Jesus Only Movements
To those unfamiliar with the term “Arianism” (not to be confused with Aryanism), it was attached to the leading opponent of Trinitarianism at the Nicene Council: Arius. The Council led by Athanasius produced the Nicene Creed and gave us, what has since been called “Orthodoxy.” Of course, a creedal statement on the deity of the Holy Spirit would come later, but the Nicene Council (called by Constantine to settle the controversy) addressed the question of the deity of Jesus Christ, which, if He was considered truly divine, it would have been at the very least a “binity” (bi-unity) of deities.
Now, Arianism did not invent the “less than divine” definition of Christ’s nature. Hints can be traced all the way back to the origins of Christianity in the Apostolic and Evangelistic writings of the New Testament. The Ebionite faction led by James the brother of Jesus at Jerusalem and the “Lord Bishop” of the New Testament Church held to an “adoptionist” interpretation of the Scriptures pertaining to Christ as “the Son of God.”
There were different currents of thought within the Ebionite faction, ranging from a supernatural presence which descended upon Jesus at His baptism to the less miraculous view that He was an exalted prophet and called “God’s Son” merely in a figurative sense.
The immaculate conception accounts in Matthew and Luke were held by the Ebionites to be 2nd Century interpolations – in other words: frauds. They regarded Jesus as the son of Joseph according to the flesh. It is not clear how James felt personally about this doctrine, although apocryphal writings ascribed to him reveal an orthodox position.
It must be remembered that in those times, to be a Christian, it was sufficient to simply believe that Jesus was the true Messiah and to follow His teachings (Acts 2:36, 38). The requirements of church dogma – even that of confessing the physical Resurrection – would come later.
(I have written on the Ebionites extensively over the course of thirty years. Use the Search function on this website. One of the earliest discussions can be found in the Preface of The Mother Heart of God.)
Scholars since have mistakenly believed that St. Paul was responsible for the “Trinitarian” doctrine, and subsequent copyists and translators of the New Testament have been accused – often justifiably – of various interpolations and mistranslations to buttress the Trinitarian formula (e.g. 1 John 5:7).
Heroes for us on this website – Newton, Whiston, Jefferson, and so on – leaned toward the Arian view that Christ had “a like nature” with the Father, but not the “same” nature. With this in mind, the reader might wonder why we have such sympathy for these more recent Arians while retaining a staunch Trinitarian position?
It comes from the fact that there was a third faction in the First Christian Century of which these men knew nothing and of which the world of scholarship remains ignorant to this day: the Bethany Community. There was the Apostolic branch of Christianity led by James, and then later, Peter. In contrast, there was the Pauline branch of Christianity, which at first, was a rogue movement, but later was adopted by the Apostolic Fathers of the episcopal succession.
But the greater one which was antecedent to them all was that of Bethany.
The Cambrian Church teaches that what has been presented as a hypothetical “Johannine Community” by some scholars, was in fact a real one which produced the Johannine literature of the New Testament: the Fourth Gospel, the Johannine Epistles, Hebrews, Revelation, and portions, at least, of Luke and Acts – especially St. Stephen’s defense. It represents, not the work of the Apostle John but rather a collaboration of the Bethany Family (Lazarus, Martha, Mary, and John Mark). Through various studies, we have demonstrated that they represented the Pythagorean branch of the Essenes which were sponsors of Christ’s ministry “from the beginning” and of His Messianic claims.
Lazarus becomes “Barnabas” in our interpretation of Acts and the story of Paul. It was Barnabas who recruited him and vouched for him to the Apostles (Acts 9:27).
Lazarus was also the “Beloved Disciple” of the Fourth Gospel who became the “kinsman-redeemer” – the ga‘al – of the Messianic family. From the charge of Christ’s dying words on the Cross, he became the gaal to the “Queen Mother” of the Messianic household (John 19:26-27). The ga‘al (or go`el) was a specific legal office in the Mosaic Law.
