THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO SAINT BERNARD SHAW by Aleister Crowley

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Page numbers from the 1st edition are indicated like this: {1} at the bottom of each page.

Original footnotes are brought up to the point of citation in text and enclosed thusly: <<footnote goes here>> There is evidence internally that several other footnotes were intended, but inadvertently left in the text instead of being set to the bottom of the page. These have been kept intact, and are usually recognizable by their form, e.g. "(Footnote re this passage: This short passage is too shocking to ...)"

Additional notes are marked in the same manner, and identified as to origin: <<T NOTE: ..........>> --- note by the transcriber of pp. 1-143 <<WEH NOTE: .........>> --- note by Bill Heidrick

"Jerusalem and the Mystical Sacrifice."

This section demands little comment; but it may be observed that Matthew says in chapter XXVII, verse 50, that `Jesus cried again with a loud voice' after the complaint that he was forsaken, as recorded by Mr. Shaw. It is not unreasonable to suppose that this last cry was the "It is finished" recorded by other evangelists. Now these words are not merely what they seem to be. They, or their equivalents "Konx Om Pax", were the technical cry of triumph used in the initiations of the ritual of the "slain god". At the risk of tediousness and reiteration we must complain once more of the extraordinary bias shown by Mr. Shaw in his reading of the text. He is so determined to be not merely a secularist, but a secularist determined to read history into legend, that he omits altogether any incidents in the story of the Crucifixion which might upset that reading. It is really as bad criticism as that of the ingenious gentleman who quite correctly reported Jesus as having said (Matthew, XXII, 40) "Hang all the law and the prophets." It is submitted that this method is utterly vicious. It would be just as reasonable to take an Arabian Night from the "Alf laylah wa laylah", remove all the evidently fabulous incidents, and conclude that "there is no reason to suppose that the remainder is not a true story." Quite right; it may be true, but there is no reason why we should suppose it to be so, and where, as in this case, there is really no particular point in the story except the fabulous elements, the universe of our discourse is, so to speak reduced to zero. Mr. Shaw is anxious to convert the world to the {52} belief that the Jesus of the Gospels was a socialist after Mr. Shaw's own heart, and his method is to take from a great mass of legend just those facts of the recorded life which suit his purpose, and just those recorded sayings which seem to bear out his contention. It would be possible to make a socialist out of Machiavelli or Hobbes, by a similar method of exegesis; and it might be rather amusing to go through the prefaces of Mr. Shaw and prove him a Tory. It would be quite easy.

		      "Not this	Man but	Barabbas."

Mr. Shaw says "The choice of Barabbas thus appears as a popular choice of the militant advocate of physical force as against the unresisting advocate of mercy." As Mr. Shaw admits, he has gained this conception of Barabbas not from Matthew, but from the other gospels. It, however, is not a `popular' choice! Read Matthew XVII, 20 <<WEH NOTE: XXVII,20>>: "But the chief priests and elders persuaded the multitude that they should ask Barabbas, and destroy Jesus. "And there seems no reason to suppose that Barabbas was chosen because he advocated physical force. It seems more likely that his name was taken simply as that of a wellknown man <<In this connection the reader is referred to Dr. J. G. Frazer's theory of the Book of Esther.>>, who happened to be popular in the way that brigands have always been from the beginning of the world. It is the romance of a brigand's life that commends him to the popular imagination. There is no reason why we should suppose that Barabbas was in any special sense an advocate of physical force. For there has never been in any country until of very late years any person so equally degenerate and imbecile as to advocate anything else as the ultimate ratio. {53} And of course if any other plan were adopted, it would be instantly upset by the first man who chose to pick up a stick. Jesus himself is the strongest possible advocate of physical force. He boasts (Matthew XXVI, 53.) "Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of Angels?" His reason for not mobilizing the angels is simply (verse 56) "that the Scriptures of the prophets might be fulfilled." It is a mere postponement of the exercise of warrior power, for he says to the high priest, in verse 64. "Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven." How are Satan and the unbelieving to be cast into the Lake of Fire except by superior force? It hardly seems the programme for the "Unresisting advocate of mercy."

