The Jesus Mystery

In her book The Jesus Mystery: Astounding Clues to the True Identities of Jesus and Paul, Lena Einhorn makes several truly astounding hypotheses. She does this in a very compelling manner, using both the New Testament and historical writings from the same time period to back up her claims. One of the problems for many believers trying to place Jesus in history is that there is little to none historical evidence of him. Aside from two mentions of him in Josephus' works (which have been disputed to be legitimate), he is non-existent in historical documents (leaving out the gospel, which were written long after he supposedly died). If such a man was causing riots (as the gospels allude to if read carefully) then there should be other written sources for this. One of the claims Einhorn makes (and makes well I should say) is that if you place these same events 15-20 years later in history, then there is an enormous amount of evidence and the names that have been associated with Jesus in Talmud show up in not only Josephus' works but other historical writers of the time. This would also mean that the gospel writers were not writing of events long past, but of those that they might have witnessed themselves.

I discovered something interesting from this book, which if I had studied Christian history would be obvious to me. However, since I haven't I never realized that Paul's writings are dated much earlier than the gospels that come before him in the Bible. In fact:

Paul started to write his letters about two decades before the destruction of Jerusalem! Thus, while the gospel writers wrote down their stories more than 30 years after the crucifixion of Jesus, Paul, according to the commonly accepted chronology, waited only 15 to 20 years...Paul is probably much closer to the center of events than the gospel writers. And whatever the situation, these gospel writers seem to have been inspired by Paul to write their stories. Not the other way around.

If then, it is true that Jesus' story might be dated 15-20 years later than commonly believed, Paul started writing IMMEDIATELY AFTER the crucifixion.

Why then would the gospel writers want to place these events in the past? Why not simply tell it as it happened? A good question and Einhorn gives compelling reasons for this to, which eventually lead to her most shocking hypothesis. The gospel writers WANTED to put a veil on the true identity of Jesus. They had good reasons for hiding who he truly was. All in all, I believe thinking Christians can find this book not so hard to digest, as it doesn't call into question their faith in anyway. Einhorn uses the Bible as well as the Apocryphal books and historical writings from the same time period to form her theories. At no point does she say anything that would diminish the faith of Christians, though she makes shocking claims that could be upsetting to traditionally held views (views that were put forth by leaders of the church, not the Bible itself). However, I will not spoil the end for you. This is too good to give away. :) I will however leave you with some wonderful quotes from the book that might lead you too in the right direction.

What is remarkable is that there is so much in the stories of the crucifixion and the burial to indicate that something uncommon has taken place. There is so much that is atypical - without, perhaps, intending to be. It is as if the gospel writers wanted to convey the story as it really happened. Why, otherwise, did they not describe him hanging on the cross for three days, and dying in the same way that other crucified men died? Why, in their writing, did they let him give a signal that he wanted a drink, and when he got this drink let him expire? Why point out that those who were crucified beside him had their legs broken, while Jesus did not? And why describe that he was wrapped in 75 pounds of medications - medications that were used to treat wounds? 

Paul is oddly unwilling to travel to Jerusalem...The explanations that are given for why Paul avoids Jerusalem vary...In fact, one never really understands why Paul, especially, would be permanently risking his life if he came to Jerusalem - when the other apostles continue to work there undisturbed, and build congregations...It is obvious that Paul is afraid of something. But none of the above can explain to us why the Romans keep him prisoner for two years.

Afterward: It was pointed out to me that I made it sound as if the author backs up everything in the Bible as if it is fact and proven by other documents. I realize this may come off this way but that's not actually what she's doing. What she's done is show that the author's of the different books in the Bible may have been leaving clues in the stories that there is a very different outcome than we have always believed. 

