Jesus Christ, born of the virgin Mary, died for all mankind so that sinners would have the right to forgiveness. He taught people how to live correctly and gathered followers around him. But he was betrayed by the vile Judas Iscariot right after the celebration of Holy Easter, when Jesus gathered everyone for the “Last Supper.”
The student betrayed his Rabbi out of envy and selfish motives, for only 30 pieces of silver, by kissing him - which was a conventional sign for the guards lurking at the entrance. This is where the story of Christ's crucifixion began. Jesus foresaw everything, so he did not offer any resistance to the guards. He knew that this was his fate and he had to go through all the tests in order to ultimately die, and then be resurrected, in order to be reunited with his father. It is not known for certain in what year Jesus Christ was crucified; there are only a few theories put forward by the best minds of mankind.
Jefferson's theory
An unprecedented earthquake and eclipse described in the Holy Scriptures helped American and German scientists determine when Jesus Christ was crucified. The study, published in the International Geology Review, is based on the movement of lithospheric plates at the bottom of the Dead Sea, which is located 13 miles from Jerusalem.
The Gospel of Matthew (chapter 27) says: “Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and died. And the curtain in the temple was torn exactly in the middle, from top to bottom; the earth shook; and the stones settled…” - which, of course, can be interpreted as an earthquake, from the point of view of science. To analyze the consequences of long-standing geological activity coinciding with the execution of the son of God, geoscientists Marcus Schwab, Jefferson Williams and Achim Broer went to the Dead Sea.
Foundations of the theory
Near the beach of Ein Jedi Spa, they studied 3 layers of earth, on the basis of which geologists recognized that the seismic activity that coincided with the execution of Christ was most likely involved in “an earthquake that occurred before or slightly after the crucifixion.” This event was actually taken by the author of the Gospel of Matthew in order to indicate the epic nature of the dramatic moment. According to researchers, the described earthquake occurred around 26-36 years after the birth of Christ, and, apparently, was sufficient to change the layers near Ein Djedi, but clearly not so large-scale to prove that the Bible is talking about German
“The day Jesus Christ was crucified on the cross (Good Friday) is known with great accuracy, but as the year goes by, things get more complicated,” Williams said in an interview.
At the moment, the geologist is busy with an in-depth study of sandstorm deposits in layers of the earth that coincide in time with the beginning of a century of historical earthquakes near Jerusalem.
Date given in the Bible
Based on the Gospel, during the terrible torment and death of Jesus on the cross, an earthquake occurred and the sky turned black. Matthew, Mark and Luke write that the Son of God was executed on the 14th of the month of Nisan, but John indicates the 15th.
After studying the annual deposits near the Dead Sea and comparing these data with the Gospel, scientists came to the conclusion that April 3, 1033 AD can be considered a more accurate date when Jesus Christ was crucified. e. And they explained the darkness, which epically coincided with the mortal sigh of the Son of God, as a sandstorm caused by the activity of lithospheric plates.
Was there an eclipse?
According to the Biblical version, during the crucifixion of Christ, a total eclipse occurred, but did it happen? Since ancient times, scientists have been unable to determine whether it could have happened on the day, month and year when Jesus Christ was crucified.
In various artistic creations of great masters, the following scene is reflected - “the crucified Son of God hangs on the cross, his wounds are bleeding, and there is darkness all around - as if an eclipse had hidden the sun.”
The director of the Vatican Observatory, Guy Consolmagno, in his letter to RNS, Fr.
There are several answers to the question in what year Jesus Christ was crucified, but is there only one correct answer among them?
In three of the four Gospels, there are references to the fact that at the moment of the death of the only son of God, the sky darkened. One of them says, “Now it was about noon, and darkness fell over the land, and lasted about three hours, because the light of the sun had gone away”—Luke 23:44. And in the new Bible of the American edition this part is translated as: “due to a solar eclipse.” Which does not seem to change the meaning, but according to the Rev. James Kurzinski, a priest of the Roman Catholic Diocese of La Crosse, Wisconsin, attempts to explain everything with the help of science are nothing more than “a side effect of life in the modern era.”
He went on to say, “Everything in the Bible must have a natural explanation, and we are only now beginning to understand that.”
Even Newton tried to find out at what time Jesus Christ was crucified and whether an eclipse took place, but the question is still relevant.
The Holy Scripture explains that the execution of the Son of God on the cross fell on the day of the Jewish holiday of Passover, which is celebrated during the full moon in the spring. But for a solar eclipse, it is the new moon phase that is needed! And this is one of the inconsistencies of this theory. Moreover, the darkness that fell on the earth during the crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth was too long to be a simple eclipse of the sun, which lasts a couple of minutes. But if it was not complete, then it could well last up to three hours.
Moreover, people of that time had good knowledge of the movements of the moon and the sun, and they could accurately predict such a phenomenon as an eclipse. Therefore, the darkness that appeared during the crucifixion cannot be him.
When Jesus Christ was crucified. Opinions differ about the date and even the day of the week
The birth, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ are three events that continue to be debated. Scientists and Bible researchers have not come to a clear answer about the date when Christ was crucified and died, which has led to controversy regarding the day of celebration of one of the main events for Christians - the day of the Resurrection or Easter.
We have collected some of the most popular versions.
Version 1. March 23, 29
The Eastern Church believed that Christ was resurrected on March 25th. Thus, in the Constantinople list of consuls of 395 (Consularia Constantinopolitana ad A. CCCXCV) after the later date of the year - 29 AD. e. — and the names of the consuls Fufius Gemina and Rubellius Gemina have a postscript: “His conss. passus est Christus die X cal. Apr. et resurrexit VIII cal. easdem" (“Under these consuls, Christ suffered on the 10th day before the Kalends of April and rose again on the 8th day”), that is, Jesus allegedly suffered on the 23rd and rose again on March 25.
Version 2. April 3, 33
For a long time, scientists at the National Observatory of Romania, Liviu Mircea and Tiberiu Oproiu, studied the Bible. The New Testament states that Jesus died on the day after the first night of the full moon, after the vernal equinox. The Bible also tells us that a solar eclipse occurred during the crucifixion of Christ.
Based on this information, the help of calculated astrological programs was used. The movement of the planets between 26 and 35 AD shows that during these years the full moon occurred on the day after the spring equinox only twice. The first time was on Friday 7 April in 30 AD, and the second time was on 3 April 33 AD. It is easy to choose between these two dates, since the solar eclipse occurred in 33.
The resulting result can well be called a sensational discovery. If you believe the New Testament and the calculations of astronomers, then Jesus Christ died on Friday, April 3 at approximately three o'clock in the afternoon, and rose again on April 5 at four o'clock in the afternoon.
Evangelist Matthew noted that after the crucified Jesus, “crying out with a loud voice, gave up the ghost,” “the earth shook” (Matthew, 27: 50-51).
Geologists from the German Research Center for Geosciences regarded the words from the Bible as a direct indication of the earthquake. And they decided: if they determine exactly when this earthquake happened, they will establish the exact date of the death of Jesus Christ.
Scientists under the leadership of Jefferson Williams, who examined vast areas in the vicinity of the Dead Sea, undertook to determine. As a result, it turned out that about two thousand years ago there really was a very strong earthquake here. But the data varied - from 26 AD to 36 AD.
Next, geologists used the instructions found in the Bible. For example, the fact that the Son of God was crucified during the period of the procuratorate of Pontius Pilate. They crucified on Friday, the day after the first night of the full moon, after the spring equinox.
It also looked like there was a solar eclipse during the execution. At least Luke Fr. According to modern standards, darkness began around 12.00 and ended at 15.00.
Putting all the pieces of the puzzle together, scientists came to the conclusion: Jesus Christ died on the cross on Friday, April 3, 33 AD at approximately 15:00.
