YAHOWSHUA OR PAUL?
ESSENE CHRISTIANITY VERSUS PAULIANITY
AN EXPOSEŽ AND CALL TO ACTION
by Rev. Abba Nazariah, D.D.

[NOTE: The Order of Nazorean Essenes is not anti-Paul (nor are we officially associated with Nazariah). We accept Paul to the extent Mar Mani accepted him. We acknowledge, however, that many un-Paul like doctrines were added later to his writings by his school, and that some of the letters said to be written by him were written by others. The culture promoted by Paul was once a threat to the Nazorean culture of original Christianity, but since the demise of that original Nazorean culture, the writings of Paul can be appreciated for the mystic content within them.]

"Paul was the first corrupter of the doctrines of Jesus!" -- Thomas Jefferson

In previous articles published in 'The Essene Path", I have briefly touched on the topic of how Paul, the self-proclaimed Apostle, violently opposed the original vegetarian Essene Christianity of Jesus, first by killing and imprisoning its leaders, then by infiltrating the movement and leading a schism. The schism led by Paul -- a meat-eating version of Christianity -- replaced the teachings of Jesus with the teachings of Paul. As briefly described in previous articles, "Paulianity" evolved into the Roman Catholic Church and gave birth to all of what is considered mainline Christianity today, Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestant. Whereas I have briefly touched on this topic in previous articles, it is the purpose of this article to deal with it in great depth. I will begin by setting the stage; I will describe early Christianity as it existed prior to the advent of Paul. What were the main tenets of this pre-Pauline, Essene Christianity? What was the early Christian doctrine of salvation? Having set the stage, I will describe in detail the schism led by Paul which evolved into modern Christianity. I will conclude this exposeŽ with a call to action: A CALL TO REJECT PAULIANITY AND RETURN TO ESSENE NAZARENE EBIONITE CHRISTIANITY. The choice is simple, yet profound; and every Christian must make it: YAHOWSHUA (Jesus) OR PAUL?

First, some necessary background information must be given. There was an ancient Jewish religion which was very mystical, high and noble. It was a very evolved form of religion, rooted in respect and care for all of creation. This ancient Jewish religion was both very esoteric -- as evidenced by its Kaballah mysticism -- and yet very practical, as evidenced by its emphasis on daily lifestyle disciplines, ecology and communal economics. It was also VERY VEGETARIAN: not only was animal sacrifice forbidden, but so was the eating of animal flesh absolutely condemned. War and slavery had no part in this nonviolent religion. Women were the equals to men; women were entitled -- in fact, encouraged-- to participate in the Priesthood. This Priesthood -- called "The Priesthood of Melki Zadek" -- was governed by God via good angels and the divinely inspired BOOK OF THE ETERNAL COVENANT. Their original founder was Enoch; later, Moses led a major remanifestation of their movement. THIS ENLIGHTENED ANCIENT JEWISH RELIGION WAS KNOWN AS "THE ESSENE NAZARENE HASIDIM."

But Essene Nazarene Judaism was not the only form of Judaism. A violent, flesh-eating form of Judaism based on bloody animal sacrifice became the dominant religion in Israel. The nonviolent, vegetarian Essenes were persecuted by the animal sacrifice cult. Both forms of Judaism expected a Messiah: the sacrificial cult expected the Messiah to be a warrior king; the Essene Nazarenes expected a Messiah of Peace, a spiritual King. And so it was that the Messiah of Peace, the spiritual King of Israel, came to earth through the Essenes; for it was the Essene scriptures and prophecies that proved true. And so it was that the Essene Nazarene Jews, practitioners of the authentic Judaism established by God through Enoch and Moses, BECAME THE VERY FIRST CHRISTIANS!

The "first Christians" were not called "Christians"! That term was not used until years later. They were called "Essene Nazarene Ebionites". For short, they were usually referred to simply as "Nazarenes" or "Ebonites". Let us begin our description of early, pre-Pauline Christianity with a look at the meaning of the terms "Nazarene" and "Ebionite".

The term "Nazarene" refers to a member of the Essene movement associated with Mount Carmel in Northern Israel. The Essenes considered Mount Carmel to be so holy that none of the natural vegetation growing there could be disturbed: no trees cut, no bushes cleared away, no permanent dwellings built. Some of their priests lived on Mount Carmel in tents (similar to yurts) but no permanent structures were permitted. Even their Temple atop Carmel was a type of large tent, a beautifUl yurt with a bloodless altar. Only a small contingent of their priests actually lived atop Mount Carmel, the majority of their membership lived in an Essene cooperative village -a couple miles from the southwestern edge of the base of the mountain. That Essene village was called "Nazareth". Those who lived there were called "Nazarenes", as were all members of the Essene sect associated with Mount Carmel. Thus, the fact that Jesus was referred to as "the Nazarene" and his first followers were called "the sect of the Nazarenes" demonstrates the link between early Christianity and the Essene Nazarenes of Mount Carmel.

The other term that the first Christians were called was "Ebionite". The word "Ebionite" comes from the Hebrew word "Ebon" which literally means "poor" but implies "THOSE WHO HAVE VOLUNTARILY RENOUNCED WORLDLY MATERIALISM TO ENTER THE ESSENE LIFESTYLE OF SIMPLE LIVING AND RADICAL SHARING IN COMMUNITY." Simply put, an "Ebionite" is an "Essene renunciate", an Essene who has given up materialism to serve God within the context of the communal lifestyle in which all is shared. While all frilly initiated Essene Nazarene Ebonites lived in, or were sent out on missions by, the network of Essene Christian communes, there was a large outer-circle of members not yet frilly initiated who still lived in private homes. These outer-circle devotees were called "Hearers"; until ready to divest themselves of private wealth and join the communal economy, they studied the teachings and supported the communes by tithing. In the beatitudes of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus declared "Blessed are the Ebon ("Poor"), for they shall inherit the Earth." He was not pronouncing a general blessing on all poor people; neither was he praising poverty. Rather, he was making specific reference to his sect, the Essene "Ebon" or "Ebionites" gathered around him atop the Mount.

The terms "Nazarene" and "Ebionite" are central to a correct understanding of early, pre-Pauline Christianity. why? Because certain specific beliefs and practices can be identified with those terms. We know from many sources that both terms --Nazarene and Ebionite -- are associated with: vegetarianism, reincarnation, God as both Father and Mother, communalism, pacifism, an absolute prohibition against slavery, absolute sobriety (no intoxicating drinks or drugs), equality of men and women, holistic health and Essene Yoga. THOSE ARE THE BELIEFS AND PRACTICES OF THE VERY FIRST CHRISTIANS, the beliefs and practices of the ESSENE NAZARENE EBIONITES.
And what was the doctrine of salvation of these early, pre-Pauline Christians? They believed that SALVATION IS DEPENDENT UPON FOLLOWING THE SAVING TEACHINGS OF YAHOWSHUA (Jesus). In a profound contrast with the theology of Paul -- which became orthodox Christianity ("Paulianity") -- the literature of the Essene Nazarene Ebionites NEVER TAUGHT SALVATION VIA BELIEF IN THE SACRIFICIAL DEATH OF JESUS ON THE CROSS. The Pauline doctrine which asserts that you can only be saved by believing that Jesus died for your sins, is called ATONEMENT. The Essene Nazarene Ebionites had a very different doctrine of Atonement; it was AT-ONE-MENT. They believed that to be AT-ONE with God (the goal of religion) one must follow THE SAVING TEACHINGS OF YAHOWSHUA, not simply believe in his sacrificial death. The Essene Nazarene Ebionites based their doctrine of salvation on the actual instructions they personally received from Yahshua before his crucifixion. Unlike Paul, who NEVER EVEN MET JESUS, the leaders of the Essene Nazarene Ebionites were PERSONALLY TRAINED AND INITIATED BY THEIR SPIRITUAL MASTER, YAHOWSHUA. In The Essene New Testament, Jesus tells his disciples that blood sacrifice cannot bring salvation: Jesus was teaching his disciples in the outer court of the Temple and one of them said unto him, "Master. it is said by the priests that without shedding of blood there is no remission of sins. Can blood offerings take away sin?" Jesus answered, "No blood offering. of beast or bird. or man. can take away sin. for how can the conscience be purged from sin by the shedding of innocent blood? Nay, it will increase the condemnation....For sins against the Law of God there can be no remission. except by repentance and amendment."


So, Jesus made quite clear that no blood sacrifice --not even his own -- can provide salvation for your sins; rather, you must quit sinning (repent) and follow his SAVING TEACHINGS. And that was the doctrine of salvation of the Essene Nazarene Ebonites.