Short Stories: Brainworms

I took so long getting this posted today because I 1) have a migraine that's going to kill me and 2) wanted to give you a little more than just more Oliver Sacks. First I'll start with the Sacks because it's actually interesting

This comes from Chapter 5 of Oliver Sacks' Musicophilia, Brainworms, Sticky Music, and Catchy Tunes. Maybe I should explain what Sacks means about Brainworms before I lose everyone! Here's the sentence that explains it best:

Many people are set off by the theme of music of a film or television show or an advertisement. This is not coincidental, for such music is designed, in the terms of the music industry, to "hook" the listener, to be "catchy" or "sticky," to bore its way, like an earwig, into the ear or mind; hence the term "earworms" - though one might be inclined to call them "brianworms" instead.

This one was fun to read because who hasn't had this happen? We have all at one point be driven insane by some snippet of music stuck in our heads, whether we even liked the song or not. But I'll bet you've never had it happen for 43 years straight and felt locked inside yourself by it. This is what happened to one of Sacks Parkinson's patients described in his more well known book Awakenings. He says, "seven pairs of notes (the fourteen notes of Povero Rigoletto)...would repeat themselves irresistibly in her mind. She also spoke of these forming "a musical quadrangle" who four sides she would have to perambulate, mentally, endlessly. This might go on for hours on end, and did so at intervals throughout the entire 43 years of her illness, prior to being "awakened" by L-dopa."

Sacks talks of some ways people have found for getting rid of this problem, such as singing the song to it's actual conclusion (which I've heard of but never seems to work for me, I just get another part of the same song stuck in my head) or singing another song purposefully (of course then THIS may become stuck too!).

He gives an interesting theory, which I'll leave you to ponder, of the possible evolutionary reason for this phenomenon.

It may be that brainworms, even if maladaptive in our own music-saturated culture, stem from an adaptation that was crucial in earlier hunter-gatherer days: replaying the sounds of animals moving or other significant sounds again and again, until their recognition was assured.

The next short story is a real short story. I'll leave Sacks where he belongs for now, in my head! hahaha. It comes from Orson Scott Card's Keeper of Dreams, which I bought a year ago at his book signing. Yes, it's signed! It says, "To Tonya, A fellow dreamer," probably a common statement but one I enjoyed nonetheless. This story The Elephants of Poznan.

It is set in the future, as most of his books and stories are. It is in Poland after a devastating plague has not only killed most of the human population but also left them sterile. I'll start with the opening paragraph because I think it conveys so much:

In the heart of old Poznan, the capital of Great Poland since ancient times, there is a public square called Rynek Glowny. The houses around it aren't as lovely as those of Krakow, but they have been charming painted and there is a faded graciousness that wins the heart. The plaza came through World War II more or less intact, but the Communist governement apparently could not bear the thought of so much wasted space. What use did it have? Public squares were for public demonstrations, and once the Communists had seized control on behalf of the people, people, public demonstrations would never be needed again. So out in the middle of the square they built a squat, ugly building in a brutally modern style. It sucked the life out of the place. You had to stand with your back to it in order to truly enjoy the square.

Now I'm not sure if he is exaggerating or if the pictures I found simply didn't show the building he's talking about, but I thought it was beautiful!
This is an interesting story. After the plague, the elephants come to Poznan. The have journeyed from Africa and everyone is a little confused as to what they are doing here. Shortly afterward, a family comes to Poznan. The mother, father, and daughter came through the plague together, though they lost their two sons. Miraculously, the daughter is fully healthy and the parents believe she may be able to conceive. Since she is the only hope of the human race to survive, she agrees to an experiment of sleeping with one man every three months (in order to know which man is fertile). The narrator of the story turns out to be that man. Shortly after his son is born, he begins focusing on the elephants and why they seem to be watching the people, almost as if they are conducting an experiment...

I would love to tell the whole story but it would be the same! Please read this wonderful story!

Short Stories: More from Sacks

This Saturday I am continuing with Oliver Sacks' Musicophilia. I'm doing chapters since they are arranged in short story like manner. Here's the first post if you want more info.