Version 3: 7 April 30
It is known for certain that Jesus died under the emperor Tiberius (14–37), during the governorship of Pontius Pilate (27–37) in Judea, on Friday (Matt. 27:62; Mark 15:42; Luke 23 :54; John 19:14,31).
However, already regarding the date of death of the Founder, we find burning contradictions in the Gospels: weather forecasters claim that Jesus was crucified after eating the Passover, that is, on the 15th of Nisan, and the fourth evangelist moves the date of death of the Founder a calendar day earlier.
However, according to the weather forecasters, it turns out that Jesus was tried and executed on the first day after Passover - the 15th of Nisan, which Jews were categorically forbidden to do according to the Law: on the first day of Passover “no work should be done” (Ex. 12:16; Lev. 23:7; Num.28:18; Deut.16:8). The arrest and trial of the Sanhedrin certainly fit the definition of work. In addition, Simon of Cyrene could not work in the field on Easter night and the following morning (Mark 15:21), for all work stopped before the Passover meal (Mishna. Pesachim 4:5). And Joseph of Arimathea could not buy funeral attributes (Mark 15:43-46) on the day when all trade was prohibited (Nehemiah 10:31). It should be remembered that, although executions were carried out before the holidays (Mishnah. Sanhedrin.11:4; Vav Talm. Sanhedrin.89a), on the holidays themselves, according to Jewish laws, executions were prohibited (Acts 12:3-4; Mishnah. Sanhedrin.4:1; cf. John 19:31).
Thus, we will have to discard the version of the weather forecasters, as well as Justin (Just.Dial.17,88,97,100,111), and accept as true that Jesus was crucified not on the 15th, but on the 14th of Nisan, especially since the Talmud states: Jesus died “ on the eve of Passover" (Vav Talm. Sanhedrin.43a, 67a).
Using calculations, it can be established that the 14th of Nisan (the day of the execution of Jesus) fell on a Friday only in the 26th (March 22), in the 33rd (April 3) and in the 36th (March 30) years.
Years 26 and 36 may have to be excluded. Firstly, because Pontius Pilate, in all likelihood, accepted the post of prefect either at the end of the 26th or in the 27th year (Jos.AJ.XVIII.2:2; cf. Luke 13:1). Secondly, because the governor of Syria, Vitellius, removed Pilate from office either at the end of the 36th or in the 37th year (Jos.AJ.XVIII.4: 2), but none of the New Testament writers timed this event to coincide with the death of Jesus , although I had an excellent opportunity for this.
Therefore, Eusebius’ entry in the Chronicle deserves attention that “Christ was crucified and resurrected in the 19th year of the reign of Tiberius, or in the 4th year of the 202nd Olympiad” - this year lasted from June 32 to June 33. Apparently, representatives of the modern Eastern Church tend to accept this date.
However, if we take April 3, 33, as the date of Jesus’ death, then what about the testimony of Quartus, who places the date of the Founder’s death in the period from 29 to 31? Even Tertius points to the year 30. Let us note that we can exclude the 28th year, to which the Aquitaine Bishop Victoria attributes the Resurrection, since the 15th of Nisan this year fell on Tuesday (March 30). The 29th year, as stated above, also could not have been the year of Jesus' death. But the 30th year deserves our attention.
We have already noted above that the Jewish calendar did not have a certain accuracy. Only in the period between 450 and 550. n. e. a calendar was developed that did not depend on the visibility conditions of the new Moon, but was based solely on calculations. And as a result of this reform, there was a shift in the first numbers of the calendar from neomenia to conjunction; as a result, the 15th of Nisan became the day of the full moon, and not the day following it.
The true full moon in Nisan 30 fell on Thursday, April 6, at 22:31 Jerusalem time. And since the date of Easter at that time was established through direct observations, it could be moved to Saturday, April 8. More precisely, in the year 30, the Easter holiday could begin on the evening (after approximately 18 hours of our time) of Friday, April 7. In addition, it is interesting to note that, following the instructions of the Torah on sacrifices and prohibitions on working - including cooking - on Shabbat and holidays, from the time the calculation calendar was developed to this day, the holiday of Passover has been moved from Monday, Wednesday and Friday to the next day .
Thus, we can assume that Jesus died on April 7, 30 at about 3 o'clock in the afternoon - about the ninth hour in Jewish time (Matt. 27:46; Mark 15:34; Luke 23:44).
Version 4: Was it Friday?
Evangelists say it's Friday. But then, if Christ was crucified on Friday and laid in the tomb at the last rays of the sun, and he rose again on Sunday early at dawn, then it turns out that He was in the tomb for about 40 hours, i.e. a little over a day and a half. But we are talking about three days and three nights. Christ himself said this: “The Son of Man will be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights” (Matthew 12:40). How can such a discrepancy be explained?
If you count Friday evening, full Saturday and the beginning of Sunday, you can call it three days. It really could have been that way. Moreover, the words of Jesus about Himself: “... And on the third day he will rise again” (Matthew 20:19) or the phrase of the disciples returning to Emmaus: “... It is now the third day since these things happened” (Luke 24:21) - can point to Friday as the day of death.
But there is one “but” - two instead of three nights. If Christ was crucified on Friday, He could not have been “in the heart of the earth” for three nights. Only two. Of course, if we call the darkness that enveloped Jerusalem for three hours on the day of the execution of Jesus Christ night, then we will have three days and three nights. Maybe so, but I don't believe it. After all, Christ was not in the grave during this terrible sign. Moreover, He was still alive (Matt. 27:45-50). So the version of replacing the missing night with three-hour darkness seems far-fetched.
There is another option, it is suitable for those who are fond of allegorical interpretations. The third night is the period from the death of Christ on the cross until the resurrection of all dead believers. The chain of thought is something like this: believers are the Body of Christ, but believers die, so the resurrection began, but did not end, but will end with the resurrection of all believers, and then the phrase “three nights” will be put to rest.
For myself, I draw an intermediate conclusion. Either the phrase “three days and three nights” should not be taken literally, but should be treated as a kind of phraseological turn of phrase, or Christ was crucified not on Friday, but on Thursday.
Version 5: It was Thursday
The Thursday argument basically argues that too many events (some as many as twenty of them) happened between Christ's funeral and Sunday morning to have happened since Friday evening. They point out that this is especially important since the only full day between Friday and Sunday was Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath. An extra day or two eliminates this problem. As proof, Thursday’s defenders cite the following example: “Imagine that you haven’t seen your friend since Monday evening. The next time you saw him was Thursday morning, and then you can say, “I haven’t seen you in three days,” even though technically 60 hours (2.5 days) have passed.” If Jesus was crucified on Thursday, then this example helps explain why this period could be perceived as three days.
Version 6: It was Wednesday
Proponents of the Wednesday crucifixion claim that there were two Sabbaths that week. After the first (the one that came on the evening of the crucifixion - Mark 15:42; Luke 23:52-54) the women bought incense - note that they made their purchase after the Sabbath (Mark 16:1). According to this view, this Sabbath was the Passover (Leviticus 16:29-31; 23:24-32, 39, where holy days that did not necessarily fall on the seventh day of the week, the Sabbath, are called Sabbaths). The second Sabbath that week was the regular, “weekly” Sabbath. Note that in Luke 23:56, the women who bought the spices after the first Sabbath returned and prepared them, and then “were left alone on the Sabbath.” This shows that they could not purchase incense after the Sabbath, or prepare it before the Sabbath - unless there were two Sabbaths at that time. From the perspective of the two Sabbath view, if Christ was crucified on Thursday, then Easter should have begun on Thursday after sunset and ended on Friday evening - at the beginning of the usual Saturday. Buying incense after the first Sabbath (Passover) would then mean that they bought it on the second Sabbath and broke the commandment.
Thus, this view notes that the only explanation that does not refute the reports of women and incense, and also supports the literal understanding of the text in Matthew 12:40, is that Christ was crucified on Wednesday.
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What if there was a lunar eclipse?
