To understand Yeshua ben Yosef and the simple messages he spoke, we must go back to the time before his death in 30 CE, when Yeshua spoke humbly and lovingly, without the veil of a church that would separate him from the people to whom he wished to give his message. This Web site is devoted to helping humankind understand Yeshua, realize that Christianity is not Yeshua and doesn't own Yeshua, and overcome the damage the church has done in the name of Jesus Christ, the figure that the church created. It is not a Web site affiliated with or claiming allegiance to any religion, including Christianity. It is a spiritual site dedicated to understanding Yeshua and Yeshua's message in an effort to help humankind grow spiritually into the beings and society he knew we could be while in the Earthly plane of eternal life.
Yeshua is a more profound figure, with the potential to have a more pervasive impact on humankind, than the Christian church has ever understood or been able to communicate. His life and teachings belong to humankind, not to a religious body. His wisdom and counsel stand with those of the Buddha and other brilliant luminaries who have communicated the truth of the eternal universe to humankind, helping people grow to spiritual maturity and bliss. His life is among the most inspiring accounts in humankind's history of love, spirituality, acceptance of others, suffering out of love, and forgiving all, even his executioners. Every human being—religious, atheist, spiritualist, or of any belief system—can learn from and be inspired by Yeshua's life.
Unfortunately, who Yeshua was and what he taught have been enveloped in dark ecclesiastical shrouds that are now, justifiably, being stripped away by the relentless clawing to uncover truth by a humankind that has developed sharp talons of systematic inquiry and knowledge since the seventeenth century. However, the truths that were secreted away deep within the shrouds are becoming lost among the shreds of the deteriorating church.
As the tatters that were the church are swept away, the spiritual guidance he provided must not be disposed of with them.
The reason Yeshua's message is so important to humanity is that our purpose in life is to grow in spiritual understanding and maturity, becoming blissful, unafraid of the transition called death, full of love and compassion toward others, and receiving the same love from others toward us. Every hour of every day of our lives should be filled with the warmth of love and peace with others—that is the Kingdom of God as Yeshua envisioned it.
Humankind should be evolving to having unconditional love for all others in brotherhood and harmony, without interpersonal conflict and war. "The Kingdom of God is spread out upon the face of the earth, and men do not see it," Yeshua said (Gospel of Thomas). The writer of the Gospel of Luke reported that Yeshua said, "The kingdom of God does not come visibly, nor will people say, 'Here it is,' or 'There it is,' because the kingdom of God is within you." Paradise isn't a place apart from Earth coming at a future time as the church describes it; Heaven is within us and spread out among all peoples upon the face of the earth and we're simply not living in it. Understanding and living the profound truths Yeshua, Buddha, and the other luminaries taught would open humankind's eyes to the Heaven, the Kingdom of God, that is already here—we just don't see it.
Very soon after Yeshua died in around 30 CE, his followers gathered in Jerusalem to await his return to establish the Kingdom of Israel as promised in the Old Testament prophecies. In the years that followed Yeshua's death, they began to realize that the return of their Messiah might be delayed for a few more months or years, but surely not longer than that. And so they developed rules for the body of followers in a loosely formed organization.
By the time of the Council of Jerusalem, in around 48 or 49 CE, the groups in Jerusalem and outside in the Diaspora had become more formalized, and could be referred to individually as churches. However, all of the believers together would not have been called a "church" in the larger sense of the term. There was a great diversity of beliefs about Yeshua during the first three centuries after his death
Gradually, as Yeshua's return was delayed, syllables and words of an organized church began to be heard. A canon of texts had taken form by the end of the second century. Creeds had come into being stating the beliefs. More or less permanent meeting places had been established. It became obvious that Yeshua would not be returning imminently, so a church evolved.
At the Council of Nicea, in 325 CE, around 300 bishops from a number of the larger, more established churches around the Mediterranean assembled to settle issues having to do with Yeshua's nature in relationship to God the Father. The Roman emperor Constantine presided, having been converted (ostensibly) to belief in Yeshua (now Jesus Christ). Christianity had a name and had become the state religion in the Roman Empire by the end of the fourth century. The Nicene Creed, written and revised in the fourth century, refers to a "holy catholic and apostolic church."
Insignificant Christianity had grown from a persecuted sect to the most powerful religion in the empire. In the process, it had left the teachings of Yeshua in an archive and established its own structure, beliefs, and rules. The church created its own version of the Messiah, steadily embellishing the icon until all vestiges of the humble Jewish Rabbi named Yeshua had been expunged. It promoted itself to the position of omnipotent earthly representative of the God it had created, thereby itself assuming the stature and power of God, with all the rights, status, infallibility, and absolute power characteristic of a God.
In the end, the church became the casing that held God, shielding God from humankind and serving up regulations and observances it required humankind to embrace. The church's functionaries, as the representatives of this God, eventually felt themselves to be demigods accountable only to the God they had created. They interpreted God for humankind, had license to commit any atrocities in the name of God and the church with impunity, and demanded that states and peoples defer to them in all matters of spirituality and human conduct.
The list of crimes against humanity grew, while the church's coffers swelled from enticements to give money to the church fabricated by church leaders. The church sold guarantees of salvation for people and their deceased loved ones, in contradiction of Yeshua's words about spiritual growth and the necessity of being born again for salvation, and implied that people who did not give money to the church would be punished for eternity. The money enhanced the church's power and supported its actions.
In the thick matrix of the church, Yeshua's teaching about love, forgiveness, peace, and humility were relegated to the ineffectual status of mindlessly repeated words that had become part of the liturgy. Yeshua's influence was purged from the church.
Much of the church with the name Christ in it does not represent Yeshua ben Yosef. In this twenty-first century, humankind, with all of its diverse religions and belief systems, needs to learn about the teachings and model of Yeshua before 30 CE without the ecclesiastical shrouds of myths and rituals enveloping them. Humankind must separate itself from the church that itself grew into a God over the two millennia after Yeshua's death, and see, for the first time, the truths in Yeshua's teaching that will help individuals and humankind evolve to spiritual maturity.
Yeshua's second coming will be in his being understood for the first time.
