To the obvious absurdity of this multi-storey religious structure, it remains – for “fullness” – to add that, according to modern scientific views, biblical heroes, including the above-mentioned Moses and the Jewish ancestral god Yahweh-Jehovah himself, are fictional heroes, and the entire biblical history of the Jewish people – a collection of folk tales and, of course, a fantasy. As for “through Jesus Christ,” the very attachment: Christ = Mashiach = King of the Jews, which is expected by the Jews according to the biblical OT-prophecies, to the Name of Jesus, reveals that the author of the Prologue a Messianic Jew.
“18 No one has seen God at any time; The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has revealed "– and how can this true statement be combined with all the previous? And how can this be Jehovah, whom so many had seen already: Adam and Eve, Abraham with Sarah, and Moses (from behind) and even Elijah the prophet, and who appeared to many biblical characters from behind, from the front, or even sideways, and even in the form of pillars and other horror stories, and more than once arranged personal beatings with or without reason. And again, editorial interference in the text: “the Only Begotten, who is in the bosom of the Father”– all this, I dare to insist, is a reflection of much later theological disputes that theologically, have never been completely resolved. And the victors, the “Orthodox” (church orthodox) prevailed only exclusively by “police” measures – as always. “I am the Father in the bosom” is lost in translation, hinting both at Jehovah and at the “pregnancy” of God with his Son. But in fact ὁ κόλπος πατήρ literally means “the one who is on the father’s chest”, that is, simply “beloved.” “He revealed”: ἐκεῖνος – he who; ἐξηγέομαι – to tell, show. So, in sum: “No one has ever seen God; the only beloved son told about Him”.
Whoever the author of the Prologue was, he was definitely not a disciple of Jesus.
John Chapter 1, continued
Well, let us pass, however, to ev. John from verse 19, what do we see? Priests and Pharisees came to John from Jerusalem to find out who he is. So what? He announced to them that he was not Christ (Messiah-Messiah-Anointed-King of the Jews), neither Elijah, nor a prophet – but who are you? Voice of One Crying in the Wilderness: Correct God’s Ways – Like Isaiah the Prophet[37]said. About Isaiah and his sophisticated prophecies suddenly recalls the one who appeared from the wilderness, where he was, according to Luke, from infancy (Luke 1.80: “80 But the baby grew and became strong in spirit, and was in the deserts until the day of his appearance to Israel” – this is all about him), overgrown with wild hair and never washed in life, a prophet, a savage, illiterate.
Does God need to clear the road?
And then – a question to him from the sent priests and Pharisees: why do you baptize?
From the point of view of the Jews, the question is meaningless and insane – what kind of baptism by washing with water from a river “for the remission of sins”? Sin is forgiven only by a bloody life-for-life sacrifice and nothing else. If they were sent to John, it was only for the purpose of arrest, trial and execution for blasphemy: “who can forgive sins, except God?”
Further, John elaborates before the Pharisees about “going in front” to baptize with the Spirit – who would listen to him. But the most interesting is yet to come. “28 This took place at Bethabar near Jordan, where John baptized” – in the ancient codes it is written in Bethany [38], and later converted to “Bethavar”, that is, “river crossing or ferry” – let’s remember this. Bethany is located three kilometers from Jerusalem, and thirty to fifty kilometers from Jordan, so John could hardly baptize “in Jordan” in Bethany, and therefore pious editors in later lists transported the obviously impossible Bethany to some faceless “ferry” (through Jordan, of course), which must have been on the Jewish side somewhere opposite Jerusalem, in the Jericho area – in general, no matter, geography is not a master’s science, and the authors of the Gospel are clearly at odds with it. This is followed by a whole speech, addressed to an unknown person, very pathetic: when the Jewish inspectors left, literally the next day, John suddenly sees Jesus (walking towards him) and speaks about Him to someone undefined,: “Behold the Lamb of God.”
“29 The next day John saw Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God who takes on himself the sin of the world.
29 – firstly, he sees Jesus coming to him and immediately recognizes in Him the one who was predicted to him – but how? Second, in what sense is he the lamb that takes away the sins of the world? Only in one way: the lamb was slaughtered and burned in the Jewish ritual sacrifice “for the atonement of sins”, and it turns out that Jesus was by his Father-God intended “for the atonement of sins” as a sacrifice to Himself? Whatever Heavenly Father, sounds like Ivan the Terrible, killing his own son. And thirdly, it is strange to hear about the Jewish sacrifice from exactly the man who himself canceled this sacrifice, replacing it with penitential washing “for the remission of sins.”
“30 This is he of whom I said, After me comes a man who was ahead of me because he was before me” – the very thing that the author of the Prologue could not avoid mentioning before (see John 1, 15) – that is, the idea of the eternal existence of Jesus as the Word of God is being imposed.
“31 I Didn’t Know Him; but for this he came to baptize in water, so that He might be revealed to Israel. 32 And John testified, saying, I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and staying on Him. 33 I did not know Him; but he who sent me to baptize in water said to me: on whom you will see the Spirit descending and abiding on him, is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit. 34 And I saw and testified that this is the Son of God.”
Long explanation by John as to why when he saw Jesus, he said, that he is “the Lamb of God.” That is – he sees the Spirit upon Him in the form of a dove, although Jesus has not even approached him yet, let alone has not been baptized? Then why does he speak about it in the past tense, if he saw it right now? If one saw such a thing, he would not “testify”, but, probably, would have yelled and jumped from a happy shock. Another cart ahead of the horse: he had just seen him walking, but had already seen the Spirit in the form of a dove descending on Him – when and where? But – again – not a word about the baptism of Jesus: just on whom you see the Spirit in the form of a dove, that is the One.
35 The next day John stood again and two of his disciples.36 And when he saw Jesus walking, he said, Behold the Lamb of God.
Déjà vu, the return of the story to the same place, only as if again the next day.
All this, of course, is good – but where is the very Baptism of Jesus by John? There is none, because there was none!
Many generations of interpreters asked the question: why should Jesus, the sinless Son of God, God Himself, the Word and the Light, described a couple of lines above, be baptized “for the remission of sins”? Even the authors of the synoptic gospels, who thoughtlessly copied from John what was not there at all – about the descent of the Spirit in the form of a dove on Jesus baptized by John during baptism – were also embarrassed. And Mathew even came up with the formula “for this is how we must make all righteousness” (Mathew 3, 15) – what righteousness of baptism “for the remission of sins” can there be, if the