Chapters 2 and 3 both deal with music in relation to epilepsy. Chapter 2 titled A Strangley Familiar Feeling: Musical Seizures, relates how some people have musical auras, that is, they hear a certain type of music before going into a seizure. They get recognize that if they hear this piece of music, they are most likely only hearing in their heads and are going to have a seizure soon. Some people with this type of aura feel that the music is very familiar but can never quite place it. Others recognize immediately the song they are hearing. The most interesting of these stories was of a mother who diagnosed her son with seizures before the doctors. She heard him humming Pop Goes The Weasel one morning, the same tune she hears just before she has a seizure.

Chapter 3 is titled Fear of Music: Musicogenic Epilepsy. I found this one terribly sad. It tells of people who's seizures are brought on by music. Sometimes any kind of music and sometimes one particular style or piece of music. It seems to be related to the emotions; the more emotional the type of music the more likely it is to cause a seizure. The saddest case was of the 19th music critic Nokonov. At first it was itermitent but gradually any type of music would bring on a seizure. He had to give up his career and actually began to fear all types of music.

Short Story Saturdays: First Post

I'm beginning this Short Story Saturdays for me to share short stories and chapters of books that are like short stories. I decided to do this when I picked up Oliver Sacks' book Musicophilia this afternoon and noticed that it was written in a sort of short story format. I like the idea of sharing so much more of this book than I would in a normal review but over a longer period of time. Many of you may not know that I am a music therapist. I've been meaning to read this book for a long time and finally, while at the bookstore today, said to myself "What are you waiting for? Buy it already!"

If anyone would like to join me in sharing some of their favorite short stories, feel free to do so here or on your blog but there are so many daily memes out there already that I'm not really expecting it. I have been so happy (and surprised!) that so many people are participating in my Friday 56 that I couldn't imagine being greedy and starting another one! I simply want to do this to make myself read those books of short stories I have sitting around my house looking at me and to share this wonderful book by Oliver Sacks.


Oliver Sacks is the famous neurologist who wrote the book Awakenings which the movie of the same name was based on (Robin Williams played him). Sacks is also a huge advocate for music therapy. Often when you hear him speak, he spends most of his time talking about the profound affect music can have on the brain. I was very excited when this book came out. So now I will stop blabbering and tell you about the first chapter.

A Bolt From The Blue: Sudden Musicophilia
This chapter is mainly about Tony Cicoria, a surgeon who is one day hit by a bolt of lightning. After a brief two week recovery period in which he has a few memory problems, everything seems to go back to normal. Then he suddenly is struck by the profound need to listen to piano music, specifically Chopin. He then feels the need to learn to play the piano and while he is learning Chopin, he begins to hear his own music. It becomes almost a compulsion for him to learn how to write down this music he hears. He does not stop being a surgeon but all his free time is now consumed by playing and writing his own music. Before the lightning strike he did not know how to play and was never interested in learning, much less composing his own music.

Image by Cool Text: Logo and Button Generator - Create Your Own

The Liar's Club: New Classics Challenge #2

This wonderful, inappropriately funny book took me an absurdly long time to finish. Not sure why, because I did like the book, but I had no "need" to read as I normally do with books I enjoy. (I just started Duma Key by Stephen King today and am already on page 57, even with working!) Maybe it's because I just don't really like non-fiction. I've never been able to finish a biography. I find people's lives really interesting but I would prefer to learn about them through documentaries, not literary biographies. I've read very few memoirs. I enjoyed them, but still don't go out looking for the next memoir.

This is Mary Karr's story of her tumultuous early childhood, mainly from the years of 1961 - 63. We get to live with her through her parents turbulent marriage, divorce, and reconciliation; her grandmother's overly orderly and abusive presence during a time when she's diagnosed with cancer; her families chaotic traditions; her mother's ultimate breakdown; and the many other crazy things that could have damaged a child without Karr's internal strength.

