Human sacrifice – Messiah For All

First mention of a solution against death 7 Human sacrifice

July 7, 2016Marcus Ampe15 Comments

In the previous articles about the solution for man and offerings, we talked about the way human beings looked for ways to restore their relationship with God and how they wanted to please God with offerings.

The first human beings had the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge, symbolizing potentialities or possibilities that God has made available to Man, who is free to choose and explore as much as he pleases, even to separate himself from God, like the Prodigal Son from his Father.

Man had made his choice and had to leave the Garden of Eden, trying to build up a decent life. Though now he had to work hard for everything and was aware he had disgusted or displeased God. First there was only the Most High Divine Creator of all things Who was above Adam and Eve and above all other living creatures, the plants and animals. There was no hierarchy.

The first story were we saw human beings ‘fighting’ for a place or rang order is the one of Cain and Abel. Slowly hierarchy entered the human system. From simple hunter-gatherer tribes to complex, modern industrial societies we can find a hierarchy which is loved by people. Some scholars argue that gender played a central role in the formation and functioning of stratification systems. They showed that women’s exclusion from social life placed them in an inferior position, resulting in lessened life chances and status. While women’s standing in social and economic life has improved over the past half-century, women are still restricted by gender roles and patriarchy. Rich literatures examine the impact of family structure, occupational segregation, devaluation of women’s work, and sex-based pay gaps.

We also can see that the colour of skin, the place of origin, became important to place people on a step of the ladder. One’s racial and ethnic background or ethnicity, also greatly came to influence one’s life chances. When not belonging to the troop it could well be that people saw the person suitable to be used as an offer to the gods.

Human life was looked at as something very special and was considered by many as the most valuable material for sacrifice. The killing of a human being, or the substitution of an animal in place of a person, has often been part of an attempt to effect communion with a god and participation in his divine life.

We may find two primary types of human sacrifice: the offering of a human being to a god and the entombment or slaughter of servants or slaves intended to accompany the deceased into the afterlife. The latter practice was more common.

The realisation of human sacrifice to the promotion of the earth’s fertility may explain why the phenomenon has been most widely adopted by agricultural rather than by hunting or pastoral peoples.

In a study published in Nature¹, Joseph Watts, a specialist in cultural evolution at the University of Auckland in New Zealand, and his colleagues have analysed 93 traditional cultures in Austronesia (the region that loosely embraces the many small and island states in the Pacific and Indonesia) as they were before they were influenced by colonization and major world religions (generally in the late 19th and early 20th centuries). {On Human Sacrifice (Article Nature)}

By mapping the evolutionary relationships between cultures, the team suggests that human sacrifice and social hierarchy co-evolved. Although societies can become more or less stratified over time, societies that practised sacrifice were less apt to revert to milder degrees of stratification.

Clearly there were different ways to look at the sacrificial bodies. They could be seen as something very special and very worthy but also as something they did not want in their community and found good enough to give to the gods. More than animal sacrifice human sacrifice helped to stabilize hierarchy, and conceivably, therefore, had a common role in the development of highly stratified societies that generally persist even today. Instead of killing the one in power a substitute was taken to receive for some time divine status and then was put to death. Sacral kings (considered to embody gods of vegetation) were sacrificed when their vigour declined, in order to prevent reciprocal effects on soil fertility. In various places in Africa, where human sacrifice was connected with ancestor worship or veneration of the dead, some of the slaves of the deceased were buried with him, or they were killed and laid beneath him in his grave.

There were also places were people thought the elements of nature, like the moon and the sun, needed human nourishment, which led to sacrifices in which thousands of victims perished annually in their rituals, like by the Aztecs. The Incas confined such wholesale sacrifices to the accession of a ruler.There were instances of human sacrifice in Peru and among tribes of North American Indians.

All human societies have been shaped by religion, leading psychologists to wonder how it arose, and whether particular forms of belief have affected other aspects of evolved social structure. According to one recent view, for example, belief in a “big God” — an all-powerful, punitive deity who sits in moral judgement on our actions — has been instrumental in bringing about social and political complexity in human cultures.

The network of small and island states stretching from Madagascar to Easter Island — challenges that theory. In these states, a more general belief in supernatural punishment did tend to precede political complexity, the research finds, but belief in supreme deities emerged after complex cultures have already formed ².

