Theos-Talk Archives (July 1996 Message tl00376)

Jerry Ekins said
>As you get deeper into HPB, you will find that her ideas concerning Jesus are quite radical
>from a Christian point of view.  In ISIS UNVEILED, she makes a distinction between the
>biblical, the theological, and the historical Jesus.  Unless, you keep this in mind, it is very
>easy to become confused as to which Jesus she is talking about.  HPB's historical Jesus
>lived about 100 years earlier than the Biblical Jesus, and did not know Pilate or John the
>Baptist.  Her biblical Jesus is built from traditions and revelations of early Christian
>communities not contemporary to Jesus.

HPB only refers to Sepher Toldoth. What more <traditions and revelations of early Christian
communities not contemporary to Jesus> ? I could identify only this reference in Unveiled
Isis. But even the historical Jesus at Sepher Toldoth is little consistent when compared with
anothers historical documents. Sepher Toldoth says about maccabee reign of Jannaeus, that
reigned during 104bc to 78bc, member of the hasmonean family of jewish leaders and rulers
comprising the sons of Mattathias and their descendents that reigning in Judea from 167bc
to 37bc.

http://www.demon.co.uk/solbaram/indexes/judais.html
http://www.demon.co.uk/solbaram/articles/fn2.html
MACCABEAN DYNASTY Third Generation: Country Consolidated,
Conflict Between Royal Brothers, Increased, Conflict Between Opposing Factions
When Judah Aristobulus died his brother Alexander Yannai married the widow (as required by
Jewish law) and ruled Judea for just under 30 years. During Alexander Yannai's reign the
conflict between opposing factions deepened. It seems that he was ruthless and that secular
and religious power were concentrated in his hands to a previously unknown extent.

Gibbon at Decline and fall of Roman Empire Vol I, p212 reproduce Annals XV,44 of Tacitus
that says: "with this view, he (Nero) inflicts the most exquisite tortures on those men, who
under vulgar appelation of christians, were already branded with deserved infamy. They
derived their name and origen from Christ, who, in the reign of Tiberius, had suffered death
by sentence of the procurator Pontius Pilate". Gibbon page 729 concludes: "this testimony is
alone sufficient to expose the anachronism of the jews who place the birth of Christ near a
century sooner (Basnage Histoire des Jufs 1.v.c.14,15).

the authenticity of Sepher Toldoth is also uncertain, because it "did not appear before the
thirteen century" . http://www.catholic.com we can find:
The historical character of Jesus Christ is also attested by the hostile Jewish literature of the
subsequent centuries. His birth is ascribed to an illicit ("Acta Pilati" in  Thilo, "Codex
apocryph. N.T., I, 526; cf. Justin, "Apol.", I, 35),  or even an adulterous, union of His parents
(Origen, "Contra Cels.," I, 28, 32). The father's name is Panthera, a common soldier (Gemara
"Sanhedrin", viii; "Schabbath"', xii, cf. Eisenmenger, "Entdecktes Judenthum", I, 109;
Schottgen, "Horae Hebraicae", II, 696; Buxtorf,  "Lex. Chald.", Basle, 1639, 1459, Huldreich,
"Sepher toledhoth yeshua hannaceri", Leyden, 1705). The last work in its final edition
did not appear before the thirteenth century, so that it could give  the Panthera myth in its
most advanced form. Rosch is of opinion  that the myth did not begin before the end of the
first century.

at http://ccel.wheaton.edu/fathers at file ECF04.TXT
Origen, "Contra Cels.," I, 28
    And since, in imitation of a rhetorician training a pupil, he introduces a Jew, who enters
into a personal discussion with Jesus, and speaks in a very childish manner, altogether
unworthy of the grey hairs of a philosopher, let me endeavour, to the best of my ability, to
examine his statements, and show that he does not maintain, throughout the discussion, the
consistency due to the character of a Jew. For he represents him disputing with Jesus,
and confuting Him, as he thinks, on many points; and in the first place, he accuses Him of
having "invented his birth from a virgin," and upbraids Him with being "born in a certain Jewish
village, of a poor woman of the country, who gained her subsistence by spinning, and who was
turned out of doors by her husband, a carpenter by trade, because she was convicted of
adultery; that after being driven away by her husband, and wandering about for a time,
she disgracefully gave birth to Jesus, an illegitimate child, who having hired himself out as a
servant in Egypt on account of his poverty, and having there acquired some miraculous
powers, on which the Egyptians greatly pride themselves, returned to his own country, highly
elated on account of them, and by means of these proclaimed himself a God." Now, as I
cannot allow anything said by unbelievers to remain unexamined, but must investigate
everything from the beginning, I give it as my opinion that all these things worthily harmonize
with the predictions that Jesus is the Son of God.

Abrantes