Turn of Events and Spiritual Causality Part 6
Turn of events and Spiritual causality according to Daheshist concepts.
The emergence of Christianity: The first phase.
Excerpts taken from an article published in Dahesh Voice magazine, Vol. 12, No. 1, 2006-2007.
By: Dr. Ghazi Brax
I have showed previously in segments 1-5 of this study that human beings of descent from Adam and Eve had their Sayyals extended to them through procreation—Sayyals that carry within them intellect, propensities, and dispositions, and the consequences of the Divine disobedience that they had committed. Despite this, they had immersed themselves in vile acts until God, in his infinite Mercy, pitied them and sent His Prophet Noah to guide and warn them. However, they resisted Noah and ridiculed him, thus meriting death through the Flood that spared only those that merited to be saved.
After the Flood, the survivors multiplied and so did their sins, so God sent them His Mercy personified in a series of great Prophets to guide them and to prevent further calamities from being inflicted on them. So there was Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph—who was thrown into a well by his brothers and caused the enslavement of their descendants in Egypt for 400 years. Then God’s Mercy appeared again through the Prophet Moses who liberated the Israelites from bondage and paved the way for the establishment of a golden era during the reign of the Prophets David and Solomon. However, the return of the Israelites to disobey God beginning in the 7th century before Christ led to their Diaspora, the destruction of Jerusalem, and the downfall of their civilization.
Divine Guidance did not disappear from Earth, rather its Sayyals transferred during the same century to India, China, and Greece in parallel paths. It appeared in India first through the wise men that modernized the “Veda,” introduced the more spiritual “Upanishad,” and then the “Bhagavadgita.” Then it appeared again in the teachings of Mahavira and Buddha, however, the Brahmans fought against the teachings of Buddha because it calls for the abolishment of the Caste System and restricted its followers to certain regions within India, while its circle of influence spread in the Far East. The teachings of Buddha produced great righteous rulers where Asoka the great, was the most prominent.
In China, Lao-tzu and Confucius, two great Spiritual Guides appeared. Lao-tzu called for the simple and pure life and to derive spiritual inspiration and order from nature itself. Confucius called for the building of a righteous society through the installation of righteous rulers. Their teachings were immortalized despite fierce resistance and attracted millions of followers. Likewise, in Greece many wise men and guides appeared, where Pythagoras and Socrates were the most prominent. Pythagoras was persecuted and Socrates was sentenced to death and since then the golden era of Greece was lost. However, the teachings of Socrates were immortalized through the writings of Plato, his disciple, and their influence is felt up to this date.
Perhaps the reader noticed that in my discussion of the turn of events and Spiritual causality that I have repeatedly affirmed that behind group events—as well as individual events—there exists a firmly established and just Spiritual Order that governs the Earth and the entire universe—in its known and unknown aspects. One of the principles of this Spiritual Order is the emergence of Prophets or Spiritual Guides, where each one of them first addresses his people by warning and preaching to them through revealed or inspired truths and instructions and then through his legacy addresses the entire world by confirming to them that the benefit to the individual and groups is directly related to the extent of applying and practicing these truths and instructions and consequently the extent of the direct Spiritual relations they establish between themselves and the inconspicuous Spiritual Order. The denial of the people to the existence of such a Spiritual Order drives them to commit a variety of vile acts and evils and consequently to drag their people closer to disasters, calamities, and destruction.
Dr. Huston Smith, an authority on history of religions and a professor of comparative religions at George Washington University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, State University of New York at Syracuse, and University of California at Berkley says: “Modern science continues to doubt the existence of invisible beings, however, the scientific doubt began to recede with a statement made by Eddington that the Universe is more like a mind than a machine and with the reports of astrophysicists that 90% of the matter in the universe is “dark matter” that cannot be detected by any of their instruments.”
