The False Nature of Christian Claims

Their Slavish and Shameful Devotion to the Felon in the White House

Is there anything that calls out Fundamentalist and Evangelical Christians in America for their phony piety and maligned morality more than their support for the four time indicted, thirty four time convicted felon, adjudicated sex offender, six-time bankrupted, draft dodging, racist, multi-marital-cheating, porn-star-assaulting, lawsuit loser, and most mendacious con man, Donald Trump? Do they really believe that a “god” – any god, pick one – would have anything to do with the likes of such a poor example of his creation? If you’d like to see an example of the piety crowd at their most delusional, then look no further than their slavish devotion to Trump and their obvious excitement of him occupying the office again. If they have achieved anything with this misplaced support, it is to further reinforce the explicit proof that their religion and their motivations are nothing more than a politically motivated pretense to move the country further towards their goal of a conservative Christian nation so they can continue their bilking of the America public unabated.

The “demonic forces” they would claim lay behind the Democratic Party are simply false representations of anything that violates their “Christian” sensitivities, whatever that may be. Yes, according to these purveyors of religious delirium only Donald Trump can save our country from the depravity and debauchery into which it has been led by the “godless” Democratic party! Christian political activists are putting millions of dollars DIRECTLY into the pockets of the very man convicted of 34 felony crimes (and counting), multi-million-dollar business tax fraud in New York State, and an adjudicated sexual assault predator! This is the man that the phony piety crowd is putting their money on to save the country and bring us back to the god-fearing nation we once were, even though we have never been a Christian nation. The very same man that can no longer participate in a charity in the state of New York due to his fraudulent mishandling of funds AND who sold phony university degrees to armed services veterans not worth the paper upon which they were written has been sent by “god” to save the United States. This is their claim.

Only the most seriously deluded and cognitively dissonant can rationalize such nonsense and, as it happens, that’s the very target audience upon which Christian organizations have focused their efforts. The very same people that believe in the invisible man in the sky, a 6,000-year-old planet Earth, (an Earth where dinosaurs and humans cohabitated), humans that literally “popped” into existence in our current, “unevolved” state, a worldwide flood that wiped-out humanity save a single family, talking serpents and asses, (although as “talking asses” go, I believe Trump has proven this conclusively) and dead people rising from their graves and parading around the city of Jerusalem! The most immoral snake-oil salesmen in the country are focusing their considerable caches on obfuscating the completely fallacious nature of his every word, promise and claim, even while their favorite “Christian” demonstrates the very opposite of virtually everything and anything that Jesus ever said and taught.

We now know about the vast and various Christian power bases behind this most despicable candidate and the dystopic society they would have us living in given their ability to do so. Consider the so-called Ziklag, a so-called Christian organization supported by wealthy Christians such as the owners of Hobby Lobby and described by investigative journalists ProPublica during the 2024 election as: “A network of ultrawealthy Christian donors is spending nearly $12 million to mobilize Republican-leaning voters and purge more than a million people from the rolls in key swing states, aiming to tilt the 2024 election in favor of former President Donald Trump.” Christians collaborating to steal an election as I assume they would have us believe Jesus would as well.

Another “Christian” organization that focused their considerable resources to the election of Trump is the Alliance Defending Freedom, (don’t you just love the titles?!) an Arizona-based Christian conservative legal “nonprofit”. According to the Washington Post: “The organization has had nine successful cases before the court in the past seven years, including Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, which allowed corporations to opt out of covering contraceptives based on religious beliefs, AND created model legislation for “bathroom bills,” which bar students from using restrooms that don’t correlate to their sex at birth.”

Unfortunately there are many, many more. Christian organizations across the country are working diligently to re-craft our society into the white-washed and white dominated country they contend their imaginary savior endorses. This represents a real and present danger to the democratic life that our relatives and ancestors fought and died for (not Trump’s, of course, they dodged the draft), and which the rest of the world looks upon with envy. These groups are not community volunteers nor are they motivated by altruism. These are people of power for whom money and power are virtually everything and they want control; complete and boundless control of the government and the rules of our society, and they see Donald Trump as the vehicle to their ends.