Joseph Watts, a specialist in cultural evolution at the University of Auckland in New Zealand, who worked on the study, wanted evidence to examine the idea that “big Gods” drive and sustain the evolution of big societies. Psychologist Ara Norenzayan at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, has suggested that belief in moralizing high gods (MHGs) enabled societies to outgrow their limited ability to police moral conduct, by threatening freeloaders with retribution even if no-one else noticed their transgressions^{3, 4}.

Watts says

“Austronesian cultures offer an ideal sample to test theories about the evolution of religions in pre-modern societies, because they were mostly isolated from modern world religions, and their indigenous supernatural beliefs and practices were well documented.”

The believers in moralizing high gods (MHGs) got in their system some people who got control by aligning themselves with those supreme deities and then making lists of things people could and could not do. We can imagine their way of getting more power by making the people afraid with ideas of suffering or torture (in the underground or hell) and by the possibility to become a target of offering. For centuries certain religious organisation or churches made their followers afraid of doomplaces and told them that they could buy themselves free from those torture chambers by giving money to their church. People could buy indulgences.

The granting of indulgences was predicated on two beliefs. First, in the sacrament of penance it did not suffice to have the guilt (culpa) of sin forgiven through absolution alone; one also needed to undergo temporal punishment (poena, from p[o]enitentia, “penance”) because one had offended Almighty God. Second, indulgences rested on belief in purgatory, a place in the next life where one could continue to cancel the accumulated debt of one’s sins, another Western medieval conception not shared by Eastern Orthodoxy or other Eastern Christian churches not recognizing the primacy of the pope. {Indulgence –
Roman Catholicism, encyclopaedia Britannica}

Certain faithgroups or churches wanted their believers to believe that offerings could reduce the the debt of forgiveness of sin. The offers could exist out of many gifts but also by the performance of good works in their life (pilgrimages, charitable acts, and the like) and if their offerings were not yet sufficient they would get a lesser penalty after they died, by temporarily suffering in purgatory instead of eternal suffering in hell. Indulgences could be granted only by popes or, to a lesser extent, archbishops and bishops as ways of helping ordinary people measure and amortize their remaining debt.

In different cultures an other way was less bloody, having the sacrifice taking place by going under water. Whilst in Mexico young maidens were drowned in sacred wells, others found it sufficient to have an immersion. As such we can find Celtic rituals. Whilst the burning of children occurred in Assyrian and Canaanite religions and at various times among the Israelites, it became a custom by the Israelites to be cleared of sins by immersion to enter a new life. John the Baptist as such came to immerse his cousin Jeshua, Jesus Christ, who was the long awaited Messiah. About 40 days after Jesus’ birth, his parents had brought the customary sin offering permitted in the case of the poor,

“a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.” (Luke 2:24; Leviticus 12:6-8)

The offerings and human sacrifice legitimises political authority and social class systems, functioning to stabilize social stratification. It was also an ideal way to get rid of unwanted people or to take care that those who stood in the way could disappear from the scene.

In this way the Nazarene Jeshua an annoying person and possible peril for the security and peace in the Roman empire and in the Jewish community. Though it was not thought him to be an offer, several thought it better to give him away to be killed instead of the vigilant or robber Barabbas. Pilate knew that it was out of jealousy that the chief priests and elders wanted Jesus out of the way, i.e. being killed.

“Give us Barabbas!”, from The Bible and its Story Taught by One Thousand Picture Lessons, 1910

The man being called to be crucified did not have his roots in the right soil because nobody thought anything good could come out of Nazareth. (John 1:46; 7:41, 52) Although he was a perfect man and a descendant of King David, his humble circumstances did not impart to him any “stately form” or “splendour” — at least not in the eyes of those who were expecting the Messiah to come from a more impressive background.
Spurred on by the Jewish religious leaders, many were led to overlook and even despise him. In the end the crowds saw nothing desirable in the perfect Son of God.