The Divine Managing Mind is the one that controls the cosmic Spiritual Order and influences the creatures and their fate in accordance to a comprehensive Spiritual causality and perfect justice. This influence affects all creatures—known and unknown—through its Spiritual essence present in every Sayyal. It is common knowledge in the revealed Daheshist teachings that the entire universe is a weave of Sayyals. It is impossible for the power of “matter,” no matter how great it may be, to be as great as the absolute Spiritual energy—a power that some scientists began to assume its presence throughout the entire universe. The Buddhist physicist Allan Wallace says that if science had an opportunity to measure this nonphysical energy in a space free of matter, it would show that any part of this energy, no matter how small, is greater than the sum of all energy stored in matter throughout the entire universe, because it is of infinite power.
The life of Lord Christ, his persecution, and the Spiritual reasons behind them
The One that controls the order of the universe provided Jesus of Nazareth with a supernatural Spiritual power that brings about awe and astonishment. With the power of the Spirit he healed incurable diseases, controlled the elements, walked on water, and foreseen the future…his miracles and prophecies were an affirmation of the Divine source that he derived his teachings from—teachings that are based on love, mercy, virtue, and many other Spiritual values. There is no need in this segment to elaborate on the teachings of Lord Christ, because they will be elaborated on in the segment discussing the unity of religions according to Daheshist concepts. However, it is worth mentioning here that the most important aspect of his noble teachings is the way he lived his life, for he was the embodiment of infinite love and self-sacrifice—even to the point of redemption—as well as of humility and all aspects of virtue. However, the people along with their Jewish and Roman rulers did not generally benefit from him. The clergy conspired against him—an act that led to his arrest, torture, and crucifixion as mentioned in the New Testament. However, what were the Spiritual reasons behind all of this?
In the Old Testament, after the Jews returned from their Diaspora in Babel, many Prophets prophesied the coming of Lord Christ. It is sufficient to mention the prophecy of Micah that says: “People of Jerusalem, gather your forces! We are besieged! They are attacking the leader of Israel! The Lord says, “Bethlehem Ephrathah, you are one of the smallest towns in Judah, but out of you I will bring a ruler for Israel, whose family line goes back to ancient times.”…When he comes, he will rule his people with the strength that comes from the Lord and with the majesty of the Lord God himself. His people will live in safety because people all over the earth will acknowledge his greatness, and he will bring peace.” Micah (5:1-5)
According to the New Testament, when Herod the Great learned from the “Magi” who arrived in Jerusalem that Christ, the coming Lord of Israel whose birth prophesied to be in Bethlehem, had already been born, Herod became disturbed and feared the loss of his throne. When king Herod received confirmation from the Jewish clergy that the birth of Christ will take place in the city of Bethlehem, he ordered the killing of all children, two years of age and under, throughout the city. Soon after, Joseph was inspired in a dream to take baby Jesus and flee to Egypt and remain there until king Herod dies…and so it was. However, what were the Spiritual reasons behind this?
The birth of Lord Christ was destined to be in that time period (5 BC) in order to renew the suffering that he had started back when he redeemed Adam and his descendants and those chosen ones with Sayyals linked to him. The Divine plan was:
1) For Jesus to be born in Bethlehem in order to fulfill the prophecy, however, Joseph and Mary were residents of Nazareth, so Augustus Caesar ordered a census for the inhabitants of his empire. This forced each person to return to his city to be registered. Because Joseph was a descendant from the house of David, he had to travel from Nazareth in Galilee to Bethlehem in Judaea, the city of David. While they were in Bethlehem, Mary went into labor and delivered her child. This strange complicated arrangement is not a human arrangement.
2) For the birth of Jesus to be during the reign of Herod the Great, because Herod possessed a Sayyal from the Pharaoh that ordered the killing of the Hebrew children in Egypt and in which the Prophet Moses himself was a survivor of this act. Because Jesus possessed a Sayyal from the Prophet Moses, king Herod, as we shall see, must be punished severely in order to satisfy Divine Justice.