As it has become painfully obvious, the self-designated “Freedom Party” and “Freedom Caucus” in Congress, AKA the GOP, has been the party that takes our freedoms away, all while misrepresenting that it is in our best interests or those of society at large. Yes, it is in our collective best interests not to be able to decide what we or our children can read which is why the repugnant red states are purging their libraries of such radical tomes as “Animal Farm” and “Anne Frank’s Diary”. Americans are just not responsible enough to choose reading material on our own, it must be done for us and by those that claim to know better. Similarly, women cannot be trusted to make their own decisions about their healthcare, particularly their maternal healthcare. We need the government to intercede on behalf of woman, even as some women cling to life for lack of medical care while the government dawdles in the courts. (Hopefully, they’ll still be alive when the government finally arrives at its’ decisions!). The party that for decades has been extolling the virtues of getting government off our proverbial backs would now like for the government to share in the most intimate decisions of our lives and have the last word over these matters as well.

And these kinds of behaviors go on and on and into all areas of life. Consider the solutions to “voter fraud” legislated by red states that always seem to include making it more difficult to vote, especially in areas of black or brown people. Texas has closed over 700 polling places since 2022 exclusively in minority voting districts while positioning the changes as a solution to some colossal threat to democracy from “illegal aliens” and undocumented workers, code for “non-white voters.

There is much more to reveal about this, we haven’t even begun to discuss the introduction of the Bible into our public schools complete with morning prayer and Creationism being taught as a legitimate alternative to evolution, as if there is any legitimacy at all to the Judeo-Christian mythology that warrants such special placement over both the Constitution or of other religions. They don’t seem to have any hesitation about the obvious upcoming battle over which of the 12,000 variations of Christianity in the U.S. will be “the one”.

When Trump gets to the end of his presidency, assuming we survive his presidency, perhaps the Democrats retake the House and Senate. They will need to pass new legislation aimed at securing the secular nature of the government complete with a new and vigorous reinforcing of the Johnson Amendment. The Johnson Amendment is a provision in the U.S. tax code, that prohibits all 501(c)(3) non-profit organizations from endorsing or opposing political candidates in exchange for their tax-free status. Section 501(c)(3) organizations are the most common type of nonprofit organization in the United States, ranging from charitable foundations to universities and churches. The amendment is named for then-Senator Lyndon B. Johnson of Texas, (Oh! The irony!) who introduced it in a preliminary draft of the law in July 1954. With a new emphasis placed on the Johnson Amendment and a reform of the Supreme Court including term limits and an ethics code with teeth for enforcement, maybe we can make tremendous progress towards a more compassionate and representative government for all Americans regardless of race, sexual identity, or any other discriminating factor.

But that will remain to be determined……

What If It Really Is All A Scam?

Is It Even Possible To Uncover The “Real Jesus”?

I am a layman and I do not portray myself as anything other, but I have serious doubts about whether the entire “Quest for the Historical Jesus” isn’t anything other than a search for a purple squirrel, or a fool’s errand in the words of Dr. Richard C. Miller. It just may be so obfuscated in hundreds of years and thousands of written iterations by scribes sleepwalking their way through who knows how many rewrites, edits, interpolations, and intentional ‘alterations’ as to leave itself forever shrouded in unsolvable mystery. But, more importantly, I do not believe that any intellectually legitimate evaluation of the NT can be reasonably concluded without consideration given to the most erudite scholarship of it contributed by Hebrew scholars and rabbis. A complete and thorough examination of 1st century Christianity cannot be legitimately concluded without an equally thorough examination of the thoughts and interpretations of the most learned Hebrew scholars. Their insights into the ministry of Yeshua of Nazareth are as enlightening as any you will read anywhere. Many of these learned, studied, scholars not only believe he wasn’t an ‘enemy” of the Pharisees, but that he may have actually been one himself! And, almost equally incredible, that Paul may not have been a Pharisee at all! (There is very little of Paul’s story Hebrew scholars believe.) But do not take my word, simply read their own arguments as to why Jesus answers all of the queries put to him by the various Pharisees accurately and completely within the context of 1st century Pharisaic Judaism. The NT portrayal of Jesus as an enemy of the Pharisees is simply a later and intentional reconstruction of his very devout Jewish nature which by necessity was left in the dust bin of its’ own making. They simply could not leave him to be a Jew; Paul’s gentile audience of late 1st century-early 2nd century Romano-Hellenist former pagans wouldn’t buy in to such a notion.

In this respect Christianity is it possible that be nothing more than a “false’“ religion, for what else can be said about a religion that does not include or even acknowledge the basic fundamental principals of its’ own founder? Jesus was a Jew, as many secular and even many fundamentalist scholars will admit, and actually made many statements himself that further cement that notion. So how, then, did the religion that bears his name (or, more accurately, his title) turn out to be anything other than Jewish

Hmmmmm.

