They Followed The Stars And Found The Tree Of Life: Part 4
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| What was previously unclear and unknown, now being clearly seen and made known. |
Historical scholarship is built upon empirical evidence and is usually derived from consensus.
It seeks consensus.
Contesting ideas are also mentioned as an aim towards objectivity.
Notice how consensus has been proven wrong at a later time, in historical, scientific, and religious matters.
Key word I would hang my hat on, as mentioned in Part 1, is: syncretism.
Not as that term is typically explained through secular scholarship, or even religious.
Not as that term is typically explained through secular scholarship, or even religious.
Often times, when people read commonalities, they may conclude that one thing must have preceded another.
Linear logic.
Often times, a timeline can be derived and proven 'true', or at least, consensual.
Or what is found is a conclusion favoring one theory as preeminent, or the basis, of another's idea.
Pride, centric-thinking.
Before accusing such or assuming such, consider what we do have.
In Part 3, I showed how inventions are developed in the same period of time despite those inventors never sharing information with one another.
Napoleon Hill (d. 1970) touched upon this phenomenon in his book 'Think And Grow Rich' when mentioning 'the ether'.
The point: no one knows what is going on behind closed doors, yet the purposed invention or innovation comes about nonetheless.
The same is concluded regarding all human activity on earth.
God is Sovereign and thus enacts, brings about purpose, and allows people and events to 'be'.
Linear logic.
Often times, a timeline can be derived and proven 'true', or at least, consensual.
Or what is found is a conclusion favoring one theory as preeminent, or the basis, of another's idea.
Pride, centric-thinking.
Before accusing such or assuming such, consider what we do have.
In Part 3, I showed how inventions are developed in the same period of time despite those inventors never sharing information with one another.
Napoleon Hill (d. 1970) touched upon this phenomenon in his book 'Think And Grow Rich' when mentioning 'the ether'.
The point: no one knows what is going on behind closed doors, yet the purposed invention or innovation comes about nonetheless.
The same is concluded regarding all human activity on earth.
God is Sovereign and thus enacts, brings about purpose, and allows people and events to 'be'.
Consider 'The Bigger Picture'... a movie God has been producing since the beginning of time. (joke)
Where one person may argue that a particular idea 'from the east' influenced an idea adopted or found 'in the west' somehow legitimizes 'the east' and denies 'the west', is thinking in a box and missing the bigger picture.
If such is true, to me it reveals God's Sovereignty and His work in bringing all peoples together under One - Himself in Christ.
Let's look at the greater context of when the Magi are witnessed having arrived in Jerusalem:
Where one person may argue that a particular idea 'from the east' influenced an idea adopted or found 'in the west' somehow legitimizes 'the east' and denies 'the west', is thinking in a box and missing the bigger picture.
If such is true, to me it reveals God's Sovereignty and His work in bringing all peoples together under One - Himself in Christ.
Let's look at the greater context of when the Magi are witnessed having arrived in Jerusalem:
After Yeshua was born in Bethlehem in Judea,
during the time of King Herod,
Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked,
“Where is the One who has been born King of the Jews?
We saw His star when it rose and have come to worship Him.”
When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him.
When he had called together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the Law,
he asked them where the Messiah was to be born.
“In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied, “for this is what the prophet has written:
“ ‘But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,
are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;
for out of you will come a Ruler who will shepherd My people Israel.’ ”
Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared.
He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search carefully for the Child.
As soon as you find Him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship Him.”
After they had heard the king, they went on their way,
and the star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them
until it stopped over the place where the child was.
When they saw the star, they were overjoyed.
On coming to the house, they saw the child with His mother Mary,
and they bowed down and worshiped Him.
Then they opened their treasures and presented Him with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.
And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.
When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream.
“Get up,” he said, “take the Child and His mother and escape to Egypt.
Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the Child to kill Him.”
So he got up, took the Child and His mother during the night and left for Egypt, where he stayed until the death of Herod.
And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet:
“Out of Egypt I called My Son.”
When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious,
and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under,
in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi.
Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled:
“A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning,
Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted,
because they are no more.”
- Matthew 2: 1-18
There are many insightful things to notice in these verses.
Regarding this article's premise, notice how the Magi were granted a dream by God.
One man's mind may assume the Magi did not 'know' God, due to their religion and religious practices, but here it is proclaimed they were warned by the God of Abraham in a dream.
