Part 121 (2/2)

414. In Athens itself philosophy awaited its doom. Justinian at length prohibited its teaching and caused all its schools in that city to be closed.[441:1]

After this followed the long and dreary _dark ages_, but the _sun of science_, that bright and glorious luminary, was destined to rise again.

The history of this great Alexandrian library is one of the keys which unlock the door, and exposes to our view the manner in which the Hindoo incarnate G.o.d _Crishna_, and the meek and benevolent _Buddha_, came to be wors.h.i.+ped under the name of _Christ Jesus_. For instance, we have just seen:

1. That, ”orders were given to the chief librarian to buy at the king's expense _whatever books he could_.”

2. That, ”one of the chief objects of the museum was that of serving as the home of a _body of men_ who devoted themselves to study.”

3. That, ”any books brought by foreigners into Egypt were taken at once to the museum and correct copies made.”

4. That, ”there flocked to this great intellectual centre students from all countries.”

5. That, ”the Christian church received from it some of the most eminent of its Fathers.”

And also:

6. That, the chief doctrines of the Gnostic Christians ”had been held for centuries before their time in many of the cities in Asia Minor.

There, it is probable, they first came into existence as 'Mystae,' _upon the establishment of a direct intercourse with India_ under the Seleucidae and the Ptolemies.”

7. That, ”the College of ESSENES at Ephesus, the Orphics of Thrace, the Curetes of Crete, _are all merely branches of one_ antique and common religion, _and that originally Asiatic_.”

8. That, ”_the introduction of Buddhism into Egypt and Palestine affords the only true solution of innumerable difficulties in the history of religion_.”

9. That, ”_Buddhism_ had actually been planted in the dominions of the Seleucidae and Ptolemies (Palestine belonging to the former) _before the beginning of the third century_ B. C. and is proved to demonstration by a pa.s.sage in the edicts of Asoka.”

10. That, ”it is very likely that the commentaries (Scriptures) which were among them (the _Essenes_) were the Gospels.”

11. That, ”the princ.i.p.al doctrines and rites of the _Essenes_ can be connected with the East, with Parsism, and especially with _Buddhism_.”

12. That, ”among the doctrines which the _Essenes_ and _Buddhists_ had in common was that of the _Angel-Messiah_.”

13. That, ”they (the _Essenes_) had a flouris.h.i.+ng university or corporate body, established at _Alexandria, in Egypt_, long before the period a.s.signed for the birth of Christ.”

14. That, ”the _very ancient_ and Eastern doctrine of the _Angel-Messiah_ had been applied to Gautama Buddha, _and so it was applied to Jesus Christ by the Essenes of Egypt and Palestine_, who introduced this new Messianic doctrine into Essenic Judaism and Essenic Christianity.”

15. That, ”we hear very little of them (the _Essenes_) after A. D. 40; and there can hardly be any doubt that the _Essenes_ as a body must have embraced Christianity.”

Here is the solution of the problem. The sacred books of Hindoos and Buddhists were among the _Essenes_, and in the library at Alexandria.

The _Essenes_, who were afterwards called _Christians_, applied the legend of the _Angel-Messiah_--”the very ancient Eastern doctrine,”

which we have shown throughout this work--to Christ Jesus. It was simply a transformation of names, _a transformation which had previously occurred in many cases_.[442:1] After this came _additions_ to the legend from other sources. Portions of the legends related of the Persian, Greek and Roman Saviours and Redeemers of mankind, were, from time to time, added to the already legendary history of the Christian Saviour. Thus history was repeating itself. Thus the virgin-born G.o.d and Saviour, wors.h.i.+ped by all nations of the earth, though called by different names, was but one and the same.

In a subsequent chapter we shall see _who_ this One G.o.d was, and _how_ the myth originated.

Albert Reville says:

”_Alexandria_, the home of Philonism, and Neo-Platonism (and we might add _Essenism_), was naturally the centre _whence spread the dogma of the deity of Jesus Christ_. In that city, through the third century, flourished a school of transcendental theology, afterwards looked upon with suspicion by the conservators of ecclesiastical doctrine, but not the less the real cradle of orthodoxy. It was still the Platonic tendency which influenced the speculations of Clement, Origen and Dionysius, and the theory of the Logos was at the foundation of their theology.”[443:1]

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