High Stakes

by Sylvia Browne

  Christ didn’t stop there, he goes on in Matthew 23:23–28 to say: “Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you pay tithes on mint and anise and cumin, and have left undone the weightier matters of the Law, right judgment and mercy and faith. These things you ought to have done, while not leaving the others undone. Blind guides, who strain out the gnat but swallow the camel! Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but within they are full of robbery and uncleanness. Thou blind Pharisee! clean first the inside of the cup and of the dish, that the outside too may be clean. Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you are like whited sepulchers, which outwardly appear to men beautiful, but within are full of dead men’s bones and of all uncleanness. So you also outwardly appear just to men, but within you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.”

  Hypocrisy was a favorite target of Jesus because of its untruth and deception. We find hypocrisy of one form or another throughout our lives, but in the area of religion it does run rampant. When religion puts forth an all-loving and merciful God and then turns around and says to fear God because of His/Her wrath, this is hypocrisy…for they say that God is all-loving, merciful and perfect and put that out as truth; then they turn around and betray that truth by saying God is wrathful, vengeful and condemns some of his creations to an everlasting fiery pit to suffer eternally. Just using basic logic, you can’t have an all-loving and all-merciful God who then turns around and shows no mercy or love in punishing forever those He/She supposedly loves and shows mercy to.

  We also run into religious hypocrisy in the condemnation and judging of supposed “sinners.” All religions have differing outlooks on what they consider “sin” and all give various “sins” different classifications of severity. We even have some Christian churches put forth as sin the following: wearing makeup, wearing jewelry, dancing, watching TV, attending movies, women in two-piece bathing suits, mixed swimming, playing cards, smoking, listening to rock music, men wearing beards, unmarried couples kissing, drinking wine in moderation, using a Bible other than King James version, and drinking coffee or tea. When an average adult reads this list, many might laugh at how ridiculous it seems to be, but to certain churches people who do these things are “sinners.”

  Sin, as I mentioned earlier, is also judged by its severity. In certain religions, adultery by a female (it doesn’t seem to apply to the male in most cases) can mean a death sentence. In the case of females in general, sexual sins seem to hold the most stigma, while males get off much more lightly. Many conservative churches still feel that the female is a potential Jezebel who can seduce men with her feminine wiles (hence no makeup, no lipstick, no jewelry, no two-piece swimsuits, etc.). In some cases of sin the female has an advantage, such as in murder, for women are much less likely to get a death sentence than men. Sins in religions are much more likely to daily address the sins of morality rather than crime, especially when it pertains to sexual morality. I guess religions feel that if they can control the sexual morality issues, they can then work on other issues of morality.

  I had a woman who used to come regularly to see me as a client. She was a very sweet and caring person, honest, loving and from all outward appearances a very pretty and classy lady. She was also a high-class prostitute. When I told her psychically what she did for a living, she just nodded affirmatively and then told me that she enjoyed her profession, would quit one day when she had her nest egg, marry and hopefully have two children. She was completely nonchalant and very comfortable, and I immediately knew why—she was a good person. Many religions would have strung her up from the nearest tree, so to speak, but she wasn’t hurting anybody and did volunteer work at a local hospital. I have always hated the word sin because it is a truly subjective term. Morality is geographical, as women in primitive cultures go around barebreasted and might have several husbands or vice versa. To them it is a traditional way of life and again it harms no one. I have always put forth that what separates a sinner from a nonsinner is motive. If you have the intent to hurt someone, or mean to do harm to someone, you can be judged by your fellow man for criminal intent to maintain social order. But as far as judgment in a religious sense is concerned, no one can judge another soul…that is between that soul and God. I personally don’t believe in the concept of religious judgment because I know we have an all-loving God who would not hurt or punish anyone. I believe that the only judgment we go through is when we judge ourselves on the Other Side.

  With many of the major religions in the world concentrating on humankind’s propensity to “sin,” they put more emphasis on evil than good. Instead of touting the good deeds that humankind should and could do, they constantly remind their flocks of the bad and evil deeds and inflict guilt to boot. In their negative propaganda, backed up by purported Holy Books that are inconsistent, contradictory and that also emphasize the evils that humankind does, we here on earth are inundated with negative programming. We not only have to watch all the negative news on television programs or read about negativity in newspapers, but we get no solace or respite from our religions. It’s no wonder that most of us are stressed, guilt-ridden and exhausted from life. Religion gives us no shelter from the challenges of life and in fact just contributes more by constantly pointing out our sins and giving us guilt.

  When my publisher asked me to write this book, I told him that it would be very controversial because with the knowledge and truth that I have garnered over the years, my true representation of Christ would be radically different from that of religion. I hope, if nothing else, whether you agree or disagree, it will set you on a journey to seek your own spirituality and your true sense of knowing who this God-man truly was. Is it true we are all the sons and daughters of God? Absolutely…but with this being said, Jesus was a true and divine report or messenger from God. He would be what we refer to as the first and foremost mystical traveler.