3) For the birth to take place during the reign of Augustus Caesar, because the nations of the Mediterranean were all united under Roman rule. This last point was recognized by Origen (AD 185-254), the greatest Christian theologian after the Apostle Paul, for he was convinced that the timing of the birth of Christ at that period is in accordance to a Divine plan, for the conditions conducive to missionary campaigns were great. People were free to travel from one country to another because the Roman rule removed the barriers between nations and the idealistic Greek philosophies of Plato and Pythagoras were widespread and would continue to spread for the next three centuries. As to the Magi that played a role in the announcement of the birth of “King of the Jews,” they were not astronomers or kings as theologians tend to think, but rather they were materialization of creatures from the Worlds of Paradise that were ordered to descend to Earth to contribute in the execution of the great redemption mission of Lord Christ. This secret needed to remain sealed during that period and was unlocked through a Daheshist revelation. However, what were the human causes that brought about Spiritual causes and what were their results?
At the time of Christ, the Jewish people had been under Roman rule for about 100 years paying exorbitant taxes and with their freedom usurped. On the political side, the Roman procurator made all the important decisions and the Jewish kings were nothing but a religious front backed by the clergy. As to the Jewish people, there were five groups:
The Pharisees that adhered to the strict observation of the traditional and written laws of Moses and their interpretations. They were seeking to renew the life of the Jews through forcing their sect to precise practice of the rituals in temples, washing, and specifying the type of food and relationships with others—practices that became instrumental in the development of the “Talmud.” Most of the scribes were Pharisee priests of authority on Jewish Law and were most influential.
The Sadducees were most flexible with the Roman rule and the Greek knowledge. They adhered to the teachings of the Torah however, they rejected the traditions of the scribes and the stories of the Pharisees and their oral interpretations and they also did not believe in resurrection and the afterlife. (Mark 18:12 and Acts 8:23)
The Essenes lost faith in the ability of the Jewish faith to renew itself without interference from Yahweh (God). They adhered to the written and oral Jewish Law and lived an ascetic life isolated from normal life. They lived in communes and shared with each other their food and dwellings awaiting the arrival of Christ, the Savior.
The Samaritans whose origin dates back to the split that took place between the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah (Judaea). They only accepted the Torah (the first five chapters of the Old Testament referred to as the Pentateuch) with certain changes within its text and they have taken Mount Gerizim in the heart of Samaria as a holy site for their worship. All Jews felt religious and nationalistic animosity towards the Samaritans and considered them hypocrites—especially when the Samaritans do not object in marriage between themselves and the pagans who lived in most of the coastal cities of Palestine with the exception of Joppa (Jaffa).
Certain Jewish sects whose political goals supplanted their religious goals where their first priority is liberation from Roman rule through an armed revolt. The most prominent of such sects were the Zealots and the Daggermen and their most prominent leaders were: Eleazar, son of Simon; Simon, son of Gioras; and John, son of Levi.
The bondage, Diaspora, calamities, and anguish that the Jews had faced for centuries as well as the fall of their people under the oppression of foreign nations—all were factors that made them build high hopes in being liberated by a Christ and savior who is the fulfillment of the prophecies made by their many Prophets. However, their entangled Sayyals with materialistic values overflowing with the predispositions of greed, control, and worldly desires were the same predispositions that their Prophets criticized and the cause of their repeated calamities that I mentioned earlier and made them envision their “Christ” as a royal king born from the house of David or to arrive on a cloud and descend from the sky (literal interpretation of the Old Testament) to liberate the Jews from Roman rule and to provide them with strength and economic prosperity. In other words, they envisioned the reign of Christ to be political, his might to be military, and his laws to be the same laws of their priests and scribes because they are “sacred.”
