Book Review

The Nature of the Psyche: Its Human Expression
A Seth Book by: Jane Roberts

This is such a meaty book it's taken me over three weeks to finish. I kept having to put it away and take a break from it because it is so condensed. I'll be talking about it in depth further in small doses here and there as the subject matter pertains to opinions or experiences I have.

The astral personality, "Seth" has written quite a few books over the past thirty-something years. I read "Seth Speaks" around ten years ago and was nudged by Pleroma to find the book again very recently. Upon researching the first book I was flabbergasted to discover just how many more books Jane Roberts has published since.

Yes, I know I am quoting nearly entire pages at a time. Unfortunately, Seth is very ... choosy.. with his wording and specific. Such a large amount of information is crammed into paragraphs that this is the only way for you, the reader, to understand what I'm commenting on.

Page 41

"The [human] species has built into it all the knowledge, information, and "data" that it can possibly need under any and all conditions. This heritage must be triggered psychically, however, as a physical mechanism such as a muscle is triggered through desire or intent.

This does not mean that you learn what in larger terms you already know; as for example, if you learned a skill. Without the triggered desire, the skill would not be developed; but even when you do learn a skill, you use it in your own unique way. Still, the knowledge of mathematics and the arts is as much within you as your genes are within you. You usually believe that all such information must come from outside of your self, however. Certainly, mathematical formulas are not imprinted in the brain, yet they are inherent in the structure of the brain and implied within its existence. Your own focus determines the information that is available to you."

page 42

"This does not mean that any person, spontaneously, with no instruction, can suddenly become a great artist or writer or scientist. It does mean, however, that the species possesses within itself those inclinations which will flower. It means also that you are limiting the range of your knowledge by not taking advantage of such methods. It does not mean that in your terms all knowledge already exists, either, for knowledge automatically becomes individualized as you receive it, and hence, new.

Your desire automatically attracts the kind of information you require, though you may or may not be aware of it.

If you are gifted, and want to be a musician, for example, then you may literally learn while you are asleep, tuning in to the world view of other musicians, both alive and dead in your terms. When you are awake, you will receive inner hints, nudges or inspirations. You may still need to practice, but your practice will be largely in joy, and will not take as long as it might take others. The reception of such information facilitates skill, and operates basically outside of time's sequences.

......"It seems almost heresy to suppose that such knowledge is available, for then what use is education? Yet education should serve to introduce a student to as many fields of endeavor as possible, so that he or she might recognize those that serve as natural triggers, opening skills or furthering development. The student will, then, pick and choose."

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Seth then goes on to briefly discuss categories of knowledge and traditions which allowed individuals to set aside accepted modes of perception to delve into other realms of knowledge. The problem then becomes language. This 'innate' genetic knowledge needs a way to be expressed.

I think that this is the real problem gnostics face and why our past expressions(Nag Hammadi codices, for example) have sided more with romantic verse than normal conversational language. Our 'mind perspective' has become so vastly expanded that our native tongue stumbles. We fumble around, looking for a more perfect word to describe 'immense' and 'forever,' meanwhile information is pouring into, not only our minds, but our hearts. Unspeakable and ineffable are two words which are repeated throughout gnostic texts and for very good reason.

Change is profound. How we deal with this is what makes our journey so unique. Do we stay in rigid dogmatic modes of thought and expression and only rely on those visualizations to express ourselves? Or do we throw caution to the wind and let our mind wander freely?

Seth says, "This heritage must be triggered psychically," and if I had read this book more than two years ago I'd have really been stumped as to what this means. Triggered as in 'decided upon' or triggered as in 'tripped over'? As a lay gnostic this "triggering" mechanism he speaks of means something quite simple and yet profound at the same time to me: connection.

This connection with Pleroma/The All/Source, etc, is like a torrential flood of love and information when activated. How or when does it occur? Awake or asleep, it can occur. We make life altering decisions in our sleep quite often but don't remember it.

