understand what was going on. Don't forget, he never knew Christ personally and he managed to earn Peter's everlasting hatred. His feud with James (brother of Jesus!) was even worse and I wouldn't be surprised if Paul had something to do with James's murder. So now we're stuck with the Pauline version of Christianity, which is most likely a far cry from what anyone intended. I don't believe that Christ and the Apostles planned on a new faith at all. I believe they were one of two things--either ultraconservative Jews who wanted to get back to the basics of the Jewish faith (fundamentalists) or they were Essenes..and who knows just what that group was. Egyptian mystery cult? Very possible. Judaism has its roots in Egyptian and Babylonian religion.

How many sun god characters were "resurrected"? Why, most if not all of them. Osiris. Mithras (lots of parallels with the Christ story there). Tammuz. And so on ad infinitum. I find it really hard to believe that's just a coincidence. And the sun kings have this Holly King/Oak King motif in their stories, just like Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (while we're talking about fictional characters like Wagner's Ananda).

Anyway, the term "son of god" applied only to the Messiahs--kings, priests, and prophets.