It's a good story JK , and I wouldn't expect you to wish to believe otherwise and only believe and read into that story all the irony , passsion ,pathos and feeling that your scriptures and heart demands ....
the story could have been much simpler than all that as well though , and Jesus was just a young rebellious rabbai caught up in the grave disparity between the suffering of his tribe and the priestly caste , the usury and corruption and purity of belief fallen into hypocrisy and animal sacrifice and the buying of favor and greed .
You have to remember that they were actively still sacrificing lambs, sheep , goats in the Jerusalem Temple in those times . For centuries in fact , the Jews were sacrificing animals by the 10's of 1000's ....
It is not surprising that some young rabbai , at some point would come along and rebel against such foolishness . Jesus may have felt strongly enough about this false grandeur of the great temple and the small, mean & cruel blind rituals so barbaric really and so meaningless in the eyes of the creator. This was pretty weak stuff , sacrificing goats and sheep . The Hindus and Buddhists and Jains were completely against this rude savage kind of worship and cruelty to animals .
For that time and place , and that very strident warlike group of tribes that Jesus was a part , he saw no other way to take than to go fly in their faces at the last and condemn them to their faces ....I think Jesus had been contemplating this already for some time , this last confrontation. That he would be crucified or stoned , was a forgone conclusion . Buddha also challenged the same priestly corrupt monopoly as well.
....and of course that was a death sentence ...the moment Jesus kicked the money-lender's tables over, he signed his death warrant. But he lived with nothing , and wandered possessionless and free . His life was his to sacrifice , for what he saw to be a great lie and corruption , and misinterpretation of Life's message .
Many a young man has been so moved . I would always give him credit for that sacrifice in that young short life that he lived and preached in . And in that sacrifice and that mission he fulfilled himself , for he was a man who discovered his "principals" , in spite of the hypocrisy and foolish greed and ignorance that abounded in that place .
But to call Jerusalem the "holy land" is just a fantasy ...Jerusalem was an abomination in reality , and God was no more present there than anywhere else.
Men never had to die for any "Holy Land" , for it doesn't exist....(except perhaps under the Boddhi Tree) |
