In the 15th Century the noted Renaissance pioneer, Nicolas of Cusa, told a story aiming to solve the paradox the endless murdering of people, of one another, in the name of God or religion. In his story the wise men of all the religions came together to ask God, the divine wisdom, how it is that they fight and kill one another in his name. The divine wisdom replied that they did so because they failed to recognize that there exists but one Truth. They replied that they all knew this, that there can be but one Truth. And so they asked how it is that they kill each other in the name of this one Truth. The divine wisdom replied that they did so, because they have all taken the words of their prophets as the word of God.

Nicholas of Cusa (1401 – 1464) was noted for his deep searching writings about Christianity, particularly the possibility of knowing God with the divine human mind — not through mere human means via "learned ignorance", but by way of the enfolding of creation in God and their unfolding in creation. 

When I refer to  Nicolas of Cusa's story in novels, I change the ending a bit, by taking it out of the context of religion altogether. I let the story end with the divine wisdom inviting all the sages to go to a seashore, instructing them to each pick up a grain of sand, with the divine wisdom answering their puzzlement, pointing out to them that they all fail because the fail to embrace the entire seashore, and the wind and waves, and the power that drives them. 

If one considers the great multiplicity of religions in the world, each claiming to represent Truth, the evident answer is that none of them do, and do so no more than a grain of sand represents the seashore. But within the grains there some aspects of truth imbedded, some concepts that have been recognized across the ages that uncover some divine aspects about ourselves. In them, in these sparks of truth, faint as they may be, we find the gold of the religions. But in order to discover those sparks it becomes necessary to peel away the political games for behavior manipulation that religions have been abused for.

Since Christianity is the most wide-spread religion in the world, and I have been associated with it for most of my life, I have chosen it as a case study for looking below its coverings for sparks of Truth. If one examines the great textbook of Christianity, the Bible, in this context, it becomes apparent that many of its early stories pertain to timeframes from the long historic void before written languages where developed or were in use, so that many of them where perpetuated orally in fireside tales, molded into politically correct fiction relevant to the times. Still, the stories of historic fiction pertain to the thinking of the time in which they were written, and some were evidently created as fiction to begin with.

Political fiction, which is often far from the truth, has increasingly become the hallmark in our modern world where the banners proclaim, "In Lies We Trust!" (called plausible deniability). It is not unreasonable to assume that the art of political fiction writing prevailed already in ancient days, serving tribal, ethnic, national, imperial, and in some cases even religious objectives. In the shadows of great empires and the need for power over people's and nations as a means to maintain their existence, the truth falls by the wayside. Since that dawn of the Christ era occurred within the timeframe of the rise of the Roman Empire, and within its domain, and all that we know about Christ Jesus was transmitted to us by the church of Rome, and to a large degree by the guidance of Rome that composed the New Testament, the testament and related doctrines are more likely politically inspired fiction rather than spiritual truths. 

Caption reads: "Two old priests showing the application of torture under the supervision of the Inquisition" 
Christianity

In considering the vast distance of the healing Christ and the torturing of people like this woman to make her confess her faith and the countless murders committed in the name of the church, and truth and religion and honor, and so forth, makes it the task of modern pioneers to separate fact from fiction, especially since in the shadow of the fiction Christianity became the largest religion in the world with a following of 2.2 billion, and with doctrines that shape the face of civilization probably more extensively than any other factor including monetarism and imperialism that it became intertwined with.

With this in mind let's look at some of the ancient stories cherished in the religions of Christianity that still shape civilization to the very day.

Religion: Creation Myths

Religion: Abraham Legends

Religion: Moses Legend

Empire Religion - New Testament

Religion: Christ Jesus Truth

Religion: Gospel of St. Thomas

Religion: The Decalogue

Empire Religion - Adultery

Empire Religion - Biofuels Depopulation Genocide

Empire Religion - Food Genocide

Index: Empire - Religion

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