The reader should get it entirely out of his head that Jesus is a forgiving kind of person. Even in the early part of his life he announces his mission in most uncompromising terms. In Matthew X, 34, 35, we read "Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law." And on the Cross he says: "Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do." Ignorance is the only excuse, He has a splendid chance to show nobility by forgiving Judas: and he missed it. {54} It is utterly incomprehensible to me how this superstition of `gentle Jesus' has endured. Even Shelley, a professed atheist, talks in "Prometheus Unbound" about `his mild and gentle ghost wailing for the faith he kindled,' though on a previous occasion he had written of the "Galilean Serpent". No strictures can be too severe for people who deliberately mutilate texts and emasculate characters. The hell-fire evangelists are a thousand times better as critics than the Renans. Bernard Shaw, by these remarks becomes intellectually inferior to Billy Sunday!

"The Resurrection"

No comment is here needed except as a further illustration of Mr. Shaw's carelessness. It is not said that Jesus was buried in the family vault of Joseph of Arimathaea. On the contrary it is (Matthew, XXVII, 60) "his own new tomb which he had hewn out in the rock." Which is a very different thing. It doesn't matter; but a man who drops eggs is not to be trusted to carry dynamite.

		   "The	Date of	Matthew's Narrative"

"One effect of the promise of Jesus to come again in glory during the lifetime of some of his hearers is to date the gospel without the aid of any scholarship. It must have been written during the lifetime of Jesus's contemporaries: that is, whilst it was still possible for the promise of his Second Coming to be fulfilled. The death of the last person who had been alive when Jesus said `There be some of them that stand here that shall in no wise taste death till they see the Son of man coming in his {55} kingdom' destroyed the last possibility of the promised Second Coming, and bore out the incredulity of Pilate and the Jews. And as Matthew writes as one believing in that Second Coming, and in fact left his story unfinished to be ended by it, he must have produced his gospel within a lifetime of the crucifixion. Also, he must have believed that reading books would be one of the pleasures of the kingdom of heaven on earth." The whole argument of this paragraph appears to rest upon completely bad psychology, alike of the writer of the gospel and the readers for whom it was intended. If Matthew had been worrying about possibilities in the ordinary sense of the word, he would not have got very far with his gospel! The merest glance at Matthew's mind, the most casual and superficial appreciation of it, shows that he would have been simply amazed had any one offered to him such an argument as Mr. Shaw presents. The difficulties with regard to the Second Coming of Jesus have been pointed out often enough; and I have yet to see the Christian who was in the least disturbed by them. Very few apologists have even gone so far as to take the trouble to explain away the promise of Jesus that he would return. Such an explanation in any case is fairly easy, either on the obvious mystical tack, or by showing that the Transfiguration fulfills the promise in part, the apparitions to Stephen and to Paul in part; and so on. (Mr. Shaw seems to forget that it was thousands of years before anybody doubted that Moses <<T NOTE: wrote?>> the Pentateuch, although his own death and burial are described in it.) It is a very poor argument too. There is no reason at all {56} why a man should not describe his own death and burial. (Especially is this so with Moses, who was buried by God himself, so that no man knew where his tomb was!!! (Deut. XXXIV, 5,6.) As luck would have it, I did it myself some years ago in my "Book of Lies", chapter 65! Would Mr. Shaw quote this as a proof that the book was not written by me, and not until after my death? It never occured to religious writers of such periods to try to guard themselves against any rational criticism. The thing practically did not exist; and to this day the vast majority of Christians are absolutely incapable of understanding any such arguments, which they regard as mere blasphemy. They do not worry about it, even so much as to say that the text is corrupt or interpolated, or may be interpreted after another manner. They simply ride over it without seeing it. The most powerful arguments do not even rock the boat. The type of mind is different, the plane of thought is different. It is not possible to find a common ground for intellectual discussion between Charles Bradlaugh and Charles Sprugeon, because Bradlaugh bases everything upon the mind, and Spurgeon merely remarks "The carnal mind is enmity against God." Moreover, all attempts of this kind to date documents are absolutely unscholarly. A document may be composite, and incorporate older elements. We might as well try to date Mark Twain's "Yankee at the Court of King Arthur" by saying that the author shows so much knowledge of the intimate life of the king that he must have been a contemporary, or at the very least have been informed by eye-witnesses. There are fifty possibilities of error in all documents of this class, and Mr. Shaw ignores them in a {57} way that can only be called beyond amazement. The only real way to date a book is to possess a dated copy. If I possess among (or rather above) my treasures a "Leaves from the Journal of our life in the Highlands", and that copy contain an indubitable signature of King Edward VII, authenticated by comparison with that signature in the archives of the state, one might be justified in believing that the book was genuine. The mere date upon the title-page would prove nothing. The volume might be a piracy of many years later, and all sorts of liberties might have been taken with the editing of such a book. Any one with any knowledge of bibliography knows that this is not only possible but even likely. Witness the adventures of Burton's "Arabian Nights". We have a codex of Matthew which certainly belongs to the third or fourth century, but there is no real evidence whatever that that codex is derived from any previous codex. It may have been the first time that the manuscript ever appeared in that form.