John Dvorak wrote in his book that Easter was just the right phase of the moon for an eclipse, and at that moment it could well have happened.
In search of an answer to the question of what year Jesus Christ was crucified, the date seems to be clear - it is the year 33, the 3rd day of April, but modern scientists do not agree with this theory, putting forward their own. And this is the problem with the lunar theory, because if an eclipse took place, then it should have been noticed in Jerusalem, but there is no mention of this anywhere. Which is strange to say the least. Dvorak suggested that people simply knew about the upcoming eclipse, which for some reason did not happen. In any case, there is no evidence for this theory yet.
The Torn Out Years of Jesus
Author: Ilya Nosyrev
Where was Christ between birth and crucifixion? Why doesn't the Bible tell where the Son of Man spent most of his life?
The greatest of the world's religious teachers left an unprecedented mark on history: in his name wars were declared and peace was concluded, for his sake people went into the flames of the fire and to the scaffold, renounced their beloved women, preferring to them a secluded cell in the desert. Isn't it strange that we know so little about his life? The Gospels tell mainly about his birth and the four years that preceded his death. But what did Jesus do between approximately fourteen and thirty years of age? Where did he get the ideas that led him to worldwide fame, who did he study with, where did he hone his gift as a preacher? Maybe these were the “snatched years,” as they say in Odessa about difficult years that are better forgotten?
Light from the East
“A simple Soviet boy, the son of a carpenter and joiner”... It’s as if these words were written about Christ. It seems surprising that this man, who most likely was a carpenter by profession (in ancient Jewish society, a son inherited his father’s craft), could himself create a teaching that conquered half the world. Of course, Christ’s sermons did not grow out of nowhere - seven hundred years before his birth, Isaiah said much of what he said. In the speeches of Jesus one can also hear an echo of texts created by the Essenes - Jewish sectarians who lived in the desert in anticipation of the apocalyptic battle between Light and Darkness. And yet, the teaching of Christ is very different from everything that has already been heard in the Promised Land. If we look for its roots, it will probably be somewhere in other countries.
The Bible even speaks sparingly about the childhood of the Savior. Was the wonderful youth really planing boards with a plane? In the apocrypha, created a hundred years after the crucifixion of Jesus, called “The Gospel of Childhood,” the early years of the Son of Man are described in more detail, but somehow strangely: they say that at the age of five Jesus played at the ford, collecting water in puddles and sculpting sparrows from clay. It was Saturday, a day on which the Torah forbids, among many other things, the creation of images. The neighbors immediately complained to Jesus' father Joseph, who ran to the river and began to scold his son. Then Jesus said to the sparrows: “Fly!” - and they flew into the air. It was then that the neighbors realized that they had not messed with an ordinary boy, and they were even more frightened when another child, out of hooligan motives, spilled the water that Jesus was collecting in puddles, and he cursed him for this so that the poor fellow dried up on the spot. And he said to another boy who pushed him: “You won’t go anywhere further,” and he fell and died.
Wait, are we talking about the same person? This is not Christ, but, God forgive me, Damien from “Omen”! True, he later resurrected all the victims - and yet a residue remained: it is impossible to believe that this is really the Jesus we are accustomed to imagine. In addition, this apocryphal gospel is overloaded with miracles, and actually about the life of “a curly-haired Jewish baby, who - later - was brought to Golgotha by his quarrelsome and restless character” (we thank Anatoly Mariengof for this description), there is almost nothing to learn from there.
"Holy Family" Indian miniature. 17th century
Even in the Middle Ages, thinkers puzzled over this amazing silence of the Bible about the “snatched years” of Christ.
It seemed logical to explain that at that time he was living somewhere outside of Judea. Maybe in Egypt, where his parents took him? However, when Europeans became acquainted with Indian culture, a different version appeared: it was difficult not to notice that the life of Christ is surprisingly similar to the biography of another Hindu god, Krishna. So similar that it seems as if we are talking about the same person: both Krishna’s mother is the immaculate Devaki (without losing her purity, she gave birth to eight more brothers for Krishna, but let’s attribute this episode to the poverty of imagination of Bollywood scriptwriters), and Krishna’s uncle, who was predicted that his nephew would deprive him of the throne, organized a massacre of infants in the kingdom, and Krishna himself drove out the demons, and raised the dead, and he died nailed by an arrow to a tree. I washed my students’ feet too! Isn't it a striking resemblance? The same amazing coincidences were found between the lives of Christ and Buddha. And their moralistic teachings looked like twins. Didn’t the Savior study somewhere in India? This would explain everything at once: it was there that he could glean most of his humanistic ideas. But this was only a hypothesis - without facts it was worth no more than the story of Christ’s visit to Britain, which is found in the legends of the Knights of the Round Table.
“Most Hindus have no problem regarding Christ as a god: they are ready to accept him as another avatar of Vishnu.”
However, in 1887, this version received the most thorough confirmation. A book was published in Paris by the Russian traveler Notovich, who allegedly discovered manuscripts in Tibet indicating that Christ visited here. Moreover, the manuscripts stated, he even lived here most of his life.
Rehearsal of the crucifixion
Nikolai Notovich is a bright personality: long before Alexander Rosenbaum, he managed to combine the incompatible in himself - he was a Jewish Cossack. In his youth he was baptized into Orthodoxy, and later served in the cavalry, gaining fame as a grunt and even an aristocrat. After his resignation, he became one of the pioneers of what we would call socio-political journalism - he published the newspapers “Financial Review”, “Evening Courier” and “Golos”. He wrote a series of patriotic books on foreign policy issues. He traveled a lot in the countries of the East, in particular, he tried to scout out a safe land route to India, which would help Russia win the fight with England for control of Central Asia.
Chinese scroll
Notovich was no more interested in Christ than in France’s position on the Ottoman issue; he made his discovery by accident. After the Russian-Turkish War in 1878, he went to India - and got all the way to Ladakh, to the very foot of the Himalayas. In one of the Buddhist monasteries, Notovich got into a conversation with the abbot about Christianity - and suddenly learned that the name of Christ is known here not only thanks to missionaries from Europe. The monasteries of Tibet contain ancient records relating to the life of “Saint Issa, the best of the sons of men.” It turns out that Christ personally visited these places, and not just as a tourist: here he became acquainted with local religions and preached himself. What he heard made his head spin: Notovich decided to see these scrolls at any cost. He was drawn to this mountainous country by legends about its monasteries, which kept their secrets in the shadows of silent masses, among snow and ice, under an eternally gray sky like lead. Was it not the same curiosity that forced Jesus to leave his homeland?
…By the time Jesus turned thirteen—the legal age to seek a wife—he was known as the first student of the religious school and a brilliant preacher. The house of his parents, who lived by modest labor, began to be visited by rich people who wanted to see him as their son-in-law. However, instead of pleasing his father and mother with a marriage to a prominent bride, Jesus decided to see the world: he headed to the Indus. As the gospel found by Notovich stated, “he wanted to study the laws of the great Buddhas” - Indian ascetics who achieved enlightenment.
“Some Buddhist thinkers believe that on the cross Jesus achieved complete renunciation and went straight to nirvana.”
How could a Jewish youth know about some Buddhas? Wasn't the ancient world tens of times larger than ours? Now you can board a plane and fly from Moscow to Tibet in a few hours. And why fly if you can read the latest sermon of the Dalai Lama on the Internet? However, they heard about Buddhism in Judea: hundreds of years ago, preachers arrived here from India and debated with Hellenic philosophers. The cultural ties between East and West in ancient times were sometimes so strong that it is sometimes difficult to draw the line between one religion and another. Let us give just one example: on December 2, the Orthodox Church honors the memory of Saint Josaphat (Josaphat), an Indian prince, whose righteous life is told by John of Damascus. But few people know that Jehoshaphat is a distorted “bodhisattva,” and the life of the prince conveys in detail the biography of the Buddha, stories about whom in ancient times came to the Middle East. This is how the Perfect One acquired the title of saint in Orthodoxy.