Matthew 27:11-26 NHEBME (11) Now Yeshua stood before the governor: and the governor asked him, saying, “Are you the King of the Jews?” Yeshua said to him, “So you say.” (12) When he was accused by the chief priests and elders, he answered nothing. (13) Then Pilate said to him, “Do you not hear how many things they testify against you?” (14) He gave him no answer, not even one word, so that the governor marveled greatly. (15) Now at the feast the governor was accustomed to release to the multitude one prisoner, whom they desired. (16) They had then a notable prisoner, called Barabbas. (17) When therefore they were gathered together, Pilate said to them, “Whom do you want me to release to you? Barabbas, or Yeshua, who is called the Messiah?” (18) For he knew that because of envy they had delivered him up. (19) While he was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent to him, saying, “Have nothing to do with that righteous man, for I have suffered many things this day in a dream because of him.” (20) Now the chief priests and the elders persuaded the multitudes to ask for Barabbas, and destroy Yeshua. (21) But the governor answered them, “Which of the two do you want me to release to you?” They said, “Barabbas!” (22) Pilate said to them, “What then shall I do to Yeshua, who is called the Messiah?” They all said, “Let him be crucified!” (23) But he said, “Why? What evil has he done?” But they shouted all the louder, saying, “Let him be crucified!” (24) So when Pilate saw that nothing was being gained, but rather that a disturbance was starting, he took water, and washed his hands before the multitude, saying, “I am innocent of the blood of this man. You see to it.” (25) All the people answered, “May his blood be on us, and on our children!” (26) Then he released to them Barabbas, but Yeshua he flogged and delivered to be crucified.

In the time before Jeshua the ancient temple courtyard was the altar for offering sacrifices. This foreshadowed God’s provision, according to His will, for a perfect human sacrifice to ransom the offspring of Adam. (Heb 10:1-10; 13:10-12; Ps 40:6-8)

This man, born in Bethlehem, at his immersion was proclaimed by God Himself to be the “Only begotten beloved son of God“. Nobody had managed to fully do the will of God neither could have brought a perfect sacrificial body in front of the Most Divine God. This time that man managed to put aside his will and managed to keep all the time to God’s Will. He was the living proof that man, if he wanted, could keep to God’s Commandments. Still to today there are religious groups in Christendom who want others to believe no man would ever be capable to keep God’s commandments, and therefore Jesus would have to be God himself. This idea makes of God a very cruel God Who imposed Laws to man which He knew they would never be able to keep. But God is a God of love and order Who does not asks more of people than they can endure or do. That what God asks of mankind Jesus managed to fulfil and by doing God’s Will all the time, not going against the Will of God, he was not at any time an opposer or adversary of God. Jesus him being a perfect human being made the sacrifice of his life acceptable in the eyes of God to be the best ransom that could be paid for making an end to the curse of death.

God even expanded the gift of Christ to mankind by declaring all those who have faith in Christ’s sacrifice, righteous on the basis of their faith. By believing in Jesus Christ and following his teachings, when they after their immersion try to keep to the commandments of God, they are viewed by God as sinless while in the flesh.

Romans 3:20-26 NHEBME Because by the works of the law, no flesh will be justified in his sight. For through the law comes the knowledge of sin. (21) But now apart from the law, a righteousness of God has been revealed, being testified by the Law and the Prophets; (22) even the righteousness of God through faith in Yeshua the Messiah to all those who believe. For there is no distinction, (23) for all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God; (24) being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Messiah Yeshua; (25) whom God set forth to be an atoning sacrifice, through faith in his blood, for a demonstration of his righteousness through the passing over of prior sins, in God’s forbearance; (26) to demonstrate his righteousness at this present time; that he might himself be just, and the justifier of him who has faith in Yeshua.

Romans 5:1-2 NHEBME Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Yeshua the Messiah; (2) through whom we also have our access by faith into this grace in which we stand. We rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

Differently than in other religions where every time a new sacrifice is needed, the blood of Christ is for ever and makes that no other sacrifices have to be made.

Romans 5:9-10 NHEBME Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we will be saved from God’s wrath through him. (10) For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we will be saved by his life.

Romans 8:1-7 NHEBME There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Messiah Yeshua. (2) For the law of the Spirit of life in Messiah Yeshua made you free from the law of sin and of death. (3) For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God did, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh; (4) that the ordinance of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. (5) For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. (6) For the mind of the flesh is death, but the mind of the Spirit is life and peace; (7) because the mind of the flesh is hostile towards God; for it is not subject to God’s law, neither indeed can it be.

References:

Watts, J., Sheehan, O., Atkinson, Q. D., Bulbulia, J. & Gray, R. D. Nature http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature17159 (2016).
Watts, J. et al. Proc. R. Soc. B 282, 20142556 (2015).
Norenzayan, A. Big Gods: How Religion Transformed Cooperation and Conflict (Princeton Univ. Press, 2013).
Norenzayan, A. & Shariff, A. F. Science 322, 58–62 (2008).