We hold ourselves back because we're so utterly terrified of being alone. That is why the contrasting emotions from Pleroma feel so delusional at times. So when that conscious choice is made to (re)connect it seems as though we're bit out of our heads at first. Hence, the honeymoon period. Euphoria. Absolute euphoria. Like being wrapped in the softest, warmest blanket and cuddled.

Small nudges here and there. Turning left instead of right. Not speaking when we normally would have before. Sensing the larger cause and that patience is not just a virtue of some Romantic era but the natural way to function appropriately for your own personal growth. Feeling that, even though the world's gone mad, "everything will be alright" actually makes sense although we don't know why.

Something to ponder: maybe this is why Socrates had more fun listening than talking.

Book Review

The God Delusion
By: Richard Dawkins

As much as I loathed picking this book up after already seeing Dawkins argument shredded by other people, I decided that I at least had to further educate myself on exactly what I was up against when talking to the man's disciples.

I discovered something not too terribly surprising from a gnostic stance- I agreed with him the majority of the time.

Those of you who are semi-gnostic or semi-literalist theist may gasp and say, "oh my gosh, but why?!! He's an atheist. He is the antithesis of what I believe in!" Au contraire, my friends. Atheists are not the boogieman they are made out to be(EXCLUDING the militant atheist type! They are truly scary.). In terms of the evolution of gnosis atheists are, in fact, potential infant gnostics. Tabula rasa of an adult nature. A kind of resolve the adult makes to revert back to being blank slates before the world attempted to indoctrinate them. The adult states: I see no reason to believe therefore I do not.

The God Delusion has been used as a sort of vindicating "guidebook" for atheists to explain their decision. With as much as atheists are hated(therefore rarely elected into office), spit upon, and used as pulpit scapegoats for the ills of the world, I think that the book deserves a bit more care and examination. Dawkins' job was hardly and easy one. He has well over two thousand years of religion to talk about in regards to Why He Doesn't Agree With It. It's not enough to point at a religion and say, "It promotes hatred therefore I refuse to believe in it." We have to dig deeper than that.

In the preface, Dawkins tells a short story about his wife's childhood education. She was so miserable, he said, that she wished she could leave. Years later when she told her parents about this they exclaimed, "But darling, why didn't you tell us?" The wife's reply was, "Because I didn't know that I could."

I believe this one sentence lays the foundation for exactly what atheists use as fuel. They have discovered they do have a choice and this propels them forward to question everything and everyone. In a gnostic perspective- isn't this exactly what the Good God wants us to do?!! Absolutely! To not question is to be a blank faced sheep, led to the slaughter by whoever holds our leash. This is the very reason why I state atheists are potential infant gnostics. They have turned their back on literalism as the world has promoted it and this is a major stepping stone toward (potential)spiritual growth. Some never do grow and that is their choice.

"I am not attacking any particular version of God or gods. I am attacking God, all gods, anything and everything supernatural, wherever and whenever they have been or will be invented."

Dawkins' attack of Jehovah, Allah, and other literalist deities is typical. He calls them misogynists, angry murderers, and he can in no way, shape, or form condone revering such deities without proof of their existence. The problem with his attempt at disproving God's existence is that he falls short. His argument is that he wants God to walk up and shake his hand and since He hasn't done so then obviously He doesn't exist. This is a cop out to real discourse on the nature of the soul and the divine. He is begging for literalism and pouts when he doesn't get it.

He is attacking literalism only because he knows of no other religion or concept(like gnosis). Now, he does acknowledge that Buddhism and Confucianism and a few others are "ethical systems or philosophies of life," but he does not recognize them as also being atheist. He does not look further within them to explore the solid cornerstone of gnosis at their core. Since he dismisses eastern 'ethical systems and philosophies' he completely misses the point- that he is in fact only pointing out one branch of religion he does not believe in: literalism. But by not acknowledging and researching non-literalist religions he is not only doing himself a disservice but atheists everywhere.

