The Truth about Jesus : Is He a Myth?Mangasarian, M. M. (Mangasar Mugurditch)
Religion
The Truth about Jesus : Is He a Myth?
Mangasarian, M. M. (Mangasar Mugurditch)
Jesus Christ -- Historicity; Rationalism
It is just such evidence as the above that led Prof. Goldwin Smith to
exclaim: "Jesus has flown. I believe the legend of Jesus was made by
many minds working under a great religious impulse--one man adding a
parable, another an exhortation, another a miracle story;"--and George
Eliot to write: "The materials for a real life of Christ do not
exist."
In the effort to untie the Jesus-knot by Paul, the church has
increased the number of knots to two. In other words, the church has
proceeded on the theory that two uncertainties make a certainty.
We promised to square also with the facts of history our statement
that the chief concern of the church, Jewish, Christian, or
Mohammedan, is not righteousness, but orthodoxy.
IX
Speaking in this city, Rev. W. H. Wray Boyle of Lake Forest, declared
that unbelief was responsible for the worst crimes in history. He
mentioned the placing.
--"of a nude woman on a pedestal in the city of Paris.
--"the assassination of William McKinley.
--"The same unbelief sent a murderer down the isle of a church in
Denver to pluck the symbol of the sacrament from the hands of a priest
and slay him at the altar."
The story of a "nude woman," etc., is pure fiction, and that the two
murders were caused by unbelief is mere assumption. To help his creed,
the preacher resorts to fable. We shall prove our position by quoting
_facts_:
I. HYPATIA [Footnote: See Author's, The Martyrdom of Hypatia.] was
dragged into a Christian church by monks in Alexandria, and before the
altar she was stripped of her clothing and cut in pieces with oyster
shells, and murdered. Her innocent blood stained the hands of the
clergy, who also handle the Holy Sacraments. She was murdered not by a
crazed individual but by the orders of the bishop of Alexandria. How
does the true story of Hypatia compare with the fable of "a nude woman
placed on a pedestal in the city of Paris?" The Reverend must answer,
or never tell an untruth again.
Hypatia was murdered in church, and by the clergy, because she was not
orthodox.
II. POLTROT, the Protestant, in the 16th century assassinated
Francois, the Catholic duke of Guise, in France, and the leaders of
the church, instead of disclaiming responsibility for the act,
publicly praised the assassin, and Theodore Beza, the colleague of
Calvin, promised him a crown in heaven. (_De l'etat etc, P. 82._
Quoted by Jules Simon.)
III. JAMES CLEMENT, a Catholic, assassinated Henry III. For this act
the clergy placed his portrait on the altar in the churches between
two great lighted candle-sticks. Because he had killed a heretic
prince, the Catholics presented the assassin's mother with a purse.
(_Esprit de la Ligue I. III. P. 14._)
If it was unbelief that inspired the murder of McKinley, what inspired
the assassins of Hypatia and Henry III?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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