Yeshua

  A wise person on the internet once made a post which said “Man, I wish there was a religion based on the teachings of Jesus, because that would be one I could really get behind”. I can honestly say that this is the only quote I have yet seen which accurately represents my attitude towards Yeshua (one of the few names for Jesus Christ or Christopherus, but I am partial to Yeshua as a fan of The Master and the Margarita) and the Christian religion. Interestingly enough, we know very little about the man himself. The only real narrative we have of any part of his life is his last three years: From when he was 30 to when he was 33. We do not know what he looked like, or his race, all though as far as we know he was Jewish. The only direct quote we have from Yeshua is “talitha kuom”, which translates to “girl, arise”. From what we can tell, Yeshua was an enlightened carpenter, who, due to the fact that the Roman government was threatened by his teachings, spent his last few years on the move, trying to avoid the authorities. It is clear why the Roman government would be threatened by Yeshua- his teachings preached that are men are equal in the eyes of god, which obviously contradicts the Roman tradition of slavery. Along with this, Yeshua preached that neither wealth nor status held any value in the eyes of god- and that only love was of any true heavenly value. This also frightened by the Romans, as their society was very structured and leveled, with poor people on the bottom and rich people on the top.

  Yeshua, historically, was probably very different from the way we in Western culture see him today. In fact, I think a large percentage of modern Christians would be disgusted by Yeshua if they ever came into contact with him, perhaps trying to give him some spare change in order to ward him off from approaching them with his socialist babbling. Yeshua, or as most people know him, Jesus Christ, is, as far as I understand it, a poor, traveling, socialist, feminist carpenter with teachings of peace and fraternal love for everyone, which, if I do say so myself, is certainly “something I can get behind”. However, it is clear that some of the atrocities committed in his name are far from being savory. For  example, hundreds of thousands of Jews and Islamic people were murdered in the name of Yeshua during the crusades, even though it is clear that all he ever preached was equal love for everyone. It may be true that in the eyes of a Christian, being a part of the Jewish or Islamic religion is a sin, but in a story from the Bible about Yeshua, a group of men are crowded around a hunkered, terrified woman, ready to stone her because she had been unfaithful to her husband. Yeshua sees this, and he breaches the circle of men which had isolated the poor woman, standing by the woman’s side, and looking every man who was there to murder here directly in the eye. He says in a voice that cannot be ignored: “Let the man here who has not sinned throw the first stone”. And they all dropped their stones and left.

  I find this quote incredibly poignant; it says something that resonates with me in a way nothing any Christian has said to me about their religion has before. What Christ is essentially saying is that no person alive has lived a life and not done something they are disgusted by- everyone has their dark moments. And if we treat each other with no mercy and compassion for such imperfections, we are creating a society in which we are not safe. And, honestly, I think this is really the society a lot of people, especially religious extremists (and I include christians here, live in today. Because their religious texts have sets of rules which, at some point in a life are bound to be broken in some way, these people begin to feel suppressed guilt, and try to hide their indiscretions, even though it probably doesn’t matter to a loving god if you say “oh my god” once in awhile.

  What I’m really trying to say is that I believe Yeshua’s teachings are important and profound, and I think the amount of room people have found in his mouth to jam words is astounding. He preached universal love and equality for all people, but the sadly not the values I see in most sects of the Christian religion today. Before Christianity can evolve  and modernize as a religion, I believe it will have to go back to its roots and go over the teachings of its idol.