This book is a 350+ page rant against literalism. And yet a literal handshake is the only thing which would appease him.

Since a literalist's endgame is pointing at their holy book and exclaiming in a loud voice that all the answers are within and if you don't believe it then you are going to a Very Hot Place after death then you can see why Dawkins would react with the arguments he does. He claims to be an empiricist who needs proof. I say that he is a hopeful agnostic as opposed to pure atheist. The summary of the book is a rather passionate plea for God to show Himself either in intuition or science and math:

"... Could we, by training and practice, emancipate ourselves from Middle World, tear off our black burka, and achieve some sort of intuitive- as well as just mathematical- understanding of the very small, the very large, and the very fast? I genuinely don't know the answer, but I am thrilled to be alive at a time when humanity is pushing against the limits of understanding. Even better, we may eventually discover that there are no limits."

Book Review

The Gnostics
By: Andrew Phillip Smith

Find this book. Buy it. Period.

If you ever wanted to find a truly in-depth discussion on the old gnostic history(including genocides), traditions, scriptures, and influence then this is it. This book took me around two weeks to finish from cover to cover and the reason is not length(226 pages) but of context and further study. I didn't want to put the book down but... my brain was overwhelmed and I had no choice. Giving yourself a chance to absorb the information is a good idea as the twists and turns are quite intense.

The author did not write this book to be a light foray into the idea of gnosis but to be a truly meaty study of the people and their beliefs. He didn't overwhelm with citations, however, keeping the book visually appealing and easy to follow. The references, bibliography, and index sections are rich in new avenues for further study.

Valentinians, Sethians, Marcionism, Manichaean, Hermetic, Mandaean, Bogomils, Cathars, Paulicians, and countless 'cousin' gnostic groups are discussed in comparison and contrast with how they have influenced or been influenced by gnosticism.

Excerpt from page 41 (emphasis by blog author)

Even though they traced themselves back to Valentinus as a revered teacher, and accepted Church hierarchy when they came into contact with it, the Valentinians were notoriously democratic and egalitarian in their dealings with each other. The Church Father Tertullian complained that he could see no strict hierarchy among them, "First, one does not know which is a catchumen or a believer. They enter on equal terms, they listen on equal terms, they pray on equal terms... they do not care if they confess different doctrines, provided that they all help to destroy the truth... And so today, one man is a bishop, tomorrow another. Today one is a deacon who tomorrow will be a lector. The presbyter of today is the layman of tomorrow. Even the members of the laity are charged with the duties of a priest."

The Church Father Irenaeus also had first hand experience of Valentinians. .....He was dismayed to find that there were many Valentinians in his diocese, and, being particularly concerned that he couldn't easily tell them apart from other Christians, he described them as the usual wolves in sheep's clothing.

Excerpt from page 51

The state of the hylic, who lives from the body alone, is roughly similar to that of an animal. A hylic is dependent on the body and on the needs and appetites of the body, and the body is incapable of salvation in itself. For Gnostics there was no bodily resurrection, and they would have agreed with the second century pagan and anti-Christian philosopher Celsus that the resurrection of a physical corpse was a repugnant concept. Those who live only from the body live in ignorance, which is a lack of gnosis, and gnosis begins with the soul and finds fulfillment in the spirit.

Book Review

Zen Fables For Today
By: Richard McLean

Zen? Buddhism? ... how exactly does this relate to gnosis and why would a gnostic read a book about Zen or Buddhism let alone a combination of the two? Ahhh but Grasshopper, the answer is in the question. Gnosis means knowing. The path to knowing winds and turns, rarely in a straight line, overlaps itself and then delves deeply into other religions to ferret out their kernels of gnostic truth. Zen Buddhism certainly contains some tasty morsels for thought.

In giving you a taste I hope that you will feel inclined to search out more. Here are two short excerpts.

Page 103:

"Tell me about apples," said the Roshi(teacher) to his three most promising students as he placed an apple on the table. "Whoever explains them best gets to go to Kyoto with me."