The book begins with Karr and her older sister being taken from home by the sheriff. We know that something terrible has just happened and we know that her mother is in a psych hospital for a "nervous condition." Throughout the story we're given glimpses of her mother's slow slide into "nervousness," just as a child might see small glimpses but not be able to see the whole picture until much later. We're also told about some mystery in her mother's past that is either caused by her "nervousness" or is the the cause of it. The most beautiful and poignant moment comes near the end when Karr, as an adult, finally confronts her mother. I actually cried. Of course that's not so difficult, I cry at sappy commercials too. It's truly sad.

If you like to read about other people pain, I definitely recommend this book. Otherwise, read it anyway. It's a good book!

The City of Falling Angels

This John Berendt's follow-up to Midnight In The Garden of Good and Evil. I greatly enjoyed that movie, which is the reason I even picked up the book. I like kooky characters, they're always my favorite in a book. For example, my favorite character in the Harry Potter books is Moaning Myrtle. The City of Falling Angels also has it's share of kooky characters. From the back:

Venice - a city of masks and riddles, where narrow streets and passageways form a giant maze that deepens the sense of mystery. As captivating as it is elusive, the city teeters in precarious balance between endurance and decay. Architectural treasures crumble even as efforts to preserve them are underway. In The City of Falling Angels, John Berendt...unveils the enigmatic Venice as only he can.

The story begins with the burning of the historic Fenice Opera House and winds through the many different odd and glorious people that are involved with the fire and the reconstructions. Interspersed throughout the story is the tale of Ezra Pound's mistress, Olga Rudge, and their daughter dealing with a couple who has taken advantage of Olga in her old age.

This is another story I listened to on cd in the car. Doing a lot more of that lately than actually reading books! It was hard for me to get into this and I might have stopped listening if I had something else to listen to in the car. However, I did finish it and enjoyed it for the most part. The story felt a little disjunct (spell checker says this is not word but I know it is! I hate that!) though. Not only did the author never unite the two stories in any meaningful way, besides the fact that they both take place in Venice, but he also did not make me feel that the main story of the Fenice was all that important to the people involved. It seemed more important to outsiders than to the people of Venice itself. And maybe it was, I don't know. Maybe that was the point. Overall, I enjoyed listening to Berendt read his tale, but I doubt this will make my list of favorite for the year.

Every Breath You Take

Every Breath You Take: A True Story of Obsession, Revenge, and Murder by Ann Rule is exactly what the title says: A true story of a brutal murder. I'm not generally into true crimes novels, that's usually my mother's genre. She loves them and loves to watch those true crime television shows too. I enjoy them sometimes, but after awhile, everyone begins to look like a cold-hearted-B out to kill their mom, dad, son, daughter, wife, husband, or neighbor. It really makes you feel hopeless about the human race!

This is another I picked up through Paperback Swap to give me something to listen to on my long commute. From the Simon and Shuster Website:

If anything ever happens to me, promise me that you will see that there is an investigation....And find Ann Rule and ask her to write my story," Sheila Blackthorne Bellush told her sister after she divorced multimillionaire Allen Blackthorne. Now, in perhaps the first book ever written at a victim's request, America's Number One bestselling true-crime writer, Ann Rule, untangles a horrific web of lies that culminated in Sheila's savage murder more than ten years after she left Blackthorne.

When beautiful, blond Sheila married the charming, handsome Blackthorne, she was convinced she had found her perfect soul mate, and helped him reach his goal of living the privileged life of the country club set. But behind Allen's smooth facade, she discovered a violent, controlling sociopath -- a liar, a scam artist, a sexual deviant. When she finally fled with their two young daughters, she was skeletally thin, bruised, and beaten.