Please find also to read:

Preceding articles:

Gone astray, away from God

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 3

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 4

Creation of the earth and man #3 Of the Sabbath day #1 the Seventh day

Necessity of a revelation of creation 5 Getting understanding by Word of God 3

Creation of the earth and man #6 Of the Sabbath day #4 Mosaic codes, Sabbaths and Sunday

Creation of the earth and man #17 Man in the image and likeness of the Elohim #1 In the image and after the likeness

First mention of a solution against death 1 To divine, serpent, opposition, satan and adversary

First mention of a solution against death 2 Harm or no harm and naked truth

First mention of a solution against death 3 Tempter Satan and man’s problems

First mention of a solution against death 4 A seed for mankind

First mention of a solution against death 5 Evil its law of death

First mention of a solution against death 6 Authority given to the send one from God coming out of the woman

Not trying to make the heathen live like Jews #2

Additional reading

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Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 2

March 16, 2015March 16, 2015Guestspeaker27 Comments

People should not doubt that the Supreme Divine Creator is all-powerful. It is wrong to think He needed to test Adam and Eve at all. {Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 1)}

God had given an instruction to safeguard them. God knew what could happen but they did not listen out of their own choice. When He fretted that Adam had become “like one of us“, God was not talking to some other gods or other beings but speaking in the Royal We, like any higher person still uses the Pluralis Majestatis today. (Genesis 3:22) The author of the Testimony of Truth wants us also to look negatively at the Maker and says:

But what sort is this God? First he maliciously refused Adam from eating of the tree of knowledge, and, secondly, he said “Adam, where are you?” God does not have foreknowledge? Would he not know from the beginning? And afterwards, he said, “Let us cast him out of this place, lest he eat of the tree of life and live forever.” Surely, he has shown himself to be a malicious grudger! And what kind of God is this? For great is the blindness of those who read, and they did not know him. And he said, “I am the jealous God; I will bring the sins of the fathers upon the children until three (and) four generations.” And he said, “I will make their heart thick, and I will cause their mind to become blind, that they might not know nor comprehend the things that are said.” But these things he has said to those who believe in him and serve him! {Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 1)}

It is the same as parents who noticed their children having done something wrong. They know where they are, and when they are hiding they mostly also know exactly the place where they are hiding, though still ask them to say where they are, trying to give them a chance to come out themselves and to show themselves in the condition they are.

Alexander Rivera of The Aeon Eye dedicated to research and ideas regarding scholarship in theology, various ancient texts spanning different cultures of all ages, comparative mythology, philosophical exegesis, apocrypha, patristics, the Nag Hammadi Library and the Bible, believes the author of the Testimony of Truth designating the serpent as a positive figure, telling the story from the view of the serpent.

Concerning the text also distinguishing Christ as the “Son” or messenger he talks about the “unknown Father” which is distinct from the “Lord God” of Genesis or the Lawgiver which was equated by many Gnostic groups such as the Sethians, Naasenes and the Valentinians with the Demiurge or the “Craftsman” who fashioned the cosmos from a chaotic pre-existent “prima materia”.

The Marcionites held a similar position, but lacked the speculative and imaginative cosmologies that were a staple in later Gnostic mythology, but held both the creator god as a lesser god and the Good, Supreme God as distinct, but co-eternal beings in a constant state of antagonism (we see this idea carried into the later doctrines of the Manichaeans and the Cathars). The Demiurge did not derive from the Supreme God by emanation or by a fall of another aeon. {Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 1)}

Scripture wants us to believe the Maker of all things, the Maker of the Universe is a God of Order and Clarity, who is a God of Love.

Marcion, much like his Gnostic predecessors denied that the God of goodness could have created the cosmos of corruption and entropy. Therefore, in his place, the creator god was assigned as author of the physical universe, while treated as an inferior being, not good, but only just. He is also the author of evil (as Isaiah 45:7 boldly asserts), as he is as much a lover of war (Exodus 15:3), erratic blood-lust in his constant demand for animal and human sacrifice, rejoicing in death (Deuteronomy 28:63), condoning slavery including sexual (Exodus 21:1-11), commanding the Israelites to rape, pillage and destroy at a moment’s whim (1 Chronicles 21, Deuteronomy 3, Joshua 6) all the while contradicting his own commandment of “Thou shalt not kill”. At his express command, the world is turned into a place of pain and “thorns” (Genesis 3:18)