The first student explained the apples' origin and introduction into Japan and other historical lore.

The second pointed out the marketing uses for apples in cider, desserts, and applesauce.

The third said nothing. Instead he took a pen knife, cut a wedge, slipped it into the Roshi's mouth and gently pushed hi teacher's jaw upwards so the apple would squish inside his mouth.

"Precisely," said the Roshi talking around his slice of apple. "Apples cannot be explained with words. They must be experienced on the tongue. The only way to know about apples is with your mouth shut."

The class shared the remains of the apple and the third student went to Kyoto.

Lesson: Like "knowing" apples, the only way to "know" about one's place in the universe is not through the ears but through the heart.

Page 10, Mindfulness

The Zen concept of mindfulness could be described as "time hedonism." Zen offers a view of the world that is starkly practical; it says we can (and must) live in the present. And the only way to live in the present is to be present in the moment. For example, if we are washing dishes, Zen says to be there washing the dishes and living that simple action rather than tuning out. Zen labels as wasteful recriminations over the past or worry about the future. "Live now," it commands and gives us the tool to live now: mindfulness of the moment, living in the present, not squandering this precious span of life, not putting consciousness on "automatic pilot" or dreaming away today in favor of an impossible-to-predict tomorrow

Book Review

The Laughing Jesus (Religious Lies & Gnostic Wisdom)
By: Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy

These two authors are at the top of my Favorites list. I seriously doubt if any other other authors have ever offered such a conversational and practical piece of literature on ancient gnostic wisdom as this book.

If you're looking for a way to dive right in and have someone point out the differences between literalist religious dogma and ancient gnostic wisdom- this is your book. I highly recommend you run out and find it. If you like 'lighter' reading it will end up being the bread and butter of the religious section on your bookshelf. The authors have created a book which is a frank discussion on the butchery of Christianity, Islam, and Judaism in the first half. The second half speaks conversationally about exactly why Gnostics were(and are) persecuted so heavily. The answer is simple: Gnostics didn't see a need for clergy. Gnosis is found through experience with the divine through direction conversations, not by developing a level of blind faith or performing good deeds. Learning how to live lucidly is the key.

I hope the authors would forgive this little blogster for quoting a few of my favorite passages from their book. Hopefully they will whet your appetite for more.

Excerpt from Chapter 9

"If you can stand back far enough from your cultural conditioning, the Literalist Christian message looks absurd and grotesque. You were born in sin and deserve to be punished. So God sent his own son, Jesus, to planet Earth to suffer horribly on the cross to pay for your sins. Jesus died for you and then resurrected and went to Heaven. And, if you believe that this really happened, you will also go to Heaven when you die, where you will have a very nice time forever. But if you don't believe that the resurrection really happened, when you die you will go to Hell and be subjected to really horrible tortures for all eternity. By a God of love!

It's a gruesome doctrine and inherently flawed. Surely, for any compassionate person, the existence of Hell must make the enjoyment of Heaven impossible. How could anyone with an ounce of kindness enjoy Heaven knowing that others languished in Hell, simply for not believing in an historical event for which there is no evidence anyway! It seems somewhat harsh. If there really is a God running this post-mortem apartheid, then he's a monster and we need to indict him for crimes against humanity.

We are extremely glad to tell you, however, that this grim Literalist version of the Christian message has nothing to do with the teachings of the original Gnostic Christians. They did not teach that believing in the historical death and resurrection of Jesus would save us from Hell when we die. That would be impossible because, according to the Gnostics, we are already dead and living in Hell right now!"

Excerpt from Chapter 7

"Gnostic philosophy is extreme sports for the mind. It is for those who relish the rush of exhilaration as they free-fall into uncertainty. The buzz of alert concentration as they scale the mountain of imagination, seeking out a higher view. The thrill of anticipation as they wait to ride a swell of insight as it surges up from the depths. Always hoping for the big one. Gnostic philosophy isn't safely theoretical. It is live and dangerous. It is a profound exploration of the great mysteries of life and death. An heroic adventure to excite the soul. Some people dismiss all philosophy as abstract and irrelevant. But Gnostic philosophy can utterly transform our understanding of who we are and what it is to be alive. What could be more concrete and relevant than that?