It should be noted that while the Essene Nazarene Christians did not believe in the remission of sins via Jesus' sacrificial death, THEY DID BELIEVE JESUS PERFORMED A POWERFUL WORK ON THE CROSS. Fallen angels who had become disembodied demons were tampering with the subtle, etheric atmospheres of Planet Earth; especially: 1) the energy vortex involved with the process of exiting the body at death; 2) the purgatorial realm of past life review between incarnations; and, 3) the energy vortex involved with the process of taking new birth. For Jesus to purify and reorganize those subtle, etheric atmospheres of our planet, IT WAS NECESSARY FOR HIM TO DIE AS A HUMAN BEING AND ENTER THOSE SUBTLE REGIONS THROUGH THE ENERGY VORTEX WHICH WAS INFESTED WITH PARASITIC DEMONS. He did so, freeing many souls who were being held captive in the subtle planes (being sucked of life-force by vampire-like disembodied entities) and purified the entire between-lives region and energy vortexes. This took place during the three days after his crucifixion and prior to his reappearance to the disciples at the tomb. Thus, the Essene Christians believed that salvation was dependent on following the savings teachings of Jesus -- not belief in his sacrificial death -- BUT DID BELIEVE HE PERFORMED A MIGHTY WORK BY DYING AS A MAN AND PURIFYING THE BETWEEN-LIVES REGION. But no matter how vital and necessary that deed was, if we simply believe in it and neglect to follow his teachings, we will not experience AT-ONE-MENT with God. AT-ONE-MENT WITH GOD IS ACHIEVED VIA HARMONY WITH THE LAWS OF GOD -- the laws of the universe -- AND THOSE LAWS (and how to be in harmony with them) ARE THE SUBJECT OF THE TEACHINGS OF JESUS.

Having set the stage, I will begin now to describe how Paul, the self-proclaimed Apostle, violently opposed the original vegetarian Essene Christianity of Jesus, first by killing and imprisoning its leaders, then by infiltrating the movement and leading a schism. That schism, as I shall describe, evolved into mainline, meat-eating Christianity.

About two decades after the crucifixion of Jesus, we meet Paul. Essene Nazarene Christianity was still true to the teachings of Jesus, being led by James, the brother of Jesus- Paul, an agent of the Jewish puppet-government installed by imperial Rome, then made his first appearance, leading a bloody assault on the Essene Christians in the Temple at Jerusalem. That vicious attack in which many Essene-Christians were murdered by Paul and his henchmen -- an historical fact you won't find in your "Pauline" Christian Bible -- is described by the Apostle Peter in an ancient Essene Christian manuscript titled, THE CLEMENTINE HOMILIES AND RECOGNITIONS; we read: "...the high priest of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem had often sent priests to ask us that we might discourse with one another concerning Jesus: when it seemed a fit opportunity, and it pleased all of our church. we accepted the invitation and went up to the temple. It was crowded with people who had come to listen. many Jews and many of our own brethren. First the high priest told people that they should listen patiently and quietly....Then. he began exalting with many praises the rite of animal sacrifice for the remission of sins and found fault with the baptism given by our Jesus to replace animal sacrifice...."

"To him our James began to show, by abundant proof. that Jesus is the Christ, and that in Him are fit filled all the prophecies which related to His humble advent For, James showed that two advents of Him are foretold: one in humiliation. which He has now accomplished; the other in glory which is yet to be accomplished...."

"And when James had plainly taught the people concerning these things. he added this also.- That unless a man be baptized in water, in the name of the threefold blessedness. as the True Prophet taught. he can neither receive remission of sins nor enter the kingdom of heaven: and he declared that this is the prescription of the unbegotten God.... And when James had spoken some more things about baptism, through seven successive days he persuaded all the people and even the high priest that they should hasten straightaway to receive baptism."

"And when matters were at that point that they would all come and be baptized Paul and his men entered the temple: and Paul cried out: 'Oh men of Israel. why are you so easily influenced by these miserable men?' He began to excite the people and raise a tumult....and drive all into confusion with shouting, and to undo what had been done by James. Paul rebuked the priests for having listened to James, and. like a madman. began to excite the priests and people to murder James and the brethren, saying 'Do not hesitate; grab them and pull them to pieces. Paul then, seizing a strong brand from the altar. set the example of smiting. Then others also, seeing him, joined in the beating. Much blood was shed Although James and the brethren were more numerous and more powerful they rather suffered themselves to be killed an inferior force, than to kill others. Paul attacked James and threw him headlong from the top of the steps; and supposing him to be dead left him."


Fortunately, James, the Brother of Jesus and leader of the Essene Christians, was revived by Essene healers. He and the other survivors of Paul's attack left Jerusalem and went to Qumran to heal. Paul continued to persecute Essene Christians, going from city to city with secret police agents, arresting and killing many.

Then, on the road to Damascus, Paul (this is the point where he changed his name from Saul to Paul) claimed to have a vision of Christ, and supposedly converted to Essene Christianity. By claiming conversion, Paul was entitled to receive initiation into the Essene mystery school (he entered their three year ministerial training program in Damascus) and to learn the various secrets of the group, including their hidden camps arid underground church locations. At first, the brethren considered his conversion to be authentic; later they realized it was no real conversion:   IT WAS AN INFILTRATION!

Once Paul had infiltrated the group and received ordination, he began to change the teachings of Jesus, especially in regard to vegetarianism. (We will examine the conflict between Paul and the old Apostles on vegetarianism in another section of this article.) Certainly, Paul is entitled to his own opinion on vegetarianism. But a study of all the source material makes clear that Paul did more than
simply state his own opinion:  he DELIBERATELY and SYSTEMATICALLY replaced the original teachings of Jesus and the "old apostles" with his own very different teachings, not only on vegetarianism but also women's rights, slavery and more. In The Story of Christian Origins, Martin Larson writes: "Paul declares that... the Elect may even eat meat sacrificed to idols.... whereas Jesus honored women and found in them His most devoted followers, Paul never tires of proclaiming their inferiority. He declares that. man is the head of the woman and she must always submit to his will.....whereas the Essenes proclaimed equality among the Brethren [the Essenes were the first people on earth to condemn and forbid the practice of slavery]. Paul repeatedly declares that Christian slaves must be obedient to their Christian masters."


In one of the best books on early Christianity, Those Incredible Christians, Dr. High Schonfield reports: "For the Apostolic Church much that Paul taught was grievous error not at all in accord with the mind and message of the Messiah. The original Apostles could urge that the truth was known by them. But Paul had never companied with Jesus or heard what he said day after day [remember: Paul had never even met Jesus], and Paul's visions were the delusions of this own misguided mind....

"It was not only the teaching and activities of Paul which made him obnoxious to the Christian leaders: but their awareness that he set his revelations above their authority and claimed an intimacy with the mind of Jesus, greater than that of those who had companied with him on earth and had been chosen by him....It was an abomination, especially as his ideas were so contrary to what they knew of Jesus, that he should pose as the embodiment of the Messiah 's will....Paul was seen as the demon-driven enemy of the Messiah....For the legitimate Church, Paul was a dangerous and disruptive influence, bent on enlisting a large following among the Gentiles in order to provide himself with a numerical superiority with the support of which he could set at defiance the Elders at Jerusalem. Paul had been the enemy from the beginning. and because he failed in his former open hostility he had craftily insinuated himself into the fold to destroy it from within."


In the two excerpts given directly above -- the excerpt from Larson's book and the excerpt from Schonfeld's book -- six important assertions are made in regard to Paul:
Paul taught that it was okay for the Elect to eat meat sacrificed to idols;

 
Jesus honored women and found in them his most devoted followers, but Paul proclaimed the inferiority of women and said that they must obey the will of men;

 
The Essenes forbade slavery but Paul ordered Christian slaves to obey their Christian masters;

 
Although Paul never met Jesus, he ignored the instructions of the Apostles who had been personally trained by Jesus, replacing the teachings of Jesus and the Apostles with his own very different teachings;

 
Paul was, in the view of the Essene Christians, the "demon-driven enemy of the Messiah."

 
Paul had been the enemy of Essene - Christianity from the beginning, and because he failed in his former open hostility he had craftily infiltrated the movement to destroy it from within, leading a schism which became numerically strong enough to subdue the original church.
I will now address each of the above six assertions, providing evidence to support them. I will deal with the significance of the first assertion -- that Paul taught it was okay to eat meat offered to idols --when I address number five because the two are intimately linked. Thus, I begin with assertion number two.

