Could Jesus have lived in the Middle Ages?

[jasonm]

I have always wondered about this. The Middle Ages with its crusades and inquisitions seems to fit very well with the life and crucifixion of Jesus plus the events that followed. What sparked my interest in this question again was a series of books by a Russian fellow Anatoly Fomenko who claims that Jesus was born in 1053 and crucified in 1086 (which he has backed up with scientific analysis such as dating eclipses). It would obviously make more sense that the crusades were primarily the result of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ rather than the invasion of Spain by Islamic forces, even though in reality the two are connected (as is the invasion of the Byzantine empire earlier). How do we explain the sudden religious fervour in Europe during this time, is it really possible to believe that after 1000 years people would use Jesus and the cross as their motivation for going on crusade against the "infidel". In my opinion events on the scale of the crusades are sparked by history making ideals and figures such as Jesus not just wars and potential invasions.

[davidg]

I have always wondered about this. The Middle Ages with its crusades and inquisitions seems to fit very well with the life and crucifixion of Jesus plus the events that followed. What sparked my interest in this question again was a series of books by a Russian fellow Anatoly Fomenko who claims that Jesus was born in 1053 and crucified in 1086 (which he has backed up with scientific analysis such as dating eclipses). It would obviously make more sense that the crusades were primarily the result of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ rather than the invasion of Spain by Islamic forces, even though in reality the two are connected (as is the invasion of the Byzantine empire earlier). How do we explain the sudden religious fervour in Europe during this time, is it really possible to believe that after 1000 years people would use Jesus and the cross as their motivation for going on crusade against the "infidel". In my opinion events on the scale of the crusades are sparked by history making ideals and figures such as Jesus not just wars and potential invasions.

You have to read more history and the culture of the time to see that there was nothing "sudden" about it. What you had was a basic religious culture which was "looking" for a way out. A big question of the time for a Christian Knight might have been how can I serve God with my skill and yet achieve salvation. Murder is a sin, but it is also the business of the knight. Another problem of the era was that of a changing climate in Europe and more people living longer. There were more Nobles having more children and in a feudal system this is not really a good thing. You NEED the heir, and a spare, .. and perhaps one more .. and of course you can always marry off the daughters, but to have too many sons means either you have to have some live "below their station" or find something to do with them. I've always thought that the Crusades was a very important social phenomena because it suddenly took all those unnecessary fourth and fifth sons and put them .. far, far away..
My opinion of the ideas of the Russian writer you mention is that he is simply cracked.

[Dashinvaine]

You'd have to explain how the Roman Empire converted to Christianity seven centuries before the birth of Christ if this theory were true. Actually it's the stupidest thing I've ever heard.

[Bauceant]

"You'd have to explain how the Roman Empire converted to Christianity seven centuries before the birth of Christ if this theory were true"

Sure, there was no "ancient" Rome, antiquity is actually the middle ages (5-1500). Unreliable dating and forged texts are the reason why events from the middle ages were thrown back in time into the so called antiquity. Here are some quotes from critics of official history and Roman history in particular that you may find useful:

Garry Kasparov who is describing the improbable strength of Roman soldiers says that:

"Besides their arms, which the legionaries scarcely considered as an encumbrance, they were laden with their kitchen furniture, the instruments of fortifications, and the provisions of many days. Under this weight, which would oppress the delicacy of a modern soldier, they were trained by a regular step to advance, in about six hours, nearly twenty miles. On the appearance of an enemy, they threw aside their baggage, and by easy and rapid evolutions converted the column of march into an order of battle." This description of the physical fitness of an average Roman soldier is extraordinary. It brings us to the very strange conclusion that, at some point, the human race retrogressed in its ability to cope with physical problems. Is it possible that there was a gradual decline of the human race, with hundreds of thousands of Schwarzenegger-like athletes of Roman times evolving into medieval knights with relatively weak bodies (like today's teenage boys), whose little suits of armour are today proudly displayed in museums? Is there a reasonable biological or genetic explanation to this dramatic change affecting the human race over such a short period of time? "

"It seems that starting with the 5th century, there were periods during which the population of Europe stagnated or decreased. Attempts at logical explanations, such as poor hygiene, epidemics, and short lifespan, can hardly withstand criticism. In fact, from the 5th century until the 18th century, there was no significant improvement in sanitary conditions in Western Europe, there were many epidemics, and hygiene was poor. Also, the introduction of firearms in the 15th century resulted in more war casualties. According to UNESCO demographic resources, an increase of 0.2 per cent per annum is required to assure the sustainable growth of a human population, while an increase of 0.02 per cent per annum is described as a demographical disaster. There is no evidence that such a disaster has ever happened to the human race. Therefore, there is no reason to assume that the growth rate in ancient times differed significantly from the growth rate in later epochs. "


TT: In your preface to Fomenko’s Introduction to New Chronology you
write about inconsistencies in various growth rates throughout human
history, including those for the development of human physical size and
strength. We first look at the great physical accomplishments attributed
to Greeks and Romans. Then we look at the relatively small size of
medieval suits of armour. Finally, we look at our size today and this
seems to describe a strange developmental pattern.

