Other Legends(Mainly Christian)

After all, I believe that legends and myths are largely made of 'truth', and indeed present aspects of it that can only be received in this mode; and long ago certain truths and modes of this kind were discovered and must always reappear.J.R.R. Tolkien,The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien

Legends are the stories about people, places and events that are written down in history. So the stories may be made up however the occasions may be founded on actualities, however not completely. The historical facts are used to make the theory/story more realistic to make it interesting to read because people can relate to the basic facts. Legends regularly pass on a lesson or moral and are described to hold the qualities that are to be shared in a community.A lot of people confuse legends with Myths. Alegendis a narrative told as a true story with people and locations clearly identified. In other words the story of a legend is narrated like a historical event rather than functioning as a symbolic narrative. Thelegendmay contain descriptions of historical events.Myth, on the other hand deals with a religious explanation for a particular custom or event. Myths do not follow any particular chronology to relate it to the present times. This is because myths tell a timeless story having symbolic events, set in a time before any history was recorded. The stories are about Gods and Super human beings who make use of their special powers to make things happen.[footnoteRef:1] [1: http://www.innovateus.net/innopedia/what-are-legends]

The reason why we took this topic was mainly because these legends, myths and superstition laid the base for human behavior, i.e. sociology. Legends are particularly taken into consideration because legends are true facts with evident proof that they occurred. In my project, the topic that I will take is about Jesus Christ, who formed Christianity. This whole religion makes people act differently than a lot of other people. There is a lot of written proof about the lord.Jesus Christ: The Man With The Mission

That's how it is with legends. The greater they sound, the more must've got left out.Tim Tharp,Knights of the Hill Country

According to legends and gospels, Jesus Christ was born in a barnyard outside the city of Jerusalem under the North Star, in presence of the three wise men. His birth was considered a Miracle because he was born out of a Virgin. His story is perhaps the most famous story on earth, yet people still debate about his life. There are no "eyewitness" accounts written about Jesus during his lifetime, so historians have to rely on interpretations of the four main canonical gospel texts, mostly scrawled several decades after his death.[footnoteRef:2] [2: http://www.livescience.com/3482-jesus-man.html]

We know very little about the life of Jesus the Messiah before he began his public ministry around the age of thirty. We don't know what he looked like, if he had any hobbies, what his favorite color was, etc. We can of course speculate that he did what other children, teenagers and young adults of his time did and then probably eventually followed Joseph in his job as a carpenter. People have not only speculated about these formative years but have fantasized about them. There are countless apocryphal stories of mainly petty miracles supposedly performed by the Christ child. But the Gospels of Mark and John don't even include the Christmas story of Jesus' birth, beginning straightaway with Jesus as an adult. In this they follow what some scholars have suggested is the ancient pattern of beginning biographies with the public lives of their subjects, skipping over everything previous, regarding it as irrelevant.The "Jesus" of history isn't a finished secret to Biblical researchers, who regularly make a qualification between the man and the religious figure portrayed in the sacred writings. Though a few books have recently argued that Jesus never existed, the evidence that he did is persuasive to the vast majority of scholars, whether Christian or non-Christian. Early Life: Jesus was born sometime just before 4 B.C. He grew up in Nazareth, a small village in Galilee, as part of the peasant class. Jesus' father was a carpenter and he became one, too, meaning that they had likely lost their agricultural land at some point. Jesus was raised Jewish and he remained deeply Jewish all of his life. His intention was not to create a new religion.Rather, he saw himself as doing something within Judaism. From Age 12-30:This age of Jesus still remains a mystery to a lot of people. This is because the bible has no written account of jesus during those years. In spite of the fact that comprehending what happened amid these years would be exceptionally fascinating, the Scriptures are totally quiet on them - recovery to say that Jesus developed and got to be solid in stature, soul, intelligence and support and was liable to the wishes of His natural folks. Undoubtedly, most folks would ache for that to be a confirmation they could apply to their own particular kids. Fundamentally, the Scriptures are noiseless on these years all together not to degrade at all from the terrifically imperative last three years of Christ's natural service. This is clearly the time of His life which God the Father and God the Holy Spirit would have us center our confidence upon. In the event that we genuinely need to comprehend why the Son of God came to earth, this is the place we must look - and the four Gospels contain all the record we know about. A lot of theories have been propounded on how was Jesus life during those years. According to a lot of researchers, Jesus travelled to the east to spread and increase his knowledge. There have been legends about Jesus in Kashmir, Iran and Japan.

