The Man Who Sold Jesus to the World

It was the year 45CE when Saint Paul sat down at his desk in the upstairs room of his abode in Jerusalem to rewrite the story of Jesus Christ. Much time, thought and effort would be invested in transforming the ordinary Gnostic preacher from a remote area of the Jordan River into a miracle creating Son of God. But why would Paul, who was educated at the exclusive School of Gamaliel in Jerusalem and subsequently became a Jewish Pharisee, deliberately invent the story of Jesus Christ the Lord and Saviour? Why would the intellectual Paul, who was a member of the elite one percent of Judeans who could read and write in Latin, Greek, Aramaic and Hebrew, sit down and write a concocted story about a little-known holy man?

Paul was a busy merchant trader and his wholesale business required him to make long journeys from Jerusalem to faraway Damascus in Syria where he purchased a variety of merchandise to sell wholesale to retailers in Jerusalem’s teeming markets. Situated on the famous Silk Road, Damascus was the oldest continually inhabited city in the world and remains that way today. It was also a major distribution centre for trading between the Orient and the Middle East. The city had become famous for a wide range of products, such as silk, clothing, glassware, tents, swords and spears. These were of such high quality that they had become legendary throughout the Roman Empire, and Paul bartered for a range of these products for the Jerusalem market.

Wind driven by just one square mainsail, Paul used his own craft to carry him from the Mediterranean port of Caesarea in Judea, to the far distant city of Antioch in Syria. Located on the periphery of the Mediterranean and the largest city in the Roman Empire after Rome and Alexandria, Antioch extended along both sides of the Orontes River, and could be crossed by any one of five Roman-built bridges. With a population of over half a million, Roman Emperors viewed Antioch as a grand retreat and they competed with each other to adorn the city with gardens, fountains, statues, public baths, theatres and temples.

A paved colonnade some four kilometres in length, and built by Herod the Great, ran through the city on one side of the river, and a stone roof supported by a seemingly endless row of columns, covered the colonnade and provided weather protection for pedestrians. A picturesque eight-kilometre avenue through beautiful parkland, cypress gardens and fountains led to the affluent suburb of Daphne and the magnificent temple of Apollo. But as a busy merchant, Paul usually had little time to dwell in Antioch before assembling his packhorses and heading for Damascus. The road he used was a tortuous, dusty, well worn track that was also used by other Mediterranean merchants to supply a variety of dried dates, anise seed, olives, ivory, wine and beer to the huge Damascene market. Marauding bandits made some sections of the route very dangerous, but Paul was an experienced traveller and very cautious. He was also growing weary of his trade.

Paul’s Jewish name was Saul, but to gentiles (Goys) it was Paul (little), and he had established a close friendship with Barnabas. He appears to have never married and according to retired Episcopal Bishop John Shelby Spong, was a guilt-ridden homosexual, although that assumption appears merely based on Paul’s strong anti-feminist attitude in Acts. He was born in Tarsus Cilicia in Asia Minor around the beginning of the Common Era (CE). Tarsus was the major area for the Pagan Mithra mythological and philosophical religion, which had been adopted into the Roman Empire in 68BCE. It is said he had once been a Pagan priest and was known to quote many Pagan sayings. This long association with Paganism, commencing first in Tarsus, was the reason Paul had never fully committed to Judaism.

Under Herod the Great’s rule the Jewish Church in Jerusalem was had become extremely wealthy and a casual stroll down Herodian street would bear witness to the vast gold and silver treasures of Solomon’s Temple. Paul had long considered that churches were actually money making businesses and this view was supported by Barnabas, who likened a church to a shop. Customers went to church to be sold the belief that God will watch over them while they are on Earth, and ensure a place in heaven for them when they die, and for this they gave tokens each time they attended. The Jewish Church in Jerusalem was an example of parishioners giving lavishly.

Clearly visible many kilometres from Jerusalem, Solomon’s Temple shone like a beacon in the desert. The amount of gold used on the exterior of the dome was staggering. The walls were first covered with cedar panels and then coated with 600 talents of fine gold, or an amount roughly equivalent to 23 tons or 720,000 ounces of gold. At today’s value of over $US1200 per ounce, the walls of the Inner Sanctuary would be worth around $US750 million. Even the nails used were made of fine gold weighing about 12 ounces each. Beneath the floors of the Temple were huge vaults filled with gold, silver and jewelry.