Jesus of Nazareth stood in opposition to all five Jewish groups. He wanted change and preached to them about life after death and the Day of Judgment, where each individual is compensated according to his deeds and propensities—a stance in direct conflict with the beliefs of the Sadducees. He wished to remain close to the people and their interests in order to reform them—in contrast to the behavior of the Essenes. He insisted on comprehensive love and peaceful resistance by loving the enemy and not through military confrontation—in contrast to the groups that called for bloody and violent resistance. He took exceptions to the Pharisees in stressing love, compassion, and purity of the soul rather than the purity of the body and nourishment, as well as equality between all people and their status, be they Jewish or gentiles; Pharisees or Samaritans; slaves or free, and rich or poor; and he used to talk to and dine with the sinners, the outcasts, and the tax collectors for the Romans. He would enrage the Pharisees by violating the Sabbath by healing the sick, for according to their laws no one is supposed to work on the Sabbath even to save a life. He would talk with authority in interpreting the Holy Text in a new way contradicting the interpretation of the scribes. The most important aspects of his life, teachings, and miracles is that they all contradicted what the Jewish people in all of its groups were accustomed to—especially the most powerful group that made the high priests an extension of the Jewish aristocratic families and they all supported each other. However, when Pilate put Jesus on trial and gave them the option of freeing Jesus or Barabbas, a leader of one of the armed-resistance factions, they had chosen Barabbas over Jesus.
This was his stance towards the different Jewish groups, but as to his stance towards the ruling Roman Empire, he took the position of the high moral conscience against oppression and resisting in a nonviolent way. The founder of Daheshism in his inspired book “Memoirs of Jesus of Nazareth,” recounts incidents that took place during Jesus’ childhood years of 12-15, and that his first miracle took place in Kafr Nahum when the chief of police interrogated Jesus and warned him after he had received complaints from parents of other juveniles because Jesus is causing turmoil in their way of thinking. When the chief of police realized that his parents are from Nazareth he asked him: How? Are you rebellious against them?” Jesus replied: “I do not rebel except against tyrants like you.” The chief of police replied: “Shut up, you naughty boy.” Jesus replied: “You are the naughty one. I will beseech my Father to brandish his sharp sword of truth in front of you to see which one of us will become silent.” The chief of police collapsed and died. This supernatural incident created an uproar and reverence!
According to chronologists writing about the emergence of Christianity, the Roman Empire watched the activities, conversations, and travels of Christ and the crowds gathering around him and did not distinguish at all between the Christian movement and the violent movements resisting Rome—especially when the Jewish head priests and aristocrats were their allies. The most violent behavior for Christ was the day he entered Jerusalem as a victor and then entered the Temple along with the crowds and was outraged for what he saw, so he made a whip from cords and lashed away at the merchants and moneychangers and cast them all out of the Temple and then he healed the sick. The Jewish head priests and guards from the Pharisees took advantage of this incident to claim that it was an attempt by Jesus to control the entire Temple (its dimensions were over 200 x 450 yards and the workplace for 20,000 employees in various departments and also included a central bank holding huge amounts of money, precious stones, and deposits).
For this reason, the Jewish head priests and aristocrats influenced the crowds to accompany Jesus when he was brought to Pilate for trial and accused him saying: “We caught this man misleading our people, telling them not to pay taxes to the Emperor and claiming that he himself is the Messiah, a king.” (Luke 23:2) All of this confirms what the founder of Daheshism had said that Lord Christ “started a noble revolt in order to destroy through it the shackles of oppression and exhaustion and to break the chains of slavery…and “For 33 years he struggled to death in calling on everyone to revolt against the constitution of power and killing, without having anyone follow his call fearing the wrath of the controlling mighty Roman Empire…except for the very few simple-hearted individuals, who were dazzled by his lofty teachings and lit their hearts with the lights of Divine Knowledge. He did not despair…he did not back out…rather, he attacked the emperor of Rome through Herod, the tyrant of Palestine…At the end, the sacrifices were great and the enmity increased, for this rebel gave his life as a redemption for the freedom of a humanity in anguish—a humanity blinded by desires and dispositions that offered him as a sacrifice on the altar of its outrageous ignorance thereby rewarding his love and efforts to liberate them by hanging him on the cross!”