English: A lion-faced deity found on a Gnostic... — A lion-faced deity found on a Gnostic gem in Bernard de Montfaucon’s L’antiquité expliquée et représentée en figures. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The saying by the prophet Isaiah that the Elohim would be a God of evil is indicating that the Most High Maker Who has no peer, no God but Him, allows evil to come over people, even making His People arm them for battle. It is true that the Bible says even though man does not recognize Him, He does this so people will recognize from east to west that there is no God but Him. Already early at the Creation God made it clear that out of the void it was Him Speaking and making it to happen. From the very start of the universe the living creatures had to know that it was Him Who made them. All had to understand that it is Him The One Who forms light and creates darkness. It was Him Who created out of chaos order and brought about peace and created calamity. Waters had to flow, air had to flow, but now that man had interfered with creation and disturbed the peace and tranquillity they themselves brought great misfortune over themselves, not out of God’s Will but out of their will. It where they who wanted to rule the world and have everything to say, so God allowed them to arrange the things like they want to do it. But up until now they still not have given any proof to be capable to order the world decently.

True, God by giving everything in the hands of incompetent human beings made that affliction became master of mankind. Though He allows all those things to happen in the hope that at one point those people will come to recognise that He alone is the Divine Supreme Maker Who deserves all worship and honour. God is patient enough to find enough people who are willing to recognise that the Elohim Hashem Jehovah is the Most High Lord over the Lord of lords, Who accomplishes all these things.

People shall also have to notice that certain things that happen may look at one moment good but at an other may look bad, like the changing skies with clouds sending down showers of deliverance. Also figuratively people shall get to see that the earth shall have to absorb the ‘showers’ from God so salvation may grow, and deliverance may sprout up along with it. This all in the knowledge that it is the Divine Supreme Being Who creates it.

Isa 45:5-8 MKJV I am Jehovah, and there is none else, no God besides Me; I clothed you, though you have not known Me; (6) that they may know from the rising of the sun, and to the sunset, that there is none besides Me. I am Jehovah, and there is none else; (7) forming the light and creating darkness; making peace and creating evil. I Jehovah do all these things. (8) Drop down from above, O heavens, and let the clouds pour down righteousness. Let the earth open, and let salvation bear fruit; and let righteousness spring up together. I Jehovah have created it.

Lots of Christians accuse Muslims to have a cruel God (Allah), because they hear stories of what that God says and do not seem to know that they have the same God saying naturally the same things. But those hard words God speaks in the Old Testament, which many Christians do not know, are part of God reacting on the bad things the people did.

That God allows it all to happen is that otherwise an intervening God would again being able to become the accused as being a dictator, only allowing that to happen what and how He wants it, not giving any liberty to man. That was the charge in the Garden of Eden. God was wrongly accused as wanting all right to govern Himself. Man forgot that they were given freedom to name and manage their own world.

Those who want to believe the world that God only executes the law without mercy or compassion when it is convenient for Him are the one the Bible is calling satan or adversary. The opponents of God, the antagonists and objectors are the ones who are mentioned many-fold in the Bible. The ones who want the world to believe that God would be a person of king-like jealousy and pride, with great appetite for praise and sacrifices are the ones who gave breath to the enemy and what motivated many early Christians to interpret “the Lord God” as either an ignorant but just creator or at worst, a malicious and belligerent demon called “Ialdaboath”. {Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 1)}

Many assume wrongly that Jesus is talking about his heavenly Father being the father of evil and the one owning this world, but The Elohim has given the world in the hands of man, God’s adversary. It is not about God when there is said

He was a murder from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. {John 8:44 / Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 1)}

Jesus is giving reference to the “father of lies” who is not his heavenly Father, but the master of evil, God’s adversary (the ‘devil‘), who can be any human person who doubts the existence and the right of power of God.

Alexander Rivera points out:

it was Yahweh who said that they would die if they ate from the Tree of Knowledge, whereas the snake said that they wouldn’t—and of course, as we know, they didn’t. All that they Serpent said is that they would become as gods, which Yahweh confirms when he says, “Look, they have become as gods. Now we must remove them from the garden, lest they eat of the tree of life and live forever.” The night preceding his crucifixion, the Johannine Jesus says in John 12:31-33:

Now is the judgment of this world. Now the prince (archon) of this world will be cast out.

