‘Conspiracy theories increase in prevalence in periods of widespread anxiety, uncertainty, or hardship, as during wars and economic depressions and in the aftermath of natural disasters…’
Encyclopedia Brittanica, 2023
What follows is based on the very simple tenet that Christianity (and most other belief systems) is a scam, a hoax, a con promoting a product which does not exists to people who can only procure the product after death. The second basis for what follows is again, simple; the Gospel stories are, for the most part, wrong.
I feel compelled to walk along the dark path of speculation on a topic. (This will leave in tatters any frail attempt at scholarship.) Nevertheless, the speculation to be engaged deals with the oral tradition of the new sect of Judaism which will later be known as Christianity.
A question niggles regarding past scholarship; did they all (or most) miss or disregard something so rudimentary as the honesty of humans telling stories? Did nearly two millennia of scholars over-look the self-serving nature of humans relaying a life-changing outlook? In a phrase, I think they did. They attributed undeserved honor and deference to those, who for more than a generation, spread the word of the new Jewish sect of the Nazarene during the early and middle years of the first century CE.
One aspect, too, that has always troubled me about the spread of Christianity is how it spread. Books on the subject always seemed to miss some fundamental aspect of its proliferation in the ancient world. Sure, Saul/Paul proselytized it. Marcion of Sinope attempted to make a canon of ‘belief’. That helped galvanize a proto-orthodoxy and the emergence of ‘church’ leadership. Constantine certainly legitimized it by his proclamation and his conversion. Emperor Theodosius banned pagan sacrifice and pagan worship furthering the ‘church’ in a big way. But all that was later; as late as in the late 4th Century. What had transpired in the years before the first ‘Gospels’ were written (in educated, Koine Greek, by the way)? Examination of the social ills and political strife of the day lend an understanding but always leaves out some vital, vague, yet important aspect.
I may have stumbled upon that crucial, fundamental, under-lying cause for the proliferation of the story of the Man from Galilee. Here it is: Conspiracy theorists of the First Century C.E. may well have spread the ‘good news’ in the form of gossip and tall-tales. (The books of Charles Mackay, ‘Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds’ perhaps cued up the idea. Principally, Mackay’s books verify that the ‘conspiracy theorist’ and the madness generated by such gossip-mongers is not limited to our modern era of social media.)
What I have stumbled upon might be called the ‘I-know-something-you-don’t-know delusion’; a delusion that offers something life-changing. That feeling of being privy to a forbidden secret is the motivation for many conspiracy-theorists. They consider themselves ‘special’ people because they claim to know something that most people don’t know.
‘9-11 was an inside job!’
‘The moon landings were faked!’
‘JFK is still alive!’
‘Elvis is still alive!’
‘The earth is flat!’
On and on go the litany of nonsense fueled by an ego-driven desire to be ‘special’ and to claim to know something that is life-changing and world-altering. The conspiracy theorist is essentially a gossip-monger whose bit of false news is both shocking and life-altering if accepted as fact.
Now, imagine that some of those same conspiracy mongers lived in the middle of the first century C.E. Imagine that they have no education, are illiterate and unschooled in critical thinking.
(It’s easy to imagine, right?)
If one were to put in mind the average person from any era, one would have to include that those who are not inclined to pursue truth are much in-line with those who are inclined to advance their personal status. A conspiracy theorist (or gossip-monger) fits the profile of one who seeks attention by which one’s personal status is augmented by the expression of special or extraordinary information.
Now, imagine that the conspiracy theorist and his audience are dirt-poor; without prospects or hope of social advancement. Perhaps they’re slaves. Perhaps, they’re women. Perhaps, they’re carpenters. Perhaps, they’re ex-fishermen. Perhaps, they’re simply in a society in which there is little to no upward mobility. Such was the Roman society and the society of Judah and Israel.
One could not rise to a higher social level. Period. The social classes were determined by birth; a plebe could not become a patrician. No amount of education or good fortune could make a slave a senator.
One may be unschooled, ignorant and without prospects in their life but if one was to know something their neighbors don’t know - that some guy (a local guy, for example) did miracles, died and came back from the dead. What if that same resurrected local guy preached that everybody had a live-forever card that he was sharing with everybody. It didn’t matter if you were a slave or a woman or an ex-fisherman, everybody who worshipped him would be awarded get-out-of-jail-free card.
It’s not believable, you might say – and rightly so. Well, a counter to that is this: when is a conspiracy theory believable? A movie crew faked the moon landing?
Flat-earth is provable?
Crystals control ‘life-energy’?
A pyramid sharpens razors?
But, no one comes back from the dead, you may well say. Ah, but the story being promulgated by our hypothetical gossip-monger is that the dead guy is the son of god – you know like Hercules or Romulus or Horus or Asclepius or somebody like that. Born of a virgin, too! Miracle-worker. Miracle-healer! And this dead guy (a son of god, remember!) came back to life in order to give everybody a free pass to heaven and ever-lasting life!
And the hook’s set.
Stories of fantastical whimsy gain further fantastic elements as they are told and re-told. One only think of the proverbial ‘fish tale’ or the tall tales of Paul Bunyan, Johnny Appleseed, Pecos Bill, Herakles, Aesop, or any number of fantasy characters at the center of tales meant to convey insight into the human character. One can look at the Iliad and the Odyssey for further, more classical examples. Would anyone truly contend that the greatest hero of ancient Greece, Achilles, the son of god, was slain by an arrow piercing his heel? Would anyone truly take the tales of Ulysses/Odysseus and the Cyclops, Polyphemus (also a son of god) as fact?
It seems that over a generation, the tales of the Christ were related orally without reference to written narratives about the Man from Galilee. From the time of G-zus’s purported ministry and his execution by crucifixion, about 30 years passed – a generation – before anything was written down by Saul/Paul of Tarsus. Most scholars contend that the Gospel attributed to Mark was written first, (c. 66–70 C.E.) while that of ‘Matthew’ and ‘Luke’ were written after. (c. 85–90 C.E.) What tales were told of G-zus in the intervening decades?
When such blather is repeated enough times, retold by enough people in the market, in the taverns, in the shops, in the homes, etc. the gossip and conspiracy talk is reduced to sound bites and becomes a ‘creed’; a tenet of ‘belief’, something to attach your ‘faith’ to. This is referred to as a ‘creed’ – a bit which is set to a rhyme or a meter so that it might be remembered and regurgitated. ‘He is risen!’ becomes a call sign. ‘Christ’, (χριστός (chrīstós), which means ‘anointed one’) becomes a surname as in ‘Jesus Christ’. Then there may be the phrases; ‘Lamb of god’, ‘Lord and Savior’, ‘He sits on the right-and of god!’, etc. as further examples of what might be called ‘bumper-sticker’ items of faith (i.e. ‘creeds) for those in the first years after the tale of G-zus had been spread in the ale houses by our hypothetical gossip-monger. A nascent ‘creed’ has been given voice.
Virgin birth, son of god, miracle-worker, and – wait for it! – a free pass to eternal paradise just for a profession of faith and accepting the Nazarene as your Lord and Savior. Now there’s a deal you can’t refuse, that’s for sure. All that’s missing is the set of matched, bone-handed steak knives.
Act Now! and get a free pass to eternal paradise. (Better than steak knives!)
A free pass to eternal paradise set amid a conspiracy theory to end all conspiracy theories. The Mother of conspiracy theories. (At the end of world, the Romans couldn’t kill him!) Change your life and accept this story as real and true. Remember, that’s all a conspiracy theorist wants; to be believed and taken seriously as someone ‘special’ who shares in life-changing, world-altering secret.
You know; like a preacher!
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