However, since Lord Christ knew the individual who will turn him in to the authorities, why did he remain silent? Is it true that he was crucified? I have learned from the founder of Daheshism that Judas Iscariot was one of Christ’s most beloved Disciples and who was entrusted with the treasury knowing that he possessed some of the Sayyals from Cain. Rather, this knowledge increased Lord Christ’s love and care for him on a hope that he would suppress his degraded Sayyals. However, Judas failed. The night of his arrest, Jesus realized that it was time for him to finish the mission of redemption that he came for and that started with the disobedience of Adam and Eve and their failure in the sexual temptation. During the Last Supper, Jesus alluded to his Disciples that one of them would betray him and turn him in to the authorities, so John of the Gospel—who was the youngest of all—asked Jesus “Who is it, Lord?” “Jesus answered, “I will dip some bread in the sauce and give it to him; his is the man.” So he took a piece of bread, dipped it, and gave it to Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot. As soon as Judas took the bread, Satan entered into him. Jesus said to him, “Hurry and do what you must!” (John 13:25-27) The Satan mentioned is actually a Sayyal of Cain that belongs to the Iscariot and located in an infernal world as punishment for the killing of his brother, Abel.
According to the revealed Daheshist teachings, the Divine Plan, which is based on Spiritual Justice, did not include the crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth. For this reason, it permitted a Lofty Sayyal belonging to Jesus to redeem him, so it descended from a World of Paradise and materialized at Gethsemane where the Roman soldiers accompanied by Judas, the traitor, arrived to arrest him. A Sayyal made Jesus of Nazareth invisible and he spent the rest of his life—that exceeded twenty years after crucifixion—traveling in disguise. This Lofty Sayyal that materialized was his exact physical double and the early Christians did not know this secret, however, the Qur’an revealed it in saying: “They neither killed nor crucified him; but it was made to appear so unto them.” (Sura Al-Nisa:157) However, understanding what is meant by “made to appear so unto them” remained mysterious to the Muslim scholars, who reached no consensus as to its interpretation. The clarification did not take place except in Daheshism and through the story of its founder, for after he was executed during a revolution that was taking place in Azerbaidjan on July 1, 1947, and after newspapers had published pictures of his execution, he was brought back to life! It is well known in Daheshist teachings that Jesus had a Sayyal from the Worlds of Paradise that was allowed to materialize at certain times, such as: when he walked on water and then after the crucifixion he appeared to some of his believers and then to his Disciples by passing through the solid walls of a locked room where his Disciples were meeting. This Sayyal that materializes from the Worlds of Paradise is known in Daheshism as a “Personality.”
Divine retribution and the spreading of Christianity
According to the writings of [the Jewish historian] Flavius Josephus (AD 37-100), with sources taken from Nicolas of Damascus, the companion of Herod the Great—he who ordered the killing of the children in Bethlehem on a hope of killing baby Jesus—that in the year 4 BC, a mysterious incurable disease was inflicted on Herod. This disease is characterized by: high fever; stomach ulcer; inflammation in the leg with visible pus; decay in his reproductive organs that caused the appearance of maggots; in addition to unbearable pains and constant itching of the skin. This situation led Herod to attempt suicide, however, his attempt failed when he was rescued by one of his relatives, however, it didn’t take long (same year) after the failed suicide attempt for him to die. At that point Joseph was inspired in a dream to return to Nazareth with baby Jesus and his mother. Jesus was arrested and taken to the Roman procurator during the reign of Herod Antipas, the successor to Herod the Great. When the Jewish crowd became rowdy and called for the killing of Jesus, Pilate “took some water, washed his hands in front of the crowd, and said, “I am not responsible for the death of this man! This is your doing!” The whole crowd answered, “Let the responsibility for his death fall on us and on our children!”” (Matthew 27:24-25) This request became a Spiritual cause for the retribution of the Jews who requested the execution of Jesus and regardless of their being present or absent and then retribution to their descendants, for Lord Christ addressed Jerusalem as he approached the city: “If you only knew today what is needed for peace! But now you cannot see it! The time will come when your enemies will surround you with barricades, blockade you, and close in on you from every side. They will completely destroy you and the people within your walls; not a single stone will they leave in its place, because you did not recognize the time when God came to save you!” (Luke 19:41-44)