We saw above that Martin Larson, in his book The Story of Christian Origins, asserted that whereas Jesus honored women, Paul did not. Larson asserts that Paul taught the inferiority of women, commanding women to submit to men. We need not look far for evidence; simply grab the nearest bible and read Paul's own words; in First Corinthians, Chapter 11, Paul declares: "Be imitators of me....I commend you because you remember me in everything....But I want you to understand that while the head of every man is Christ, the head of every woman is her husband....And any woman who prays with her head uncovered dishonors her husband; if a woman will not cover her head with a veil, then her hair should be shaved off....For a man ought not to cover his head. since he is the image and glory of God; but woman is the glory of man....Neither was man created for woman. but woman for man. That is why a woman ought to have a veil on her head, as a sign of submission to her husband that all men and angels will see....And if anyone disagrees with me about his, they must be told to obey; for nothing else is acceptable in churches of God"


Similarly, Paul declares in Chapter 5 of Ephesians: "Wives be subject to your husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife in the same way that Christ is the head of the church. As the church is subject to Christ, so must wives be subject to their husbands in everything."


If you think the above words of Paul are not only egotistical -- "Be imitators of me" -- but also brand him as a male chauvinist, hold onto your hats (especially you women in church!); IT GETS WORSE! In Chapter 14 of First Corinthians, Paul writes: "In all Christian churches, the women should keep silent whenever in church. For they are not permitted to speak, but should be subordinate....If there is anything they desire to know, let them ask their husbands at home. For it is shameful for a woman to speak in church....If any one thinks he is a prophet or spiritual, he must acknowledge that what I am writing to you is true and from the Lord God"


In the above excerpts from the Pauline New Testament -- the New Testament used by every Christian Church in the world today EXCEPT ESSENE CHURCH OF CHRIST (we use The Essene New Testament which has NO WORDS OF PAUL), Paul reveals himself to be biased towards women -- indeed, he seems to hate them -- and to be a megalomaniac. ("Megalomania" is a disease of the mind marked by unwarranted feelings of personal superiority, omnipotence and grandeur.) Probably, most of the older women reading this article remember having to wear hats or veils on their heads at church when they were little girls. That Pauline doctrine was enforced in nearly all Christian churches in America up until the women's liberation movement of the 1960's. That Pauline doctrine is still enforced in nearly every Christian church outside of America. Even today in America, especially in the Southern States, women still must wear head coverings in many of the more conservative denominations. Obviously, the Catholic prohibition against women being priests is rooted in this Pauline bias against women.

JESUS NEVER SPOKE NEGATIVELY ABOUT WOMEN THE WAY PAUL DID. At spiritual gatherings of his disciples, Mary Magdalene constantly peppered Jesus with spiritual questions, as did another woman named Mary and a woman named Martha. Jesus encouraged them to speak. Jesus' positive viewpoint in regard to women was a natural outgrowth of his understanding of God as both Father and Mother; we read in The Essene New Testament: Jesus said, "God is both male and female. not divided but the Two in One....In God the masculine is not without the feminine, nor is the feminine without the masculine....In God the masculine powers and feminine powers are perfectly united as One.

"Verily, God created mankind in the Divine image male and female. and all nature is in the image of God...In the beginning, God willed and there came forth the First Beloved Son and the First Beloved Daughter, united as Love and Wisdom, created in the Image and Likeness of the Father -- Mother, and of these proceed all the generations of the spirits of God, the Sons and Daughters of the eternal....

"Therefore shall the name of the Father and Mother be equally hallowed, for they are the great powers of God...."


Wow! what a vastly different vibratory frequency are the words of Jesus in regard to the feminine energy than Paul's! While Jesus praises the feminine energy as being Divine and calls women "the daughters of God", Paul tells women to cover their heads as a sign of submission to men -- or to have their heads shaved bald as punishment -- and forbids them to speak at church! Hey Ladies, take your pick: Essene Christianity or Paulianity?

Next we will examine Schonfield's assertion that Paul permitted Christians to own other Christians in contrast to the absolute prohibition against slavery by the Essenes. Once again, we need look only so far as the nearest Pauline Bible -- the Bible on your bookshelf -- for evidence to support Schonfield; for, once again, Paul's own words condemn him. In chapter 6 of Ephesians, Paul instructs Christian slaves to obey their Christian slave masters as though the slave master were Jesus Christ: "Slaves, be obedient to your masters. with fear and trembling, as to Christ."


Likewise, in chapter 3 of Collosians, Paul orders Christian slaves in another of his string of Pauline congregations to obey their Christian slave masters: "Slaves, obey in everything those who are your earthly masters, fearing the Lord"


In 1st Timothy chapter 6, Paul instructs his ministerial student, Timothy, in the Pauline doctrine on slavery, and then displays his egotistical megalomania by asserting that anyone who disagrees with him knows nothing: "Christian slaves must work hard for their owners and regard their owners as worthy of all honor....If their owner is a Christian, that is no excuse to slow down their labor; rather, they should labor all the harder because a brother in the faith is profiting from their toil....Timothy teach this truth and demand that all obey. For if anyone disagrees or teaches otherwise....he is puffed up with conceit and knows nothing. Timothy some may deny that this is the sound message of Jesus Christ....and may dispute over the meaning of Christ's words. These arguers have warped minds. are stupid and depraved"


Yes, the above words upholding slavery, like the previous words downgrading women, are printed on the pages of the supposedly "holy" Bible, the book which Pauline Christians call "the Word of God". Fortunately, there does exist a truly "holy" bible; and, fortunately, that bible forbids slavery and upholds the dignity of women. That truly holy bible is The Essene New Testament; and it is indeed worthy of the term "THE WORD OF GOD." Unfortunately, the Pauline fundamentalists don't read it! Thus, the above excerpts from the Pauline bible upholding slavery were used by governmental and religious "authorities" to defend the institution of slavery for nearly 1,900 years. In fact, when Abraham Lincoln first tried to put an end to slavery in America many Christian Churches opposed him AND USED THE ABOVE WORDS OF PAUL TO DEFEND SLAVERY IN AMERICA. The Southern Baptist denomination was formed to defend the practice of slavery in America; their theological defense of slavery was based on the words of Paul. AND EVEN THE KU KLUX KLAN BASED THEIR EARLY PRO SLAVERY PROPAGANDA ON THE ABOVE WORDS OF PAUL. (The Klan was formed three years after the end of the Civil War but hoped to overturn the freedom won by blacks and return to slavery.) How many whipped black backs, stretched black necks (lynchings), cross burnings, (yes the Christian cross burning in front of a black person's home is a symbol of the Pauline Christian Klan) and burnt black churches are directly attributable to the above words of Paul?

Schonfeld was certainly correct in his assertion that THE ESSENES ABSOLUTELY FOREBADE THE PRACTICE OF SLAVERY. In fact, as Upton Clairy Ewing points out in his book The Prophet of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Essenes were the very first people in history to condemn slavery: "The Essenes were the only sect in their part of the world who opposed the custom of slavery. They seem to have been the first people on earth to condemn slavery."


Philo of Alexandria, a contemporary of the Essenes, wrote: "Least of all were any slaves to be found among them, for they saw in slavery a violation of the law of nature which made all people free."


Jesus, the Essene Messiah and founder of the religion Paul claimed to represent, declared: "The Spirit of God is upon me. God has sent me to help the brokenhearted, TO PROCLAIM LIBERTY TO THE CAPTIVES!"


The fact that Paul betrayed the anti-slavery doctrine of Jesus and the Essene Christians is made clear by Ewing; we read in The Prophet of The Dead Sea Scrolls: "When Jesus said: 'whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even to them', he, in effect, challenged the slave owner to extend freedom to others if he would himself be free."

"The Nazarenes. also called Ebionites, the sect who represented the first Christian congregation at Jerusalem under James, the Lord's brother, abided by the strict ascetic rules of their Essene brethren. They held it to be contrary to the plan of God for anyone to enslave another."

"However, at this point we find a parting of the ways: Palestinian Christianity was to be taken over and changed by the evangelist who labored amongst the Gentiles [Paul]. Materialism succeeded asceticism and human freedom became the first great ethic of Jesus Christ to bow to the carnal customs of the heathen. Paul at this time was, no doubt, under great stress and pain in both body and spirit, for in assuming the Roman custom of slavery, he was in consequence severely criticized and shunned by the old apostles. For this... he was called an 'Apostate'."