This is the route which was taken by Jesus according to the theorists during these years. Also, there is a little proof that Jesus lived in Japan. When Jesus disappeared from Jerusalem, sometime later, a man of the same age, with same teachings as Christ evolved in Japan. For a few years, that man remained there. Then, there was a tale about that same person (considered by theorists) in India and later in Iran.Everyone is entitled to his or her right to skepticism, but if you fail to accept the challenge of considering this, you will be depriving yourself of knowledge of an extraordinary puzzle. This remarkable puzzle, which involves eighteen lost years or "Hidden Years" in the life of Jesus, may well turn out to be a cornerstone for understanding many enigmas about Christianity -- like the long-ignored missing but somehow obvious clue in a mystery that remains unsolved. Or perhaps somehow it will eventually be proven a dead end by indisputable dating of documents, DNA testing and other scientific tests and tools. Either way, none of us will be the worse for the truly incredible journey to inquire and discover what can be surmised about Jesus' Lost Years by taking the questions right to the ancient temple of the Hindus called Jagannath in Puri, India, where some say Jesus spent several years (the "some" include the present spiritual leader of the Hindu religion, the Shankaracharya) and a Buddhist monastery high in the Himalayas in Ladakh, India, where an ancient scroll has long been held to exist that purportedly answers all the questions about the Missing Years of Jesus.[footnoteRef:3] [3: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/paul-davids/jesus-lost-years-may-fina_b_179513.html?ir=India&adsSiteOverride=in]

In Fundamentalism, they call it a part of Jesus' life that God doesn't think you need to know about, or God would have made sure it was included in the Bible. On one page of the Gospel of Luke Jesus is 12 years old in the Temple in Jerusalem and then... nothing... nothing for 18 years until Jesus shows up at the River Jordan to be baptized by John the Baptist.Also, there are noteworthy mentions of Saint Issa in Hindu and Muslim scriptures. People consider him to be Jesus Christ. In fact, during the benediction at the Inauguration of Barack Obama, Reverend Rick Warren referred to Jesus at one point by the name Issa. Indeed, even the Buddhists are said to hide an exceptionally old manuscript in a cloister high in the Himalayas called "The Life of Saint Issa, the Best of the Sons of Men." The narrative of the presence of that original copy fills in the missing years of Christ and depicts his goes as a young fellow in India - and even has Jesus admonishing the Hindus to quit worshiping symbols and surrender the station framework - has been resoundingly exposed in a great part of the Christian world for about a century. It's long past due that the exposing stops. The excursion to India, taking after the trail of the individuals who saw and deciphered the original copy a few times, gives an exceptionally persuading case that the composition exists, and that it dovetails flawlessly with a not insignificant rundown of different sorts of proof that place Jesus in India amid that time of his life. On the off chance that genuine, that adventure of Jesus toward the East was helpfully discarded from the New Testament. It was said that Jesus mastered Buddhism while living in Tibet. However the problem is that Buddhism didnt reach Tibet until the 17th century.Another hypothesis is by and large considered the probably by customary Christianity. This hypothesis recommends Jesus stayed in his dad's (Joseph's) home and took in the family business. This was the most well-known way for Jewish fellows to take after. For Jesus' situation, it would mean he worked in his dad's shop as a student until he completely took in the exchange. This exchange is generally been held to be carpentry, however was more probable stone cutting and building (the Greek content backings this point). In any occasion, as indicated by this hypothesis Jesus would have worked in the family exchange until he was around 30 (Luke 3.23) and after that set out in his service. Another hypothesis proposes Jesus joined the Essenes in the Dead Sea territory as a friar or separatist. This thought takes after the generally held hypothesis that John the Baptizer was one of the Essenes and that Jesus took after his cousin to the Dead Sea caves to think about with him. Exactly who were the Essenes? They were, for every viable purpose, the Pharisee. They accepted to be heavenly they must be isolated from the unholy. They held that the standard Pharisees didn't go sufficiently far in their exemplary nature, so they cleared out Jerusalem and development to study sacred writing and carry on with the separatist life in the wild. It is from this organization that we have the Dead Ocean Looks, for they were productive copyists. As indicated by some, Jesus' relationship with this gathering would be the place he gathered his abhorrence for the practices of the Pharisees who stayed inside of society. It might likewise be from these that he and John the Baptizer received the ritual of submersion.[footnoteRef:4] [4: http://www.hcna.us/columns/30years.html]

Age 30-33: At the age of 30, Jesus apparently got baptized by Thomas and started his preaching in Nazareth. Word spread far and wide and he was considered the direct descendant of God. All the Christian gospels have a written account of these three years of Jesus.

