Heresy : Jesus Christ and the other sons of God Author: Catherine Nixey (Author) Summary:”‘In the beginning was the Word,’ says the Gospel of John, and this sentence – and the words of all four gospels – is central to the teachings of the Christian church and has shaped Western art, literature and language, and the Western mind. Yet in the years after the death of Christ there was not merely one word, nor any consensus as to who Jesus was or why he had mattered. There were many different Jesuses, among them the aggressive Jesus who scorned his parents and crippled those who opposed him, the Jesus who sold his twin into slavery and the Jesus who had someone crucified in his stead. Moreover, in the early years of the first millennium there were many other saviours, many sons of gods who healed the sick and cured the lame. Among them were Asclepius, the son of Apollo, who made the blind see; gentle, long-haried Apollonius, who raised the dead; and Salmoxis, who promised his followers eternal life. But as Christianity spread across the Mediterranean, these other saviours were pronounced unacceptable – and in some cases heretical – and they faded from view. Now, in Heresy, Catherine Nixey tells their extraordinary story, one of contingency, chance and plurality. It is a story about what might have been.xvii, 364 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (chiefly color) ; 24 cmContents: Prologue Introduction Author’s note Antichrist To heal the blind and cure the lame The falsehoods of the magicians Serpent’s blood and eye of ape The product of insanity What would Jesus do? On sardines and resurrections Fruit from a dunghill Go into all the world In Eden The birth of heresy On laws The breeds of heretical monsters Like grains of sand On the other origin of the world To unweave the rainbow St. Augustine and the spider To extirpate the adversaries of faith That no memorial be left EpilogueSubjects: Christian heresies History Early church, ca. 30-600 Hérésies chrétiennes Histoire ca 30-600 (Église primitive) Incarnation Jesus Christ Biography Apocryphal and legendary literature History Jésus-Christ Biographie Apocryphes et légendes Histoire