Please notice above that the Essene Christians prohibition against slavery was only the first "great ethic of Jesus Christ" to be betrayed by Paul. Paul systematically altered many of the teachings of Jesus, replacing them with his own false gospel. Which brings us face-to-face with the fourth assertion made by Larson and Schonfeld: PAUL, ALTHOUGH HE NEVER MET JESUS, IGNORED THE INSTRUCTIONS OF THE APOSTLES WHO HAD BEEN PERSONALLY TRAINED BY JESUS, REPLACING THE TEACHINGS OF JESUS AND THE APOSTLES WITH HIS OWN VERY DIFFERENT TEACHINGS. That is a strong accusation to make. Do other scholars agree? Let's see.

In the excellent book Christ or Paul?, the Rev. V.A. Holmes-Gore wrote: "Let the reader contrast the true Christian standard with that of Paul and he will see the terrible betrayal of all that the Master taught....For the surest way to betray a great Teacher is to misrepresent his message....That is what Paul and his followers did, and because the Church has followed Paul in his error it has failed lamentably to redeem the world....The teachings given by the blessed Master Christ, which the disciples John and Peter and James, the brother of the Master, tried in vain to defend and preserve intact were as utterly opposed to the Pauline Gospel as the light is opposed to the darkness."


The great theologian Soren Kierkegaard, writing in The Journals, echoes the above sentiment: "In the teachings of Christ, religion is completely present tense: Jesus is the prototype and our task is to imitate him, become a disciple. But then through Paul came a basic alteration. Paul draws attention away from imitating Christ and fixes attention on the death of Christ The Atoner. What Martin Luther. in his reformation, failed to realize is that even before Catholicism, Christianity had become degenerate at the hands of Paul. Paul made Christianity the religion of Paul, not of Christ Paul threw the Christianity of Christ away, completely turning it upside down. making it just the opposite of the original proclamation of Christ"


The brilliant theologian Ernest Renan, in his book Saint Paul, wrote: "True Christianity, which will last forever, comes from the gospel words of Christ not from the epistles of Paul. The writings of Paul have been a danger and a hidden rock. the causes of the principal defects of Christian theology."


In the above excerpt a reference is made to the "epistles of Paul". The word "epistle" means "letter". The Letters of Paul became a pan of the New Testament; in fact, THERE ARE FAR MORE WORDS OF PAUL IN THE NEW TESTAMENT THAN THERE ARE WORDS OF JESUS! And as we are seeing from our study, the words of Paul are not at all in harmony with the words of Jesus! To continue to drive home that point, I am going to intentionally overwhelm you will an avalanche of quotations from great thinkers! The next is from the great American philosopher, Will Durant; in his Caesar and Christ, he wrote: "Paul created a theology of which none but the vaguest warrants can be found in the words of Christ....Through these interpretations Paul could neglect the actual life and sayings of Jesus, which he had not directly known....Paul replaced conduct with creed as the test of virtue. It was a tragic change."


Robert Frost, winner of the Pulitzer prize for poetry in 1924,1931,1937 and 1943, in his "A Masque of Mercy", wrote: "Paul he's in the Bible too. He is the fellow who theologized Christ almost out of Christianity. Look out for him."


James Baldwin, the most noted black American author of this century, in his book The Fire Next Time, declared: "The real architect of the Christian church was not the disreputable, sunbaked Hebrew (Jesus Christ) who gave it its name but rather the mercilessly fanatical and self-righteous Paul"


Martin Buber, the most respected Jewish philosopher of this century, wrote in Two Types of Faith: "The Jesus of the Sermon on the Mount is completely opposed to Paul"


The famous mystic, poet and author, Kahil Gibran, declared in Jesus the Son of Man: "This Paul is indeed a strange man. His soul is not the soul of a free man. He speaks not of Jesus nor does he repeat His Words. He would strike with his own hammer upon the anvil in the Name of One whom he does not know."


Above, the great Gibran, accurately reported something that I noticed when I first read the epistles of Paul as a youngster: PAUL DOES NOT QUOTE FROM THE WORDS OF JESUS! (Even before the gospels were written, all initiated Christians were instructed in the sayings of Jesus.) when you read the epistles of Paul, the Father of mainline Christianity, all you get is Paul's own ideas; he never quotes the wise sayings of Jesus, he never reports on the life of Jesus. That point is also made by the famous theologian Helmut Koester, in his The Theological Aspects of Primitive Christian Heresy: "Paul himself stands in the twilight zone of heresy. In reading Paul, one immediately encounters a major difficulty. Whatever Jesus had preached did not become the content of the missionary proclamation of Paul....Sayings of Jesus do not play a role in Paul 's understanding of the event of salvation....Paul did not care at all what Jesus had said....Had Paul been completely successful very little of the sayings of Jesus would have survived."


Although I have amply demonstrated that Schonfeld and Larson's fourth assertion -- that Paul replaced the teachings of Jesus with his own very different teachings -- enjoys the support of many great thinkers, I am going to let the avalanche of supporting quotations continue to fall upon the reader a bit longer. But not without good reason. Because I am going to end this article with a call for Christians to abandon Paulianity and embrace Essene Christianity, I must provide OVERWHELMING SUPPORT FOR THE ASSERT~ON THAT PAUL BETRAYED THE TRUE TEACHINGS OF JESUS. And since many of the evangelical Christians currently under the yoke of Paul (instead of Jesus) are patriotic Americans, how about the following quotation from Thomas Jefferson, third president of the United States and author of the Declaration of Independence; he wrote in his "Letter to William Short": "Paul was the first corrupter of the doctrines of Jesus."


The renowned English philosopher Jeremy Bentham, in his Not Paul But Jesus, declared: "It rests with every professor of the religion of Jesus to settle within himself to which of the two religions, that of Jesus or that of Paul he will adhere."


The eminent theologian Ferdinand Christian Baur, in his Church History of the First Three Centuries, wrote: "What kind of authority can there be for an 'apostle' who, unlike the other apostles, had never been prepared for the apostolic office in Jesus' own school but had only later dared to claim the apostolic office on the basis on his own authority? The only question comes to be how the apostle Paul appears in his Epistles to be so indifferent to the historical facts of the lift of Jesus....He bears himself but little like a disciple who has received the doctrines and the principles which he preaches from the Master whose name he bears."


The great Mahatma Gandhi, the prophet of nonviolence who won freedom from England for India in an essay titled "Discussion on Fellowship", wrote: "I draw a great distinction between the Sermon on the Mount of Jesus and the Letters of Paul. Paul's Letters are a graft on Christ's teachings, Paul's own gloss apart from Christ's own experience."


Carl Jung, the famous Swiss psychiatrist, wrote in his essay "A Psychological Approach to Dogma": "Saul's [Paul's name before his conversion] fanatical resistance to Christianity....was never entirely overcome. It is frankly disappointing to see how Paul hardly ever allows the real Jesus of Nazareth to get a word in."


As you can see, I am quoting from the intellectual cream of humanity. A few more and I will consider my point to be made. Let us continue with George Bernard Shaw, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1925; in his Androcles and the Lion, we read: "There is not one word of Pauline Christianity in the characteristic utterances of Jesus....There has really never been a more monstrous imposition perpetrated than the imposition of Paul's soul upon the soul of Jesus....It is now easy to understand how the Christianity of Jesus....was suppressed by the police and the Church, while Paulinism overran the whole western civilized world, which was at that time the Roman Empire, and was adopted by it as its official faith."


Let us follow that Nobel prize winner with another. Albert Schweitzer, winner of the 1952 Nobel Peace Prize, has been called "one of the greatest Christians of his time." He was a philosopher, physician, musician, clergyman, missionary, and theologian. In his The Quest for the Historical Jesus and his Mysticism of Paul he writes: "Paul....did not desire to know Christ....Paul shows us with what complete indifference the earthly life of Jesus was regarded....What is the significance for our faith and for our religious life, the fact that the Gospel of Paul is different from the Gospel of Jesus?....The attitude which Paul himself takes up towards the Gospel of Jesus is that he does not repeat it in the words of Jesus, and does not appeal to its authority....The fateful thing is that the Greek, the Catholic, and the Protestant theologies all contain the Gospel of Paul in a form which does not continue the Gospel of Jesus, but displaces it."