		    "Class Type	of Matthew's Jesus."

Most of the points in this section have been dealt with previously in various places, but we must draw attention to Mr. Shaw's final admission. "All this shows a great power of seeing through vulgar illusions, and a capacity for higher morality than has yet been established in any civilized community; but it does not place Jesus above Confucius or Plato, not to mention more modern philosophers and moralists." `All this', as has been shown, is by no means admissable. But it leaves us to expect a further revelation {58} in some other gospel which will place Jesus above Confucius and Plato. We shall see later whether this expectation is to be realized, or whether it is in the same class of promises as that of the Second Advent. We now turn to the gospel according to Mark.

			       Mark

	       "The Women Disciples and	the Ascension"

There is little need of complaint in this section. Mark, as Mr. Shaw says, is brief, one may add mercifully brief; and Mr. Shaw also evidently agrees in the general opinion of scholars that Mark is on the whole a much more genuine document than Matthew. It is still composite, for the reasons already given in the case of Matthew. Most of the quotations which have been given above as evidence for this way of thinking have parallel passages in the older gospel. We need only cavil at one point of interpretation. Mr. Shaw takes Mark's statement with regard to Joseph of Arimathaea, and not only misquotes it, but interprets it quite unjustifiably. Mr. Shaw says that Joseph is described by Mark as "One who also himself was looking for the kingdom of God" as if it were in the text; which however reads (Mark XV. 43) "An honourable counsellor which also waited for the kingdom of God". Why should this suggest to Mr. Shaw that he was an `independent' seeker? On the contrary, it is perfectly compatible with the statement of Matthew that he `also himself was Jesus' disciple'. Mr. Shaw in this preface is making a special point of distinguishing between the gospels, but it is evident that he has not been writing with his authority in front {59} of him. The phrase `also himself' is in Matthew XXVII, 57, and in Luke XXIII, 51. It is evident that Mr. Shaw is trusting an excellent but not quite perfect memory. It is an extremely small point; but it goes to prove a big one, that Mr. Shaw is careless again and again, and therefore an untrustworthy guide, where such extreme accuracy is required as is here the case. Another example follows immediately in Mr. Shaw's very next paragraph. "Mark earns our gratitude by making no mention of the old prophecies, and thereby not only saves time, but avoids the absurd implication that Christ was merely going through a predetermined ritual, like the works of a clock, instead of living. In point of fact, the gospel begins with the fulfilment of a prophecy (Mark, 1, 2, to 4) "As it is written in the prophets, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee. The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight." There are also references to prophecy in Mark XII, 10, 35, and 36, and Mark XV, 27 28. Mr. Shaw's statement is generally true; but not as accurate as it ought to be in a work of this kind. We must protest against a later statement in this paragraph of Mr. Shaw's. The ritual through which Jesus was going `like the works of a clock' is universal. It is not absurd at all. We are all going through this ritual at this hour. If it were not so, the ritual could never have taken hold of the imagination of man in every civilization in the way in which it has done. The ritual is merely a dramatic statement of the most evident and important facts of nature {60} Mr. Shaw says that it is impossible to discover whether Jesus `means anything by a state of damnation beyond a state of error`. It is true that the passage quoted does not make this clear; but damnation in the regular Christian sense is constantly referred to in other parts of the gospel. Mr. Shaw concludes "On the whole Mark leaves the modern reader where Matthew left him." It is not here, then, that we are to look for any facts which will `place Jesus above Confucius and Plato.' Perhaps we may have better luck with Luke.

			     "Luke."

		    "Luke the Literary Artist."