I think God had a much bigger plan in mind when having the Magi present to worship the infant Yeshua.
God has a much bigger plan than men can wrap their minds around.
Why these men from 'the east', instead of any one of the many other groups from the other countries and religions, came to acknowledge God having arrived in the flesh.
How could men from a different religion come and worship Him?
We can only speculate exactly how the Magi's experience influenced their country / region / people upon the return to their homeland.
The familiarity between religious ideas likely helped them explain their experience with God, and their testimony likely assisted the work God had started among their countrymen centuries before.
To mention quickly, when Jonah was sent to Nineveh (Assyria / ancient Persia - present-day northern Iraq), notice God's response to Jonah when Jonah quibbled about being sent to such a people:
Some of the work was completed with the Magi's arrival before Yeshua as Messiah.
Consider what may have developed prior to the arrival of the Apostles a generation later (after Christ rose) into the eastern regions.
40 years (a generation) is enough for ideas to be absorbed and resolved into any given culture / religion.
About a generation passed between the Magi and the early Apostles traveling into the eastern regions where Zoroastrianism was found.
Although this is further speculation, it is possible that the Zoroastrian cultural brand had enough of an alteration for several centuries (since Jonah), and during the Magi, and ever since the Apostle's proclaiming the full Gospel to accommodate this human unity despite conflicting details.
The conflicting ideas that, when fully explored, have little to do with Truth.
Thus, conflicting details are sometimes like one man preferring a certain attire to another man's preference, yet both attires can be found to be honorable, discrete, and having little to do with Salvation.
The fact that the eastern Church (later called the Assyrian Church) developed in such a way in the Persian region after the arrival of Thomas, Thaddeus, and Bartholomew, may echo the notion of these three having watered seeds planted long ago.
Seeds planted by Jonah's preaching, likely watered with the Magi, and most assuredly pruned, managed, clarified, and made to flourish with the Apostles.
Ponder:
It points matters more important: serving the most vulnerable of society and the task to fear God and do what is right.
In a broader view, that passage can speak about 'how' God has established His kingdom on earth despite men's ability to not 'see' it nor clearly identify it.
I mention this often in my work, because people (especially the religious) typically judge by outer appearance and fail to recognize others as their current (or future) brothers in Christ.
The aim: serve and meet others where they are... the people one is called to love, serve, befriend, invite in, and build community with.
For example, a 'typical' Christian may only recognize another Christian according to dress, or a symbol (a cross), or words ("I'm a Christian"), or if they do certain religious things or repeat Bible verses.
This typical Christian may suspect that God's kingdom has yet to go into eastern regions of the earth (wherever the east is perceived from the west, yet the earth is the Lord's).
The typical Christian is likely unaware as to how profoundly God has altered, even to the smallest degree effecting an eternal trajectory, any particular place or people on earth throughout times.
Why?
Because it is typical to judge by mere appearance, or to 'recognize' things only on their surface.
I think it is unclear the full role and greater impact the Magi had upon their return home.
How their short mention in the Bible was a magnanimous influence measured in 'biblical proportions'
When considering Jonah and other things not clearly found in man's histories of himself and of the things he'd rather highlight outside of the hidden mysteries God has done, we may look past the surface into the more profound things of God.
People assume that the use of a certain word is evidence of something agreeable, while the use of another word is grounds for opposition.
Yet both words may speak to the same thing.
I've pointed out some parallels, one being Zoroastrianism's messiah concept.
Consider how the Name of God been understood and spoken in a variety of ways.
A typical religious Christian may get into an argument over the Name of God, arguing that it is 'Jesus' against another Christian who argues it is 'Yeshua'.
Yet another would argue it is '_______' (the many other languages and traditions of speaking God's Name).
The argument is nearsighted and removed from wisdom: speaking of, and to His Holy Name.
Since God is One and the Name He has revealed under heaven is One, it is uttered in a variety of ways according to a particular understanding, background language, culture, etc.
All the mirrors in men God has reflected His image through.
Men commonly argue over words instead of acknowledging the One Spirit allowing them to confess such a Name as the Lord their God.
To consider the Magi only had a single role - to notify Herod and the religious Hebrew hierarchy of Messiah's arrival - is a very narrow view.
A narrow view similar to how people only greet those who look like, talk like, and act like themselves.
God, His purpose and work, is bigger than man's narrow-mindedness.
Thus, any man's inability to 'see' doesn't influence or diminish God's ability to establish His kingdom.