William Wrede, in his excellent book Paul, informs us: "The oblivious contradictions in the three accounts given by Paul in regard to his conversion are enough to arouse distrust....The moral majesty of Jesus, his purity and piety, his ministry among his people, his manner as a prophet, the whole concrete ethical-religious content of his earthly life, signifies for Paul's Christology nothing whatever....The name 'disciple of Jesus' has little applicability to Paul....Jesus or Paul: this alternative characterizes, at least in part, the religious and theological warfare of the present day"


Rudolf Bultman, one of the most respected theologians of this century, wrote in his Significance of the Historical Jesus for the Theology of Paul: "It is most obvious that Paul does not appeal to the words of the Lord in support of his....views. when the essentially Pauline conceptions are considered, it is clear that Paul is not dependent on Jesus. Jesus' teaching is -- to all intents and purposes -- irrelevant for Paul."


Walter Bauer, another eminent theologian, wrote in his Orthodoxy and Heresy in Earliest Christianity: "If one may be allowed to speak rather pointedly the Apostle Paul was the only Arch-Heretic known to the apostolic age."


My point has been made. Schonfeld and Larson were quite correct in their assertion that PAUL REPLACED THE TEACHINGS OF JESUS WITH HIS OWN VERY "DIFFERENT TEACHINGS. I have supported that assertion with powerful quotations from the intellectual cream of humanity. But before moving on to the next assertion in our list of six from Larson and Schonfeld, I choose to end this section on a humorous note (at least I find it humorous!). This rather humorous and certainly true quotation comes from another Nobel Prize winner; Ernest Hemingway: "That Saint Paul....He's the one who makes all the trouble!"


Do I hear a chuckle? (By the way, if you think it took a lot of stamina for you to read all the above quotations, ponder for a minute how much stamina it took me to gather them! The above quotations --and those that follow in subsequent sections of this article -- took many years of intense research to gather. So, suck in your gut, consider yourself fortunate, and read on! Chuckle!)

Earlier in this article, I listed six assertions made by scholars Martin Larson and Hugh Schonfeld in regard to Paul, and then began to provide supporting evidence for each assertion. We began with assertion number two because, as I explained at the time, I will address assertion number one when I address assertion number five, as they are intimately linked. We have now reached that point; we will now address numbers two and five. We will deal with the two assertions as a unit. Assertion one is: PAUL TAUGHT THAT IT WAS OKAY FOR CHRISTIANS TO EAT MEAT, EVEN MEAT WHICH HAD BEEN SACRIFICED TO IDOLS. Assertion five: PAUL WAS, IN THE 'VIEW OF THE ESSENE CHRISTIANS, THE DEMON-DRIVEN ENEMY OF THE MESSIAH. The two assertions are linked in that the Essene Christians believed disembodied demons were responsible for the introduction and continuance of flesh eating and animal sacrifice on our planet THROUGH THE AGENCY OF HUMAN TOOLS. In other words, when Larson stated that the Essene Christians considered Paul to be the "demon driven" enemy of the Messiah, he intended the term "demon-driven" to be taken quite literally, not figuratively. Although some of the modern readers of this article may not believe in disembodied demons, the ancient Essene Christians -- including Jesus -- certainly did. (Jesus performed many exorcisms.) So that the modern reader may understand the ancient Essene Christian belief in demons -- including their belief that the demons introduced flesh eating and animal sacrifice to our planet via human tools like Paul --I am going to provide extensive background information.

Planet earth was, originally, a VEGETARIAN PARADISE. In the first chapter of the first book of the Bible, Genesis, the first humans are told by God: "Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed which is upon the face of all the earth, and the fruit of the trees, for you it shall be for meat. And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth on the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so."


Obviously, something occurred which overturned God's plan for a vegetarian earth. But who -- or what -- would dare oppose the will of God?

Answer: THE FALLEN ANGELS OF THE LUCIFERIAN REBELLION.

A host of fallen angels, demonic soldiers of Satan, came to vegetarian earth and instituted bloody sacrificial rites, flesh-eating and warfare. Several ancient manuscripts provide the above information. In The Book of Jubilees, fragments of which were found amongst the Dead Sea Scrolls, we read that fallen angels came to earth and: "....the way of life of every creature became corrupted; and they began to devour one another."


In The Book of Enoch, also found amongst the Dead Sea Scrolls, we read: "The fallen angels....began to injure birds, beasts, reptiles, and fishes, to eat their flesh and drink their blood. Moreover. they taught men to make swords, knives, shields, and breastplates...."


These fallen angels mated with earth women and produced a race of half demon half human giants that terrorized the world. Finally, in an attempt to purify' the land, Mother Earth and Father Sky responded: A flood was sent. The Book of Jubilees makes clear that the flood was a response to the demon-caused fall of mankind from vegetarianism to flesh eating. Martin Larson, in his excellent book The Essene Heritate (subtitled: "The Teacher of the Scrolls and the Gospel Christ."), writes: "...it was basic Essene doctrine that sin did not derive from Adam but from the activities of the fallen angels known as the Watchers....Some of the lower angels came to this earth to give instruction....They became degenerate and could no more ascend to heaven. This was the Fall. precisely as we learn in Enoch and Jubilees....This, according to Essene-Ebionite doctrine, was the origin of that dreadful impiety, the eating of meat. Blood, thus shed, polluted the air with noxious vapors; mankind was filled with diseases; and death came prematurely and in agony."


Another ancient manuscript, The Clementine Homilies and Recognitions, informs us that NONE OF THE BODIES of the demonic entities survived the flood; BUT THEIR EVIL SOULS DID SURVIVE! And they continued to cause trouble. Because the demonic entities no longer had physical bodies -- and were forbidden by God to incarnate as humans -- they had to get their bloody thrills vicariously. In The Clementine Homilies and Recognitions, the Apostle Peter explains: "But the reason why the demons delight in entering into men's bodies is that, being disembodied spirits and having perverted desires after meat and perverted sex, but not being able to partake of these due to being spirits, and wanting organs fitted for their enjoyment, they enter the bodies of men in order to gain organs with which to satisfy their lusts, both meat and perverted sex."


Peter goes on to give many more "gory" details. Through the flesh diet, the demons are able to decrease the rate of vibration of your aura (energy field around your body) to the point they can pierce it and enter your body. Then, they attach themselves to your mind and "make suggestions" to you, suggestions which you believe are from your own mind. Through the agency of your body -- including your sex organs -- these demons get their vicarious "thrills". Because they feed off of emotional turbulence and pain, they attempt to influence human behavior in such a way as to increase the likelihood of wars, violence and crime. Tens of thousands of these demons "hang out" at such places as slaughter houses, battle fields, brothels and bars, feeding on the negative energy. In order to "cultivate" their "garden of pain", these demons attempt to influence politics, business and religion.

Shortly, we will consider how the sentence directly above -- especially the word "religion"-- relates to the false apostle Paul. But first I want to expose you to two more ancient accounts of the fall of humanity from original vegetarianism. The second of the following accounts is especially significant in that it links the fall from vegetarianism to the beginning of demonic, animal (and human) sacrifice in religion. The first of the two accounts is from the Oahspe: "And in that same time the Beast rose up before man, and spake to him saying: 'Whatsoever thou findeth to eat, be it fish or flesh, eat thou thereof taking no thought of tomorrow.' And man ate fish and flesh. becoming carnivorous, and darkness came upon him and he neither heard the voice of God or believed in Him."


The fall from original vegetarianism into flesh eating and then human sacrifice is described in The Covenant of Love (a version of the New Testament revised with help from the Dead Sea Scrolls and published as part of Upton Ewing's, The Essene Christ). We read: "And God said to man: 'Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed and every tree in the garden... to you it shall be for meat....' But alas!....The will of God was no longer obeyed Divine principles were overcome by sensual desires....The most sacred of trusts of all time was annulled by the lusts of the appetite, and the blood of an innocent creature stained the hands of man."

"The Tree of Life was rent with pain. Its leaves hung limp in sorrow, its precious fruits fell to the ground in rot, and its stench deplored the sickening deed

"Fear and foreboding grasped the heart of every living creature. The bold became vicious and the meek fled in terror, and the carcasses of dead beasts became the abomination of carnal appetites....

"Farther and farther man strayed from the truth of God. More and more did his power of choice become dominated by greeds and lusts. Weaker and weaker became his will to resist the cravings of the senses. Greater and greater grew the separation between the way of God and the way of man. And the True Light was obscured by the denseness of man 's own maleficent designs. and he no longer recognized the Divine Presence. Man thereafter began to invent his own god or gods....[at which point the demons set themselves up to be worshipped as gods.]