"Hosanna". Laura James. 1995
A year after Jesus left Judea, he forded the Indus and settled among the “Aryans.” The rumor about the talented teenager spread throughout the surrounding villages, and the Jains, Indian ascetics, wanted to have him as their student. True, Jesus flatly refused to study with them: they demanded too monstrous forms of renunciation from the world. Instead of shaving their heads, they preferred to pull out hair by hair in order to learn to despise pain. They walked naked and did not eat for days, refusing even to beg. Suicide was considered a good way to end one’s life: the soldiers of Alexander the Great were once delighted by the fearlessness of the Jain Kalan, who voluntarily climbed onto the fire to rid the soul of its decaying shell. But their asceticism seemed senseless to Christ, and he set off to wander through Indian cities.
After what he saw here, social inequality in Judea should have seemed like a light version to him: in his homeland, the rich talked to the poor through clenched teeth, but here people from different castes sometimes could not even look at each other. And even the very last Shudra servant had those whom he himself could despise - the “untouchables” who were engaged in burying dead bodies and cleaning latrines. The Brahmin priests and Kshatriya warriors were offended by his democracy: the boy shunned the society of the nobles, preferring to associate with the lower classes - with Vaishya traders and Shudras, considering them equal to himself. “Only death will free them from slavery,” the Brahmins admonished him. God the Father, Jesus said, makes no distinction between His children: “On the day of the final judgment, the Shudras and Vaishyas will be forgiven much for their ignorance; on the contrary, the wrath of God will punish those who have arrogated His rights to themselves.”
“The most ardent Christians in Africa are Copts, descendants of the ancient Egyptians: on some frescoes, Jesus looks like Osiris giving eternal life”
And Jesus did not believe in their gods: he said that God had no need to play with toys, incarnating himself in all sorts of Vishnu and Shiva. He created the world alone and did not share his power with any living creature. At times, the priests whom he criticized directly begged him: perform a miracle - and we will believe you. At least destroy the stone idols for whose worship you blame us. Christ responded with a proposal to the proposal: no, if they are really powerful, let them strike me down on the spot. The priests left unsalted and, like their colleagues later in Judea, began to look for an opportunity to capture Jesus, but he, warned by the poor of the danger, left this land and went to Nepal, where Buddha was once born.
On a slippery slope
Unlike the canonical Gospels, there are no miracles in the Tibetan treatise published by Notovich: Jesus does not raise the dead or cast out demons. This gives the text a spirit of realism: you read and seem to see everything with your own eyes. So Jesus sits down between his disciples, as black as a tree, tries for a while to assume the lotus position, and then waves his hand: down with show, because the Spirit gives life, and the flesh is of no use. His sermons are passionate and understandable to these half-beggars, dressed in simple pieces of cloth: “A man humiliates the working people by the sweat of his brow, currying favor with the idler sitting at a magnificent table.” How familiar this is even now, two millennia later!
“Christ died not to save people, but to teach them to save each other”
Oscar Wilde
...For Russian people at that time, few places on earth were as inaccessible as Tibet, and yet Notovich decided. I took a train to Rawalpindi and, accompanied by a servant, the black Philip, and several Indian guides, began climbing the mountains. What motivated him? Hardly the usual journalistic curiosity. Probably, a man who tried on so many masks - a Cossack, a patriot, a brave journalist - felt that he had touched something truly real. And if Christ himself wanted to become something more than an experienced carpenter, then Notovich wanted to go down in history as more than just a fearless cavalryman. There was another reason, but we will save it until the end of the story.
"Holy Family" (fragment). Japanese school. 20th century
In the mountain village of Notovich, for a lot of money, he bought a local tarantass - like a round table on wheels, on which one could travel with some convenience: however, due to the lack of a backrest, the rider every now and then risked sliding off the “table top” straight into the abyss. The prudent British built a network of small hotels along the roads, the comfort in which, however, was very relative - Notovich sat awake all night long, as scorpions and centipedes ran rustling along the clay walls. The nature of this country seemed to take revenge on him for his desire to penetrate its heart and steal its great secret. Rocking on his tarantass, under the scorching sun, brushing aside the midges, he closed his eyes - and he imagined Jesus wandering along narrow paths among the mountains, to the cells where, like termites, monks nested, monotonously muttering their incomprehensible words. The future Messiah spent six years in Buddhist monasteries, studying the sacred sutras, mastering the Pali language perfectly, and then descended to the Rajputana valley and began to teach people again. He hardly left the monks without conflict: in his sermons he denied the key principle of reincarnation for all Indian religions. “He will never humiliate His child by forcing his soul to move, as in purgatory, into the body of an animal,” he said about God. A new reality was opening up before the amazed Hindus: the slumbering world would soon be awakened by heavenly thunder, the mountains would collapse into the abyss and there would be nowhere to hide from the sight of the Lord. Huge India, tossing and turning, woke up, and Christ, feeling that here he had already learned everything he wanted and did everything he could, decided to return to his homeland.
...After a short rest in Kashmir, Notovich’s expedition moved further into the mountains. As people walked in the dark along a narrow path between old fir and birch trees, the silence of the forest was broken by a terrible howl. A torch flashed in the darkness, and Notovich saw the eyes of a panther, which was gnawing on the body of one of the servants. Notovich raised his hard drive. The beast growled, about to jump on him, but suddenly changed its mind and dived into the thicket.
"Christ leaves his mother." Albrecht Altdorfer. 1520
If Notovich were inclined towards mysticism, he would see a symbol in this bloodthirsty beast: after all, this is the name - Panther - given by the malicious author of the Talmudic commentary to the Syrian soldier who was supposedly the father of Jesus. They also tried to feed Christ to wild animals: when he came to Persia, the priests did not like his preaching. Jesus did not order the inhabitants to worship the sun and fire: to speak with the Lord, no intermediaries are needed, he assured. The elders were afraid to arrest him in front of the people, however, when night fell, they grabbed him and pushed him out of the gate - they hoped that he would become an easy prey for tigers and jackals. However, Christ did not die - he reached Judea on foot and began to preach in his homeland.
The canonical Gospels are silent about the content of the speeches that he delivered at this time, but the Tibetan treatises are striking: it turns out that he convinced his compatriots to respect women - the years spent in Buddhist communities, where the daughters of Eve could occupy an important position, were not in vain. “Honor the woman, for she is the mother of the universe, and all the truth of divine creation is contained in her,” said Jesus. - Her love ennobles a man, softens his hard heart, tames the beast and makes him a lamb. Do not humiliate her, by doing this you will only humiliate yourself and lose that feeling of love, without which nothing exists here below. Whatever you do for your wife, your mother, a widow or any other grieving woman, you will do for God.” Where did all these thoughts go in medieval European Christianity, where a woman was called nothing more than a “vessel of evil”? God knows.
Jesus Was Here
"Mary and Jesus". Laura James. 1991
Here they are finally - the legendary monasteries of Tibet. Notovich was slightly disappointed: the monks turned out to be simple people, without a shadow of any mystery. The lama, whom the travelers visited first, treated the guests to local beer - chang, the frequent use of which made a person obese, which was considered a sign of heaven's favor. He complained about Muslims who forcibly converted his flock to their faith, and said that Buddhism has and cannot have anything in common with Islam. Christianity is another matter: after all, it is just a variety of Buddhism. When Notovich began to argue, the lama told him the story of Jesus: “Issa is a great prophet, one of the first after the twenty-two Buddhas. He is greater than any of all the Dalai Lamas. It was he who enlightened you and returned the souls of the lost to the fold of religion.” It turned out that Jesus merely brought the teachings of Buddha to the European peoples, which they were not slow to distort. It was for this task that he was born again to a woman from Galilee. To prove that he was right, the lama mentioned ancient scrolls, copies of which are kept in many monasteries in Tibet. True, he himself does not have a single copy, but every child here knows about them.