Donald Trump Must Be Removed From Office

He must be prosecuted for his crimes, present and past, along with those that followed his illegal orders…..

If there was ever a case for the 25^th Amendment removal from office for a renegade president and administration, it is the present and past Trump administration(s). We must not forget that this man actually stole classified intelligence documents, (commonly called “treason or sedition” when instigated by anyone other than Donald Trump), claiming they “belonged to” him, and tried to hide the boxes full of stolen intelligence (commonly called “obstruction of justice” when instigated by anyone other than Donald Trump) when told the FBI was on their way to recover them. In fact, had there been any other party in charge other than the hapless, spineless, Dumocrats, the Felon in the White House would have been served a heaping helping of justice already and would be, most likely, now sporting an orange jumpsuit.

In this second administration, he is not only breaking laws almost daily, but he is basically flaunting it with complete impunity in the face of the courts, Congress, and the American people. Extorting millions from law firms for not prosecuting them for the outrageous act of representing those that successfully sued or prosecuted him, or may have pursued justice against the so-called Jan 6^th traitors, or that won lawsuits against him or his businesses. He now has the power of “point & prosecute”, virtually calling attention to anyone or any entity for any transgression, real or perceived, and the “appropriate” agency or authority – legal, regulatory, and even tax agencies – will take it from there. No need for any legal process, least of all the due process of law allowed by his most formidable enemy, the Constitution of the United States of America. This must be corrected, and justice must be served both to the imposter in the Oval Office and those that have chosen to collaborate, facilitate, or remain silent while he scoffs in the face those that oppose him and breaks the law with complete impunity. This includes the real “enemies of the American people”, those sources of actual “fake news” that continue to provide cover for his lies, misrepresentations, and crimes, namely, Fox News, Newsmax, and OAN. These purveyors of pure nonsense and mendacious propaganda are the real opponents of democracy and truth in journalism that continue to cause irreparable harm to our well-being and way of life.

“Sic Nos Sic Sacra Tuemur”

80% OF EVANGELICALS VOTED FOR COMRADE TRUMPSKY! 😇

HERE’S WHAT THE HYPOCRITICAL ‘JESUS PEOPLE’ VOTED FOR: (JESUS WOULD BE SO PROUD!)

64 Times Mentioned in Epstein Report

97 Times Pleaded the Fifth Amendment

34 Felony Convictions

91 Criminal Charges

26 Sexual Assault Allegations

6 Bankruptcies

5 Draft Deferments

4 Indictments

2 Impeachments

2 Convicted Companies

1 Fake University Shut Down

1 Fake Charity Shut Down

$25 Million Fraud Settlement

$5 Million Sexual Abuse Verdict

$2 Million Fake Charity Abuse Judgment

$93 Million Sexual Abuse Judgements

$400+ Million Fraud Judgment

1^st President to increase the deficit every, single, year

1^st President with Debt to GDP ratio > 100% his entire term

Highest Annual Budget Deficit EVER

Most Debt Added to National Debt in a single term

Most New Unemployment Claims in History

Largest Single-Day Point Drop in the History of the Dow

1^st Major Candidate in 50 Years to lose popular vote twice

Longest Government Shutdown in History While his Party Controlled Both Chambers of Congress

1^st to Maintain Net-Negative Approval Rating his entire term

1^st/Only President In History to be Impeached Twice.

1^st President with Bipartisan Conviction after Impeachment.

Most Indictments, Guilty Pleas, and Criminal Convictions of His Administration Members (“All the Best People”!)

1^st President to Have a Mug Shot

Please Lookup Every Claim. All are verifiable. JESUS WOULD BE SO PROUD! SHAME! SHAME! SHAME!