Death: As indicated by the accounts, the fundamental charge against Jesus was that he asserted to be the lord of the Jews. The Roman warriors were ridiculing this thought when they dressed him in a purple robe and squeezed a crown of thistles onto his head. This was likewise the charge composed on the sign at the highest point of the cross.

Be that as it may, the charge was false. The adversaries of Jesus had prepared it by contorting the significance of the old Jewish forecasts about the happening to the Messiah.

As indicated by those predictions, the Messiah was an extraordinary future pioneer who might show up amid a time of compelling edginess and emergency known as the End Times (or Last Days). Helped by God, he would topple every single fiendishness oppressor and set up an immaculate kingdom on earth, where every one of the noble individuals could live everlastingly in peace and satisfaction.

Amid the years when Jesus was growing up, numerous individuals trusted that the End Times had as of now arrived, and that the Messiah would soon show up. This conviction was particularly solid in Galilee, the area of Palestine where Jesus lived. Also, the conviction developed significantly more grounded when John the Baptist started announcing that every one of the predictions about the Messiah would soon be satisfied. Be that as it may, those predictions could be deciphered in distinctive ways. A few sacred writings, for example, Isaiah 53, delineate the Messiah as a sincere peaceful individual who will set up the path for the new kingdom by relinquishing himself to pay for mankind's wrongdoings. Different sacred texts portray him as a future descendent of King David, and delineate the new kingdom as a cleaned adaptation of David's unique kingdom. These references to King David brought about numerous regular individuals to imagine the Messiah basically as a military pioneer, whose first activity would be to arrange a rebellion against the despised Romans and drive them out of the nation.

The Romans were completely mindful of the discontent in the nation and the expectation for a savior. More mobs and uprisings occurred in Palestine than in whatever other piece of their realm. Due to the nonstop turmoil, they were dependably vigilant for potential agitator pioneers. When Jesus began his ministry, he didn't publicly call himself the Messiah. He probably realized that it would be dangerous to do so, because even though he clearly didn't plan any type of military action, the authorities could have misunderstood his intentions and arrested him anyway. An example of his cautiousness can be found at Matthew 16:20, which says that "he warned his disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Christ." (The word Christ is the English equivalent of the Aramaic word for Messiah.)[footnoteRef:5] [5: http://www.gospel-mysteries.net/crucifixion-jesus.html]

But despite his public silence about his plans, his teachings and miraculous cures soon began to attract large crowds, and within a short time many people in Galilee were thinking that he might be the Messiah. As a result, when he and his disciples set out for Jerusalem to attend the annual Passover festival, they were accompanied on the trip by a large group of followers. It isn't clear how big this procession eventually became, because other groups of festival-goers may have joined it along the way. But by the time it reached Jericho it was apparently large enough to attract considerable attention, for many people in the city heard that it was coming and gathered along the road to watch Jesus go by.According to Luke 19:11, during the last stage of the trip many of the travelers were expecting the new perfect Kingdom of God to be created at any moment. This is an indication of the high level of excitement within the group at this time. This excitement was sustained all the way to the end of the trip, so that when Jesus reached Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, a large exuberant crowd celebrated his entry into the city. Shortly after he arrived, he did not like the dishonesty of the merchants, it angered him beyond control and he attacked them physically in the temple court yard. Some say that he was trying to trigger an uprising in the city. Another group of scholars suggest that he was expecting god to step in to create a better kingdom for the humans on Earth by divine intervention. The main Gospels state that he was trying to prepare his followers for his departing. Often, Christians blame the Jews for his death, forgetting the fact that it was the Jew leaders of THAT time who were to be blamed. These leaders saw the crowds that gathered around Jesus, and they knew that many people were calling him the Messiah. Mark 11:18 says "they feared him, because the whole crowd was amazed at his teaching." But their ultimate fear probably went deeper, because if growing numbers of people believed that Jesus was the Messiah, he could eventually become a serious threat to their authority. The leaders hesitated to arrest Jesus because they were afraid of the uproar the crowd would case because of this decision of theirs. But, at some point they decided to get rid of him. They took the help of one of Jesus 12 disciples and his most trusted man, Judas Iscariot and seized him in the night when all his other disciples were sleeping. After interrogating him the next morning, they handed him over to the government (The Romans) stating that he called himself a king, i.e. he was rebelling against the current king. There was a rule in the Roman law, that if anybody rebels against royalty, they would be punished by crucifixion. But the crucifixion couldn't take place until the Roman governor Pontius Pilate gave the final order for it, and the gospels indicate that he was reluctant to do so. Apparently he realized that Jesus was innocent. Actually, he had the power to release Jesus if he really wanted to. But in his role as governor he often needed the collaboration of the Jewish leaders. And in the end, he was more concerned with placating them than with saving Jesus. Jesus was crucified in the streets of Jerusalem and later died on the cross.