  What exactly are mystical travelers? They are entities created by God with the perfection to bring about the word of our true all-loving Creator. They are usually assigned to a specific planet to help the creations on that planet evolve their souls. We also can ask to be mystical travelers, but will not attain (at least not in this life) the stature and divineness of Jesus until our souls reach a state of perfection that warrants that designation. Most mystical travelers, as in the case of Jesus, are created with that perfection already intact within them. All mystical travelers, whether they were created as such or attain that state through the evolution of their souls, take a simple oath that they will live their lives in complete ser vice to God and go anywhere to do any good that God infuses them to do.

  My Gnostic Christian Church, Novus Spiritus (New Spirit), was founded because we believe that truly all religions have their own messengers or messiahs and ours happens to be Jesus Christ. In many ways Jesus, above all the others, was the most simplistic in his messages and teachings; but he has also been the most misunderstood, argued over and misrepresented messenger or messiah on earth.

  Tragically, how is it possible that the teachings of this God-man have gone so badly awry? He taught parables, love, beatitudes, forgiveness, justice and nonjudgment and put forth at that time the new concept of an all-loving, all-merciful and benevolent God. According to the Bible, in his public life he only traveled in a radius of about a hundred miles, and yet his teachings and influence spread eventually throughout most of the world. What or who was it that took teachings of love, formed them into a religion and then turned around and went out and killed millions with their wars, crusades, inquisitions and persecutions? You probably already know the answer, the early Catholic Church. There has been more horror wrought on humankind in the name of Christianity than of almost all the other religions put together. When early Christianity became the state religion of the Roman Empire in the fourth century, it started to grow by leaps and bounds. With that growth came unbelievable power and corruption.

  This kind and caring s
pecial messenger named Jesus came into a world maybe not as bad as ours, but very much like ours. A world divided by taxes, the poor, the needy, the rich and the powerful. A world of two warring factions—the Roman Empire and the Sanhedrin, the governing body of Judaic Law and religion.

  I’m convinced that Jesus had direct contact with God, with no intermediaries. My guide, Francine, says he had angels in abundance around him and the teachings that he absorbed from tutors in Judaic law as a young boy and from his travels to the Far East also helped him a great deal. But his real guidance came from God.

  Certainly as an Essene and Gnostic, Jesus came to show all of us that we have to go through the trials and travails of life that include suffering to learn from life and to magnify our souls. He didn’t come to die for our sins (only Paul and the Book of Revelation, which was influenced by Paul, say that), he came to teach and heal and lead an exemplary life doing God’s will. His Chart did not allow him, in all his power, to help himself, because he was not a hypocrite, and it also showed that he felt his teachings were the most important part of his life, not his Divinity or power. Although his divinity was magnified in his teachings and power, being incarnated in human form brought out all the frailties and emotions that all of us experience when we incarnate on this plane called Earth. He, like us, fell prey to depression, anger, fear and all the other emotions that we all go through in life in pressing against our written Chart to change it. This manifests in his anger at the moneychangers in the Temple, his fear in the Garden of Gethsemane and his anxiety of feeling alone on the cross when he asked God if He had forsaken him.

  One of the controversies that has always surrounded Christ is whether or not he was in actuality Divine. Some believe he was a myth put forth by Christians and Jews and they cite the fact that there are no historical references to Jesus other than in Christian writings. They say that none of the major historians of the time mention anything about the existence of a man known as Jesus Christ, and in actuality this is true. You would think that great historians of the time like Josephus would have mentioned him in their writings, but the truth is that they did not, and it is still a puzzle to many scholars and historians today. Francine says that one reason for this is that Christ’s public life was confined to such a small area, and although he drew large crowds of Jews, many did not accept him as a Messiah or the Christ because they were solidly indoctrinated into the Judaic faith that was highly influenced by the Sanhedrin. If indeed Christ had been wholeheartedly accepted by the Judaic people, there would be no Judaic religion today. The Judaic religion had a long history even in Christ’s time, and the strength of Judaic tradition and faith overrode the new teachings of Jesus among the vast majority of the people. Yes, Christ had his converts and followers, but most of them still remained loyal to the Judaic faith and became Jewish Christians. You must also remember that during Christ’s public life, no semblance or structure of a church or religion had yet formed. The gospels also highly exaggerated his influence on the majority of the followers of the Judaic faith, and were instead used to convert followers of other religions; which is why Jesus sent his disciples to other lands to preach his words.

  Many of the Jewish Christians and eventual Gnostics also didn’t necessarily believe in his divinity because they knew he survived his crucifixion, did not die and was not resurrected. Most believed he was a great prophet and teacher who carried a message from God and who was human like the rest of them. One of the primary figures of the early Jewish Christian church in Jerusalem was Christ’s brother James, who certainly didn’t believe in his divinity but certainly did believe that Jesus was a great prophet and messenger with divine teachings for all. Paul and some of Christ’s disciples were the ones who really emphasized the divinity of Christ. They initially, by word of mouth, put forth stories of his miracles and teachings in sermons to anyone who would listen. It was not until several de cades later that they started to put these stories in writing, and they were definitely slanted from the actual truth to help propagate their new religion that would be called Christianity. As with all religions, they tended to overexaggerate the deeds of their heroes or founders to make a favorable impression that their religion was greater than any other.