COMRADE TRUMPSKY’S “HISTORIC” ACHIEVEMENTS

Despite All His Blathering, He Has Done Some Truly Historic Things! Here Are Just a Few:

64 Times Mentioned in Epstein Report

97 Times Pleaded the Fifth Amendment

34 Felony Convictions

91 Criminal Charges

26 Sexual Assault Allegations

6 Bankruptcies

5 Draft Deferments

4 Indictments

2 Impeachments

2 Convicted Companies

1 Fake University Shut Down

1 Fake Charity Shut Down

$25 Million Fraud Settlement

$5 Million Sexual Abuse Verdict

$2 Million Fake Charity Abuse Judgment

$93 Million Sexual Abuse Judgements

$400+ Million Fraud Judgment

1^st President to increase the deficit every year in office

1^st President with Debt to GDP ratio > 100% for his entire term

Highest Annual Budget Deficit

Most Debt added to the national debt in a single term

Most New Unemployment Claims in History

Largest Single-Day Point Drop in the History of the Dow

1^st Major Candidate in 50 Years to lose popular vote twice

Longest Government Shutdown in History while his own party controlled both chambers of Congress

1^st to Maintain Net-Negative Approval Rating

1^st/Only President to be Impeached Twice.

1^st President with Bipartisan Conviction after Impeachment.

Most Indictments, Guilty Pleas, and Criminal Convictions of Administration Members

1^st President to Have a Mug Shot

Please Lookup Every Claim. All are verifiable.

My Delayed Response To The Election

It’s taken a bit of time for this one to sink in but I think I have a plan.

I am very fortunate to have the opportunity of spending some quiet time at my lake house in New England. Especially now, at this particular time of year, the lake is very quiet. Many of the homes on my road are inhabited seasonally or intermittently, so the lake is extremely quiet during the early winter months. I often joke with friends that it is as if I am the last person on Earth after the apocalypse, but in a good way! Not a boat, a jet ski, even a kayak, to be seen for weeks or months on end. As Martha would say, “It’s a good thing!”

I have basically turned off the news in all its ugly forms since the election, mostly as a way of coping with who-the-hell-knows what we’ll be dealing with in the next 6 weeks or so. I can’t even stomach the odious idea of Joe & Mika – I hope they get everything they deserve for their obsequiousness bullshit they paid to “Dear Leader” – or anyone else on MSNBC for that matter, or CNN, or any of the other so-called, “news” shows. I am resolved to finding new sources of “legitimate” news, if that be a thing, mostly meaning journalism delivered with an objective of shining the necessary light on the government and its’ corporate cronies and holding them accountable for their actions and misdeeds. If the Trump years have shown us anything, it is the extent to which our elected – and unelected – officials will go to enrich themselves or avail themselves of the most depraved excesses, and mostly at the expense of the taxpayer.

This brings me to the Democrats. I have supported the “Dumos”, as I prefer to think of them, for too many years now, spiritually and financially, but mostly because there is no alternative if you are in any way liberal or progressive. We are stuck with the worst of the worst. From Nancy Pelosi suggesting that enriching herself and her family through insider stock trading information that only the members of Congress possess as the perks of “a free country” (she should sell that bullshit to Martha, in fact), to Chuck the Schmuck Schumer’s incestuous ties to Wall St, I have finally just had enough. I can no longer in good conscience continue to support a party which, in my opinion, is only slightly less corrupt than the other party, and infinitely dummer!

Putting aside the myriad disasters they’ve left in their wake; botched elections, congressional agendas, political positions (after all, they talked more about the rights of transgender people – a whole, entire, 1.14% of the national population*) than they did about the rights and plight of the middle class, a miscalculation that cost them dearly across an entire host of demographic categories. Looking at the presidential elections where Rupugnanticans won, it is always over a ridiculous social issue that the Dumos just wouldn’t let go of.

And now, this botched election – and the monumental way in which they botched it – demonstrated a level of incompetency and delusion that I, personally, can no longer abide. What they now left for us to have to deal with somehow, someway, is anyone’s guess. But, in the meantime, Kamala Harris and the Democrats squandered over a billion and a half dollars in little over three months; a burn-rate record that could last some considerable time. With Trump in office, it could be weeks!

So, what shall I, personally do? My response is to withdraw all support I once provided them; this inept, incompetent, group of mindless milquetoasts and spineless morons that I put so much of my ‘faith’ in and for so very little and put my efforts and resources into finding/creating a new liberal/progressive party that can achieve the admirable objectives of a fairer and more prosperous country for everyone. Objectives that are in fact, very achievable given a party of competent, and judicious minded patriots. Stating it simply for now, at least, If you don’t have an “I” next to your name on the ballot, don’t call, text, or write.

I believe it can be done.

* usafacts.org/articles/what-percentage-of-the-us-population-is-transgender/

More Death in Texas – The Blood Red State

Should Texas Be Accountable For The Deaths Caused By Their Abortion Laws?