At the heart of Gnostic philosophy is the outrageous claim that if we experience the state of gnosis we will recognize that life is a dream. This idea challenges our most fundamental assumptions about who we are and what life is. At first it may seem even madder than the maddest of Literalist claptrap. The Christian Gnostic Theodosius acknowledges:

"I know that the teachings of gnosis are a laughing-stock to most people. Some are startled by them, as when a light suddenly illuminates the darkness of a drinking party. But the truly blessed are those who rouse themselves from sleep and raise their eyes to the truth."

Is gnosis just another mad ancient theory? No. Gnosis isn't a theory at all. It's an experience. The Gnostics aren't trying to persuade us to adopt their opinion that life is a dream. They want to use philosophical ideas to wake us up, so we see for ourselves the true nature of reality."

Book Review

Jesus Under Fire: Modern Scholarship Reinvents the Historical Jesus
By: Michael Wilkins & JP Moreland

This book left a lot to be desired by way of real scholarship.

I checked out Amazon's feedback on this book left by customers/readers and not surprisingly there was a lot of "This is the best book ever written on the topic!!!" type comments left by literalists and "ye gods, people- wake up!!" comments from the apologist haters. (I'd leave a review along that last line myself but I'm too damn lazy to do so. I'd actually have to remember my Amazon log in information.)

This customer said essentially what I was thinking:

Circular Reasoning, September 5, 2000

By A Customer

I have to admit up front that I stopped reading this book after the first 100 pages or so (the first three essays). Despite the claims of this book that the Jesus Seminar's research starts with the assumption that the Jesus in the Gospels could not be the true Jesus, this book starts with the equally arguable assumption that everything in the New Testament is true (despite serious inconsistencies between the four Gospels) unless proven otherwise.

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Along the same lines as the "circular thinking" motif, I wonder if the authors realized just how asinine it is to call a 2,000(supposedly) year old collection of writings as accurate when they're using THE WRITINGS THEMSELVES to authenticate it.

*blog author slams head into keyboard*

Repeating a verse so many times doesn't make it true. Classifying and color coding verses into ratings of what the Jesus-they've-visualized would have said into nice, neat little piles doesn't make their fact finding mission true. Not when you've got asshats like Irenaeus at the helm of Christian orthodoxy so many centuries ago.

I know that sometimes I sound almost like an atheist in my arguments. But I'm not. I'm simply fed up with the pathetic cookie-cutter circular reasoning happening in the minds of worldly Christians. It's self defeating.

Gnosis is about using your BRAIN to come to a conclusion about a question. Not circular reasoning. Not by using the the subject matter itself to prove it's dogmatic worth when we really know crap about what happened 2,000 years ago. Anything of real worth that once existed to compare it to in order to find the truth- simply does not exist anymore. There were too many library burnings taking place. Once you get through the first few chapters of fluff where the authors spout off at how they're going to "prove the Jesus Seminar wrong" the book takes a decidedly apologetic turn- straight downhill.

Pure fluff for the brain-dead masses.

Book Review

The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind
By: Mark A. Noll

Through several chapters I found myself cheering the author along as I read. He's taken on a monumental task- ferreting out the how's, when's, and why's of the decline in intellectualism within the evangelical protestant faith.

Starting with modern evangelical education settings and traveling backwards and forwards again in time, Mr. Noll accomplishes what I believe to be a remarkable endeavor: looking at the same texts which the majority of sects of Christianity reads every day and deciding that it is not the texts themselves which are the 'problem' with the evangelical sect, it's the overall attitude which is bred within families, congregations, and the church itself. Doomed from the start.

I believe this research of the author's is pertinent in how we view gnosticism today and the state of our education system overall. We have a great deal to be thankful for and to be wary of.

