Return to the Antiquity for the principles of peaceful and effective evolution and humanistic progress
Return to the Antiquity for the principles of peaceful and effective evolution and humanistic progress
Autor: Bogdan Góralski
Library of the Historical Institute of the University of Warsaw
Assuming that the resurrection of Jesus Christ and all the extraordinary events in Jewish history were attempts to contact Heaven with the human world, we come to the question whether these unusual events described in the Bible were properly interpreted? Jewish attempts to live in harmony with scientifically worked out ethics were modified by miraculous events in the history of Jews, which brought them conviction about a nation chosen by God to bear an ethical message to the rest of the world. The only problem was how to be ethical among unethical people?
Ancient Jewish ethics was a synthesis of spiritual searches for all neighboring civilizations, among them civilization of India and China. The crowning achievement of this Jewish ancient ethic was the message of Jesus Christ as the summit of human ethical thought. The Resurrection of Christ was a sign from Heaven indicating the special meanings of the message and life attitude of Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ was a Pharisee and the beloved leader of the rise of the Pharisees against Roman. In the Gospels there is the view that the Pharisees contributed to the crucifixion of Christ. This is an illogical and most likely false view originated during the Hellenization of Christianity. This view was the fruit of hostility between Jewish and Greek intellectuals dominant in ancient Rome in which early Christianity developed.
Christianity misinterpreted the sign of the Resurrection and commanded the worship of Christ as God, forgetting the essence of his message. The Church of Christ based on the principles of Jewish ethics developed and grew during the crisis and fall of the Roman Empire, because the communities of Christians modeled on Jewish communities were protection against the poverty and lawlessness of the Roman empire. During the fall of Rome, the Church of Christ became an institution supporting the power of emperors and slowly forgot about the ethics of Christ. Today, the Churches of Christ are a global conservative financial institutios that supports every political reactionism and combats social progress.
Numerical development of human population and climatic crises caused armed conflicts between ancient empires and other powered countries. Democracy has intensified international conflicts, setting politicians with the task of defending national interests. The ethics of Christ (and its source) were forgotten and was treated as unnecessary ballast. Churches of Christians have become part of a political system that holds society in check on bans and church orders.
I think we should go back to the source, to ancient Israel twenty centuries ago, to make an ethical leap forward and restore the ancient Jewish ideals and universal principles of organizing society, which I think are tailored to the needs of each community.
The ethical achievements of the Jews are the synthesis of all earthly ethical systems. We have to go back to this and think about the meaning of this for us all and for the future of our civilization.
Maybe we can work out an ethical basis for all people. My words below are an attempt of creating such a ethical base.