GK: Correct. We know that for the last 300 or 400 years, the size of
human bodies is growing. Now what happened is that we suddenly, in
history, have the backward process. We have these great Greek athletes,
we have ultra-powerful Roman soldiers. You look at the size of the Roman
soldier who has to carry all this ammunition. You’re
talking about 300,000 Arnold Schwartzeneggers. And even well-known
historians like Edward Gibbon are talking about how the soldiers of the
18th century were not able to do the same type of exercise.

TT: Isn’t it possible that we have an over-romanticized view of the
Romans and so we grossed up their abilities a bit? No harm done, the
duration of the empire remains the same, but they simply weren’t as
fast, they didn’t jump as high, they didn’t carry as much iron.

GK: But then we have to devaluate all the sources. And that’s very
important. We’re talking about very reliable quote-unquote historical
sources. And they describe it in great detail . . . it’s not just
fifteen kilos of iron. He’s talking about all sorts of ammunition: a
sword, a shield, a long pike. It’s a precise description.

TT: So this is about credibility of source material.

GK: Oh, this is a big credibility issue! If these things, if all these
things never existed, then we have to devaluate as a credible source the
entire literature that is attributed to the ancient authors, because how
could they make such mistakes describing the
ammunition of their contemporary soldiers? This suggests that those
sources do not belong to the contemporary writers, and they were made up
much later.


"And we have again a strange gap. We have the big scientific
discoveries around the second, third century BC. Then we have an
invention of the so-called Arab system, the positional system of
counting with zero dated to the eighth or ninth century
AD. Then we have another gap of 600 to 700 years before the positional
system of counting was used for logarithms and for decimals. But it
doesn’t take 600 years. It takes two generations maximum. Which takes me
to the conclusion that probably the positional system of counting was an
invention of the fifteenth century. And then we have a very very good,
gradual development from the invention of this system of
counting, then we have decimals, we have logarithms, then we have great
scientific works of people like Archimedes and Apolloni on one side and
you have Kepler, Descartes, Fermat . . . because the complexity of the
tasks they were solving is identical. So if we don’t know anything about
history, we should assume that all these great scientists from the
second and third century BC have to be contemporaries of
Kepler, Descartes, and Fermat."

(Moderator/Bauceant Edit: http://www.new-tradition.org/view-garry-kasparov.html Download 11-17-09)

[jasonm]

"These discrepancies lead me to suspect that there is a gap between the historical dates attributed to the Roman Empire and those suggested by the above computations. But there are more inconsistencies in the historical record of humankind. As I have already noted, there are similar gaps of several centuries in technological and scientific development. Notice that knowledge and technology traditionally associated with the ancient world presumably disappears during the Dark Ages, only to resurface in the 15th century during the early Renaissance. The history of mathematics provides one such example. By chronologically and logically ordering major mathematical achievements, beginning with arithmetic and Greek geometry and finishing with the invention of calculus by I. Newton (1643-1727) and G.W. Leibnitz (1646-1716), we see a thousand-year gap separating antiquity from the new era. Is this only a coincidence? But what about astronomy, chemistry (alchemy), medicine, biology, and physics? There are too many inconsistencies and unexplained riddles in ancient history. Today, we are unable to build simple objects made in ancient times in the way they were originally created -this in a time when technology has produced the space shuttle and science is on the brink of cloning the human body! It is preposterous to blame all of the lost secrets of the past on the fire that destroyed the Library of Alexandria, as some have suggested. "


"In order to supply such an army with weapons, a whole industry would have been needed. In his work, E. Gibbon explicitly mentions iron (or even steel) weapons: "Besides a lighter spear, the legionary soldier grasped in his right hand the formidable pilum ..., whose utmost length was about six feet, and which was terminated by a massy triangular point of steel of eighteen inches." In another place, he indicates "The use of lances and of iron maces ..." It is believed that the extraction of iron from ores was very common in the Roman Empire. However, to smelt pure iron, a temperature of 1 539oC is required, which couldn't be achieved by burning wood or coal without the blowing or the blast furnaces invented more than a 1 000 years later. Even in the 15th century, the iron produced was of quite poor quality because large amounts of carbon had to be absorbed to lower the melting temperature to 1 150oC. There is also the question of sufficient resources - the blast furnaces used in the mid-16th century required large amounts of wood to produce charcoal, an expensive and unclean process that led to the eventual deforestation of Europe. How could ancient Rome have sustained a production of quality iron on the scale necessary to supply thousands of tonnes of arms and equipment to its vast army? "