The prince or “archon” is a direct reference to the Demiurge, the “god of this aion” as Paul calls him 2 Corinthians 4:4. Before, the creator God said to both Adam and Eve “but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” On the other hand, the Serpent said pointedly: “You will not surely die. For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” {Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 1)}

The author of Genesis let us know that Adam and Eve where cast out of the Garden of Eden and would have to face death, because God told them so and that all their offspring would have to face the problems and will have to die as well. This penalty form one to the other generation is a thorn in the eye of many Christians as well, but otherwise God would intervene again and could be accused of favouritism, giving partiality to His own people.

The eyes of both of them were opened, making them aware of what they had and what they now had to loose. Eve in her heart had hoped to get more wisdom. She did not want to believe that they would die. How could the one Who made them, losing them again? Reason why we do not follow the Gnostic writings is that they continue to follow the path of Eve and the adversaries of God who want us to believe that it was the Serpent who was right and the creator God Who was the one who had lied.

He said that Adam and Eve would die if he ate the fruit, but neither died. Instead, the Serpent was telling the truth. As a matter of fact, the creator himself ended up agreeing that the Serpent was right! The creator Lord God had proved himself to be a chronic liar as well as plagiarizer. To the Gnostics, the entire stratum of material creation was a failed and botched attempt to imitate an unknowable world of light. Likewise, the “Good Book” or “Word of God”, which being the Bible itself is based principally on pre-Biblical Babylonian and Egyptian texts. {Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 1)}

Rivera looks also at the claim of St. Augustine of Hippo in Adversus Haeresis, 46, 147-153, that the Manichaeans had also taught that “Jesus the Splendor” or the “Third Messenger” was the Serpent that illuminated the minds of both Adam and Eve of their predicament and their divine origins.

Before the arrival of the Serpent in the Garden, man was in a state of ignorance and was blinded to his true position—as automatons in blind servitude to their creators. This is confirmed by an unnamed Manichean text in which the 8th century historian, Theodor Bar Konai quotes:

Jesus the Splendour approached sinless Adam and awoke him from the sleep of death, that he might be delivered of innumerable demons… Then Adam examined himself and realized, who he was. {Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 1)}

Man has always played with the idea of being master of creation becoming superior to its Creator. In the races of worldly people, human artefacts have become objects of fear for their creators – for example statues and images and everything that is made by human hands as representing a god. In Christendom we still find many Christians who have that urge to bow down in front of graven images, though the Maker has clearly demanded not to do so. Several Christians made them crosses, statues of Jesus, Mary and several saints where they bow for and where they burn candles for or in certain countries even provide food and clothing. Though this is all abomination in the eyes of God.

People made themselves many male and female gods and also in Christendom we can find people who worship a ‘mother of god‘, though the God of gods has no mother and no beginning being an eternal Spirit.

We can agree with Alexander Rivera who writes in his blog The Aeon Eye:

Ultimately, the aim of the creator god is to align mankind as the reflection of the creator rather than something far grander. {Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 1)}

Trees, fruit and seeds have always played an important role in many cultures and were often used symbolically as well.

Rivera writes:

As we can see, the Tree was an important universal symbol for not only the Gnostics, Simonians, Valentinians, etc, but to groups like the Jewish-Kabbalists, alchemists and many occult groups throughout the ages. The Tree is highly associative with the idea of the descent and crucifixion (and eventual ascent and resurrection) of spirit into and from matter as seen in Sophia-Achamoth’s fall from the celestial world and into the prima materia which parallels the Genesis account of the fall of Eve, the “mother of the living”. In Plato’s Timaeus, do we find the account of the Fall of Atlantis, (as strange as it might sound) which could be read as symbolic of the Divine tragedy and catastrophe so predominant in Gnostic cosmology and theology. {Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 3)}

We too look at the seed of Adam which brought forth the seed of Abraham, giving us the servant David, giving seed to next generations bringing into the world a new light, a seed without intervention of a man.

Please do find the very interesting articles by Rivera:

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 1)

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 2)

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 3)

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden (Part 4)

Preceding posts:

Coming to the creation of human beings in the image of God

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 1

Scripture about Creation and Creator Deity

Additional reading:

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Gnostic Salvation And Rebellion Against God’s Law (hammeringshield.wordpress.com)
For Gnostic Christians, the story of salvation is the story of human beings learning of their true position in the world and of their taking the necessary steps to escape the bondage of the evil Creator God. The Gnostic goal was the return of their Spiritual Light, which the Creator God had trapped within their bodies, to the Father Of Light.