  In the book The Templar Revelation—Secret Guardians of the True Identity of Christ, by Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince, the authors point out an example of how the Gnostics felt about Christ. They write about a doctor whose name was Bernard Raymond Fabré-Palaprat, who allegedly got his authority from what is known as the “Larmenius Charter.” Johannes Marcus Larmenius claimed to have written this charter in 1324. He was appointed to be the grand master of the Knights Templar by the supposed last grand master, Jacques de Molay, before he was burned at the stake in 1314 by the Catholic Church and the king of France, who were trying to destroy the Knights Templar. This charter supposedly outlines the continuation of the Order of Knights Templar by containing the signatures of all the subsequent grand masters of the Knights Templar, of which Fabré-Palaprat was now grand master. Fabré-Palaprat also possessed another document of significance called the Levitikon, which was a version of John’s gospel that had blatant Gnostic overtones and had supposedly been written in the eleventh century. He used the Levitikon as the basis for founding the Johannite Church (original Christians) in Paris in 1828, and it certainly had Neo-Templar philosophies.

  The Levitikon has two parts in its makeup. The first part has religious doctrines that are taught, which include the nine grades of the Templar Order. The second part has much more controversy, as it contains the Gospel of John as it is mainly put forth in the New Testament but omits several significant portions and adds some very contentious writings to it. All of the miracles of Jesus are eliminated, as are certain references to Peter, including the story where Jesus says, “Upon this rock I will build my church.” The last two chapters of the original Gospel of John are also eliminated, which refer to his resurrection. In addition, any writing that puts forth that Christ was an initiate of the mysteries of Osiris, the major Egyptian god of his day, and that he had passed on these mysteries and esoteric teachings and knowledge to his disciple John “the Beloved” were included. It also says that Paul and some other Apostles founded the Christian Church, but they did so without any knowledge of Christ’s “true” teaching. According to Fabré-Palaprat, these secret teachings that were given to John the Beloved had great influence on the beliefs of the Knights Templar. It also fits in with what my guide Francine says about Jesus learning the “ancient mysteries” in Egypt just before he went into his public life.

  What has always been amazing to me is the fact that we have the writings of Christianity on the one hand and, on the other, the equally massive collection of writings from Gnostics and Jewish Christians that, in so many cases, are directly in contradiction. In researching all of these religious writings we can become so confused at the interpretations, discrepancies, omissions, contradictions and blatant falsehoods that it leaves us with our head spinning in wondering who is telling the truth. It really boils down to the premise that if “truth” has been put forth by Christianity, why are there so many adherents of Jesus Christ who have writings against the “truths” of Christianity? If the opponents of Christianity’s “truth” were other religions, you could understand their opposition, but other religions don’t attack Christianity near as much as the so-called “heretical” sects made up of fellow believers in Christ. A multitude of Christian secret societies throughout history have sprung up, claiming that they have secret knowledge of the real truth about Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene and Christ’s life. Some of these societies became so popular or powerful that the Catholic Church literally tried to suppress them through annihilation in which thousands died.

  Why did so many fellow Christians rebel against the teachings and dogma of the early Catholic Church? Could it be that they were based on lies about his death and resurrection and the omission of his true relationship with Mary Magdalene? If truth is put out, you mi
ght have a few detractors; but truth is truth and you wouldn’t have thousands of fellow Christians fighting those “truths” if they were all really true. There is definitely something fishy going on or, as others like to say, there is something rotten in Denmark.

  I have tried to give you the truth as I know it to be. Again, whether you believe what I say or not, we all have to go back not just to the core of faith, because that can be shaken with historical fact…but to our real core knowledge that Christ was here on this world and walked among us. Jesus’ message was simple. It became complicated because of religion and humankind’s need to modify his teachings, change them and omit them for their own agendas of a political and moneymaking nature. Scholars don’t know who wrote the four canonical gospels, but it is certainly safe to say that the early Church edited them highly and that they eliminated many other gospels and books that are now contained in what we know as the Apocrypha. These omitted texts held great truths that were kept out of the public eye for centuries. Many of Christ’s teachings were edited, such as those on reincarnation and the true nature of God. Many of the facts of Christ’s life were omitted or completely made up and exaggerated. Christianity today can condemn an author such as Dan Brown for writing a book of fiction, but they won’t condemn themselves for also writing, in many cases, a fictitious account of Jesus Christ.

  So with all of this and still carrying Christ as the Messiah in our hearts and soul, what do we do? It’s easy—we go on loving and realizing why he came—and, as I stated, he really survived what humankind tried to do to him. His divinity is real and his resurrection was real—it just happened at his real death, when he was eighty-six or so; just as all of us are resurrected at our deaths. Jesus didn’t have to die for our sins, nor did he come to die for our sins…he came to teach us and give us the knowledge of our all-loving Creator.