Although Sheila recovered, remarried, and was starting a new life and family, she still felt she was doomed. Joyously pregnant, she and her new husband expecting quadruplets, Sheila still feared Blackthorne, who had sworn to her he would monitor her every move and "every breath you take." And, in fact, Blackthorne inevitably tracked her down, as did her killer, who left her in a pool of blood marked by the tiny footprints of her two-year-old toddlers. The questions remained: Could the authorities ever link Sheila's murder to Blackthorne himself? Was his true obsession high-stakes golf and his extravagant pink mansion -- or was it to destroy Sheila?

I was impressed by Ann Rule speaking at the beginning and the end of the audiobook about Sheila and how this apparently lovely woman knew something could happen to her and she needed to have her story told if possible. This story seems to have affected Rule unlike any other book she has written since Ted Bundy. If there is anyone out there, like me, that did not know that Rule knew Ted Bundy and considered him a friend before it was known he was a murderer, well, now you do. This was very surprising to me because one of her books is about him. I wonder what it would be like not only to know a murder (because I have) but to then have to write about him! I can't imagine living in the story of that person for the time that it takes to write a book about him. It might just drive me crazy!

Another thing that impressed me was the story of Sheila herself. How such a strong person can let herself become enveloped so much in an abusive relationship no longer surprises me. Anyone who says it would never happen to them has simply been lucky. What surprises me is that she was able to get out with her two children and remake her life. She returned to the strong person she was before this relationship.

Ann Rule writes in such a way that you forget this is a true story. You forget that most of the people in the story are actually living somewhere in this world having to deal with the consequences of this murder. I was sucked into the story and only afterward was I reminded that this is not fiction. It breaks my heart that this family has been so completely torn apart.

The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins

First of all to my Christian friends who read this and want to run away screaming at the terrible things you believe I am about to say, I'm sorry. There is no reason for that if you can keep an open mind.

So I picked up the God Delusion because I was intrigued by the premise. Did he mean that the God of Abraham and therefore Jews, Christians, and Muslim is a delusion or did he mean that ANY god is a delusion? Well, he pretty much gets that out of the way right away. He doesn't believe in any god. I don't agree with everything in the book. It seems that he makes a fairly logical argument for the most part but then when it gets down to the nitty-gritty, he grasps at just as many straws as the rest of us. He simply shades his doubt with science. The truth is, we simply don't know. If you're truly interested in my beliefs, I'll explain a few things at the end of this review. I think it might be interesting after this. By the way, this is probably my longest post ever.

Dawkins is actually very funny. He had me laughing throughout most of the book. He retells a story by Bertrand Russell called the parable of the celestial teapot:

Many orthodox people speak as though it were the business of sceptics to disprove received dogmas rather than of dogmatists to prove them. This is, of course, a mistake. If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time.

Dawkins then goes on to talk about the Flying Spaghetti Monster which is a popular internet deity. Apparently there is a Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Moster. "I haven't read it myself, but who needs to read a gospel when you know it's true?...The fact that orbiting teapots and tooth fairies are undisprovable is not felt, by any reaosnable person, to be the kind of fact that settles any interesting argument...I have found it an amusing strategy, when asked whether I am an atheist, to point out that the questioner is also an atheist when considering Zeus, Apollo, Amon Ra, Mithras, Baal, Thor, Wotan, the Golden Calf and the Flying Spaghetti Monster. I just go one god further."

Dawkins' main point is in chapter 4: WHY THERE ALMOST CERTAINLY IS NO GOD. He makes many points but it all boils down to the same thing in the end. If there is a being that has created the universe and therefore us, if this being also can simultaneously read the minds of millions people who are also simultaneously praying to this being for many (mainly frivolous) different things, if this being is the ultimate designer then who designed him (or her)? This being would have to have the most amazing scientific knowledge, far beyond anything close to what we have but a being this great could not just poof into existence out of nothing. A being like this would HAVE to come from somewhere and then that points to another creator. So is that creator the ultimate creator? If a being could create another being who could create a universe and listen to the prayers of people everywhere, who created THAT creator? Do you see? This is an endless loop that ultimately doesn't make sense. There can be no end. In othe words, "How do they (theists) cope with the argument that any God capable of designing a universe, carefully and foresightfully tuned to lead to our evolution, must be a supremely complex and improbable entity who needs an even bigger explanation that the one he is supposed to provide?"