There is nothing to alter in Mr. Shaw's account of Luke. It may be helpful, however, to add that many biblical scholars surmise that Luke was a Greek physician. This Gospel is in fact very suggestive of the Greek romances of the decadence. The importance of this characterization of Luke is that one would justifiably reprimand even a servant girl who attached any historical value to such a work. The gospel was evidently retained because of its appeal to the Greek colonists of Asia Minor, where Christianity had made tremendous strides. We can agree with the ordinary scholar that Matthew primarily intended to convince Jews that Jesus was the Messiah who they had been expecting. Matthew starts from the crack of the pistol: "The Book of the Generations of Jesus Christ, the Son of David, the Son of Abraham." Luke has to explain to his readers in Chapter I, verse 5, that Herod was king of Judaea, and when he comes to genealogy does not stop at Abraham, but ends {61} (III, 38) "which was the son of Adam, which was the son of God." We also note that Luke's Gospel is addressed by name to a certain Theophilus, evidently a Greek.

		    "The Charm of Luke's Narrative."

Mr. Shaw might have emphasized even more than he does the extravagance of Luke's imagination. Not content with a miraculous birth for Jesus, he plagiarizes the story of Abraham and Sarah in Genesis (chapters XVII and XXI) in order to make a miracle out of the birth of John the Baptist! Mr. Shaw explains with admirable conciseness and clarity the difference in the characterization of Jesus given by Luke, but he does not tell his readers the reason, which is simply that given above, that it was addressed to a different audience. This disposes of the cavil of the freethinker about `conflicting gospels', but it also disposes of the claim of the orthodox as to inspiration. It is perfectly comprehensible that a life of the Kaiser written by the court historian at Potsdam should differ markedly from that compiled in the office of the "Daily Mail". But if an argument of this sort is advanced to explain discrepancies, the canon of truth has been abrogated and that of expediency put in its place. When we find a cure-all advertising in the `Daily Cough-drop' that will cure consumption, and in the "Strand Mercury" that it will cure specific disease, sensible people begin to doubt whether it will cure anything at all. In the most favourable case, they pay no heed to the advertisement, but inquire into the matter by means of analysis and clinical {62} experiment. It is therefore absolutely unsafe for the orthodox to bring forward the explanation given above for the contradiction in the gospel narrative.

		   "The	Touch of Parisian Romance."

If for `Parisian' Mr. Shaw had written `Greek' there would be a truer characterization. There is really nothing else to be said. But Luke has no sense of anything at all except his art, and art of any kind always bears the seed of mysticism within it. It is extraordinarily amusing to find James Thomson in the "City of Dreadful Night" indulging in qabalistic speculations in the second section of that magnificent poem, the greatest of its kind that was ever written<<The poet follows a man who goes to a church, where Faith dies, a villa, where Love dies, and a squalid house, where Hope dies: and repeats eternally this mournful cycle.

     "I	ceased to follow, for the know of doubt

     He	circled	thus for ever tracing out

     Perpetual recurrence in the scope

			   333		  >>> >>.  We should like, however, to add one remark, Mr. Shaw	here admits that Luke can record a mystical view of the	kingdom, yet still thinks of it	as entirely material.  What then becomes of his	argument about the date	of Matthew's Gospel? {63}

			     "JOHN"

"A New Story, and a New Character."

