Gospel of afrania

The novel consists of two parts. In the first, the main points of the gospel history are sequentially analyzed, their assessment is given, and attention is focused on some features of the described events, which are usually overlooked. The author aims to build a version of biblical events that would be completely internally consistent, not require assumptions about the lies of the authors of the canonical gospels and Christ, but would explain the whole complex of events related to the crucifixion of Christ from a purely materialistic point of view. The second part is, in fact, a novel, in an artistic form, outlining the version built by the author.

The author builds his reasoning on the basis of logic and common sense, relying on the Gospels and a number of religious and religiously neutral historical sources. In order not to enter into a debate on near-theological issues and to avoid disputes about the veracity of the evangelists and the historicity of the gospel characters, he builds his version, taking as a basis a number of basic principles:

• The four canonical gospels are a priori recognized by historical sources. Farrara's “Life of Jesus”, written from orthodox Christian positions, is used as the basic work uniting the information reported in the Gospels.
• The authorship of the canonical Gospels and the history of their writing is supposed to correspond to the classical Christian canon.
• Evangelicals rely on honest and decent people who describe what they saw and heard themselves. Assumptions about the dishonesty of this or that evangelist are allowed to be made only if it turns out to be impossible to construct a logically consistent picture of what is happening in another way.
• On the other hand, it is taken into account that any honest person can be honestly mistaken, incorrectly evaluate what is happening or be deliberately misled by one or another force, for one purpose or another. In addition, in some cases, the Gospels write about events that their authors obviously could not be witnesses (for example, those that took place at the court of the king of Judah). Since such a message cannot be anything other than a retelling of rumors, it is accepted as evidence of the presence of rumors, but not as evidence of the event itself.

The second part of the book is a report allegedly found by archaeologists somewhere in a cave in a sealed vessel from the military tribune of Afranius, the head of the secret guard under the procurator of Judea . The report is addressed to the proconsul of Syria, Lucius Vitellius, and is a kind of “posthumous letter”, which should be sent to the addressee if the author suddenly dies or is arrested; thus, Afranius insured himself against the possible steps of the procurator, for whom he is a very dangerous witness:

... Your receipt, proconsul, of this document means that Igemon did not heed the warning and I am already dead - stabbed to death by “Jewish terrorists”, poisoned by stale oysters or executed for espionage in favor of Parthia , India or Atlantis . If the procurator shows prudence, then this document will never leave the cache in the vicinity of Jerusalem ...

In the report, Afraniy describes the operation " Fish ", which, under his leadership and with the oral permission of the prosecutor, was carried out in the deepest secret for several years by the imperial secret guards. The purpose of the operation was to create, on the basis of one of the religious communities that existed at that time in the lands occupied by the Romans , a strong, influential religion that proclaimed humility and the renunciation of the armed struggle against the Roman invaders. The spread of such a religion could undermine the authority of Judaism , destroy the unity of Jewish terrorists - Sikarians and religious fanatics, on which the long-standing guerrilla war in Jewish territories was largely held.

In pursuance of the plans of the operation, a secret guard operative, Judah , was introduced into a religious community led by Yeshua . The tasks of Judah included ensuring the safety of the community and personally Yeshua, as well as ensuring that the latter in his sermons did not move from peacefulness to calls to fight the invaders. Judah also raised the authority of the community by organizing various “miracles” and “healings” (by hiring scammers for the execution of their plans, for example, “paralytics,” who miraculously “recovered” after meeting Yeshua). Through Judah, who became the treasurer of the community, the Romans supplied it with money, gently patronized it, provided assistance if necessary, and all these actions were carried out so that members of the community, especially Yeshua himself, did not suspect that they were being used “blindly” . The help was either arranged as a happy coincidence or provided through third parties, for example, representatives of the Jewish local authorities who sympathize with Yeshua's doctrine. Thus, the arrest and execution of John the Baptist were organized by the Romans in order to eliminate the strongest competitor of the new community.

The operation developed successfully, but Judah's greed prevented her final success. As Afraniy found out quite by accident, some of Yeshua's healed were not scammers hired by Judas at all - they were real patients who really recovered, although Judas indicated them among those who were paid the money for the staging. Judas, summoned for explanation, said that all the missing money had been invested by him in organizing some great miracle, which was to happen in Jerusalem just the other day. Judas really organized such a miracle - they became the resurrection of Lazarus , but, instead of hiring performers and paying them, he used supporters of Yeshua, the Bethany sisters, convincing them that the performance would raise the authority of the Teacher. When the disciples of Yeshua realized that the resurrection was a hoax, the women involved in the scam demanded recognition from Judas, which was completely unacceptable to him - he would probably have been expelled from the community, after which he would face trial for embezzlement of official money.

Judas found the only way of salvation - he turned to the Sanhedrin (of course, not as a Roman agent, but introducing himself as a disciple of Yeshua, who suddenly realized his errors), offered his services in organizing the elimination of the popular religious leader and, a little later, escorted the capture group to community lodging place in the Garden of Gethsemane . The purpose of the operation was the assassination of Yeshua under the guise of accidental death during the capture of the resisting sectarians. The Romans, who at the last moment unraveled the plan of Judah, sent a special forces detachment to Gethsemane and prevented the assassination of Yeshua, but could not prevent his arrest without revealing to the Jews their interest in the preacher.

The Sanhedrin court, instead of sentencing Yeshua to death for blasphemy , handed him over to the procurator as accused of claiming the throne of Judea. Jewish hierarchs hoped that the procurator would have mercy on the preacher, thereby admitting that he was useful to Rome, and this would make a political corpse out of Yeshua. The Romans did the opposite: the procurator sentenced Yeshua to death, but made it so that in the eyes of the people, the Sanhedrin became the culprit of the death of Yeshua. The Romans expected before the execution to replace Yeshua with another person. After the death of the substitute on the cross, it was supposed to organize a “miraculous resurrection” of Yeshua, after which his authority would increase to an incredible height. However, Yeshua refused to participate in the staging, preferring to die on the cross.

To save the operation, the Romans resorted to desperate measures: they organized the burial of Yeshua in the tomb, then they removed the body and staged a resurrection, substituting a skillfully made-up imitator instead of Yeshua. Judas was eliminated because he was the only one who could convict them of a substitution.

Fancon Prize, 1997 - Grand Prix ^[1] . Zilantkon Prize, 2001 — The Big Zilant ^[2] .

• Historical jesus

• Kirill Yeskov. Gospel of Afrania , text of the book on lib.ru