During the reign of king Herod Antipas Lord Christ was persecuted. He was married to the daughter of el-Hareth the 4th, king of the Nabateans, whose kingdom was in “Arabia,” and its Capital was Damascus. However, when Herod seduced Herodias, the wife of his brother Philip (from another mother) in order to marry her, she accepted provided that he abandon the daughter of el-Hareth. This drove John the Baptist to publicly admonish Herod and Herodias, which historically led to his beheading. However, the daughter of el-Hareth knew of his plot, so she pretended to be sick and asked him to let her recuperate in the fort that lies between the kingdom of Herod and the kingdom of el-Hareth. It is the same fort that John the Baptist was beheaded in. From there, she sent word to her father, so he sent his generals with their men and rescued her and then he declared war on Herod Antipas and defeated his army. Since Herod was an ally of the Roman emperor Tiberius, the emperor ordered Vitalius, the commander of his army in Syria to declare war on el-Hareth. At this point the Spiritual intervention becomes clearer, for whatever God wishes cannot be refuted by a human being. During the advance of Vitalius and his army towards the kingdom of the Nabateans, they needed to enter Jerusalem, however, the Jewish leaders requested that they do not enter Jerusalem so that the statues and pagan images affixed on the soldiers spears and flags do not desecrate the city. The argument continued for days and while they were at it, news of the death of Tiberius reaches Vitalius and he retreats and on the one hand the war is avoided and on the other hand the enmity between the Arab kingdom of the Nabateans and the kingdom of Herod continued to grow and to the point that many of the believers in Christ took refuge there—to include the Apostle Paul who launched his wide scale preaching in it in freedom and without being subjected to danger.
In a matter of few years, the armed resistance intensified not only against the Romans, but also against the Jewish aristocracy and their allies, the chief priests. The sect of the “Daggermen” killed the high priest Jonathan during the rule of the Roman procurator Antonios Felix (AD 52-60). In the year AD 66, they demolished the house of the high priest, Ananus and two palaces belonging to Agrippa II and his brother Berenike, the grandsons of Herod the Great and they also burnt the general bank notes. The “Zealots” and the “Daggermen” took an oath to assassinate any Jewish traitor suspected of being an ally to the Romans. The leader of each sect claimed that he is Messiah, the savior, so they would infiltrate the crowds, stab their victims in the back, and then disappear after the ensuing chaos. Not only that Jerusalem was divided between the warring factions, but also just about every family was divided against each other. In the year AD 68, a civil war broke out where the warring factions used any weapon (fire, metal, or rock) that they laid hands on. Josephus, the Jewish historian and witness of the events, described this horrible uprising by saying that the Jewish people became “more like a raging and starving wounded animal who feasted on his own body.” (Jewish Wars, Chapters 15 and 16)
Towards the end of the first uprising, the extremists—mostly young men and poor—won after they had killed about 12,000 Jews to include most of the rich. The bodies of old men, children, and naked women filled the streets with no one to bury them. This calamity reached its peak around the year AD 70, after the Roman leader, Titus, set up a siege around Jerusalem continuing the siege that his father, Vespasian had started before he became emperor of Rome. He leveled the homes left standing and obliterated its Great Temple. The few Jews that survived this utter destruction of the city fell into bondage and Diaspora and suffered from hardships, persecutions, and contempt throughout the world for two thousand years. In this fashion, the prophecies of Lord Christ pertaining to the destruction of Jerusalem and the fall of the Jewish people had come true when he said: “Some will be killed by the sword, and the others will be taken as prisoners to all countries; and the heathen will trample over Jerusalem until their time is up.” (Luke 21:24) Tacitus, the Roman historian (AD 55-117) estimated the number of Jews killed around 600,000, while according to Josephus, the Jewish historian, the number is 1,197,000. King Agrippa II joined the Roman soldiers, first in the siege of Jerusalem and then in the burning of its Temple and the leveling of its buildings…what a twist of fate!