"They arranged a variety of lewd ceremonials and lurid dances to please the indulgence of a 'sensuous God'. They spilled the blood of virgins, of children, and of the gentle lamb and the faithful ox upon the temple altars to satisfy a lustful God"


While the last paragraph of the above excerpt is shocking enough -- dealing with human sacrifice -- Peter, in the Clementine manuscript, makes an additional claim; he declares that the demons not only instituted animal and human sacrifice, but even CANNIBALISM: "...These bastard men tasted also human flesh. For it was not a long step to the consumption of flesh like their own, having first tasted it in other forms."


Although most historians do not believe in fallen angels -- or any other angels -- it is a mater of historical record that animal sacrifice, human sacrifice and cannibalism occurred -- and in some dark corners of the world still occur -- ON TEMPLE ALTERS IN THE NAME OF RELIGION. (There are many traces of that demonic religion in the sections of the Old Testament which were composed by the scribes of the cult of sacrifice; that cult of sacrifice was briefly described in the first pages of this article. The Essenes declared that much of the Old Testament came not from God, but from the fallen priesthood of the sacrificial cult. The Essenes described the Old Testament "Book of Leviticus" as "the work of a wicked angel". In Leviticus -- which you will find in the Pauline "Holy" Bible on your book shelf we read such things as: "He shall lay his hand on the head of the victim and it will be accepted on his behalf to make expiation for him. He shall slaughter the bull before God, and the priests shall present the blood and fling it against the altar all around the entrance....He shall then flay the victim and cut it up....The priests shall arrange the pieces, including the head and suet, on the wood on the altar fire, the entrails and shiny... And the priest shall burn it all on the altar...a soothing odor to God" We also read in the "Holy" Bible, Book of Leviticus; "This is the law of the guilt-offering: it is most sacred. The guilt-offering shall be slaughtered....and its blood shall be flung against the altar. The priest shall cut out the entrails. the two kidneys. the haunches and the long lobe of the liver The priest shall burn these pieces on the altar as an offering to God" Charles Vaclavik, in his book The Vegetarianism of Jesus Christ, accurately reports: 'The altar of the ancient Judaic Temple was a slaughter house, butcher shop, and barbecue pit. The Essenes were absolutely opposed to the sacrificial cult of Judaism; they considered it -- and the eating of animal flesh -- to be of demonic origin.)

Now, let us begin to examine how all the above relates to Paul. You will recall that Martin Larson asserted (assertion #1 on our list of six) that Paul taught IT WAS OKAY FOR CHRISTIANS TO EAT FLESH, EVEN FLESH FROM ANIMALS SACRIFICED TO IDOLS. First, let us see if Larson is correct; did Paul permit the eating of flesh, even flesh sacrificed to idols? As with Paul's upholding of slavery and his downgrading of women, we need not look far for evidence to confirm Larson's assertion in regard to Paul and meat; the nearest Pauline Bible will suffice. In his Epistle called "Romans", Paul wrote: "...he whose faith is weak eats only vegetables....For meat destroys not the work of God."


Later, after Paul had led an outright schism against the "old Apostles" (i.e. against those who had actually known, walked with, and been trained by Jesus), he went so far as to call vegetarianism a doctrine "taught by demons"; in 1st Timothy (the same epistle in which he ordered Christian slaves to work extra hard for their Christian slave masters), Paul declared: "the spirit clearly warned me that in latter times some would abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. Such teachings come through hypocritical liars....commanding people to abstain from meats, which God created to be eaten with thanksgiving....For every animal created by God is good for eating, and none are to be refused if received with Thanksgiving."


Shortly we shall see that Paul even encouraged the eating of meat sacrificed to idols. But before doing so, we need to compare the above words of Paul with those of Jesus. After all, Paul has asserted that those whose "faith is weak eat only vegetables" and that "every animal created by God is good for eating". He has even gone so far as to call vegetarianism a doctrine taught by "hypocritical liarers" and "demons". QUESTION: Does Paul consider Jesus to be a "hypocritical liar" or "demon"? For, consider the following words of Jesus on vegetarianism; in the Essene New Testament we read:

Jesus said: "Verily I say unto you, they who partake of benefits which are gotten by wronging one of God's creatures. cannot be righteous; nor can they understand holy things, or teach the mysteries of the kingdom, whose hands are stained with blood, or whose mouths are defiled with flesh."

"God giveth the grains and the fruits of the earth for food; and for righteous man truly there is no other lawful sustenance for the body....

"wherefore I say unto all who desire to be my disciples. keep your hands from bloodshed and let no flesh meat enter your mouths, for God is just and bountiful, who ordained that man shall live by the fruits and seeds of the earth alone."


Of course, Jesus practiced what he preached: he was himself a vegetarian. In The Gospel of the Holy Twelve, we read:

Jesus said: "Of the fruits of the trees and the seeds of the herbs alone do I partake, and these are changed by the Spirit into my flesh and my blood Of these alone and their like shall ye eat who believe in me, and are my disciples, for of these, in the spirit, come lift and healing unto man."


In another verse of the same manuscript, Jesus declares: "I am come to end the sacrifices and feasts of blood, and if ye cease not offering and eating of flesh and blood, the wrath of God shall not cease from you. even as it came to your fathers in the wilderness, who lusted for flesh. and they ate to their content, and were filled with rottenness, and the plague consumed them."


Immediately prior to the above quotations of Jesus, I listed two excerpts which prove Paul upheld the eating of animals; but what about meat sacrificed to idols? In his epistle called "Corinthians" (the same epistle in which he ordered women to keep their heads covered as a sign of submission to their husbands -- or have their heads shaved bald as punishment -- and never to speak in church), Paul wrote: "As to eating meat offered in sacrifice unto idols, it makes no difference to God whether you eat such meat."


Compare the above words of Paul with the following words of Peter; in The Clementine Homilies, Peter declared: "But you are still ignorant of this law, that everyone who worships demons or their idols, or sacrifices to them, or partakes with them of their table, shall become subject to them and receive all punishment from them, as being under wicked lords. And you who, on account of ignorance of this law, have been corrupted beside their altars, and have been satiated with food offered to them, have come under their power, and do not know you have been in every way injured in respect of your bodies. But you ought to know that the demons have no power over any one, unless first he be their table-companion; since not even their chief can do anything contrary to the law imposed upon them by God wherein the demons have no power over any one who does not worship them by being their table-companions in the eating of flesh....But you, being ignorant of the foreordained law, are under the power of the chief of demons through evil deeds. wherefore you are polluted in body and soul, and in the present life you are tyrannized over by sufferings and demons....If therefore, ye wish to be the vesture of the Divine Spirit,....neither believe in idols, nor partake with them of the impure table...."


In the Clementine manuscript, Peter repeatedly uses the terms 'table of the Lord" and "table of the demons." The term "table of the Lord" is used to indicate all vegetarian foods. The term "table of the demons" is used to indicate all non-vegetarian foods, all types of meat. IMPORTANTLY (very important in that it serves as a MAGIC KEY to unlock the true meaning of important passages in The New Testament), Peter asserts that anyone who eats any meat from any source is guilty of eating meat offered to demonic idols -- whether or not any sort of demonic ritual was connected to that particular piece of meat. That is so, insists Peter, because the practice of eating animal flesh was originally introduced by demons to humanity as a sacrificial rite. In reality it still is exactly that, according to Essene-Ebionite Peter, whether or not the flesh eater is aware of that fact. Thus, Peter concludes, "eating any animal flesh is always a tribute to the demons," is a "direct link" to various demonic rituals including "human sacrifice and cannibalism" and constitutes "EATING THINGS OFFERED TO IDOLS" -- a clear violation of the commandment against idol worship. All potential converts to Essene-Ebionite Christianity (original Christianity) were told they must choose between the table of the Lord or the table of the demons. There was no room for compromise.

In regard to the Essene Christian belief that Paul was "demon-driven" in his effort to subvert the teachings of Jesus (assertion number five in our list of six), consider the following words of Peter in The Clementine Homilies: "Many not knowing how they are influenced, consent to evil thoughts suggested by the demons, as if they were the reasoning of their own souls....For as dire serpents draw sparrows to them by their breath, so also these demons draw to their own will those who partake of their table of flesh meats."