The absence of evidence does not equal any evidence of absence.
That phrase argues for denying a thing because no evidence of it is verifiable according to man's senses and methods.
Typically, man understands the world through observation of things material.
Some men only 'believe' things that they consider materially existing, or materially evident.
However, the veil is being peeled back in such a way that man is confronting things previously deemed impossible or improbable as now possible (positive ability) and probable (promoted ability).
The prescient quality of Scripture, and the 'inventions of men coinciding despite no collective communication between inventors' is another 'proof' there is a world beyond material measure.
Regarding this article's premise, notice how the Magi were granted a dream by God.
One man's mind may assume the Magi did not 'know' God, due to their religion and religious practices, but here it is proclaimed they were warned by the God of Abraham in a dream.
I think God had a much bigger plan in mind when having the Magi present to worship the infant Yeshua.
God has a much bigger plan than men can wrap their minds around.
Why these men from 'the east', instead of any one of the many other groups from the other countries and religions, came to acknowledge God having arrived in the flesh.
How could men from a different religion come and worship Him?
We can only speculate exactly how the Magi's experience influenced their country / region / people upon the return to their homeland.
The familiarity between religious ideas likely helped them explain their experience with God, and their testimony likely assisted the work God had started among their countrymen centuries before.
To mention quickly, when Jonah was sent to Nineveh (Assyria / ancient Persia - present-day northern Iraq), notice God's response to Jonah when Jonah quibbled about being sent to such a people:
And should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh,
in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people
who cannot tell their right hand from their left—and also many animals?
- Jonah 4: 11 (8th century BC)The syncretic points that are notable and should override 'differences' is the fact their religion had a 'messiah' concept.
Some of the work was completed with the Magi's arrival before Yeshua as Messiah.
Consider what may have developed prior to the arrival of the Apostles a generation later (after Christ rose) into the eastern regions.
40 years (a generation) is enough for ideas to be absorbed and resolved into any given culture / religion.
About a generation passed between the Magi and the early Apostles traveling into the eastern regions where Zoroastrianism was found.
Although this is further speculation, it is possible that the Zoroastrian cultural brand had enough of an alteration for several centuries (since Jonah), and during the Magi, and ever since the Apostle's proclaiming the full Gospel to accommodate this human unity despite conflicting details.
The conflicting ideas that, when fully explored, have little to do with Truth.
Thus, conflicting details are sometimes like one man preferring a certain attire to another man's preference, yet both attires can be found to be honorable, discrete, and having little to do with Salvation.
The fact that the eastern Church (later called the Assyrian Church) developed in such a way in the Persian region after the arrival of Thomas, Thaddeus, and Bartholomew, may echo the notion of these three having watered seeds planted long ago.
Seeds planted by Jonah's preaching, likely watered with the Magi, and most assuredly pruned, managed, clarified, and made to flourish with the Apostles.
Ponder:
Those who consider themselves religious
and yet do not keep a tight rein on their tongues deceive themselves,
and their religion is worthless.
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this:
to look after orphans and widows in their distress
and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
- James 1: 26-27That passage from James literally speaks to Church members who are very religious with their traditions, rituals, and outward appearance... yet lack love and kind words towards all others.
It points matters more important: serving the most vulnerable of society and the task to fear God and do what is right.
In a broader view, that passage can speak about 'how' God has established His kingdom on earth despite men's ability to not 'see' it nor clearly identify it.
I mention this often in my work, because people (especially the religious) typically judge by outer appearance and fail to recognize others as their current (or future) brothers in Christ.
The aim: serve and meet others where they are... the people one is called to love, serve, befriend, invite in, and build community with.
For example, a 'typical' Christian may only recognize another Christian according to dress, or a symbol (a cross), or words ("I'm a Christian"), or if they do certain religious things or repeat Bible verses.
This typical Christian may suspect that God's kingdom has yet to go into eastern regions of the earth (wherever the east is perceived from the west, yet the earth is the Lord's).
The typical Christian is likely unaware as to how profoundly God has altered, even to the smallest degree effecting an eternal trajectory, any particular place or people on earth throughout times.
Why?
Because it is typical to judge by mere appearance, or to 'recognize' things only on their surface.
I think it is unclear the full role and greater impact the Magi had upon their return home.
How their short mention in the Bible was a magnanimous influence measured in 'biblical proportions'
When considering Jonah and other things not clearly found in man's histories of himself and of the things he'd rather highlight outside of the hidden mysteries God has done, we may look past the surface into the more profound things of God.