Notovich was determined to see these treatises with his own eyes, even if for this he would have to visit every monastery in Tibet. For this, he had to cross several high mountain passes and visit ten more monasteries. In each, the same story was repeated - they knew about “Issa” here, too, but they could not show any evidence of his presence in India. Desperate, Notovich stopped to rest near the large Hemis monastery in Ladakh. Here they were preparing for the holiday, and the traveler decided to attend a costume performance - to the mournful sounds of trumpets, twenty people dressed as devils and monsters fought with the “gods” in white and gold robes. Tired of the performance to the point of ripples in his eyes, Notovich went out onto the terrace and sat down opposite Lama Hemis, whose eyes shone with intelligence and kindness.
“Spas” (fragment of a triptych). N. Goncharov. 1910-1911
How strange, the traveler told him, Buddhism strives to get rid of the external, but here there are so many colors and colors... This is exactly what these ideas are for, the lama explained. A person is always looking for something that is accessible to his senses. The Egyptians idolized animals, trees and stones, the Assyrians deified the stars, but only a select few managed to free themselves from the bonds of images that connect us with reality. Notovich skillfully directed the conversation to the chosen one he needed. “The name of Issa is highly respected by Buddhists,” replied the lama. - But people mostly don’t know about its very existence. Only the high lamas who studied the documents about his life know something about him.” And then he said what Notovich had been wanting to hear for many weeks: in his monastery there are copies of scrolls written about the life of Jesus.
The abbot did not want to continue the conversation. He apologized, saying that it was time for him to return to his rituals. Relations between Russia and England were tense, and Notovich was also known to the British colonial administration as a man who compiled a detailed map of Indian roads and rivers. Realizing that if he began to show interest in the monastery library, he would immediately be expelled from the country as a spy, Notovich reluctantly decided to leave empty-handed. And then chance helped him. Moreover, it was an accident: having rode very close to the monastery, he fell off his horse and broke his leg. It’s hard to believe that this was just a coincidence, and he was an excellent rider - probably the traveler already realized that spiritual knowledge cannot be obtained without damage to mortal flesh. Be that as it may, the compassionate monks could not leave him in trouble and provided first aid. In the few days during which he stayed at the monastery, Notovich managed to convince them that his interest was purely scientific in nature. Yielding to his requests, the lama brought two large bound volumes with pages yellowed with age and began to read Issa’s biography in Tibetan. Notovich wrote down the translation in a notebook, which was done by an interpreter present at the scene. The records about the life of Jesus were scattered: the traveler himself built them into something like a plot. How many secrets he learned! Even the end of Jesus' earthly life was depicted differently in the Tibetan Gospel. It turns out that it was not the Jewish priests, but the ruthless functionary Pilate who wanted his death - Caiaphas, who sympathized with the ideas of Christ, could only wash his hands, the Tibetan text assured.
"The Blessed Virgin Mary and Child." 17th century
When Notovich, having arrived in Europe, showed his French translation of the text to the famous author of “The Life of Jesus” Ernest Renan, his eyes lit up: give me your manuscripts, I will make a report on them! But the traveler was afraid that the old man would take all the glory of the discoverer for himself, and published them himself. Everyone to whom he told about this idea recoiled from him like a leper: the Monk Plato, Metropolitan of Kiev, and one of the cardinals of the Roman Church warned him about the undesirability of the publication, and one of the cardinals of the Roman Church, who said that he was leading those of little faith into temptation. When a book called “The Unknown Years of Jesus” was published in Paris, it had the effect of a bomb exploding. They started talking about Notovich. True, instead of the honors due to discoverers, the glory of a forger awaited him! The leading Indologist of the time, Max Müller, ridiculed his gullibility, suggesting that cunning Tibetan lamas had taken advantage of the "great white lady's" interest in exotic secrets. Less scrupulous critics accused Notovich of not having been to any Tibet - some lady traveler sent a letter directly from there that she had not seen him there.
Notovich tried to defend himself, but he had no authority in historical circles - some kind of Cossack, a paper maker and, according to rumors, also a spy! The Pope included his work in the “Index of Forbidden Books,” and historians years later cited this work as an example of a mediocre forgery of ancient texts. True, in certain circles his book gained real popularity. She was raised on a shield by Blavatsky’s disciples, who were equally happy to talk about Christ in India and about the Martians. Notovich himself was not happy about the privatization of his ideas by the mystics, but he could not do anything: in 1908, there was even a sequel to his book called “The Gospel of the Age of Aquarius,” written by the American preacher Levi Dowling. The author confirmed: yes, Christ was in India - he received reliable information about this... during a spiritualistic seance. Notovich no longer found out that in 1925 the correctness of his words was confirmed by Nicholas Roerich, who reached Hemis and heard the legend about “Issa” from the monks. True, Roerich himself was a mystic and did not disdain the same spiritualistic seances. And only a hundred years later historians began to agree that the “Tibetan Gospel” is an authentic text. But more on that later.
It didn't end with a cross
"Nativity". Hans Leonard Schaufelein. Early 16th century
This would be the end of the tale, but, as it turned out, Notovich was not the only one who was looking for materials about the unknown years of Christ: a publicist appeared in the Muslim East claiming that Christ visited India twice - the first time before the crucifixion, and the second... after. The fact that he did not die on the cross was not news for Muslims: after all, the Koran says that instead of Christ, God gave a ghost to be crucified, and saved Jesus himself from execution, which was considered shameful among the Romans, by taking him alive to heaven. However, the Indian Muslim Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, who wrote the treatise “Jesus in India” in 1899, denied this miraculous end and argued that the life of an ordinary person awaited Jesus: together with his mother, Mary Magdalene and several disciples, he went to Asia and lived there to old age. years old, and was buried in Kashgar. Where his grave still exists to this day.
Here is how it was. On the day when Jesus was crucified, Judea was shaken by an underground shock - the Bible also mentions this. The earthquake caused general confusion - onlookers watching the execution ran to check their houses: whether the roof had collapsed, whether thieves had climbed through the cracked walls... In this confusion, everyone forgot about Christ: the guards quickly removed his body from the cross, being sure that the man who called himself as the king of Judah, already dead, and, laying him on the ground, went to their families. Meanwhile, the women standing at the cross, the mother of Jesus and Mary Magdalene, noticed that he was still breathing, and with the help of the apostles they carried him into the house. Then they brought a doctor to him, thanks to whom Christ woke up a few days later, and a month later he stood on his feet. Then Mary and his admirers put him in a cart and went away from this God-forsaken country - to the eastern borders, to places that he already knew well. Through Syria and Afghanistan they came to Kashgar, converting an entire Afghan tribe to the true faith along the way. In Kashgar, Jesus found a local wife and within a few years became the father of a large family.
Critics immediately attacked Ahmad with accusations of selfishness: they say that by denying the miraculous ascension of Jesus, he wants to split Islam and distract Muslims from the fight against the British enslavers of their region. And indeed, a whole sect soon gathered around Mirza Ghulam. Orthodox Muslims were also outraged by the fact that he called for abandoning the words of the Koran about the need to kill apostates, and interpreting jihad allegorically, not as a war against infidels, but as a struggle with one’s own passions. At the same time, Ahmad argued that Islam gets along well with scientific doctrines, even with Darwinism. For that time his teaching was too bold.
Be that as it may, Ahmad did not invent a story about the life of Christ in India, but relied on many writings of Arab historians. Their works featured Yuz Asaf, a mysterious ascetic who in time immemorial came to Kashgar from afar and was nicknamed here “the shepherd who teaches.” He taught, however, a little different from what the biblical Christ preached: he no longer promised his listeners an imminent Last Judgment, but only called on them to be kinder to each other and not to be mean. He healed the suffering with his hands, taught his skills to children. He lived to be 125 years old and was buried in Kashgar as an ordinary mortal. Mirza Ghulam claimed that he personally saw his grave in this city.