Reading this morning’s article in ProPublica’s daily email story regarding the death of another pregnant young girl in Texas, I was confounded by the lack of action or comment by the cretins running the state. According to the article:

“It took three ER visits and 20 hours before a hospital admitted Nevaeh Crain, 18, as her condition worsened. Doctors insisted on two ultrasounds to confirm “fetal demise.” She’s one of at least two Texas women who died under the state’s abortion ban.” [Alexandra Zayas, Deputy Managing Editor, ProPublica]. Needless to say, as a result of this barbarous and cruel act of “legislation”, the doctors were fiercely panicked in their approach to this patient, now having to worry not only over the health and well-being of the patient, but would could potentially happen to them as a result of their treating her!

If she were my daughter or niece or granddaughter, I would be looking for justice and that would have to come from the state that implemented these odious laws without even the concomitant medical knowledge necessary to make such crucial, life-altering, even life-ending, decisions. An act so obviously bereft of even a modicum responsibility to anyone other than their mindless religious fanatics, in fact, seemingly doing everything they can to obfuscate, deny, avoid disseminating such vital information to the public as to allow for informed debate. No, the Texas governor and legislation went ahead and passed actual laws that deny medical services and attention to their own constituents, even when their very lives are in danger!

For me the answer is clear: Yes! The State of Texas and the scum that currently occupy their governing offices and legislation are indeed responsible for the deaths that are directly caused by their incompetence and their complete intransigence regarding a matter of such elevated urgency and importance.

Ms. Crain’s family and survivors should initiate legal action against the State of Texas, the Governor, and the entire GOP legislation, holding them legally responsible for the death of their family member.

My “Goodbye” to Jeff Bozos, WaPo & Amazon

Now that Jeff Bozos, owner of the WaPo, Amazon, among other entities, with enough money to piss away a billion or so on a 15 minute rocket ship ride to nowhere, has subordinated himself to the potential threats from Donald Trump it’s finally become time for me – and millions of others, by my calculation – to dismiss him from our minds and pocketbooks by cancelling my subscription to the Washington Post AND, since that isn’t a drop in the bucket to him, STOP USING AMAZON.

Remember that one of the last remaining powers that we have, “we” being us little people, is our power as CONSUMERS! Jeff Bozos need to be reminded of this!

Listen To The Crickets From The Religious Right

Not A Sound Concerning The Killing Of Our Children At Schools!

I recently called into a Christian radio station show (which shall remain unnamed, at least for now) and listened while hosts couldn’t stop gloating over the recent Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe v. Wade by the lying religious zealots on the court. They were simply over the top with enthusiastic praise to the “Lord” for his intervention – finally! Of course, no one mentioned the fact that it took some FIFTY YEARS before the “Lord” saw fit to take up the argument and finally settle the matter but I guess that’s par for the course since it took him FOUR HUNDRED YEARS to finally intervene and help the Israelites escape slavery in Egypt! (Gee. Thanks.) Apparently he’s got a major backload of prayers to answer! (Let’s not bother to mention that abortion is mentioned NOWHERE AT ALL in either Hebrew or Christian scripture, but moving on…..) The phone was answered by someone appointed to screen their calls and when asked the nature of my question I said I wanted to know how the Religious Rights’ overwhelming support of the GOP comports with their absolute resistance to gun control, in light of the extraordinary amount of school shootings and student deaths. I was extremely interested in how they were going to substantiate their position on this seemingly stark dichotomy in the value of life? I wonder if you, Dear Reader, can wager a guess as to how they reacted?

Those of you that guessed that they immediately proceeded to engage me in an on-the-air sensible debate about how they see the issues and their future plans of taking on the gun lobby can return to your seats; I’m afraid they did nothing of the kind. In fact, what they did do was hang up after telling me they were putting me on hold, at which point I called two or three more times and they continued to pick up the phone and hang up without speaking a word! Apparently they wanted absolutely nothing to do with this obvious and blatant hypocrisy on this most urgent, lethal issue.