Mr. Shaw's characterization of Jesus is a fairly sound one. He says that he "gives the impression of an educated not to sasophisticated mystic." The statement is, however, masked and overlaid by details of discrepancies. He does not sufficiently emphasize the great discrepancy. John does not begin with Jesus at all. He begins with the Logos. The gospel starts in chapter I, verses 1-5. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men." We learn the other half of the story later, Verses 9 to 14, "That was the true light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. He came unto his own, and his own received him not. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God". Here are two main points. There is an eternal Light or Word which is capable of being made flesh. That is to say, John is concerned with an avatar, exactly like an Indian or a Gnostic. John's object is simply to prove that Jesus is that avatar. Hence John the Baptist is introduced to us entirely as a prophet, not in the least as a religious reformer. Read John, chapter I, verses 6 to 8. "There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. The {64} same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe. He was not that Light, but he was sent to "bear witness of that Light." John I, 15 to 16. "John bare witness of him and cried, saying, This is he of whom I spake, He that cometh after me is preferred before me: for he was before me. And of his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace. For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ." John, I, 19 to 27. "And this is the record of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, Who art thou? And he confessed, and denied not; but confessed, I am not the Christ. And they asked him, What then? Art thou Elias? And he saith, I am not. Art thou that prophet? And he answered, No, Then said they unto him, Who art thou? that we may give an answer to them that sent us. What sayest thou of thyself? He said, I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet Esaias. And they which were sent were of the Pharisees. And they asked him, and said unto him, Why baptizest thou then, if thou be not that Christ, nor Elias, neither that prophet? John answered them, saying, I baptize with water: but there standeth one among you, whom ye know not." Immediately that John sees Jesus he bears witness that he is this avatar. John, I, 29 to 37. "The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. This is he of whom I said, After me cometh a man which is preferred before me: for he was before me. And I knew him not: but that he should be made manifest to Israel. {65} therefore am I come baptizing with water. And John bare record, saying, I saw the spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him. And I knew not: but he that sent me to baptize with water, the same said unto me, Upon whom thou shalt see spirit descending, and remaining on him, the same is he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost. And I saw, and bare record that this is the Son of God. Again the next day after John stood, and two of his disciples: and looking upon Jesus as he walked, he saith, Behold the Lamb of God!" One of these disciples who followed Jesus proceeds to spread this statement. John, 1, 41. "He first findeth his own brother Simon, and saith unto him, We have found the Messias, which is being interpreted, the Christ." This is a very remarkable verse. Two Jews are talking; one of them says that the Messiah has been found; naturally a Jew would have understood no other allusion. It is to be noted that John everywhere speaks of `the Jews' as an alien race. The author of his Gospel was certainly not a Jew himself. This fact alone is sufficient to dispose of the imbecile identification of him with `the beloved disciple'. The character of the latter was invented by John to please certain elements of psychology which were peculiarly dear to Greeks. But John immediately explains to his readers that Messiah merely means Christ, which is rather like explaining that the Prince of Wales is Balder the Beautiful. It is impossible in this brief essay to go into the entire story of the Christ idea, but it is as different from that of Messias as Parzival is from Horatio Nelson. The error has arisen from the etymological accident that both words mean `annointed'. {66} The Christ is a purely mystical conception, which is not only a person but a spiritual attainment. It comes from the Gnostics and then from Chaldea, India, and China. Even the most enlightened of the Jewish prophets, occupied as they were with the material prosperity of their country, show no glimmering of the Christ idea. The whole theology, philosophy, and eschatology connected with Christ are utterly different from anything in Judaism, except the high Qabalah, which was by no means accepted in a general way, some authorities (though not the best) going so far as to say that it had not yet been invented, but that it was a mediaeval forgery, or at the very best never antedated Rabbi Schimeon, who is credited with the Zohar, the date of which is given as the first century A.D. (Footnote: The date of the Qabalah. In the text of the Old Testa-ment (Gen. XVII 5. XVII. 15) the numerical value of the name Abram is increased by five, and it becomes Abraham, while that of Sarai is reduced by five to Sarah, in connexion with the promise of a son. Some sort of Qabalah, deriving mystic truths from numerical considerations, therefore certainly existed at the date of the writing of the Book of Genesis. Students will note that this sort of trickery with words is common. It can hardly be an accident of trickery that MITHRAS the sun-god adds to 300, and is later spelt MEITHRAS 365, as is also his secret name ABRAXAS. With regard to 360 and 365, consult the authorities on the ancient calenders.) It is evident from all this that John was writing to an extremely specialized class of persons. A few of the old sayings and doings of Jesus are retained; but the characteristics of the Oriental `holy man' have practically vanished. The parables of {67} the Synoptics disappear completely, and are replaced by a single parable (John X, 1-6) which is hardly a parable at all, but a metaphor. The sayings of Jesus are totally different from those recorded by the synoptics. Even the `Sermon on the Mount' and the `Lord's Prayer' are omitted. Nor are there any practical injunctions as to life. The conversation of Jesus is plain Greek mysticism with hardly a tinge of anything else. He is almost as anti-semitic as Mr. Hilaire Belloc. He does not even keep the Jews' passover, as he does in other gospels. He has a perfectly ordinary supper. (John XIII, 1, 2,)

"John the Immortal Eyewitness"

Mr. Shaw takes it for granted that John is at least in part the writer of the gospel bearing his name, but the evidence for this view is almost comically indirect. It rests principally upon the 24th verse of chapter XXI: "This is the disciple which testifieth of these things, and wrote these things; and we know that his testimony is true." The identification of John is simply that the disciple who `testifieth of these things' is also the disciple whom Jesus loved. (John XXI, 20.) But there is no evidence whatever except ecclesiastical tradition that this disciple was John, unless we admit the minute literary point that the writer of the gospel is careful "not" to make the identification. This is presumed to be John's modesty. But the grounds for an actual identification are as