I am very sad that I did not find this out until after Conspiracy Theories Month, but now having found it, I can't not share it, because it's just too insane to keep to myself.( Read more... )
The Bible is an excellent example of occult literature. The real satanic conspiracy took place in the fourth century when early Christianity was attacked by the power brokers who crafted trinitiarian dogma. Your friend is barking up the wrong tree.
Haha. The "Gnosticism is the real Christianity!" lie never gets old, does it? I had a professor once who was obsessed with Elaine Pagels' "scholarship" and took every opportunity to bash the Church.
It's funny, though, that the Gnostics were recognized as a heresy as early as the second century, and that the supposed "artificial" elements grafted onto the "pure" Gnostic Church by those evil orthodox bastards, such as the hierarchy, the importance of Scripture and Tradition, the Eucharist, the Trinity, and a distinct lack of Gnosticism, are all attested by the end of the second century. Moreover, the line of bishops in many of the early churches can credibly be traced back to the beginning, and none of them were Gnostics.
But, yeah, Constantine's Sword! The papacy! The Councils! It was all a conspiracy to hide the truth, and Mary Magdalen really was the 13th Apostle!
I wouldn't mock her scholarly efforts with the finger-quote treatment. You may not agree with how others present her work, but she's no academic slouch.
I remember when that book on the Gnostics came out, there was a big buzz about it for sure. And the Nag Hammadi Library had just been published in English a few years previously (I think by DoubleDay/Anchor?)
What sucks is that it's truly fascinating stuff, but I haven't met a professor yet who used Gnostic materials objectively to, you know, study them. There's always one of two agendas: either it's (like my former prof.) use them to bash Christianity in the classroom on a daily basis or (like another professor at another Wichita college) use them to demonstrate how mainstream academia is evil and secular and anti-Christian.
I used to fancy doing a Master's in ancient history, but that History of the Roman Empire class pretty much ruined the idea. Also the fact that I'm horrible with foreign languages. :P
I was in a unique major, it was called "Religious Studies" as a part of the philosophy dept at Christopher Newport College (now University), a state school. The head of the program was a Anglican who was a believer and attended his parish regularly, etc. But he was firmly in the modern form criticism and modern scholarship camp and believed there were several heterodox traditions and conflicts within early Christianity, with present day Catholicism wining the day.
I just did a general history program for my BA...ended up concentrating on Russian history. Not the most useful of degrees, perhaps, but the Russian history professor had us watch Alexander Nevsky in class. :D
It's weird... I got the same instruction in my ninth grade religion class at a Catholic school (run by the Brothers of the Sacred Heart, for those interested). I was of the impression that it was totally non-controversial until this comment thread.
I had my fill of reading Edward Schillebeeckx's books (so big if you dropped them on your foot, you'd need to go to the ER), and a lot of the South American liberation theological books (Gutierrez, Leonardo Boff, etc). I don't know I survived all that reading lol.
For Contracts, I read a case about a kid who actually saved up for the freakin' Harrier jet pictured in this commercial. Here's a Wiki article on the case. I loved that one.
We read that one too! lol I also loved the "stupid idiots" cases from Torts, such as "climb onto an electrical substation to fry fish on a live wire then claim the company was negligent" kid.
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It's funny, though, that the Gnostics were recognized as a heresy as early as the second century, and that the supposed "artificial" elements grafted onto the "pure" Gnostic Church by those evil orthodox bastards, such as the hierarchy, the importance of Scripture and Tradition, the Eucharist, the Trinity, and a distinct lack of Gnosticism, are all attested by the end of the second century. Moreover, the line of bishops in many of the early churches can credibly be traced back to the beginning, and none of them were Gnostics.
But, yeah, Constantine's Sword! The papacy! The Councils! It was all a conspiracy to hide the truth, and Mary Magdalen really was the 13th Apostle!
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I wouldn't mock her scholarly efforts with the finger-quote treatment. You may not agree with how others present her work, but she's no academic slouch.
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I used to fancy doing a Master's in ancient history, but that History of the Roman Empire class pretty much ruined the idea. Also the fact that I'm horrible with foreign languages. :P
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I just did a general history program for my BA...ended up concentrating on Russian history. Not the most useful of degrees, perhaps, but the Russian history professor had us watch Alexander Nevsky in class. :D
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