While visiting foreign dignitaries often brought expensive gifts, the vast wealth of the Jewish Church had come from local Jews. Unshakable in their belief that gold, silver and jewellery opened the doors to heaven, wealthy Jerusalem merchants gave generously and often. The Hekhal or Main Hall was the most revered room in all of Judea. It was a small room located at the rear of the Temple, and was called the Holy of Holies or the Temple Inner Sanctuary.

Copied from the 3000BCE Egyptian Temple of Abydos, located on the west bank of the Nile 323 kilometres from Cairo, the Inner Sanctuary was said to be where the Lord dwelled, as well as the Ten Commandments. In the basement vaults of the Temple, vast amounts of money, gold, silver and jewellery were stored. Said to be the Treasury of all Jewish Wealth, with typical Jewish meticulousness, it was accounted for on papyrus scrolls.

Just outside the Temple wall was the huge Roman garrison of 10,000 troops, but they posed no threat and permitted the residents of Jerusalem to go about their business unimpeded. All costs of running the garrison, including salaries and provisions, were covered by taxes paid to the resident Roman Governor by the citizens of Judea and Galilee. A century of Roman rule had made little difference to the affluence of the Jews of Jerusalem. Elegantly dressed women strolled on the cobblestone footpaths, and well dressed children frolicked around them. Shopping was always popular with the ladies, and they could be seen wandering in and out of the boutique clothing shops and jewellery stores. The wealthy Jews in Jerusalem provided a stark contrast to the living conditions of the poverty stricken villagers in outlying areas of Galilee and Syria.

The annals of the Jewish nation could be traced back at least three thousand years. Its history, its beliefs, its entrenched community values had been maintained on written scrolls, and through these vital records, its history could be traced back to Abraham, the founder of the Hebrew nation, and then Moses, King David, Daniel and Solomon. Under Herod and the tolerant Romans, the Jewish nation had expanded, become more robust and prosperous. Roman governors in all parts of the Roman Empire, including Judea and Galilee, permitted religious freedom and many religions prospered under Roman rule.

In Jerusalem however, the all-powerful Sanhedrin was intolerant of religions other than Jewish, but Paul and Barnabas were carefully considering a new religion that would be acceptable to the Sanhedrin. They would target non-Jewish gentiles (contemptuously caused Goys) living in Judea, Galilee and Syria. The new religion would have a strong Jewish flavour through the highlighting of King David and Moses—and it would conform with Isaiah 60:16 (old) which states: Thou shalt suck the milk of the Gentiles.

Solomon’s Temple was not the only depository for the Jewish Church wealth. The Copper Scroll of the Dead Sea Scrolls listed 64 sites in Jerusalem, Qumran, Jericho and other places where 3000 talents of silver, 1300 talents of gold, 64 bars of gold and 19 gold and silver vessels lay hidden in church vaults, presumably out of Roman eyes. Estimated at 65 tons of silver and 26 tons of gold, on today’s values, the gold alone would be worth over $400 million dollars.

Paul’s business centred mainly in the markets of Jerusalem and Damascus and he seldom ventured out east to the Jordan River township of Jericho, a city that had been rebuilt by Herod the Great. Now curious about the wealth of the Jewish Church, Paul and Barnabas made their way to the revamped Herodian city that now boasted a massive hippodrome and citadel, designed and structured in the Hellenic-Roman style. The lavish homes of the wealthy of Jericho merged into a large central marketplace, while in the outlying suburbs peasants existed in squalid mud brick huts and houses with limited, or no sanitation.

Already hot from the mid-day sun, Paul and Barnabas dismounted near an outer suburban well to allow their horses to drink from a ground-level trough. Nearby, a group of peasants squatted under a roadside tree sheltering from the sun, while big men on small donkeys wandered past, their feet occasionally dragging on the ground. Gathering the reins of their pack horses, Paul and Barnabas walked to the next corner where they stopped, for immediately ahead a gathering of people had spilled from the footpath onto the road, blocking their path.

The crowd seemed transfixed by a man standing over a woman who was kneeling on the dusty pavement at her front gate. Clothed in robes, the man stood out against the grubby sheepskin attire of village people around him, as he placed one hand on the woman’s head and waved a string of beads back and forth across her eyes. He murmured words that neither Paul nor Barnabas could hear and she appeared to become slightly mesmerised. He then clapped his hands, smiled down at her and helped her to her feet. The woman kissed his hand as others rushed forward holding out money.

Leaving the task of collecting to his followers, the man turned and with outstretched arms, spoke out forcefully to the crowd gathered on the roadway, "Let me take those who