Chapter one of Scandal of the Evangelical Mind, the author quotes Richard Hofstadter's Pulitzer-prize-winning book Anti-Intellectualism in American Life, who said, "the evangelical spirit is one of the prime sources of American anti-intellectualism." For Hofstadter, there was a common reasoning process by which evangelicals had chosen to evacuate the mind. (EVACUATE the mind?!!)

"One begins with the hardly contestable proposition that religious faith is not, in the main, propagated by logic or learning. One moves on from this to the idea that it is best propagated (in the judgment of Christ and on historical evidence) by men who have been unlearned and ignorant. It seems to follow from this that the kind of wisdom and truth possessed by such men is superior to what learned and cultivated minds have. In fact, learning and cultivation appear to be handicaps in the propagation of faith. And since the propagation of faith is the most important task before man, those who are as "ignorant as babes" have, in the most fundamental virtue, greater strength than men who have addicted themselves to logic and learning. Accordingly, though one shrinks from a bald statement of the conclusion, humble ignorance is far better as a human quality than a cultivated mind. At bottom, this proposition, despite all the difficulties that attend it, has been eminently congenial both to American evangelism and to American democracy."

If that doesn't make you think twice about the pregnant chad fiasco of the presidential election a few years back then I can't imagine what will. Why our gubernatorial choices get so worked up wooing certain religious groups is just pathetic. It appears as though Martin Luther's diatribe against reason is bearing fruit now in this age of pseudo-democracy combined with a love affair of binary numbered technology.

In Ronald Knox's essay on "enthusiasm" he says about most evangelicals,

"That God speaks to us through the intellect is a notion which he may accept on paper, but fears, in practice, to apply."

I am wholeheartedly confounded by this philosophy of 'not thinking.' It leaves me asking a pretty harsh question: why is it fashionable to be ignorant? Somehow I think that being ignorant was not the will of the most holy when He/he said, "be like innocent babes." Then again, it depends on which "subject pronoun" you're talking about as to how you can interpret the phrase declaring we must be innocent.

Overall, I'd have to give this book eight stars. The author, a self-professed evangelical, makes no secret of his religious leanings and is instead relaying his disappointment in his research findings as well as stating that he still believes in evangelism but not how it has taken shape the past hundred years. He isn't giving up on it. The book is thorough and holds no punches. I did learn about a few positive angles of the evangelical mind, too. I was surprised at this.

When you read about the proto-gnostic teachers being exiled, tortured, killed, or simply written about by Irenaeus as blaspheming heretics, choose your words very carefully when you say that gnostics have nothing in common with evangelicals. Gnostics were just as ... verbose... back then as evangelicals are now. We may be a pacifistic and peace loving group who don't really have a political agenda(as a rule we hate getting involved in politics. Period), but we're just as capable of getting the word out to the masses about Love, Peace, and Understanding. The difference is that while we tend to be looked upon as anarchists by comparison because of our freedom loving nature, we have a very different interpretation of Genesis and view of the type of education we should devote ourselves to. But we do have something in common with them. We all believe in Christ's mandate of compassion.

I knocked two stars off for my personal rating of the book because of the downright ass backwards view of the author's concerning Martin Luther. This is a man who championed murdering Jews in Germany and killing off Muslims when he couldn't convert them. And Luther chastised parents who didn't properly educate their children. (say what?!!) I have never found Luther to be spoken of as very big on educating the masses. Quite the opposite. According to the author, Luther was "horrified" to find that his name was now synonymous with a new branch of Christianity. Couldn't have been too horrified since he wrote all the new catechisms himself and even quite a number of hymns!

We'll have to agree to disagree about Luther. The rest of the book was enlightening.