The surviving Jews managed to unite and to ignite the second Jewish uprising (AD 132-135) under the leadership of Simon Bar Kokhba who claimed to be the Messiah. However, the Romans managed to quell the uprising after destroying 985 towns in Palestine and killing 580,000 Jews. About the same number of people died due to hunger, sickness, and burning and the land of the Jews was nearly destroyed and the leader of the uprising, Bar Kokhba was killed.
As to Christianity, its wide scale spread in Greece, Asia Minor, and Rome itself was specifically due to the efforts of the Apostle Paul, as well as to other believers to include the Apostle Peter. The Jewish communities in these regions stirred trouble for them no matter where they went. God wished to grant many Christians the honor of being tortured and martyred for the sake of His Christ and the spreading of His Glory throughout the world. In the Divine Plan a tyrant, no less criminal and despicable than Cain himself, would lead the persecution of Christians. It is Nero who committed the greatest of crimes and killed so many to include his mother, Agrippina; his wife, Octavia; his brother Britannicus; and many others from his family and friends—including his tutor Seneca. He then ordered the burning of Rome in order to accuse the Christians with the act. The burning started on July 18, 64 and lasted for 9 days.
The Roman historian Tacitus, a contemporary of Nero, mentioned that in order for the tyrant to escape the accusation of burning Rome, he resorted to “attach the accusation to and to severely torture a class of people hated by the general population for their awful acts and called Christians…This serious inaccuracy dealt a great blow to the growth of Christianity, however, soon after it regained its momentum not only in Judaea (source of the first evil), but also in Rome itself (the popular center and the seat of corruption to everything despicable, hated, and emanating from various parts of the world. According to Tacitus, they first arrested those who admitted their guilt [non-Christian criminals] and then based on the information the criminals provided, they sentenced many [Christians] not based on proofs of their guilt in the crime of burning the city, but rather as an excuse of their alleged hatred of the human race. The method of their punishment became synonymous with the art of ridicule and contempt…Even though the Christians were considered by the public as criminals well deserving the harshest of punishment, they managed to bring about emotions of sympathy and mercy in people because their killing was not in the best interest of the public, but rather to satisfy the bestiality of Nero.” The people revolted against Nero and attempted to kill him, however he committed suicide. In this manner, the Christians faced the harshest kinds of torture and death with bravery and a solid faith by taking as their example the life of their Lord of Glory and Divine Mentor.
If we are to compare the Christian human losses with the losses of pagan Rome, the first would seem trivial since those who were arrested were only a few and the total number of Christians was insignificant in the year of the fire and the Apostle Paul was released from prison only two years earlier. The Roman losses in life and structures were astronomical and the martyrdom of Christians in conjunction with the discovery of Nero’s crime aroused the curiosity of the Roman people to learn more about the new religion. The events proved to be a strong reason for the spread of Christianity.
In addition to this, in August 24, 79, Mount Vesuvius suddenly exploded with a volcanic eruption and witnessed by Pliny the Younger who wrote two letters to Tacitus. In the following day, when the eruption seized, the city of Pompeii was covered with volcanic ashes and rubble measuring around 19-23 feet. In the city of Herculanium, the volcanic lava mixed with water and infiltrated the entire city and covered it with a layer of lava about 65 feet deep that soon hardened. What took place in Herculanium also took place in Stabiae where archaeological diggings unearthed beautiful spacious houses, gardens, squares, theaters, and markets; religious, commercial, and judicial buildings surrounded by columns and statues for Jupiter, Juno, Minerva, Apollo, Venus, and Isis; and hundreds of dwellings with many elegant palaces with studded walls, decorated floors, and gardens with fountains–objects reflecting the wealth of its inhabitants. As to the most emotional scenes of the burnt remains frozen in time are those of the thousands of skeletons of men, women, and children where many were embracing each other. This natural disaster helped the Christians awaken the conscience of many that there is an all-seeing great Divine Power that far exceeds humans and Caesars and that the Jesus that the Romans killed in Palestine is of truth and might and was truly resurrected.