Many Gnostics believed that the Savior was sent by the Father Of Light to help us in this quest. Others, like Marcion, believed that the Savior was sent by another deity entirely, an “Alien God” completely uninvolved in the creation of our particular cosmos, but who, knowing of our condition, took pity on us and sent the Savior to deliver us.
What If God Were NOT Good? (hammeringshield.wordpress.com)
The beliefs we today associate with Christianity and the Bible became the orthodox set of beliefs, the form of Christianity in which God is good. But there was another form of Christianity, that of the Gnostics. Unlike the Orthodox Christians, many Gnostic Christians believed God to be a malevolent being. Both types of Christians believed in the Savior, but they had different versions of his mission. And whereas Orthodox Christians believed in salvation via faith in the divinity of the Savior, the Gnostics believed that salvation is to be obtained via knowledge (“gnosis“) of our true condition, hence their name.
Deceptive Practices (culturalatheist.wordpress.com)
The first lies recorded (although we know he was already telling them in heaven) are the the lies about God’s character. He lied to Adam and Eve about God’s love and care for them. The lies were relational.What if Satan’s deceptive practices begin with or are grounded in lies about others? It would be in his best interests if we think the worst about others – their beliefs, their practices, their intentions and character. I also suspect that we reveal our acceptance of the lies and our culpability in spreading them when we say, “All (insert person or group) are (insert belief, practice, intention).”
Can a Gnostic army fix the world? (vaticproject.blogspot.com)
God gave us dominion over the animals to care for them, and that is in Genesis. And Christ reinforced those sentiments, so I don’t know where he got that, unless he has not read the Bible, which is possible. In fact, it was Christ who brought a new coverant stopping the slaughter of animals by the Jews and instead offered himself as the redeeming sacrifice. So, I am not sure where he got that, but be it as it may, just focus on the recommendations which I think are reasonable, actually. How do you protect society from those that murder at will for no earthy good reason, especially little children and babies.
Humble beginnings: a rib and an apple (annabelfrage.wordpress.com)
As a little aside, when God in Genesis 1 creates Adam, the name denominates mankind rather than a specific dude. In Genesis 2, however, God moulds Adam the man from the earth and breathes life into him. It is this Adam who is gifted with Eve, lest he become too lonely playing with himself.
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The tree, however, was always on their minds, a little teaser that now and then had them taking a couple of steps in its direction before remembering it was out of bounds. Eve would pick an apple from another tree and bite into it, eyes stuck on the perfect, Christmas-red apples that hung from the Tree of Knowledge. She bet those apples tasted sweeter, were crunchier and jucier. Adam would pick an apple and eat it while watching Eve, considering just what he would do to her after their meal. men are, at times, rather singleminded…
Great Day (theotherjc.com)
God is…my Father. That’s a revelation that doesn’t come easily to everyone but one we need to get. We can be disappointed by our own Father but without realising it not notice that God has filled our lives with many Fathers. Thanks to Rachael for sharing her journey in this in such an honest way.
Jesus the Phoenician – Karim El Koussa on GW Radio (gnosticwarrior.com)
“Yāwshu (Jesus) is the son of the Canaano-Phoenician Most High God Ēl-Alyon, being the Son of the Virgin Lady Maryām by the Divine Will of the Lord, who blessed this conception of a child that would be named Immanuel. He would live among us as “God Ēl with us,” a Nazarene, sacredly chosen to consecrate himself for keeping the word of God in his heart, mind, and spirit, healing the human race from its many errors and sins. He is the Galilean Meshiha (Messiah) who would anoint the people—who believed in him, his mother, and Father, and who believed in the Great Message he came to deliver, Love and Peace—with sacred water, the purest form of what is considered as the origin of life here on earth. He is the Khristós (Christ) who came and had himself crucified on the altar of life so that we may be clean and have life abundantly. He is the Good Shepherd.”
― Excerpt from Jesus the Phoenician
Fear & Loathing In… God? (cwoznicki.com)
How can God loath his chosen people? How does that even make sense? In one of John Webster’s sermons on this very Psalm he addresses how this can be. Honestly its one of the best explanations of God’s wrath and hatred and anger that I have ever read…
Trust (activeinspiration.wordpress.com)
Trusting in riches instead of our Father means you can’t attain to a relationship with God, you have replaced God with riches, thus you can’t attain, only fall.
Scripture of the Day, 3/13 (sowegalive.com)
1 Timothy 2:5 For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,

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