The Truth About Jesus (Part two)
By this time we stood at the entrance of a large edifice which
my guide said was "the House of God." As we walked in I saw
innumerable little lights blinking and winking all over the
spacious interior. There were, besides, pictures, altars and images
all around me. The air was heavy with incense; a number of men in
gorgeous vestments were passing to and fro, bowing and kneeling
before the various lights and images. The audience was upon its
knees enveloped in silence -- a silence so solemn that it awed me.
Observing my anxiety to understand the meaning of all this, my
guide took me aside and in a whisper told me that the people were
celebrating the anniversary of the birthday of their beautiful
Savior -- Jesus, the Son of God.
"So was Apollo the son of God," I replied, thinking perhaps
that after all we might find ourselves in agreement with one
another.
"Forget Apollo," he said, with a suggestion of severity in his
voice. "There is no such person. He was only an idol. If you were
to search for Apollo in all the universe you would never find any
one answering to his name or description. Jesus," he resumed, "is
the Son of God. He came to our earth and was born of a virgin."
Again I was tempted to tell my guide that that was how Apollo
became incarnate; but I restrained myself.
"Then Jesus grew up to be a man," continued my guide,
"performing unheard-of wonders, such as treading the seas, giving
sight, hearing and speech to the blind, the deaf and the dumb,
converting water into wine, feeding the multitudes miraculously,
predicting coming events and resurrecting the dead."
"Of course, of your gods, too," he added, "it is claimed that
they performed miracles, and of your oracles that they foretold the
future, but there is this difference -- the things related of your
gods are a fiction, the things told of Jesus are a fact, and the
difference between Paganism and Christianity is the difference
between fiction and fact."
Just then I heard a wave of murmur, like the rustling of
leaves in a forest, sweep over the bowed audience. I turned about
and unconsciously, my Greek curiosity impelling me, I pushed
forward toward where the greater candle lights were blazing. I felt
that perhaps the commotion in the house was the announcement that
the God Jesus was about to make his appearance, and I wanted to see
him. I wanted to touch him, or, if the crowd were too large to
allow me that privilege, I wanted, at least, to hear his voice. I,
who had never seen a god, never touched one, never heard one speak,
I who had believed in Apollo without ever having known anything
provable about him, I wanted to see the real God, Jesus.
But my guide placed his hand quickly upon my shoulder, and
held me back.
"I want to see Jesus," I hastened, turning toward him. I said
this reverently and in good faith. "Will he not be here this
morning? Will he not speak to his worshippers?" I asked again.
"Will he not permit them to touch him, to caress his hand, to clasp
his divine feet, to inhale the ambrosial fragrance of his breath,
to bask in the golden light of his eyes, to hear the music of his
immaculate accents? Let me, too, see Jesus," I pleaded.
"You cannot see him," answered my guide, with a trace of
embarrassment in his voice. "He does not show himself any more."
I was too much surprised at this to make any immediate reply.
"For the last two thousand years," my guide continued, "it has
not pleased Jesus to show himself to any one; neither has he been
heard from for the same number of years."
"For two thousand years no one has either seen or heard
Jesus?" I asked, my eyes filled with wonder and my voice quivering
with excitement.
"No," he answered.
"Would not that, then," I ventured to ask, impatiently, "make
Jesus as much of an idol as Apollo? And are not these people on
their knees before a god of whose existence they are as much in the
dark as were the Greeks of fair Apollo, and of whose past they have
only rumors such as Homer reports of our Olympian gods -- as
idolatrous as the Athenians? What would you say," I asked my guide,
"if I were to demand that you should produce Jesus and prove him to
my eyes and ears as you have asked me to produce and prove Apollo?
What is the difference between a ceremony performed in honor of
Apollo and one performed in honor of Jesus, since it is as
impossible to give oracular demonstration of the existence of the
one as of the other? If Jesus is alive and a god, and Apollo is an
idol and dead, what is the evidence, since the one is as invisible,
as inaccessible, and as unproducible as the other? And, if faith
that Jesus is a god proves him a god, why will not faith in Apollo
make him a god? But if worshipping Jesus, whom for the best part of
the last two thousand years no man has seen, heard or touched; if
building temples to him, burning incense upon his altars, bowing at
his shrine and calling him "God," is not idolatry, neither is it
idolatry to kindle fire upon the luminous altars of the Greek
Apollo, -- God of the dawn, master of the enchanted lyre -- he with
the bow and arrow tipped with fire! I am not denying," I said,
"that Jesus ever lived. He may have been alive two thousand years
ago, but if he has not been heard from since, if the same thing
that happened to the people living at the time he lived has
happened to him, namely -- if he is dead, then you are worshipping
the dead, which fact stamps your religion as idolatrous."
And, then, remembering what he had said to me about the Greek
mythology being beautiful but not true, I said to him: "Your
temples are indeed gorgeous and costly; your music is grand your
altars are superb; your litany is exquisite; your chants are
melting; your incense, and bells and flowers, your gold and silver
vessels are all in rare taste, and I dare say your dogmas are
subtle and your preachers eloquent, but your religion has one fault
-- it is not true."
And that dear Bob is what you need to realize. We do not need you here promoting a lie and calling us names because we are intelligent and refuse to buy your lie. |
