Gospel Talk #3

- Commentary on the Gospels tied up with the Universal Spiritual Tradition (known to us in its purest form as Sant Mat) - Is not an exotic import from Indian culture - instead, the essence of all cultures, including our own John the Baptist - understanding conditions of Palestine at the time necessary for understanding gospel records - 70 A.D. to 110 A.D - Palestinian world changed drastically - when Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered, information about the Essenes was learned - showed similarities between teachings and practices of John and Jesus such as baptism, sacramental meal, and the founder known as "teacher of righteousness" and "Messiah" - also parallels with the New Testament - Essene sect was destroyed in70 A.D. after existence for about 200 years, Romans destroyed the temple and ended the Judaic way of life. Dead Sea scrolls hidden at that time. - similar to Shakers of today by living together and apart from the world - some were vegetarians and rejected sacrificial slaughtering of animals - scholars believe Jesus and John were Essenes though maybe not orthodox - relatively large movement in Palestine at this time - 4 active sects though none mentioned in New Testament - Jesus supposedly lived in Nazareth on the sea of Galilee though scholars say there was no city with that name at that time - no record of Jesus' life for 30 years except for the account when He went to Jerusalem and argued with the theolgians at the age of 12 - He was 30 years old when He began to teach after John's imprisonment - "The Unknown Life of Christ" is an account of one who travelled in the Himalayan section of India, ends up in a monastary, and copied a manuscript of (supposedly) Jesus's teachings - Old Testament Prophets had disciples, writings and schools, which later became Essenes, Gnostics, and eventually the Sufis - St. Luke gives the fullest picture of John's teachings - e.g., saying is not enough; the doing is what counts