As Barnabas, it was his belief that a mission to the Gentiles was necessary to fulfill the prophecy of Amos reiterated by James in Acts 15 to establish a Davidic caliphate of the Desposyni among the Gentiles (Acts 15:16-17). Clearly, the Jerusalem ruling required that the new Gentile Christians come under the discipline and leadership of a Desposynic episcopacy, the “zadokites” as interpreters of the Law (15:21). Paul was meant to be a part of that mission, but he parted ways with Barnabas after the Jerusalem Council. Obviously, such a mission, although couched in “spiritual” language typical of the Essenes, ran the risk of being discovered as a shadow government and a subversive movement to Rome. They were not known as “Davidians,” of course. They were the “zedeks” (the Just ones), “Nazoraeans” and “Jesseans.”
Paul – ever an eclectic, still tainted with Herodianism, and no longer under the supervision of Barnabas – would recombine Christian teachings into something more akin to the Greek mystery cults which were only concerned with internal spiritual experiences and the afterlife. As a former Herodian, his goal on a path to God’s Great “Eschaton” was to destroy Judaism and to forge a new religion cut-loose from any meaningful ties to the Temple and the Davidians. While James, who also was a Davidian, was trying to hold the Church together as an expression of Messianic Judaism, the Bethany family would move to Cyprus, to Rome, the north side of the Pyrenees and then ultimately to Britain. It espoused the true Messianic doctrine which became the foundation of Trinitarianism: the doctrine of “the Father and the Son” (1 John 2:22, et al).
To be a “father,” one must have a “son,” and to be a “son,” one must have a “father.” And just as in nature, fathers and sons are of the same “essence” – that is they are both fully human beings (with sons being no less “human” than their fathers) – the true son, therefore, is he who was not “made” or “adopted,” but rather “begotten” (John 1:14). This was the core teaching of the Bethany Family (or what later theologians would mistakenly label “the Johannine Community”). Christ was the “only begotten of the Father” who was “born of the Spirit” and from thence, we get the doctrine of the Trinity and of the Desposyni. The Apostolic and Pauline Christians would eventually discard the episcopal role of the Desposyni but keep the doctrine of the Trinity. The great minds of the historic church, not knowing of this third branch of Christianity, have been pulled to the extremes of either the Pauline or the Ebionite position. Bethany was both the author and the defender of true orthodoxy.
But the Desposynic doctrine would persist throughout the Middle Ages in the royal houses of Europe, although corrupted with various “divine right of kings” ideologies. It is because they lack the “book of the kingdom,” first composed by the Prophet Samuel but restored by our Lord Jesus Christ. More another time.
I beg the reader to consult our “Peshers” offered on this website, and the books, to gain a greater understanding. Yet another Pesher is planned for September for the Day of the Holy Cross: “Melchizedek and the Priesthood of the Uncircumcised.” We will revisit this topic yet again.
The renewal of Arianism in our time is real and powerful, but so is its extreme opposite: the Marcionism of the hyper-dispensationalist Evangelicals. As “only Paul” adherents, the Evangelicals are a heresy of a different sort.
The Arians camouflage their heresy with a “the words of Jesus only” mantra, not acknowledging that Jesus told His disciples the Holy Spirit would lead them into “all truth” (John 16:12-13).
Thomas Jefferson created his own New Testament by cutting and pasting those portions of the New Testament which contained the actual words of Jesus. Who can complain with that? But he left it there. He did not understand that most of what we know about “Jesus Christ” comes from Messianic prophecy of the Old Testament (Luke 24:27). In other words, what we know about Jesus and His teachings in the Gospels, for example, is a limited description of His messianic office. Jesus Himself taught the disciples how to use “the pesher” to interpret the Law and the Prophets. That is why “New Testament only” believers are not only truncated, but heretical.
“Jesus Only” followers see Jesus as a great teacher and insist that he is not divine because Jesus never claimed to be divine. But Bethany has told us that he is divine: for He was the eternal “Word . . . made flesh.”
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Hapgood, Thomas & the Crustal Displacement Theory
Douglas Vogt thinks he has permanently slain the crustal displacement dragon and buried it into oblivion in his most recent YouTube lectures:
(to be continued)