Book Review

Fabricating Jesus (How Modern Scholars Distort the Gospels)
By: Craig A. Evans

I couldn't get through the first six chapters without slamming the book shut in disgust. For having over twenty-five years experience in looking at and translating ancient biblical texts, Mr. Evans' logic is .... I can't find the appropriate word. Appalling. Frightening. Shortsighted. Those are the closest approximations of emotion I could find. Oh, add a thick layer of disdain to that. Yeah. That'll cover it.

The author's grand pronouncement that the scholars who have translated the Nag Hammadi scrolls are dating it incorrectly is quite frankly anti-climactic. Gnostics wax poetic and have always assigned their dialogues with Christ as visions or meetings in the mind. And even more confounding to modern dogmatic Christian scholars, gnostic writers sometimes even refer to each other as Christs. Or sparks. Or a piece of light. Or a million other symbols. If you don't understand the jargon of gnostics it all looks like a twisted mess.

Here's the main idea Mr. Evans attempts to convince his audience: the Old Testament is truly the OLD Testament. The gnostic gospels really belong in the NEW Testament because of their supposed age, if they belong there at all.

We've got a problem, though. When the powers that be in Christiandom met for the first Council of Nicaea(325AD) all the New and Old Testament books were agreed upon and even edited to everyone's satisfaction. You're talking about rewriting and re-interpreting the Word Of God(supposedly). Man rewriting God's Book. It was decided that yes, Jesus was the literal son of God and not some human prophet with a gift for words or even a human baby who came into his divinity at a certain age. The human child was never born from humanity. He was born from God. A study of Arius, one of the priests to be excommunicated during the Council of Nicaea, shows that he was a not-so-quietly-in-the-closet gnostic. The base of truth was there, right in front of Constantine's eyes and for all to see. But it was blasphemous and deemed dangerous for the souls of Christians to contemplate. So naturally Arius was excommunicated and his works were burned. And then he was murdered. Nice touch, that.

My point is that the Old and New Testament books all have such shady history and interpretation that exactly how can one even establish which was written first in the instance of the Old Testaments in relation to the Nag Hammadi collection? Mr. Evan's argument that many of the Nag Hammadi books were either perfect copies of or very close paraphrases of a multitude of passages of books in the Old Testament only proves one thing- there were common themes. How do we know that the Old Testament books weren't copied from the Nag Hammadi books and then filled out with more appropriate fluff to stupefy the masses? Why is it that the Old Testament is sacrosanct and yet everything we find after it simply must be either a) a forgery or b) written after the Old Testament books? Why can't they coexist in peace as a part of history?

This isn't a debate over a chicken and her laid egg. This is an argument over who has edited texts, burned them, murdered people for their "hypocrisy" and then those people who simply want to spread God's love and be left alone. There is a 350 year period when all these books were written(and edited to please the masses) and the Vatican clearly fails when it comes to proving authenticity with Irenaeus as their chief historian.

Mr. Evans placed a very touching preface in his book, detailing how his faith has been changed through his decades of hard work. While others in his field lost their faith his merely shifted in focus. After reading only six chapters of his book I can summarize the author in three words: very polite apologist. While trying to rationalize the New Testament he only succeeds in pointing out his own flaws in deduction by not saying what he should. If you're going to attack the authenticity of one document saying it's "secondary and not primary" then you better be able to coherently discuss the shenanigans which happened while "authenticating" and outright editing the primary. Not talking about it doesn't mean that it didn't exist and you can't sweep it under the rug.

Gnostics don't care if another gnostic believes Jesus was maybe a brighter spark than the rest of us. We don't care if he really walked as a human or was merely a heavenly apparition who lingered thirty-three years. We don't care because we know that it's all about the evolution of gnosis and personal experience with the All. Free thinking at its best. That's why gnostics have a multitude of sects- happily! Literal Christians, however, have big Councils to decide such things and then damn anyone who disagrees. Murder and mayhem have always been dealt out by literal religions. Isn't it funny how exclusive inclusive religions become? They always morph into a society which teaches their children to hate the 'others.'

Doesn't anyone get metaphors anymore? Irenaeus certainly didn't. I think his inner child died too early.