“Today no one would crucify Christ. They would have invited him to dinner, listened to him and laughed heartily.”
Thomas Carlyle
In the 80s of the last century, the Indian scientist Fida Hassnain confirmed many of Ahmad’s conclusions - he personally went to Kashgar and made sure that the grave he wrote about existed. The dark-skinned guardian of the mausoleum, the good-natured and quiet bespectacled Sahibzada Basharam Salim, was very polite and told us that he was a direct descendant of Jesus. He doesn’t encourage people to believe in themselves and doesn’t strive for publicity; he doesn’t care: the truth won’t change because of it. He didn’t let the scientist into the mausoleum, just as he didn’t let in any of those who, having read the books of Mirza Ghulam and Hassnain, tried to get there. Having said goodbye to Salim, who saw him off with a meek smile on his lips, the upset Hassnain walked along the rocky road from the mausoleum and imagined how right on this slope two thousand years ago an old man, brown from the sun, sat, looked from under swollen eyelids at the sun red from dust and remembered native Judea, where I saw so much injustice. Did he know that for about a hundred years he had been revered there as God?
Great mystery
Modern historians have a complex attitude towards the “Tibetan Gospel”: no, it was definitely not a forgery created by Notovich. This text, written in Pali, was indeed preserved in the monasteries of India for hundreds of years. And yet, its connection with the historical Christ is not direct, but indirect: historians believe that it was written 700-800 years after his death by Nestorian heretics who moved to India to introduce the local residents to the Good News. By the way, it is precisely the stamp of Nestorian ideas that lies on this text that is the main proof that Notovich did not lie: he simply could not understand Nestorianism so well as to accurately reproduce in his text the typical features of this teaching - for example, the idea that in In Christ, two natures constantly fought - divine and human.
And even less can the texts that depict his miraculous salvation after the cross tell us about Jesus. No, an ascetic named Yuz Asaf really existed, and perhaps it was he who was buried in that grave, but Yuz Asaf is not Christ, but... another acquaintance of ours: this is how the Arab writers conveyed the word “bodhisattva”, which we have already encountered in stories about Jehoshaphat. In other words, we are not even talking about the Buddha himself, but about one of his countless followers, many of whom received the title “Bodhisattva”.
"Holy Family" P. Filonov. 1914
But let's not forget that skepticism is a natural and commendable quality of a historian. But people outside the scientific community jumped at the hypothesis of the life of Christ in India with joy. Why did both Notovich and Ahmad so stubbornly defend the veracity of this story? Why did thousands of people around the world fiercely support their rightness? Why did people like Roerich or Blavatsky, who had a great influence on the minds of their contemporaries, want to believe in this legend? We will understand this when we remember in what era this version became popular. Then, at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries, the world, woven like a patchwork quilt from different peoples, faiths and classes, was bursting at the seams, each pulling it in its own direction. Europe suddenly realized that the inhabitants of the colonies, which it treated as a means of its enrichment, were also people - like those Vaishyas and Shudras whom the legendary Jesus protected. The peoples of the world declared their right to exist, but were faced with the fact that even their closest neighbors denied them this right.
Russian Jew Notovich, who with all his soul wanted to be a patriot of the Russian Empire, but could not help but feel that his homeland was being torn apart by contradictions... Another quarter of a century, and it would fall apart into commissars and White Guards, people's defenders and enemies of the people, ours and yours.
When and where did he die? You can sit in the library for a month, scour the archives - and still you won’t find how his own story ended: the storm of the First World War and the Civil War that followed it, the years of Soviet rewriting of the past destroyed the memory of the man who lived on the eve of these hurricane trials. Indian Muslim Mirza Ghulam, who lived in a land that half a century later would declare itself Pakistan and fight to the death with the country of which he had recently been a part... These people felt that the world in which they lived would soon fall apart, like a clay pot thrown to the ground . And they were looking for an opportunity to reconcile East and West, warring religions and tribes taking up arms against each other. Jesus, who studied in India, preached in Persia and Afghanistan, understood in Asia as well as in Europe, turned out to be the best symbol for this reconciliation. And they would believe in him, even if they had no evidence at all. But their warnings were not heeded, their wishes were not fulfilled. And there, far in the legendary past, in the mythical Kashgar, the wrinkled old man Jesus closed his teary eyes so as not to look any more at this world, which never became kinder. photo: BRIDGEMAN/FOTODOM; AKG/EAST NEWS; EPA/TASS; FAI/LEGION-MEDIA
Christian theory
Holy Father Kurzynski suggests that the darkness could have come due to unusually dense clouds, although he does not abandon the thought that this is only “a beautiful metaphor used to express the epicness of the moment.”
Believers see this as a manifestation of a miracle revealed by the Lord God himself, so that people would understand what they had done.
“Darkness is a sure sign of God’s judgment!” says evangelist Anne Graham Lotz. Christians firmly believe that Jesus died for all people, taking upon himself what was due to damned sinners.
Anne Lotz also noted other references to extraordinary darkness in the Bible, referring to the darkness that fell over Egypt, described in Exodus. This was one of the 10 disasters that God brought upon the Egyptians to convince Pharaoh to give freedom to the Hebrew slaves. The prophet Joel also predicted that the day would turn into night, and the moon would fill with blood at the hour of the Lord.
She also said: “This is a sign of the absence of God and complete condemnation, and until we get to heaven we will not know the truth.”
Fomenko's theory
Quite popular today is the theory proposed by several scientists from Moscow State University, based on which the history of mankind was completely different, and not as we are used to knowing it; it was more compressed in time. According to it, many historical events and characters were only phantoms (doubles) of others who existed earlier. G. Nosovsky, A. T. Fomenko and their colleagues established completely different dates for such events as the compilation of the star catalog “Algamestes” by Claudius Ptolemy, the construction of the Council of Nicaea, and the year in which Jesus Christ was crucified. And if you believe their theory, you can see a completely different picture of the existence of the world. It goes without saying that the assumptions of Moscow scientists require analysis and clarification, just like everyone else.
Gospel about the age of the disciples
The Lord calls the Zebedee brothers with the nickname Boanerges - “sons of thunder” (Mark 3:17). This is more suitable for desperate young men, and not for serious fathers of families. And the mother’s request for places of honor in the Kingdom of God for James and John (Matthew 20:20-21) is appropriate for young guys. Mature men would take care of themselves in a society where women are in second place.
The Apostle Peter had a wife, but the behavior and impulsiveness with which he is depicted in Scripture are the properties of youth. Peter leaves the boat with the catch to follow Christ, rushes to the Teacher who walks on the water. Illuminated by the light of Tabor, he is ready to build tabernacles, and while defending Jesus, he cuts off the ear of the guard.
The Gospel tells how the Lord calls the pious young man to “follow him” (Matthew 19:16-22). Jesus offers the position of disciple not to a respectable, wealthy man, but to a young man. After all, the path of unrest and danger that lies ahead for the apostles is more suitable for young people.
Sacred Tradition says: the death of the apostles , still quite strong and energetic people, occurred 30-40 years after the crucifixion of Christ . Thus, the Apostle Peter held the post of Bishop of Rome for more than twenty years and was crucified during the persecutions of Nero in 64-68 of the first century.
Apostle Andrew was captured and crucified in Patras in the 70s. The Apostle Philip was martyred in 87 during the reign of Emperor Domitian. It turns out: the apostles at the time of Christ’s crucifixion were no more than 20-30 years old . And on icons it is more correct to depict them as young, strong guys, ready to follow Christ with all the energy of youth.
Fomenko's innovative calculations
To establish the newest date of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, scientists have invented two ways to find out:
- Using “Sunday calendar conditions”;
- According to astronomical data.
If you believe the first method, then the date of the crucifixion falls on the year 1095 from the Nativity of Christ, but the second indicates the date - 1086.