People assume that the use of a certain word is evidence of something agreeable, while the use of another word is grounds for opposition.
Yet both words may speak to the same thing.
I've pointed out some parallels, one being Zoroastrianism's messiah concept.
Consider how the Name of God been understood and spoken in a variety of ways.
A typical religious Christian may get into an argument over the Name of God, arguing that it is 'Jesus' against another Christian who argues it is 'Yeshua'.
Yet another would argue it is '_______' (the many other languages and traditions of speaking God's Name).
The argument is nearsighted and removed from wisdom: speaking of, and to His Holy Name.
Since God is One and the Name He has revealed under heaven is One, it is uttered in a variety of ways according to a particular understanding, background language, culture, etc.
All the mirrors in men God has reflected His image through.
Men commonly argue over words instead of acknowledging the One Spirit allowing them to confess such a Name as the Lord their God.
To consider the Magi only had a single role - to notify Herod and the religious Hebrew hierarchy of Messiah's arrival - is a very narrow view.
A narrow view similar to how people only greet those who look like, talk like, and act like themselves.
God, His purpose and work, is bigger than man's narrow-mindedness.
Thus, any man's inability to 'see' doesn't influence or diminish God's ability to establish His kingdom.
The absence of evidence does not equal any evidence of absence.
That phrase argues for denying a thing because no evidence of it is verifiable according to man's senses and methods.
Typically, man understands the world through observation of things material.
Some men only 'believe' things that they consider materially existing, or materially evident.
However, the veil is being peeled back in such a way that man is confronting things previously deemed impossible or improbable as now possible (positive ability) and probable (promoted ability).
The prescient quality of Scripture, and the 'inventions of men coinciding despite no collective communication between inventors' is another 'proof' there is a world beyond material measure.
Some current or future readers of this article (or blog), may consider me a non-expert in some of the topics I write about.
Perhaps I am no expert at all... besides aiming to expertly love God, be like Christ in all ways, and love others as best I am enabled by God's Spirit to do so.
And in this latter aim, I can rely on the expertise of experts in their respective fields... such as this historian's video presentation.
Even in that short seminar, some things are found very agreeable while other things likely mentioned in ways that could have been mentioned with greater clarity.
Taking all sources at their face value (Zoroastrianism included), this is what I mentioned when touching upon 'syncretism'.
Acknowledging what is good, rejecting what is bad.
For such is how, in my eyes, God has brought distant peoples together into one.
Some men will always wonder and doubt, while other men will praise His Holy Name in wonderment.
This is how I understand Paul's missionary work when reconciling cultural and religious differences under Christ.
This was done through love, peace, and speaking clarity while being patient with people's inability to see past their noses.
Paul mentioned people's religious themes and introduced God's purpose for their lives.
The Art of Preaching.
Acknowledging what is good, rejecting what is bad.
For such is how, in my eyes, God has brought distant peoples together into one.
Some men will always wonder and doubt, while other men will praise His Holy Name in wonderment.
This is how I understand Paul's missionary work when reconciling cultural and religious differences under Christ.
This was done through love, peace, and speaking clarity while being patient with people's inability to see past their noses.
Paul mentioned people's religious themes and introduced God's purpose for their lives.
The Art of Preaching.
Ancient Israel was taught not to follow celestial signs, but only to obey things clearly mentioned from God through the prophets.
Israel was taught to follow the Law of Moses, and in doing so to exclude other manners or ideas found outside of Israel.
This was purposed and for a reason.
This was purposed and for a reason.
But does such negation remove the validity of any religious or spiritual manner outside of Israel?
Yes, no, and not always.
As I've concluded regarding Zoroastrianism and the attested testimony of the Magi, one should ponder how God reconciles people from all walks of life.
This is done so we won't ignorantly dismiss the good works of God before searching matters out.
Yes, no, and not always.
As I've concluded regarding Zoroastrianism and the attested testimony of the Magi, one should ponder how God reconciles people from all walks of life.
This is done so we won't ignorantly dismiss the good works of God before searching matters out.
The important detail, once again, is why would men from the east, supposedly following their own religious ideas (Zoroastrianism) care about a child not of their heritage?
It seems that through syncretism, and again that word limitedly defined in a way that often avoids or ignores Providence, God brought about a third party to testify to things likely previously mentioned in the land of Zoroaster.
