The Nazarene reformer had undoubtedly belonged to one of these sects; though, perhaps, it would be next to impossible to decide absolutely which. But what is self-evident is that he preached the philosophy of Buddha-Sakyamûni. Denounced by the later prophets, cursed by the Sanhedrim, the nazars--they were confounded with others of that name “who separated themselves unto that shame,”[200] they were secretly, if not openly persecuted by the orthodox synagogue. It becomes clear why Jesus was treated with such contempt from the first, and deprecatingly called “the Galilean.” Nathaniel inquires--“Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?” (_John_ i. 46) at the very beginning of his career; and merely because he knows him to be a _nazar_. Does not this clearly hint, that even the older nazars were not really Hebrew religionists, but rather a class of Chaldean theurgists? Besides, as the _New Testament_ is noted for its mistranslations and transparent falsifications of texts, we may justly suspect that the word Nazareth was substituted for that of _nasaria_, or nozari. That it originally read “Can any good thing come from a nozari, or Nazarene;” a follower of St. John the Baptist, with whom we see him associating from his first appearance on the stage of action, after having been lost sight of for a period of nearly twenty years. The blunders of the _Old Testament_ are as nothing to those of the _gospels_. Nothing shows better than these self-evident contradictions the system of pious fraud upon which the superstructure of the Messiahship rests. “This _is Elias_ which was for to come,” says Matthew of John the Baptist, thus forcing an ancient kabalistic tradition into the frame of evidence (xi. 14). But when addressing the Baptist himself, they ask him (_John_ i. 16), “Art thou Elias?” “And he saith _I am not_!” Which knew best--John or his biographer? And which is divine revelation? The motive of Jesus was evidently like that of Gautama-Buddha, to benefit humanity at large by producing a religious reform which should give it a religion of pure ethics; the true knowledge of God and nature having remained until then solely in the hands of the esoteric sects, and their adepts. As Jesus used _oil_ and the Essenes never used aught but pure water,[201] he cannot be called a strict Essene. On the other hand, the Essenes were also “set apart;” they were healers (_assaya_) and dwelt in the desert as all ascetics did.