How was the first date derived? It was obtained in accordance with “calendar conditions” borrowed from the manuscript of Matthew Blastar, a Byzantine chronicler of the 14th century. Here is a fragment of the recording: “The Lord suffered for the salvation of our souls in 5539, when the circle of the sun was 23, the moon was 10, and the Jewish Passover was celebrated on Saturday, March 24. And on the coming Sunday (March 25), Christ was resurrected. The Jewish holiday was celebrated during the equinox on the 14th lunar day (i.e., full moon) from March 21 to April 18, but the current Easter is celebrated on the following Sunday.”
Based on this text, scientists applied the following “resurrection conditions”:
- Circle of the sun 23.
- Circle of the moon 10.
- Jewish Passover, celebrated on March 24.
- Christ rose again on the 25th, Sunday.
The necessary data was entered into a computer, which, using a specially developed program, produced the date 1095 AD. e. Moreover, the year corresponding to Sunday, which occurred on March 25, was calculated according to the Orthodox Easter.
As is known, science and the church have always had a difficult relationship. But the warring parties made a compromise. At the end of the 14th century, an unspoken agreement was concluded: knowledge is under the jurisdiction of science, and moral values are given to religion.
Common sense imperatively dictates that science and religion must stick together, otherwise a person will never “get to the bottom” of the truth. But our knowledge is still very, very limited. So we still don’t know when the founder of the Christian religion, Jesus, was born? How old was she at the time of crucifixion? Why did he die?
When was the Messiah born?
In any scientific discipline, as is known, proof is decisive. Meanwhile, history as a scientific discipline, due to subjective and objective reasons, still stands apart. Despite this, the need for evidence in history has always been felt. However, how can this problem be practically solved? How can we eliminate the possibility of various types of falsifications? There is a way out of a seemingly deadlock situation. History must actively apply the achievements of other sciences. With this in mind, let's get down to business.
So, no one knows exactly when Jesus was born. For a long time, Bible scholars, trying to determine the date of birth of Jesus, reasoned as follows. He was born in Bethlehem no later than 4 BC, since the death of Herod the Great (1st century BC), during whose reign Jesus was born, dates back to the indicated year.
The parents of the future Messiah, according to the Gospel of Luke, went to this Palestinian city to participate in the census conducted by the Romans in order to streamline the collection of taxes in Judea. According to reliable sources, this event was carried out by the Roman procurator Quirinius in 6 or 7 BC. As we see, the exact date (year) of the Savior’s birth cannot be determined in this way.
By the way, the day of the Nativity of Christ is even less definable. In the East, it began to coincide with December 25 only at the end of the 4th century. In Rome, this date was adopted to supplant the pagan holiday of the Nativity of the Invincible Sun, and not on the basis of church tradition, which considered January 6 to be Christmas Day.
But astronomers came to the aid of historians. The Gospel of Matthew, one of the earliest accounts of the life of Christ, says: “Where is he born King of the Jews? for we saw His star in the east and came to worship Him” (2:2) Researchers have tried to use this story of the Magi and the Star of Bethlehem to pinpoint the exact date of Jesus' birth. As is known, the laws of celestial mechanics are an unusually precise and subtle thing, amenable to mathematical calculations.
The pioneers of this direction were the great mathematician and mystic, one of the founders of modern astronomy, Johannes Kepler. On the night of December 17, 1603, he observed through a telescope the movements of the planets Jupiter and Saturn, approaching the point of astronomical conjunction. A little later Mars joined them. Two years passed, and the scientist saw a new star in the constellation Ophiuchus. And the whole trick was that when two or more planets come very close to each other, sometimes even merging into one, the earthly observer sees a bright light in the sky.
Guided by an ancient rabbinic commentary on the book of the prophet Daniel, which indicated that the conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in the constellation Pisces was especially significant for the Israelis, Kepler put forward a hypothesis - the Magi were eyewitnesses of the described phenomenon. According to mathematician calculations, the conjunction of the planets should have happened in 7 BC. He concluded that this was the date of the Immaculate Conception, and that the Nativity took place in 6 BC.
Much later, in the middle of the 20th century, Dr. David Hugers, lecturing on astronomy at Sheffield Albion University, obtained different results. Using the information from the Gospel, he made an assumption - the Bethlehem star is nothing more than a comet.
However, the English astronomer Chris Clayton seems to have come closest to solving the mystery of the birth of Jesus. Ultra-modern technology helped her in this. In 1998, using a Rutherford–Appleton Laboratory supercomputer, he painstakingly calculated the trajectories of the planets of the Solar System over the last two millennia. And I discovered something interesting! It turns out that in June 2 BC. e. Jupiter and Venus came so close to each other in the sky that for the naked eye of an earthly observer they would probably have merged into one unusually bright star.
It was this astronomical event, according to Clayton, that formed the basis of the biblical tale of the Star of Bethlehem. This is what the Evangelist Matthew wrote about this: “And this star, which they saw in the east, went before them, and at last it came and stood over the place where the Child was” (2:9).
Thus, the “Christmas star,” firstly, was not a star at all; secondly, it was not a comet, as previously assumed; thirdly, it did not ascend into the sky in December, as is commonly believed according to Christian tradition.
How old was Jesus at the crucifixion?
According to widespread opinion among believers, Jesus lived for 33 years, of which the last 3 years he preached to people the doctrine of salvation. Indeed, the holy evangelist Luke (1st century) writes: “When Jesus began his ministry, he was about thirty years old...” (3:23)
Everything seems to be true, but the apostle and evangelist John the Theologian (1st century) states otherwise in his Gospel: “The Jews said to Him: You are not even fifty years old, and have you seen Abraham?” (8:57)
As we see, there is a clear discrepancy in dates between Luke and John. Which one is right? Until relatively recently, it was considered hardly possible to establish exactly at what age Jesus was crucified. But a researcher from Athens, Nikos Kokkinos, got down to business. By the way, back in 1980, he studied in detail Roman sources and the New Testament and convincingly proved that Christ was crucified in 36 AD. (and not in the 33rd, as is traditionally believed).
After twenty years of research, N. Kokkinos stated - Jesus, in the year of his crucifixion, could not have been a young man of 33 years old. Why, a surprised reader may ask? Yes, the whole point is that in ancient Jewish society only one who had reached at least fifty years of age was considered a religious teacher. This is confirmed by the testimony of Irenaeus of Leon, a disciple of Polycarp, who knew people who saw Jesus Christ with their own eyes. He said that the Savior was about fifty years old when He began to teach people. Similar information is contained in the Gospel of John we have already mentioned (8:57). In another passage of St. John (2:20) writes how the Savior compares his body, and in fact the path of life, with the Jerusalem Temple, which was built “forty-six years.”
The original solution to this problem was proposed by Kokkinos. The Savior said that he and the temple were of the same age - that is, both were forty-six years old. The construction of this building, located in Jerusalem during the life of Jesus, was completed under King Herod in 12 BC. - the first year of Christ's preaching. Thus, according to Kokkinos, it follows that Jesus was crucified in 36 AD. at the age of forty-eight years.
Guided by the theory of the Athenian scientist, Jesus was born in 12 BC. It is interesting to note that after Kokkinos established the last date, he made another interesting discovery. It turned out that in 12-11 the appearance of Comet Halley was observed in the sky.
A completely different way of evidence was presented to the public in 2005 by Romanian astronomers Liviu Mircea and Tiberiu Oproiu. Let us remind readers that the New Testament indicates that Jesus Christ died crucified on the cross, and then resurrected and ascended into heaven. It also says that he passed away on the day after the first night of the afternoon after the spring equinox. According to the Bible, during the execution of the Savior, a solar eclipse occurred. Using this information, astronomers conducted an interesting investigation and established the following.
Between 26 and 25 AD. The full moon occurred the day after the spring equinox only twice: April 7, 30 and April 3, 33. A solar eclipse was observed only in the year 33! It follows that Jesus died on Friday, April 3, 33, at about three o'clock in the afternoon. The Savior has risen on April 5 at four o'clock in the afternoon!