[jasonm]

It is a fact that people have been getting bigger, this development is "gradual and irreversible" yet we see the medieval warrior who is the size of a 12 or 13 year old boy. In contrast the demands placed on a Roman soldier were something that modern soldiers would have trouble accomplishing, so how can it be when we know human development to be gradual and irreversible, that a Roman soldier could have pulled off this feat when he would have had only a small frame. It is quite frankly impossible.

Also the strange dissappearance of "ancient" texts during the "dark ages" and their sudden reappearance during the renaissance. The Byzantine empire didn't lose contact with the West during all that time, it is ridiculous to suggest that all of a sudden after the fall of Byzantium that the Greeks came flooding back with their ancient knowledge and books with them. It is pure fantasy and nothing else. In reality these so called "ancient" texts were probably the work of renaissance era writers, even the different schools of thought in the middle ages and "antiquity" mirror one another.

[Garalt De Canton]

Garry Kasparov who is describing the improbable strength of Roman soldiers says that:

"Besides their arms, which the legionaries scarcely considered as an encumbrance, they were laden with their kitchen furniture, the instruments of fortifications, and the provisions of many days. Under this weight, which would oppress the delicacy of a modern soldier, they were trained by a regular step to advance, in about six hours, nearly twenty miles. On the appearance of an enemy, they threw aside their baggage, and by easy and rapid evolutions converted the column of march into an order of battle." This description of the physical fitness of an average Roman soldier is extraordinary. It brings us to the very strange conclusion that, at some point, the human race retrogressed in its ability to cope with physical problems. Is it possible that there was a gradual decline of the human race, with hundreds of thousands of Schwarzenegger-like athletes of Roman times evolving into medieval knights with relatively weak bodies (like today's teenage boys), whose little suits of armour are today proudly displayed in museums? Is there a reasonable biological or genetic explanation to this dramatic change affecting the human race over such a short period of time? "

Uh....training, diet and fear of being the one that got decimated?

Ancient Greeks had the agogi system: Basically weight and skills training from the age of five. You'd look like Schwarzenegger too if you were brought up as a Spartan or you'd be killed, simple.

Roman legions were compromised of every race that they conquered and physical build was prized in the main infantry section but scouts and light cavalry would have been smaller are more lithe due to their lack of armour and need for speed. Skirmishers were just that: "throw something and leg it! merchants" they were there to hit the opposition that generally didn't sport heavy shield and weren't generally divided into different classes of soldier.

The Legionnaire you are describing is very credible. These are the physically bigger peanut headed guys that make up most modern army special forces now.

[jasonm]

Garalt De Canton,

Ancient Greeks had the agogi system: Basically weight and skills training from the age of five. You'd look like Schwarzenegger too if you were brought up as a Spartan or you'd be killed, simple.

But you can't exceed the limits of your body, training is not going to make you two foot taller, nor can you build up to levels beyond which the body can go to. We know that in the 17th and 18th century people were much smaller in height and understandably in body mass as well, you only have to look at some of the old homes from that period where the doors and windows are so low. How is it possible that Romans or other ancients were much bigger than people from this era? Usually people will say that with the collapse of the Roman empire that everything just fell apart, however as Kasparov says, this doesn't stand up to reason.

"It seems that starting with the 5th century, there were periods during which the population of Europe stagnated or decreased. Attempts at logical explanations, such as poor hygiene, epidemics, and short lifespan, can hardly withstand criticism. In fact, from the 5th century until the 18th century, there was no significant improvement in sanitary conditions in Western Europe, there were many epidemics, and hygiene was poor. Also, the introduction of firearms in the 15th century resulted in more war casualties. According to UNESCO demographic resources, an increase of 0.2 per cent per annum is required to assure the sustainable growth of a human population, while an increase of 0.02 per cent per annum is described as a demographical disaster. There is no evidence that such a disaster has ever happened to the human race. Therefore, there is no reason to assume that the growth rate in ancient times differed significantly from the growth rate in later epochs. "

[VINDICATUS]

You'd have to explain how the Roman Empire converted to Christianity seven centuries before the birth of Christ if this theory were true. Actually it's the stupidest thing I've ever heard.