This argument is in the middle of the book and Dawkins goes on to make some other very fine points regarding the harm religion can cause. For example, he talks of a study done with more than a thousand Israeli children, ages 8 to 14 in which they were to discuss the Battle of Jericho in the Book of Joshua:

Joshua said to the people, "Shout; for the LORD has given you the city. And the city and all that is within it shall be devoted to the LORD for destruction...But all silver and gold, and vessels of bronze and iron, are sacred to the LORD; they shall go into the treasury of the LORD." Then they utterly destroyed all in the city, both men and women, young and old, oxen, sheep, and asses, with the edge of the sword...And they burned the city with fire and all within it; only the silver and gold, and the vessels of bronze and of iron, they put into the treasury of the house of the LORD.

The children were then asked, "Do you think Joshua and the Israelites acted rightly or not?" An overwhelming majority of the children gave total approval. When asked why, their answers were all religiously based:

God promised them land, and gave them permission to conquer. If they would not...then there would have been danger that the Sons of Israel would have assimilated among the Goyim.

God commanded him to exterminate (lovely word) the people so that the tribes of Israel will not be able to assimilate...

Joshua did good because the people who inhabited the land were of a different religion...

Genocide is condoned through religion. Where have we seen this before?

A control group was given the same story only "Joshua" was changed to "General Lin" and " Israel " was changed to "a Chineese Kingdom ." The results were opposite. This time the children, without the influence of religion, saw the terribleness of exterminating a group of people. "When their loyalty to Judaism was removed from the calculation, the majority of the school children agreed with the moral judgements that most modern humans would share. Joshua's action was a deed of barbaric genocide."

I ask another question, why exactly does God need silver, gold, bronze, and iron? What is an all-knowing, powerful deity who doesn't live on the earth going to do with these things? Why would he need to destroy a city for them? Shouldn't he just be able to take them?

I will leave you with some wonderful quotes from our founding fathers.

As the Government of the Unites States of America is not in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Musselmen; and as the said States never have entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mehomitan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from the religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.
--Treaty of Tripoli as drafted by George Washington and signed by John Adams (give that to whoever tries to convice you our founding fathers meant us to be a Christian nation).
--Also, 'Musselmen' and 'Mehomitan' were contemporary words to refer to Islam, which makes this paragraph more than a little ironic right now

Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because if there be one, he must more approve of the homage to reason than that of blindfolded fear.
-Thomas Jefferson

Christianity is the most perverted system that ever shone on man.
-Thomas Jefferson

During almost 15 centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What has been its fruits? More or less, in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and servility in the laity; in both, superstition, bigotry, and persecution.
-James Madison

Lighthouses are more useful than churches.
-Benjamin Franklin

This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it.
-John Adams

And a few others:

Religion...has certain ideas at the heart of it which we call sacred or holy or whatever. What it means is, 'Here is an idea or a notion that you're not allowed to say anything bad about; you're just not. Why not? - because you're not!
-Douglas Adams

What impresses me most about Catholic mythology is partly its tasteless kitsch but mostly the airy nonchalance with which these people make up the details as they go along. It is just shamelessly invented.
-Richard Dawkins

The great unmentionable evil at the center of our culture is monotheism
-Gore Vidal

So for mine? Do I believe in God? Not really. Not in the sense that most people mean. I believe we are all connected. We are all part of the energy of the universe and we are able to tap into this. Different people, based on their education and experience, call it different things. Some people tap into this energy, feel something powerful, and call it God. Some people call it magic. However, I also believe in science and I truly believe that this is something that will one day be measurable and a lot of people will lose faith because of that. The sad thing is there is no reason. That power will still be there, it's the stories they have believed in forever that won't be.