We see from the above that Paul, according to Essene Peter, may have been influenced by demons without knowing it. According to Peter, any human that eats meat becomes susceptible to demonic influence -- WHICH IS THE VERY REASON THE DEMONS INTRODUCED THE MEAT DIET TO HUMANITY IN THE FIRST PLACE. To the Essene Christians, how suspicious it must have seemed that:
Paul first attacked them (the attack in the temple described earlier in which Paul threw James, the Brother of Jesus, off a balcony and murdered many Essenes) JUST AS JAMES WAS ABOUT TO GAIN THE AGREEMENT OF THE MAINLINE JEWS TO GIVE UP ANIMAL SACRIFICE AND RECEIVE BAPTISM AS VEGETARIAN CHRISTIANS (one of the requirements of baptism was vegetarianism); and,

 
Paul, after faking a "conversion" on the road to Damascus, infiltrated their movement and founded a meat-eating version of Christianity in which even meat sacrificed to demonic idols was "kosher". Obviously, the disembodied demons who delight in entering human bodies to experience various perverted vicarious thrills (described in detail earlier) AND CAN ONLY DO SO WHEN THE PROTECTIVE HUMAN AURA VIBRATION FIELD IS SLOWED DOWN BY THE INGESTION OF FLESH, are not going to give up without a fight! Thus, because Paul was the human who led the charge to protect the interests of the demons against the reforms of Jesus -- and Paul was definitely the point-man -- it is reasonable to assume that he was indeed "demon-driven", that he was a tool used by the demons. This was the opinion of the Essene Nazarene Christians.
Again, I realize it may be difficult for some modern readers of this article to believe in disembodied demons. But I will confess here and now that I believe the Essene Christians were correct in their
analysis: PAUL WAS UNWITTINGLY INFLUENCED BY DISEMBODIED NEGATIVE ENTITIES. I am not alone in my agreement with the early Essene Christians in this regard; consider the following words of Rev. V.A. Holmes-Gore, a respected scholar. In his book Christ or Paul, he writes: "Let the reader contrast the true Christian standard with that of Paul and he will see the terrible betrayal of all that the Master taught....The powers of evil which failed to defeat the Master's mission by bringing about the crucifixion. partly achieved their object by working through Paul and his friends to alter the teachings and give them a false interpretation."

"It is clear from his own Epistles that Paul was the victim of evil forces and received his visions from an unreliable source, for in II Corinthians. he says: ....'I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord....And by reason of the exceeding greatness of the revelations...there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to buffet me....' Thus, Paul admits that his visions and revelations came to him from....a very unreliable source....Had he been caught up into the seventh heaven, or into the Angelic world his evidence might have been trustworthy but that was not possible for one who befogged his spiritual vision by eating flesh and drinking wine...."

"Various other sayings of Paul suggest that it was some kind of possession by the powers of evil.... Thus he speaks of having to wrestle against something not physical....This passage and the reference to the 'thorn in the flesh' as the 'messenger of Satan' sent to buffet him show that Paul was the victim of the evil powers, and it is therefore easy to understand how, WITHOUT REALIZING IT OR EVER INTENDING IT, he became a vehicle of those influences which were determined to betray the Master's teachings and defeat His mission."

"It is evident that when the principalities and powers failed to exterminate Christianity by accomplishing the Master's crucifixion through agents such as Caiaphas, Herod and Pontius Pilate, they tired another way of accomplishing their object when they saw that the Gospel could not be exterminated they devised a more cunning means of rendering it ineffective. They used false teachers, of whom Paul is the most famous, to popularize the Gospel and rob it of its power to redeem mankind....Thus did the evil powers use Paul as their Chief Apostle to defeat the very religion which he believed he was especially chosen to promote."


We come now to the last in our list of six assertions from Schonfield and Larson. Assertion six is: PAUL HAD BEEN THE ENEMY OF ESSENE -CHRISTIANITY FROM THE BEGINNING, AND BECAUSE HE FAILED IN HIS FORMER OPEN HOSTILITY HE HAD CRAFTILY INFILTRATED THE MOVEMENT TO DESTROY IT FROM WITHIN, LEADING A SCHISM WHICH BECAME NUMERICALLY STRONG ENOUGH TO SUBDUE THE ORIGINAL CHURCH. In the course of dealing with the first five assertions from Schonfeld and Larson, we have already amply demonstrated the truth of the first portion of assertion six -- that Paul had been the enemy of Essene -- Christianity from the beginning -- and have at least touched on the other aspects of assertion six. But there is yet some fresh and fascinating material to consider in regard to this sixth and final assertion. Perhaps the most intriguing of our yet to be introduced material is found in the book, The Dead Sea Scrolls Deception (the book documents how the Catholic church conspired to suppress the explosive contents of the Dead Sea Scrolls). In Chapter 16 of that book -- a Chapter titled "Paul: Roman Agent or Informer", the authors, Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, provide evidence to support our assertion that Paul "craftily infiltrated" the Christian movement to "destroy it from within": "...his [Paul 's] teachings -- which become the foundation of later Christianity -- are a flagrant deviation from the 'original' or 'pure' form extolled by the leadership.... James, the Lord's brother... knew Jesus personally. So did most of the other members of the community or 'early church' in Jerusalem -- including, of course, Peter. When they spoke, they did so with first-hand authority. Paul had never had such personal acquaintance with the 'Savior'. For Paul to arrogate authority to himself... is, to say the least, presumptuous. It also leads him to distort Jesus' teachings beyond all recognition -- to formulate, in fact, his own highly individual and idiosyncratic theology, and then to legitimize it by spuriously ascribing it to Jesus.... Paul knows full well what he is doing. He understands... the techniques of religious propaganda."

"Startling though the suggestion may be. it does seem.. ..that Paul was some species of Roman 'agent'. Eisenman was led to this conclusion by the scrolls themselves, then found the references in the New Testament to support it....Does Paul, then, belong in the company of history's 'secret agents'? Of history's informers?....But in any case... the movement entrusted to the 'early Church' and the Qumran community was effectively hijacked and converted into something that could no longer accommodate its progenitors."


Baigent and Leigh's reference above to "Eisenman", is in regard to a scholar named Robert Eisenman; Eisenman's research indicates that although most of the Dead Sea Scrolls were written prior to Christianity, at least one of them -- the "Habakkuk Commentary" -- was written by early Essene Christians and concerns Paul. In that Scroll,

Paul is referred to as "the Man of Lies"! In regard to the suggestion by Baigent and Leigh that Paul was some species of Roman "agent", they offer strong evidence in support, including: "While in Caesarea, he [Paul] hobnobs in congenial and intimate fashion with the Roman procurator... he is also intimate with the procurator's brother-in-law, Herod Agrippa II and with the king's sister -- later the mistress of Titus, the Roman commander who will destroy Jerusalem and eventually become emperor.

"These are not the only suspicious elements looming in the background of Paul 's biography. From the very beginning, his apparent wealth, his Roman citizenship and his easy familiarity with the presiding establishment have differentiated him from... other members of the 'early church'. Obviously, he has influential connections with the ruling elite. How else could so young a man have become the high priest's hatchet man? In his letter to Romans (16:11). moreover, he speaks of a companion strikingly named 'Herodian' -- a name obviously associated with the ruling dynasty.... And Acts 13:1 refers to one of Paul's companions in Antioch as 'Manaen, who had been brought up with Herod the Tetrarch'....

"Paul's heavily escorted departure from the city. his sojourn in luxury at Caesarea, his mysterious and utter disappearance... these things find a curious echo in our own era. One is reminded of beneficiaries of the 'Witness Protection Program'.... He consents to give evidence and testify.... Having cooperated with the authorities, he would then be given a 'new identity' and... resettled somewhere.... Does Paul, then. belong in the company of history's 'secret agents'? Of histories informers?"


The reader may choose between two theories on the motive of Paul: 1) He was unwittingly influenced by negative, disembodied demons; 2) He was a secret agent planted by the Roman police, working in league with the Jewish puppet-government and high priest installed by Rome. My own opinion -- and this was the opinion of the Essene Christians -- is that both the above are true: Paul was unknowingly influenced by disembodied demonic powers and, also, worked knowingly with corrupt worldly powers. But regardless of Paul's motive, all of the sources in this article are in agreement in regard to the following: PAUL CRAFTILY INFILTRATED THE CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT AND SUBVERTED IT. Jesus, himself had warned of this; we read in Rev. V.A. Holmes-Gore's Christ or Paul: "The triumph of Paul's Gospel is all the more remarkable in view of the Master's repeated warnings that false teachers would arise immediately after his 'going away'. Thus we read in Matthew: 'Beware of false prophets. which come to you in sheep's clothing. but inwardly are ravening wolves. By their fruits ye shall know them.... Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but the corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit...Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter the kingdom, of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.'"