Why did the Savior die?
There are three versions on this matter. In the 20th century, in German concentration camps, people were crucified and observed what happened to them. As it turned out, on the cross a person slowly dies from suffocation. The center of support of the crucified is not the arms and legs, but the chest. Over time, the pectoral muscles become cramped from tension, which makes it impossible to expand the diaphragm and ventilate the lungs, from where air cannot escape.
This is probably how the Savior died, and not from the blow of a Roman soldier’s spear. This point of view is also confirmed by studies of the Shroud of Turin. There is a bloody stain on the outline of the body on the right side in the chest area. The analysis showed that the leaked blood no longer coagulated, as would have happened if a living person was injured. This means that the warrior thrust his spear into the dead body.
According to another version - it was published in 2005 by Israeli scientist Benjamin Brenner - the Savior died from a blood clot that entered the lungs. While working at a medical center in Haifa, Brenner presented his views in a professional journal devoted to thrombosis and other similar problems. As is known from the Holy Scriptures, the death of Jesus occurred relatively quickly - within a few hours after the crucifixion, although with such an execution a person dies a few days later. Another Brenner point: Jesus was a resident of Galilee, where a quarter of the population suffers from thrombophlebia (the tendency of more viscous blood to quickly clot and form clots). So he, too, could be one of them.
Meanwhile, the third version says: The Savior died from great loss of blood. In 1986, an examination of this issue was carried out by the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Who is right? Further research will probably show this. But one thing is clear – it’s too early to draw a conclusion.
Based on RuNet materials.
Source: Author:
based on RuNet materials
Why is this theory controversial?
And yet, the year 1095, calculated by scientists as the year of Christ’s resurrection, is not accurately determined. Mainly because it does not coincide with the Gospel “condition of the Resurrection”.
Based on the above, it is obvious that the year 1095, as the date of the crucifixion and resurrection, was determined incorrectly by researchers. Probably because it does not correspond to the most important “condition of the Resurrection,” according to which the full moon fell on the night from Thursday to Friday, when the disciples and Christ ate Easter at the Last Supper, and not at all on Saturday, as the “3rd condition” was determined. innovators." And other “calendar conditions” are not only incorrect, but rather unreliable and easily disputable.
The “astronomical” version put forward by Moscow State University scientists seems to complement the newest date of the crucifixion of Christ, but for some reason it places the execution of Jesus in 1086.
How was the second date derived? The Holy Scriptures describe that after the birth of Christ, a new star shone in the sky, showing the wise men coming from the East the way to the “Wonderful Child.” And the time of Jesus’ death is described as follows: “...From the sixth hour darkness enveloped the whole earth until the ninth” (Matthew 27:45).
It is logical that the disciples meant an eclipse by “darkness,” and given that in 1054 AD. e. a new star lit up, and in 1086 (32 years later), a complete “hiding of the sun” occurred, which happened on February 16, Monday.
But any hypotheses may be wrong, because the chronicles throughout history could be easily falsified. And why do we need this knowledge? You just need to believe in God and not question the biblical data.
Why was Jesus Christ crucified?
The meaning of death, burial and Resurrection Jesus Christ Himself told people. His words and actions remained in the Gospel, in the interpretations of the apostles - their Epistles from the New Testament, and in the interpretations of the holy fathers - teachers of the Church. Everyone can learn more about this from a conversation with a priest or at church courses. We will briefly talk about the last days of the Lord’s earthly life, His Crucifixion and Resurrection, as well as the significance of these events for the Orthodox Christian and the holidays of the Church.
The most important thing about His voluntary Sacrifice for people - and the Lord allowed Him to be crucified - Christ told the apostles at the Last Supper. The day before, He solemnly entered Jerusalem - this holiday is celebrated as Palm Sunday.
The Lord enters Jerusalem, where the inhabitants are waiting for Him to reign in the world, wanting to support Him as a military leader in the fight against Roman rule. But He enters the city meekly, on a donkey. People greet him with shouts of “Hosanna” and palm branches - but after five minutes the same people will shout “Crucify Him!” - because Jesus Christ did not live up to their hopes as a worldly power. That's why this holiday is sad. All believers in Slavic countries come to churches with palm branches - this is the first tree that begins to produce buds in early spring - and in southern countries people come to churches with flowers and the same palm branches. They mean that Orthodox people truly welcome Christ as the Heavenly King, but they also remind us to pray for our spiritual victories, not our worldly success. After Palm Sunday, the strict fasting of Holy Week and preparation for Easter begin.
At the Last Supper, the Lord gave the last instructions to the apostles, again reminding them that He must leave them, dying a terrible death. Christ calls the disciples children - as never before - and calls them to love one another as God Himself loves them. For the sake of strengthening their faith and the birth of the Church, sealed by the Body of Christ Himself, the Lord performs and establishes forever the greatest Sacrament that sealed the New Testament between God and man - the Sacrament of the Eucharist (in Greek thanksgiving), in Russian usually called the Sacrament of Communion.
Vecherya in Russian means dinner. It was secret because at that moment the Pharisees were already looking for Christ, expecting the betrayal of Judas, for the sake of putting the Lord to death. Christ, as the Omniscient God, knew that this dinner was the last, and he made it in secret so that the important meal would not be interrupted. He chose the place in Jerusalem, now called the Zion Upper Room.
This evening became a turning point in the history of the Church and all mankind. All the days of the end of the earthly life of the Lord Jesus Christ - the Last Supper, the Crucifixion, the Resurrection - were filled with mysterious theological meaning and events that created further history.
Christ took the bread into His hands and, blessing it with a sign, broke it, then poured wine and distributed everything to the disciples, saying: “Take and eat: this is My Body and My Blood.” With these words, priests to this day bless wine and bread during the Liturgy, when they are transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ.
The meal was served in the evening, since Christ followed one of the Jewish traditions of the Old (Old) Testament, on the basis of which he established the New Testament traditions, without destroying the previous ones. So, on that day the holiday of Passover was celebrated, the memory of the exodus of the ancestors of the Jews from Egypt at night. On that ancient day, every Jewish family had to slaughter a lamb and mark its blood on the door so that God would not direct His wrath at them. This was a sign of the election of the Jews. On that day, God the Father punished the Egyptians for keeping the Jews in slavery by the death of their firstborn. Only after this terrible execution did Pharaoh release the tribe of the Jews, led by the prophet Moses, to the Land Promised by God.
At the Last Supper, Jesus Christ, remembering this holiday, establishes a new one: God no longer needs sacrificial killings of animals and sacrificial blood, because the only Sacrificial Lamb, the Lamb remains the Son of God Himself, who dies so that the wrath of God for every sin would pass over a person who believes in Christ , partaking of Him.
After the words of Christ: “Take and eat: this is My Body and My Blood,” - by the grace of the Savior, bread and wine, having their former appearance, then ceased and cease now at every Liturgy to be earthly things. They become, according to the Gospel word, bread, that is, the food of life - the Flesh of Christ, which He gives for the forgiveness of all human sins.
Then the Lord went to pray in the Garden of Gethsemane with the disciples. According to the evangelists, Christ prayed three times, until he sweated blood. In the first prayer, He asked God the Father not to drink the Cup of suffering, saying at the same time that it would happen as God wanted. Christ expressed his fear and anguish before suffering. Then He prayed with complete submission to the will of God and the understanding that He could not escape torment. Evangelist Luke writes that at this time God the Father sent Him an Angel who supported Christ. For the third time, the Lord repeated the words of His acceptance of the will of God and turned to the disciples, waking them up and saying that a traitor was approaching, who would deliver Him into the hands of sinners. He even called on the disciples to go with Him in order to surrender themselves to the guards Himself.
At that moment, Judas and the guards approached Him, pointing them to the Lord.