Resurrection:

For centuries many of the world's distinguished philosophers have assaulted Christianity as being irrational, superstitious and absurd. Many have chosen simply to ignore the central issue of the resurrection. Others have tried to explain it away through various theories. But the historical evidence just can't be discounted.After more than 2 weeks of research, I have come to a conclusion that the resurrection of JesusChrist is either one of the most wicked, vicious, heartless hoaxes ever foisted on the minds of human beings--or it is the most remarkable fact of history. The New Testament witnesses were fully aware of the background against which the resurrection took place. The body of Jesus, in accordance with Jewish burial custom, was wrapped in a linen cloth. About 100 pounds of aromatic spices, mixed together to form a gummy substance, were applied to the wrappings of cloth about the body. After the body was placed in a solid rock tomb, an extremely large stone was rolled against the entrance of the tomb. Large stones weighing approximately two tons were normally rolled (by means of levers) against a tomb entrance. A Roman watchman of entirely restrained battling men was positioned to protect the tomb. This watchman fastened on the tomb the Roman seal, which was intended to "keep any endeavor at vandalizing the mausoleum. Anybody attempting to move the stone from the tomb's passage would have broken the seal and accordingly brought about the rage of Roman law. Be that as it may, after three days the tomb was vacant. The devotees of Jesus said He had become alive once again. They reported that He appeared to them amid a time of 40 days, demonstrating to Himself to them by numerous "faultless evidences." Paul the messenger described that Jesus appeared to more than 500 of His adherents at one time, the larger part of whom were still alive and who could affirm what Paul composed. Such a large number of security safety measures were brought with the trial, torturous killing, internment, burial, fixing, and guarding of Christ's tomb that it turns out to be exceptionally troublesome for critics to safeguard their position that Christ did not become alive once again. Some of the important facts that persist are: 1. Broken Roman Seal: The roman seal that stood for the power and authority of the Roman Empire was broken. The consequence of a broken seal was very dangerous, because it lead to crucifixion. All the believers of Christ were cowards and hid themselves after Jesus crucifixion. 2. Empty Tomb: Both Jewish and Roman sources and traditions admit an empty tomb. Those resources range from Josephus to a compilation of fifth-century Jewish writings called the "Toledoth Jeshu." Dr. Paul Maier calls this "positive evidence from a hostile source, which is the strongest kind of historical evidence. In essence, this means that if a source admits a fact decidedly not in its favor, then that fact is genuine."3. The large stone blocking the entrance was moved: Those who observed the stone after the resurrection describe its position as having been rolled up a slope away not just from the entrance of the tomb, but from the entire massive sepulcher. It was in such a position that it looked as if it had been picked up and carried away.

4. Grave clothes: In a literal sense, against all statements to the contrary, the tomb was not totally empty--because of an amazing phenomenon. John, a disciple of Jesus, looked over to the place where the body of Jesus had lain, and there were the grave clothes, in the form of the body, slightly caved in and empty--like the empty chrysalis of a caterpillar's cocoon. That's enough to make a believer out of anybody. John never did get over it. The first thing that stuck in the minds of the disciples was not the empty tomb, but rather the empty grave clothes--undisturbed in form and position.

5. Jesus appearance confirmed: Christ appeared alive on several occasions after the cataclysmic events of that first Easter . When studying an event in history, it is important to know whether enough people who were participants or eyewitnesses to the event were alive when the facts about the event were published. To know this is obviously helpful in ascertaining the accuracy of the published report. If the number of eyewitnesses is substantial, the event can he regarded as fairly well established.

THE SWOON THEORY: Another theory, popularized by Venturini several centuries ago, is often quoted today. This is the swoon theory, which says that Jesus didn't die; he merely fainted from exhaustion and loss of blood. Everyone thought Him dead, but later He resuscitated and the disciples thought it to be a resurrection. Skeptic David Friedrich Strauss--certainly no believer in the resurrection--gave the deathblow to any thought that Jesus revived from a swoon: "It is impossible that a being who had stolen half-dead out of the sepulchre, who crept about weak and ill, wanting medical treatment, who required bandaging, strengthening and indulgence, and who still at last yielded to His sufferings, could have given to the disciples the impression that He was a Conqueror over death and the grave, the Prince of Life.

