nothing is certain. There are rival places for most of the “holy” sites in Israel that are touted today as genuine places where “events” in Jesus’ life are held to have occurred. Fighting over which religious group has control over what “sacred spot” is a major and ongoing scandal.
There is a good reason for discussing the alleged Nazareth connection, but as is becoming clear, the issues are far more complex than a surface examination suggests. Study of the records reveals that it is even quite possible there was no village or settlement at a place called Nazareth in the first century CE. For example, there is no mention of a village or town called Nazareth in the Hebrew Bible, nor in the works of Josephus (who wrote during the first century CE), nor in the Talmud. Yet both of the latter sources give lengthy lists of Galilean settlements. Josephus lived for some time in the region. According to The Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls, Nazareth “is not mentioned in the Hebrew scriptures (nor in any Hebrew literature prior to the seventh or eight century CE).”11 Among recent books raising doubts over this whole issue is The Fabrication of the Christ Myth by the Jewish author Harold Leidner.12
My own examination and summary of the voluminous scholarly discussion over whether or not Nazareth was a hamlet at the putative time of Jesus’ childhood suggests that the general archaeological picture would appear to indicate the existence of a very tiny village wholly devoted to agriculture that originally came into being in the course of the third century BCE.13 So, I believe there most likely was a village called Nazareth in the first century CE. But its connection with any historical Jesus is at best obscure.
The reason St. Paul, who mentions the term “Jesus Christ” about two hundred times, never once writes of or calls him “Jesus of Nazareth” was undoubtedly because he himself had never heard of such a place. Its use by Mark and the other Evangelists appears ultimately to me to have its roots in theology, not geography or history.
The Temptation—
Testing in the Wilderness
Mark’s Gospel
Mark, as we have seen, has no real chronology. His work is not a biographical “life” of a historical person. Consequently, he covers this up and regularly connects scenes that were unconnected in his sources (or his creative imagination) with the Greek word euthus, which means simply “immediately.” That’s what happens right after his description of the experience attributed to Jesus at the River Jordan at the hands of John the Baptist. Aware now of his true, essential nature as God’s child or “son”—“the Beloved” with whom God is well pleased—we are told, “And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness.” Mark then continues: “He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.”
When we look at the parallel descriptions of this episode in Matthew and Luke in a moment, we will see just how abbreviated and condensed this pericope (the technical, scholarly term) or passage really is here. But for now I suggest that you try to put aside all previous conceptions and misconceptions gained from whatever source—early Sunday school lessons, old sermons, or even recent readings of the text—and see the narrative through fresh eyes if you can.
Consider, first of all, that there were no witnesses to this “event.” You know at once you are in the presence of the mythical when there is no precision whatever regarding time or place and no possibility of eyewitnesses. The Evangelist is simply recounting or creating the story or mythos. The wilderness here, as it is time and time again throughout the Scriptures, is also simply an allegorical manner of speaking. It is a metaphor for the soul’s life in the body on this plane of existence. We are spiritual beings in the “wilderness” of bodily existence. Incidentally, the wilderness wanderings of the Israelites in the Old Testament uses the very same metaphor. The mention of his being with “the wild beasts” is a unique feature of Mark and again is a pointed reminder that we have an animal nature that cannot be hidden or ignored even though, notice carefully, the text clearly emphasizes our spiritual nature by saying that it was not chance but the Spirit that “drove” him out for the wilderness testing. This clash of Spirit and our animal nature is not just inevitable, however; it is absolutely essential for any possibility of growing and evolving into the complete beings of light we are destined one day to become. This can be costly and painful. But, it should be added, we are not, somehow, wholly on our own; there is the ideal model of the Christ figure in the Gospels to inspire us on our journey.
Everybody knows what is probably the most familiar passage in the entire Bible. Nearly every wedding one attends these days has it as a primary reading. It is Paul’s famous Hymn to Love in 1 Corinthians:
If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love. (1 Corinthians 13)
What must be realized is that, while Paul never met a historical Jesus, he had in his heart and teaching a vivid portrait of the Christ within—the goal of all human striving. In other words, this is not just a hymn to love, it’s an explicit, detailed picture of what God intends us to become. Anyone can talk about “beings of light,” but this sculpts out the steps we need to take to get there.
How long does this “wilderness” testing go on for? Well, the text of Mark says Jesus was there in the wilderness for forty days. But, as was described more fully in The Pagan Christ, in the Bible this is a fully symbolic number. Here it refers to the whole of life. Our entire life is a “test in the wilderness.” Forty always types, or represents, a period of incubation—as of seeds prior to blooming, or of a birthing process of some sort. A human fetus takes forty weeks to develop fully from conception. Jesus, acting out here the drama of the soul of every one of us, is then put to the test by Satan. It should be understood that Satan too is symbolic. He represents the necessary, opposing force in the yin and yang of life. Without the tension of opposites—Satan on one hand, “the fallen angel of light” or Lucifer, and the Spirit together with the “good angels” on the other—the soul would have nothing to push against, nothing to develop its spiritual muscle on.
It is worth pondering that much that we consider evil in our lives frequently has to be seen and understood in a far deeper and broader context. Without it, without the struggle with pain and suffering, we would be greatly weakened and impoverished.14 That’s why St. Paul could say that when he was “weak,” he found he was being made stronger by the enabling or “grace” of God.
Throughout the entire spectrum of evolving forms of life on this planet, you can witness this fundamental principle at work. All advancement and gain comes through the “pain” of the clash of opposites. Without this, everything would turn literally and figuratively to a kind of mush. Carl Jung said about this basic inevitability of human