--What Dashinvain said.

--I thought this was going to be a serious discussion about a what if scenario, example: 'What if Jesus had returned during the middle ages, could he have begun a new message, tried to work on the original...help society/people move forward...", ect., and potentially intellectually stimulating conversations and such.

--Thank you not for wasting my time, now if you canexlain how the Gospel of Mary which was discovered in the current age and was dated to apx 100 years or so after the Crucifiction, (not birth), and I find it has even limited plausability...I'd love to entertain more conversation.

[John O'Brien]

In this great debate a number of things have been overlooked.

Jesus Christ was Jewish and educated and brought up as a Jew. The 2nd of February each eyar celebrates in Chrstian Chruches when he was tkaen to the Temple for what is known as his Bar Mitzvah.

For several hundred eyars after his death many people claimed to preach ihs word. There were ven thsoe who claimed that John the Baptist was the true Messiah, promised to the Jewish people.

It was not until the Battle of Milvian Bridge, just outside Rome for control of the Roman Empire, by Constantine, elected Emperor by Roman Soliders in Brtain that he believed that the power of the Judeao Christian God was greater than the power of the many Roman Gods.

At Nicea in Turkey he called all the bishops and patrarichs of the diverse Christiian religions together and obliged thme to creat one holy apostolic church based in Rome. From this forst Council of Nicea came the Nicene Creed. Our father which art in heaven etc. which ends with the words "for thine is the power and the glory, Amen " Amen is the ancient Egyptian sun God, for which they claimed all life springs. This could well have been added as a compromise to the roman worship of the Sun as a God.

When the Roman senate heard of this unification of the one church approved by Emperor Constantine they removed Constantine for office and he moved into exile in Byzantium which was renamed Constantinopoiis. This then became the foundation and centre of the Greek orthodox church.

When the Bishop of Rome learned of the removal of Constantine form office and his exile he claimed that Cosntantine gave him his palace, as well as seniority over all teh other bishops of the by then Western Roman Empire.

What is now known as the Vatican in Rome was originally the Palace of Constantine, Emperor of Rome. The archives in the Vatican still hold the origianl deed of transfer signed by Constantine. Alleged to be a forgery nobody can prove it one way or another.

The invasion of Jerusalem by crusaders was ordered by the Pope in Rome.

The reason was that Islaam controlled Jerusalem, claimed to be a holy site by Christians and Jews. Muslims freely allowed Christiand and Jews to visit Jerusalem to worship, but charged a tax for entry into the city.

Chrstians and Jews objected to paying this tax, and as a result Christians relsoved to take over Jeusalem so that entry would be free to all Christians.

All the above are verifiable from historical and geological records. It is therefore absurd to say the least that Jesus Christ was born 700 years after the Christian Church of Rome was officially recognised by the Roman Empire in 325 A.D. under Emperor Constantine.


Constantine was born in York in Britian to a Roman Father and a Brtish Judeao Chrstian mother.

There are thousands of people who were sainted by the Catholic Church for dying for their Christian faith. The earliest Saint in Britain is Saint Alban who was beheaded around 180 A.D. on ahill overlooking the town that bears his name.

Trust this puts history in perspective. Remember most historians write to their own agenda.

Regards

[John O'Brien]

Please note the Battle of Milvian Bridge was in 312 A.D.

The Council of Nicea in Turley took place in 325 A.D.

Regards

[jasonm]

What if Jesus had returned during the middle ages, could he have begun a new message

This theory is interesting with perhaps Knight & Lomas being the most well known advocates of it. Also in the book of Revelation there is Jesus returning after 1000 years, the problem is that Jesus is supposed to return victoriously and bring in a new age of "righteousness".

[Garalt De Canton]

In response to the 1000 years later theory of Jesus returning in glory.

Viking raids? - Conversion to Christianity.
Norman Conquests - Christianity becoming the dominant religion.
Crusades especially 1099 founding of Outremer Kingdom of Jerusalem

There certainly are many examples an imaginative person could use to illustrate the idea that there was a preacher that came among the masses and brought God's message to them in their own language.

He's probably a Cathar, though.

it's a nice theory. Good for a novel (my focus)

[jasonm]

"n response to the 1000 years later theory of Jesus returning in glory.

Viking raids? - Conversion to Christianity.
Norman Conquests - Christianity becoming the dominant religion."

None of the above. Jesus certainly wouldn't establish a corrupt religion that was Christianity during the Middle Ages. The difference between the teachings and philosophy of Jesus and that of the Catholic Church are light years apart, most importantly Jesus's church was not a physical and worldly church but a mystical, spiritual one.