Conclusion

There are four conclusions about jesus life that can be taken into consideration with the help of four essays namely, the four gospels. (1) Jesus the greatest of prophetswas a mortal like Elisha.(2) Jesus according to Mark (based on a recently discovered passage) had sex with a young man whom he raised from the dead.(3)The Essene leader known as the Teacher of Righteousness (executed during the reign of Jannaeus, 103 to 76 BC) was the seed for the Christ legend.(4) The Gnostics were the earliest Christians.To those who have put aside the production of ideas generated by Christians and look at the period through the eyes of an historian, these conclusions are consistent with the surviving record of that period.Moreover, except for (4), other scholars have come to arrive at the same conclusions.This conclusion (that the bible is not to be taken as history) reached by historians is fundamental for you to come to an understanding of the following three essays and this guide you are now reading.There are 4 basic reasons for finding the Gospels fictive.First, is the silence of Paul.The Epistle (Pauls and others) do not contain an account of the life of Jesus, and do not rely upon his teachings.Since they are earlier than the Gospels, either they lacked the source for Mark, or Mark wrote a work that creatively fulfilled these gaps.But given the importance of such source, it is likely that if there was a source document, it would have been widely disseminated.The silence of the Epistle support as more likely that there was no source document or such work was considered unreliable.Second, the Gospel of Mark (the foundation for Luke and Matthew) has been freely modified by them only in ways in which they would consider it as an improvement.Each narrative implicitly argues that the other is fictional.Secondly, based on the energies of Randel Helms (a Christian), it is shown that the NT fulfills very consciously the OT prophecies.The authors of the Gospels believed that the life of Jesus (which was not recorded or known to them) fleshed for the oracles of the OT.Such an approach assures that the Gospels are fictions.Third, the numerous inaccuracies as to events recorded by historians of that period and the failure of historians such as Josephus to mention such a worthy figure as the Christ of the Gospels for inclusion in their histories (assuming the Gospels to be essential true).Fourth,unless the world was much different back then, things found in the Gospels simply do not occur.The dead are not raised after 3 days; there are no demons to cast out; etc.The work is mythic.For all these reasons the Gospels are held to be fictions.It is a fiction about the Revealer of the Truths of Heaven.The silence of the Epistles has been corrected by the Gospels.If the new faith was to spread among the common herd, a narrative in the form of history was needed.The essays form a group on a theme.In thefirst essay, that on Mark believing Jesus to be a mortal unto whom the spirit of god had entered upon baptism, I examine the question of divinity as it was understood by Mark and his contemperanous audience.The conclusion is that the phrasethe son of godmeans being selected by god and given special powers, and there were many who made this claim.Thus the debate of the early Christians on the nature of Christ and todays position of the Unitarians as to Christ being mortal have a foundation in the meaning of the phrasethe son of god.Thesecond essay,Mark Describes Jesus Gay Affair,concerns a missing passage from the Gospel of Mark which has been preserved in part in a letter by Bishop Clemens of Alexandria.The Church in Alexandria thought it best to censor Mark.The portion about Jesus visit to Jericho is described in the letter of Clemens, c. 190 CE.The purpose of the essay, besides embarrassing Christians, is to expose how freely the Gospels were dealt with.If Marks production was either that of a witness to the acts of Yahwehs dutiful Son and/or inspired by Yahweh, then such radical changes as Luke and Matthew made of Mark would be contrary to the intent of Yahweh.(One can indeed wonder how the Church decided which passages to include and which of the over dozen Gospels were truly inspired.)This second essay besides implicitly containing these problems for Christians, serves the purpose to publicize the discovery of Professor Morton Smith of the letter by Saint Clemens.Thethirdessay,Sources of the Jesus Legend,deals primarily with two speculation, one that the Quamran (Essene) communitys leaderThe Teacher of Righteousis the source for the Jesus legend; and second that the Gnostics were the first Christians.Their surviving scriptures are closer in content to those of the Essenes.What the surviving records support is much different than is taught in Sunday school and repeated on television.These three essays and the one on the historical Christ form a family that reveal the state of biblical scholarship.And as you will see in the references in these essays, it is a state that many Christian scholars and theologians acknowledge.