As a kid growing up on Long Island in New York I can’t remember a single time when we had to practice an Active Shooter drill in my entire school career. In fact, before the “Texas Tower Shooting” in 1966 we had never even heard of such a thing and even afterwards we never engaged in such a drill or even thought about it again. Of course now, after corrupting the original meaning behind the Second Amendment and essentially giving the gun and firearms industry complete carte blanche on the manufacture and distribution of even the most lethal weapons available – including assault weapons that are manufactured for no other use than to kill people – the problem has become unsolvable and all we can get from our Republican “representatives” and their phony-baloney supporters in the Religious Right are “thoughts and prayers” and a lot of lip service about how no law enacted would have prevented the mass murder of our students. Keep in mind that after the Sandy Hook mass-massacre of kindergarten and first and second grade students – babies, really – and six heroic teachers, the entire GOP refused to lift a finger to do anything to prohibit this from happening again. Not a single thing. Again, nothing but their vacuous and useless thoughts and prayers, as if their mythological creator had no ideas about how to circumvent such egregious, pointless violence aimed at the most innocent of our population. Even more reprehensible is the fact that they hide behind “god” in order to facilitate their slavish, obsequious, bootlicking of the gun manufacturing industry.

The fact is we can no longer send our children to school and be 100% certain of their returning home alive. That’s where we are today a direct result of the efforts of our corrupt representatives falling over themselves for the blood-soaked dollars stuffed into their pockets from the gun industry! The GOP provide the thoughts and prayers, the rest of us provide the grief, anguish, and despair. Not a fair trade at all.

Who among us would believe that, had it happened in a school where the children of our elected officials attended, that we wouldn’t see some form of action or immediate response from the very same demented hypocrites in the GOP? Is the money they receive worth the lives of our children? And where exactly is the response from the Religious Right about the blatant murder of our children by individuals that should never have been allowed to even consider owning a firearm? Would the same miscreants selling Jesus everyday to their mindless assemblies have us believe the fiction that we are completely and utterly helpless to protect our children in any way?

The Religious Right MUST be called out on this outrageous hypocrisy. As I’ve often said, the GOP and the Religious Right are adamant that a woman must have a child when impregnated regardless of the circumstances however, once the baby is born, that’s where their concern ends. Women, you are on your own from that point on up to and including the murder of the very same children while attending school. Does multi-zillionaire Joel Osteen, John Hagee, Franklin Graham, Jimmy Swaggart, T.D. Jakes, Jim Bakker, and, my personal favorite, Kenneth “Four Jets” Copeland think that Jesus would approve of their sycophantish subservience to the gun industry?

Where are their voices? Where is the outrage at the complete absence of action to protect the children of this country? It amounts to nothing less than their complicity; they are, for all practical purposes, accomplices after the fact.

? , . .

Question For The Faithful

Q: Why Was Jesus’ Tomb Empty”

A: Because Jesus Was Never In A Tomb

I recently watched a YouTube video by Paulogia, a former Christian now fighting the good fight against the enemies of reason, rationale, and science. In it Paulogia was replying to challenges made by three Christian apologists; Mike Winger, Red Pen Logic, and InspiringPhilosphy to the argument as to whether Jesus’ body ever made it into a tomb. Now I am not a Bible scholar, nor am I a historian per se, but I have been reading and researching Christianity and Christian history for some 30 odd years or so and I do not believe you have to be a Bible scholar to weigh in on such religious claims. This topic in particular lends itself to enough reason as to conclude that Jesus was never in a tomb to begin with not only entirely plausible but highly likely.

Remember that when Jesus entered Jerusalem for the Passover festival the Romans were already on high alert. The Jews of the 1^st century were always hostile to the occupation of the Romans, complete with their standards depicting their Caesars as divinities and, sometimes in an act of pure provocation, even putting them in the Temple. Never were the Romans more ready for riot and disorderliness than during the high festivals such as Passover. And the Galilee, specifically where Jesus came from, was considered nothing less than a hotbed of sedition and rebellion. Pontius Pilate, who under normal circumstances would have resided in Caesarea in the splendor and comfort of his palace, made it a point to be in Jerusalem for the Passover feast in order to quash any potential unruliness or rioting that may have broken out. Keep in mind that when Jesus entered the city it was – supposedly – to an enthralled crowd of thousands of Jews screaming “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest heaven!” (Mark 21:9) This would have already aroused the suspicion of the Roman troops in the area as the crowds were essentially pleading with Jesus to save them from their plight under Roman rule. “When he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was in turmoil, asking “Who is this?” The crowds were saying “This is the prophet Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee.” (Mark 21:10). This could be seen as bad enough however Jesus immediately enters the Temple and proceeds to turn the tables and cause even more commotion, this time violently.