"This warning fits Paul. who taught that entry into the kingdom of Heaven depends upon faith. i.e. by calling Jesus "Lord. Lord'. and did not teach the pure way of lift by which alone man can enter the kingdom. And if we apply to Paul the test 'by their fruits ye shall know them' it is abundantly clear that he was a false prophet We have seen that it was he who founded the Pauline Church in spite of the true Apostles' opposition. It was he who,formulated its doctrines...."

"The Christianity which the nations claim to follow is the religion of Paul. who is admittedly the chief and almost the only theologian that the Church recognizes. Because of his betrayal of the Master's teachings the vision of true Christianity has been so dimmed that men have been able to defend war and a host of other evils. such as flesh eating and slavery, on the authority of the Bible. Had the teachings of the Master come down to us in their true form such misinterpretation would have been unthinkable."

"We may well grieve that Christians have failed to give more heed to the Master's warnings against false prophets...."


Paul's schism -- "Paulianity"-- became numerically larger than the stricter, revolutionary, vegetarian, pro-woman, anti-slavery Essene Christianity. In fact, Paul's church became the Roman Catholic Church; in Chris Bennett's Green Gold the Tree of Life: "Their systems were cannibalized and absorbed into... the Roman Catholic Church -- the Church of Paul...."

"The....Roman Catholic Church (the Paulist Church) erased and reinterpreted much of the information regarding Christ 's true gospel"


Also supporting the assertion that Paul's church grew in size and eventually became the Roman Catholic Church is Gene Savoy; in his The Essaei Document, we read: "Paul's Christianity is another matter. He taught a different kind of theology than that shared by the original disciples. who were schooled under Jesus....Moreover, James, Peter and the disciples were members of the Essaei community, which Paul most assuredly was not....

"We see, then, that Paul was the father of Pagan Christianity [Roman Catholicism] a movement based on a concept completely foreign to Jesus. James, Peter and the Essaci community...."

"It should be remembered that Paul persecuted the Essaei. He was armed with commissions and authority of the chief priests and took great pains to imprison as many as he could find...."

"The theology that Paul created is not the religion of the Essaci....Rome assumed control over it when the Roman emperor embraced Pauline Christianity...."

"Palestinian Christianity [Essene Christianity] was displaced by Roman Christianity. The teachings of Jesus the Messiah were overshadowed by the teachings of Paul"


Although Paul's Christianity -- "Paulianity"-- grew to be much larger than Essene Christianity (because it was so 'worldly' and watered-down it was easier for the masses to accept; they could continue to eat meat, own slaves and control wives), Essene Christianity did continue to exist. Up until the fourth century both types of Christianity existed as separate religions: Essene Nazarene Christianity and "Catholic Paulianity". But then, in the fourth century, the Catholic Church -- by then a large state-run religion -- sent their army to exterminate (as heretics!) the Essene Nazarenes. Nearly all the Essene Nazarenes were killed and most of their books (which contain the unadulterated teachings of Jesus) were burned. From that time on, Essene Nazarene Christianity existed only in small numbers as a hidden, underground religion, while Paulianity spread all over the planet.

We have now concluded our examination of the six assertions made by Schonfeld and Larson. We found overwhelming evidence in support of each of the six assertions. Our supporting quotations came from the intellectual cream of humanity; thinkers such as: Thomas Jefferson, Carl Jung, Mahatma Gandhi, Robert Frost, Albert Schweitzer, Ernest Hemingway, Kahil Gilbran, Soren Kierkegaard, Will Durant, Martin Buber, George Bernard Shaw, and a host of others. We leamed that Paul at first openly murdered Essene Christians -- even attempted to kill James, the Brother of Jesus -- and then faked a conversion so that he could infiltrate the movement. He then altered the teachings of Jesus and led a schism which evolved into the Roman Catholic Church and gave birth to all mainline Christian denominations. We learned that Paul upheld slavery and downgraded women. We learned that Paul is responsible for the removal of Jesus' doctrine on vegetarianism from Christianity. We learned that

Paul replaced Jesus' doctrine of salvation -- which was based on following his SAVING TEACHINGS -- with the Pauline doctrine of BELIEF IN JESUS' SACRIFICIAL DEATH. In essence, we learned that the religions of Jesus and Paul are as different as light and darkness, and that all of mainline Christianity is the religion of Paul, not Jesus. (This does not mean that there are no "good" or "true" things in the letters of Paul; neither does it mean that mainline Christianity is completely void of goodness. If the powers behind Paul had overtly preached only bad, dark things, they could not have convinced millions of souls to give their hearts and minds to Paulianity. No, they are much too sophisticated for that! The words of Paul are a mixture of good and evil, of truth and falsehood, of light and darkness. And so is mainline Christianity such a mixture. Thus, in 1st Corinthians, sandwiched between Paul's upholding of slavery and downgrading of women, we find a beautiful poem on love [albeit the poem on love was lifted from The Essene Gospel of Peace and Paul recites it as if he 'wrote it himself!]. No, the powers behind Paul were experts in the field of propaganda and knew how to mix enough truth with their lies to keep people fooled. The speech writers of Hitler did the same. And most of the "good" things done by mainline Christianity are attributable to the fact that the powers behind Paul were not completely successful in removing the words of Jesus from the New Testament.)

Paul -- and the unseen powers that pulled his strings -- were not entirely successful. They did not succeed in completely eliminating the words of Jesus from the Bible. But it must be admitted that they did accomplish their main objective: to water-down the revolutionary message of Yahshua ha Mashiakh (Jesus the Christ). By removing vegetarianism from the New Testament, the powers behind Paul accomplished three things:
They insured that Christians would be too spiritually sluggish -- the result of meat consumption -- to actually follow the teachings of Jesus;

 
They (the disembodied negative entities) maintained their ability to enter millions of human bodies for vicarious, perverted fun and games; and,

 
They maintained the existence of one of their favorite places to "hang-out": THE SLAUGHTER HOUSE!
Yes, the Pauline irony won a battle. However, to win a battle is not to win a war. AND JESUS CHRIST DOES NOT LOSE A WAR. Love is not conquered by hate. Light is not defeated by darkness. Jesus is not vanquished by Paul. In fact, the tide of the battle has already turned:

THE ANCIENT MANUSCRIPTS CONTAINING THE UNADULTERATED TEACHINGS OF YAHOWSHUA HA MASHIAKH HAVE COME TO LIGHT!

Jesus predicted these manuscripts would come to light when the world was ready to receive them; AND THAT TIME HAS COME! We read those words of prophecy in The Essene New Testament:

Jesus said: "But the time cometh when darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people, and the enemies of truth and righteousness shall rule in my name, and set up a kingdom of this world and oppress the peoples.... putting for my doctrines the opinions of men, and teaching in my name that which I have not taught and darkening much that I have taught by their traditions. But be of good cheer, for the time will also come when the truth they have hidden shall be manifested and the light shall shine, and the darkness shall pass away and the true kingdom shall be established which shall be in the world but not of it, and the word of righteousness and love shall go forth from the Center...."


In another section of the same ancient manuscript, Jesus prophesied: "There shall arise after you, men of perverse minds who shall through ignorance or through craft, suppress many things which I have spoken unto you, and lay to me things which I never taught....Woe is the time when the spirit of the world entereth into the Church, and my doctrines and precepts are made void through the corruptions of men and women....But the time cometh when the things which they have hidden shall be revealed and made known, and the truth shall make free those which were bound"


Jesus also said: "They shall make alliance with the kings and rulers of the world and seek earthly power, and riches, and domination, and put to death by fire and sword those who seek the truth, and therefore are truly my disciples. And in their days, Jesus, shall be crucified a-fresh and put to open shame, for they will profits to do these things in my name. As I shall be nailed to the cross, so also shall my Church in those days, for she is my Bride and one with me. But the day shall come when this darkness shall pass away, and the true light shall shine.... And my Church shall be filled with Light and give Light unto all nations of the earth...."


The BLESSED DAY of the restoration of the true teachings of Jesus Christ has NOW COME! Truly, this is a time of great blessing, BUT IT IS ALSO A TIME OF CHOOSING. Every Christian must make a choice:

YAHOWSHUA OR PAUL? ESSENE CHRISTIANITY (the religion of Jesus) or PAULIANITY?

I hereby issue a call to all Christians: REJECT PAULIANITY AND EMBRACE JESUS CHRIST! [...] And the Priests and Pastors of Paul will do more than whisper in your ear; they will scream in it! (And thump their Pauline Bibles more than a few times!) But their day is rapidly fading. A new day has dawned. The table of the Lord has been prepared;

WILL YOU COME?
--Brother Abba Nazariah
http://essenes.net/NazPaul.htm