How these matters are expressed can bring clarity or obscure things clearly evident.
For those who argue from a secular perception, yet without faith, there may be a tendency to not see things as providential.
For those who argue from a faithful perspective, yet without consideration to secular views, the same outcome is likely nearsightedness.
And then there's God's perspective, which include and surpass man's points of view.
Where Christian social, cultural, and religious overtones are not evident on the surface, one should consider the accommodating themes (like messiah from a Zoroastrian perspective).
It could be concluded that Truth is not about arguing a Christian identity (that identity often defined narrowly, for example, from a 'western' point of view).
Rather, Truth is revealed and confirmed according to things previously written (prophetic messages).
As with Balaam, not all prophetic sources (through humans) is tied to a particularly defined religious perspective.
For those who argue from a secular perception, yet without faith, there may be a tendency to not see things as providential.
For those who argue from a faithful perspective, yet without consideration to secular views, the same outcome is likely nearsightedness.
And then there's God's perspective, which include and surpass man's points of view.
Where Christian social, cultural, and religious overtones are not evident on the surface, one should consider the accommodating themes (like messiah from a Zoroastrian perspective).
It could be concluded that Truth is not about arguing a Christian identity (that identity often defined narrowly, for example, from a 'western' point of view).
Rather, Truth is revealed and confirmed according to things previously written (prophetic messages).
As with Balaam, not all prophetic sources (through humans) is tied to a particularly defined religious perspective.
Again, the Magi came to worship and give gifts honoring a 'King' to be born, yet the Magi had an arguably very different religion.
'How' they were led to this King, even through astrology, is less of an issue as to the fact that it did happen.
Again, according to their manner of religious worship or understanding of the world.
'How' they were led to this King, even through astrology, is less of an issue as to the fact that it did happen.
Again, according to their manner of religious worship or understanding of the world.
Zarathustra / Zoroaster is believed to have: lived some time between 1500 BC to 1000 BC (some scholars giving a later date of 600 BC); hailed from the east in the Iranian plateau (a large expanse including Ur, Babylon, and north towards the Caspian Sea); and was considered ethnically Persian.
Around 1000 BC, Iranians - the ancient cultural and ethnic group - moved south to modern-day Iran (along the Persian Gulf) into what came to be called 'Persis' - with Ur being included in their sphere of influence.
In due time, the Persian influence / empire went as far west as Egypt, and became one of several empires developing rich and intricate cultural details over the centuries.
Consider the time and place Abram (later called Abraham) was born.
Abram was born in Ur of the Chaldeans, some scholars estimating 1800 BC... some saying later, others earlier.
Chaldea in existence by the 10 century BC and was located between the Egyptian and Persian empires... at times subject to one or the other, or peered with either one, or independent, over time.
Is it possible that Zarathustra was Abram?
Is it also possible that what became known as Zarathustra was the legend of Abram?
Since peoples, nations, and their ideas overlap, it is very possible what looks like hijacking or adoption is simply sharing and forwarding realities on the ground (providential syncretism).
These 'realities' being talked about in typical human fashion, but revealing greater 'realities' beyond time, place, and ideological arguments.
These 'realities' being talked about in typical human fashion, but revealing greater 'realities' beyond time, place, and ideological arguments.
In pride, people consider a legendary character as their next of kin... or of their ethnic type.
Man's pride desires him to call things his own, and such ideas are typically spoken from a centric point of view.
Man's pride desires him to call things his own, and such ideas are typically spoken from a centric point of view.
The rise of Abraham's narrative, coming to be known through Christ and thus spreading the world over, should not be something easily dismissed as ‘chance'... but purposed, since this is what has historically happened.
This is very significant.
Significant not because of its popularity, but as to 'why' it has become known the world over.
From a very marginal and smaller tribe (Israel) came a world dominance proclaiming Yeshua as Lord.
Great significance.
Significant not because of its popularity, but as to 'why' it has become known the world over.
From a very marginal and smaller tribe (Israel) came a world dominance proclaiming Yeshua as Lord.
Great significance.
One prophetic message from the Old Testament was that the God of Abraham was going to be made known the world over.
Christ prophesied that He (Christ the Lord thy God) would be proclaimed the world over, bringing glory to Himself as the God of Abraham revealed on earth and, in due time, to the world.
These two prophecies have evidently come to pass!
This may very well be the same God that Zarathustra's writings / legends speak about.
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