Now Pontius Pilate was already known as a particularly cruel and brutal governor (or procurator, as his Roman title was) and had already been involved with – or the cause of – a number of particularly brutal episodes with Jewish crowds where hundreds or even thousands of Jews were slaughtered by Roman troops. He is referred to as such by Flavius Josephus and Philo of Alexandria as well as other contemporaneous authors however the Gospels gradually turn Pilate from the sole pronouncer of the death sentence on Jesus (Mark) to a milquetoast forced by the Jews to pass sentence on an innocent man or face the wrath of the Emperor, Tiberius. This is where the Gospels writers turn the tables from the Romans to the Jews as the purveyors of deicide and thus begins a two-thousand-year history of antisemitism and violence against Jews. It is much more conceivable – and likely – that having referred to himself as the King of the Jews, a very specific crime of sedition, Pilate sentenced Jesus to death, had him scourged and crucified, without even a morsal of remorse. He wouldn’t have had lost a moment of sleep over sentencing a rebellious Jew, instigator of turbulence and potential rioting, or had given it another thought. It is also highly likely, given his demeanor as described by the contemporaneous authors previously cited, that he would have allowed Jesus’ body to be removed from the cross.

We do know that there were instances where victims of crucifixion were allowed to be taken down and buried according to Jewish law or custom and this was Paulogia’s original comment on his Twitter blog. However, in most instances, this is not the case. One of the principal reasons and desired effects of the sentence of crucifixion was specifically for the public at large to see the effects of defying the Romans or causing mayhem or disorder. The site of a decaying corpse – being eaten by birds, dogs, literally falling off the cross – was the very best illustration that this could be YOU. Jesus, as a seditionist, rebellious instigator of Roman rule, and by declaring himself to be the “King of the Jews”, as inscribed in three languages on the titulus over his head confirms, it is extremely unlikely – and in my opinion, highly improbable – that his body would have ever been taken down. He simply would have decomposed until his bones were on the ground, then tossed into a common grave for such victims.

Now let’s dispel some of the more highly unlikely occurrences at this point in the passion narrative. First let’s dispense with the myth of Pilate releasing a prisoner as a Roman “tradition” (Mark 15:6). Besides the fact that there is absolutely no historical evidence of such a tradition in either Rome or Israel should close this loop once and for all however for the chosen subject for such clemency to be an acknowledged murderer and seditionist carries the story into the realm of fantasy. “Now a man called Barabbas was in prison with the rebels who had committed murder during the insurrection.” (Mark 15:7) In my hometown of Brooklyn, NY, we have a colloquial saying for such a story: “no f’n way, not in a million years!” I think it serves us well here as the chances of Pilate, in his infinite brutality, releasing a murderer of Roman soldiers or citizens is just beyond what any reasonable mind can absorb. This simply never happened. It is nothing more than a device used to put the blame of Jesus’ death on the Jews and away from the Romans. “I am innocent of this man’s blood; see to it yourselves. Then the people as a whole answered “His blood be on us and on our children!” (Matt 27:24-25)

Mission accomplished.

Next the idea that “Joseph of Arimathea”, literally synthesized out of thin air sashayes onto the scene as a “friend” of Pilates and walks off with Jesus’ body only hours after his death is simply inconceivable. As previously stated, this is out of the question; Pilate lets one seditionist go (Barabbas) and another to be taken down from the cross after only hours after his death. This can only be the need to get Jesus off of the cross and into a tomb from which he can later be resurrected. It isn’t even necessary to debate the fact that Arimathea is a total and completely mythological place, never having appeared on any map, ancient or modern. The place simply never existed and doesn’t to this day.

As far as the “witnesses to the resurrection”, no one ever saw Jesus “resurrecting”; they simply went to an empty tomb. Additionally, none of the four gospels tell the story the same way. “Matthew” tell us Mary Magdalen was there with the “other” Mary. (Mt 27:59-61) “Mark” says it was Mary Magdalen and “Mary the Mother of Joseph”. (Mk 15:46-47) “Luke” says “The women from Galilee followed Joseph and saw the entombment. (Lk 23:53-56) and, finally, “John” ever the embellisher, says it was “Nicodemus and Joseph” that wrapped the body and placed it in a tomb, “at a garden near where Jesus was crucified”. (Jn 19:39-42)

No one ever witnessed the actual reanimation of his body. The tomb was empty simply because Jesus never actually occupied a tomb.