In Joseph Atwill’s eye-opening book ‘Caesar’s Messiah’ (subtitled ‘The Roman Conspiracy to Invent Jesus’ ) he talks about “the satirical level of the Gospels,..designed to be difficult to see”.(1) And he goes on to talk about the use of a sort of shorthand of communciation.(2) As in, say -
a pun.
I thought of this today after having gone yesterday to see my dentist. The evening before, while chewing my dinner, I came across some grit, that turned out to be - after I felt it with my tongue - a tooth that I had just broken. And I say “my dentist,” rather than just “a dentist,” because I have had considerable work done on my teeth since coming back to my old hometown to retire in the sun; “considerable” to the point that I have very few of my own original teeth left in my mouth.(3) My dentist - whom I ‘chose’ simply because his office is near to me - talked me into going for crowns rather than the cheaper alternative of dentures, mostly because - as he said - that is what he would recommend to his own father. At that point, I had a fair amount of savings, and could afford the difference. But now - some five to six years later, and having to live in part on said savings (my Social Security check doesn’t even cover my monthly food bill, after the, er, extraction of my rent, telephone/internet connection, and power) - I have to be more careful of my expenditures.(4) Hoping that this trip wasn’t going to end up costing me an arm and a leg - in either a filling or an extraction - off I want. (Getting up earlier than I usually get up, from being a night owl, ‘surfing the net’ as I do - shall we say, religiously - every evening.)
The Receptionist recognized me immediately, which was a nice beginning to my visit, and so did the dentist, who happened to come by while I was at the Reception desk; and instead of my having to set an appointment to be seen, he told me - having overheard the purpose of my visit - that he would take a look at the situation that afternoon, considering the possibilities of emergency, and so I took a seat. When they called me, and took the requisite x-rays, I got parked in one of his workrooms, with a young gal having prepped me for his inspection. In he came - just like old times - and
took a look, and said, simply, “You need a crown.” And I said, ’Tell me something that I don’t know.’ No, I tell a lie; just kidding. But knowing how ‘the universe’ - The Play - works, I wouldn’t be surprised if this was just such a play on words - a pun. Intended to let me know to go for it, and not insist on just having the broken tooth extracted and be done with it. Including with the fact that I already have a gap on that side of my teeth - on the upper right side - and two gaps on the same side might be a bit much.
To explain: Some years ago - at the end of our previous relationship - he took out a broken tooth up there, and I told the receptionist/bookkeeper, who came to, er, fill me in that I couldn’t afford the replacement process that I was told that I would need, and I let the matter go; and that was my last visit there. Until we came to yesterday. I’m not sure why I didn’t respond that way on this occasion, about just having the broken tooth removed and let any further work go. He seemed very clear as to what I needed. And who knows. Maybe the potential pun worked on me on a certain level. Although I certainly wasn’t aware of it at the time.
Aware. That for me to set things right -
to the full extent that is needed, now, on dear old planet Earth, needing a full reworking -
I need a crown.
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footnotes:
(1) [After a decade-long study of the Dead Sea Scrolls] “I also began studying the other two major works from this era, the New Testament and Wars of the Jews by Flavius Josephus, an adopted member of the [Flavian] imperial family; I hoped to determine how the Scrolls related to them. While reading these two works side by side, I noticed a connection between them. Certain events from the ministry of Jesus seem to closely parallel episodes from the military campaign of the Roman emperor Titus Flavius as he attempted to gain control of the rebellious Jews in Judea. My efforts to understand this relationship led me to uncover the amazing secret that is the subject of this book: This imperial family, the Flavians, created Christianity, and, even more incredibly, they incorporated a skillful satire of the Jews in the Gospels and Wars of the Jews to inform posterity of this fact…
“Flavius Josephus, the adopted member of the family, who wrote Wars of the Jews, was their official historian. The satire they created is difficult to see. If it were otherwise, it would not have remained unnoticed for two millennia. However, as readers may judge for themselves, the path that the Flavians left for us is a clear one. All that is really needed to walk down it is an open mind…
“(T)he satirical level of the Gospels has not been discovered because it was designed to be difficult to see. The Flavian Caesars [father Vespasian, elder son Titus - he who was responsible for the siege and sacking of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple there; and made out to be, in the Gospels, the Son of Man prophesied’ by the messianic character in the fable, Jesus - and younger son Domitian] wanted more than just to transform messianic Judaism. They wanted Christianity to flourish and become widely held, even world-wide, before the Gospels’ satirical level was discovered. Why did they want this? Because they wanted legacy, and they needed to fool the world to prove to posterity how clever they were. Though on their surface the Gospels appear to be religious literature, which many believe were written by the Jewish followers of a messianic leader, they actually stem from the overwrought vanity of Roman Caesars, desiring the populace to worship them as gods. (My emphasis.) (pp. 9-10)
(2) “To produce the Gospels required a deep understanding of Judaic literature. The Gospels would not simply replace the literature of the old religion, but would be written in such a way as to demonstrate that Christianity was the fulfillment of the prophecies of Judaism and had therefore grown directly from it. To achieve these effects, the Flavian intellectuals made use of a technique used throughout Judaic literature - typology. The genre of typology is not often used today. In its most basic sense, typoiogy is simply the use of prior events to provide form and content for subsequent ones…The typology in the Gospels is very specific - the system uses repeating names, locations, or concepts in the same sequence…” (p 14)
(3) All a bit of a shock to me, since I have been in the habit of brushing my teeth - shall we say, religiously - every evening. Not ‘after every meal’. Perhaps that is the problem. But to move on.
(4) And in point of fact was in the very process of letting a handful of the organizations who write to me, with important petitions to sign, etc., that I have ‘No more disposable income,’ and send the signed items back without, alas, a donation to their worthy cause. Or simply tear up their appeals.
A shame. Often such appeals, er, tear me up.
Comes the revolution……
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P..S. In her newsletter of October 2nd Patricia Cota-Robles talks movingly about
‘Holding The Sacred Space For Divine Government,’ and the U.S.’s role in that process. It is copyrighted. Visit:
www.eraofpeace.org. Full article is entitled ‘Pay Attention Humanity Is Awakening’.
It contains a reference to her newsletter of September 11th entitled ‘A Monumental Victory!’ That would be valuable to read as well. All food for thought.
Don’t let her New Age jargon get in the way of her message.
A word to the wise. And checking with their heart.
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