After breakfast he offers a second prayer ... (only) two things are left entirely to them ... personal aid, and charity ... they champion good faith and serve the cause of peace ... They are wonderfully devoted to the works of ancient writers, choosing mostly books that can help soul and body ... they ... conquer pain by sheer will-power: death, if it comes with honour, they value more than life without end. Their spirit was tested to the utmost by the war with the Romans, who racked and twisted, burnt and broke them, subjecting them to every torture yet invented to make them blaspheme the Lawgiver or eat some forbidden food, but could not make them do either, or ever once fawn on their tormentors or shed a tear.... It is indeed their unshakeable conviction that bodies are corruptible and the material composing them impermanent, whereas souls remain immortal for ever. ... Some of them claim to foretell the future ... rarely if ever do their predictions prove wrong ...
Flavius Josephus, who wrote these words in A.D. 77, knew all this about the Essenes, because, by his own account, he himself had lived among them for three years. It is highly probable that he also knew the written traditions and leather scrolls from about 100 B.C. which the community had packed in jars and hidden in nearby caves during a rebellion that threatened them [66].
This theological bomb with a time-fuse of 2,000 years exploded. In 1947 the original documents hidden by the Essenes, now known as 'The Dead Sea Scrolls' [16], were found by accident in caves at Wadi Qumran. Since then they have had an unshakeable place in theological historical literature.
Heinrich Alexander Stoll has told the whole exciting story of the Qumran texts in the book The Caves by the Dead Sea [l7]. This incredibly valuable Manual of Discipline, already supplied with commentaries by the Essenes (!), found its way half-way round the world, was appraised in universities and monasteries until it came into the good hands of objective scholars such as Professor Andre Dupont-Sommer [18] and Professor Millar Burrows, after all kinds of intrigues and haggling
[19].
The translations of the Qumran Scrolls show quite unequivocally that vital parts of the Gospels originated from the Essene school: that Jesus' style and way of life followed the customs of the Essenes and that parables, such as Jesus used, indeed whole sermons attributed to him, had been taught by the Essenes long before him.
Textual comparisons of the Qumran Scroll and the New Testament would be recognized and confirmed as clearly tallying with one another by any normal court of law - not so by Christian theologians. As if there was something reprehensible about the remarks of Jesus of Nazareth or Bethlehem containing the spiritual teachings of the ascetic Essene community! But here Jesus'
consubstantiality with God, ordained in Nicea, stands in the way. The Essenes were simple members of an order who had their own doctrine long before Christ Jesus an epigone? Impossible. The Christian guardians of the pure teaching of Jesus find that intolerable. Albert Schweitzer [20] obviously did not speak clearly enough when he said: 'Modern Christianity must always as a matter of course reckon with the possibility of abandoning the authenticity of Jesus.'
Here are some examples of clear agreements between the teaching of the Essenes and the teaching of Jesus: The Essenes did not baptize. Neither did Jesus.
The Essenes denounced the theologians of their time, the Sadducees and Pharisees. So did Jesus.
The Essenes preached meekness and humility to please God. So did Jesus.
The Essenes warned of an imminent 'Last Judgment with fire. So did Jesus.
The Essenes said a man must love his neighbour like himself. That was the leitmotiv of all Jesus'
speeches.
The Essenes spoke of the 'Sons of Light' who fight against the 'powers of darkness'. Who does not know these metaphors from Jesus' sayings?
The Essenes preached the 'spirit of truth' and promised 'eternal life'. Jesus did so, too.
The Essenes spoke of 'members of the New Covenant' and the 'Holy Ghost'. What did Jesus do?
The Essenes had communal meals preceded by saying grace - like Jesus at the Last Supper.
The Essenes spoke of the foundation 'that will not be shaken' - Jesus of the rock (Peter) against which the gates of hell shall not prevail.
'Beatitudes' were found in the fourth Qumran cave that begin sentence after sentence with the word
'Blessed' - the opening phrase that Jesus used in his Sermon on the Mount.
The Essenes required every member who had just entered their community to confess his sins - an iron law of Christianity.
With so many proofs (they are no mere indications), the question inevitably arises whether Jesus, too, did not spend a period among the Essenes, just like the historian Flavius Josephus. For nineteen Christian centuries clever men puzzled over the accounts of Flavius Josephus: no one knew anything about the Essenes. They are not mentioned in the Gospels or the Acts of the Apostles. Had Flavius Josephus penned a science-fiction story about a non-existent order? The discovery of the Qumran Scrolls posthumously confirmed him as a scrupulous historian.
One of the branches of the Bank of the Holy Ghost in Rome It is owned by the Vatican Anyone who
believes should feel safe in opening an account there!
The dark clouds opened and the whirling sun began its firework display against a background of clear
blue sky Fatima is one great garden of expectation on 13 May and 13 October every year.
Fatima The children Jacinta Martos Francesco and Lucia Santas had their first vision of Mary around
noon on 13 July 1917 70,000—80,000 pilgrims saw the solar miracle on 13 October 1917.
From 11 February to 16 July 1858 Bernadette Soubirous had a total of 18 visions of Mary in this
grotto on the spot where the marble statue is worshipped by the hopeful today.
At night searchlights illuminate the row of taps from which bottles of all shapes and sizes are filled
with 'miraculous water.' According to analysis it is ordinary tap water.
A candle stall with a notice in German (There are others in all known languages ) The sea of candles
has been shining since 1858 The massive turnover also helps the Church.
Day after day the concourse below the basilica teems with thousands of pilgrims — Five million a
year.
In the square in front of the basilica male and female helpers push incapacitated patients towards the
miracle in wheel-chairs.
One of the many daily rosary processions, with megaphones and singing. They follow a strict
timetable.
Au Saint Basque. ... At Lourdes the saints are invoked to sell you everything — bottles, rosaries, clogs
...
Profane commerce flourishes side by side with prayer and hope.
Cars from all over the world. Shops with religious items by the dozen and in every one of them the
Madonna, 'made in Lourdes'.
Nowhere else in the world have I seen such a collection of differently shaped bottles potbellied and
spherical rectangular and triangular pocket sized and gallon-sized in every conceivable colour — all
for the wonder working water.
There is nothing they haven't got in the religious shops pictures of the saints and clogs purses bells