Truth in Mikra

The case against Rome fabricating Christianity

—

by

The Hoosac historian
in

(Disclaimer) This is not a specific response to one person’s Roman creation theory or a bad review of one book but is an abstract refute of all notions that in any way Rome could have invented Christianity. This is a full abstract debunk of the general idea as a whole, I am aware multiple people and professors and historians have advanced such theories. I have no issue here with Roman invention proponents attacking this article I am not backing down from my argument here at, that is not why I am saying this. My point is I will not attempt to debunk one professor or historian’s theory but to put to bed forever any possibility that Rome was ever capable or had the ways and means of contriving Christianity at all.

So why then is the New Testament also sometimes called “The Brit Chadashah” or “The Apostolic writings” absolutely authentic?

Conspiracy theory number 1- Rome fabricated the New Testament.

So why would Rome want to fabricate Christianity as a means of appeasement or to pacify the Jewish population after the destruction of the second Temple.

Key Arguments for the “Roman Invention” Theory:

  • Pacification of Rebellious Jews: Proponents argue that after the intense Jewish-Roman Wars (c. 70 AD), the Roman state needed to stop recurring revolts. They claim Rome created a religion featuring a “passive” messiah who urged followers to “give to Caesar what is Caesar’s” (Matthew 22:21).
  • Syncretism with Roman Paganism: Some theories suggest Christianity was fabricated by combining Jewish theology with popular Roman/pagan ideas, mystery cults, and imperial symbols, making it more palatable and easier to implement across the empire.
  • Fabricated Evidence: Proponents suggest that figures like Flavius Josephus were involved in producing the New Testament documents as pro-Roman propaganda

These theories are argued by writers such as James Valliant and Warren Fahy and Dr. Joseph Atwill.

Here is John 6:53-60

53 Then Jesus said to them, “Yes, indeed! I tell you that unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life in yourselves. 54 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life — that is, I will raise him up on the Last Day. 55 For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. 56 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood lives in me, and I live in him. 57 Just as the living Father sent me, and I live through the Father, so also whoever eats me will live through me. 58 So this is the bread that has come down from heaven — it is not like the bread the fathers ate; they’re dead, but whoever eats this bread will live forever!” 59 He said these things as he was teaching in a synagogue in K’far-Nachum.

60 On hearing it, many of his disciples said, “This is a hard word — who can bear to listen to it?

Here is John 18:36

36 Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.”

The Kingdom of Jesus Christ described in the Gospels is not of this world or age but of a world that is to come. This is not what the ruling classes of Judea wanted. These are not Messianic teachings that most Jews in Roman Judea taught or wanted taught and these teachings are not consistent with the direction that that Rabbinical Judaism was going post 70 ce. The only argument that these theorists use that makes sense is the “render to Caesar what is Caesar’s” thing. Let me me then ask? Would it make sense for Imperial Rome to contrive a whole book just for one line that tries to get Jews to pay more taxes. Obviously not at all. If the New Testament as a whole was so appealing the the Jewish audience of the day why wasn’t it accepted more by the Jews of the day. The idea did not work at all either because between 132-136 ce the Jews revolted again under Shimon bar Kokhva which led to the final expulsion of Jews from Israel and the beginning of the exile and diaspora. The plan failed in any case, so to believe that Roman elites contrived such a plan makes the Emperors and intellectuals of the greatest Empire the world had known to date look pretty stupid.

Let me me ask you this? If you wanted to contrive a story to appease the Jewish public then for one: Why make the persecutors of their Messiah Jews themselves, like the Pharisees and scribes wanting Jesus executed by the Sanhedrin and Jesus’s betrayer being a Jew in the person of Judas Iscariot. Then second point: Why make the Romans who are by their so called fake Messiah story then make themselves the ones who in the end kill Jesus by their execution method and Pilate agreeing (reluctantly albeit). The Romans did kill Jesus in any case. If the Romans wanted to appease the Jews into liking Rome then why not say for example, have Persians or Syrians kill Jesus with Rome not knowing about it until later and after the fact. So maybe Syria and Persia are not perfect examples but it would be absurd to make yourself the villains in your own so called fake story and make villains of the people you are trying to win over. So if Rome did try to contrive a new religion the smartest intellectuals of that era failed to reach the target audience and hurt themselves by converting there own ranks weakening pagan Rome. In other words they did a terrible job of it. So one argument is that James Valliant claims that Nero was in on Rome inventing Christianity. So didn’t Nero blame Christians for the fire? So Nero invented Christianity just to have someone to blame for the fire? However even more significant is that unless (you deny Nero blamed Christians for the fire), if Nero blamed Christians for the fire then there must have been knowledge of Christian existence, which would be illogical if Nero just helping to invent it in the first place.

Valliant is further quoted as saying that ” Christianity is profoundly pro-Roman and anti-traditional-Jewish”. For one if so then why did Nero hate them and Tacitus although validating the crucifixion called Christians “followers of a mischievous superstition”. So how is Christianity helping Rome exactly? Tell me please other than “render unto Caesar” how at all the does Christianity benefit Rome. The Jews would rebel again anyway in 132-136 in the bar Kokhva Revolt. Although it may be true that the Christian emphasis on the “world to come” as opposed top “this world” made Christians willing to endure persecution which was in Rome’s favor but if Christianity truly in the long haul was a benefit to Rome then why did Rome continue to persecute Christians? Valliant further claims “Vespasian and Titus claimed to be the Jewish Messiah and had similarities with Jesus”. This is historically inaccurate and totally false and cannot be backed up by any fact. Also let me ask that if Christianity was contrived by Flavian Roman Emperors or even Nero was supposedly in on it. If Nero for instance invented Christians, then how could they have been well known enough to make it worth his while to blame the fire on them.

So if Flavian Emperors contrived Christianity and the Flavian dynasty was from (69–96 AD) (was a Roman imperial family comprising emperors Vespasian and his two sons, Titus and Domitian). For one the Apostle Paul was dead by by ce 65 (unless you buy that Marcion wrote Paul, which I deconstruct in section 2 of this article). So all of Paul’s letters were written from ce 48 with Galatians to Titus just before his death in the mid 60’s ce. Unless the debunked theory of Marcion being Paul is true (which it is not true, see section 2) there is no way that the Flavians created Christianity with even the most lenient estimates of Paul’s life which would be him dying 67-68 at the latest. Plus if the Flavian dynasty contrived Christianity how did Nero blame the Roman fire on Christians in 64 ce. In the documentary “Creating Christ” they claim the first actual documented “Christians” were connected to the Flavian elite. It is possible that such members were the first known Christians of the Roman Aristocracy maybe, but there were early known Christian groups in Israel and the Galilee called “The Way” and “The Ebionites” (poor ones) that were well known in the late 30’s and 40’s ce. Here is another false statement:  “The Flavian historian Josephus claimed that his boss, Emperor Vespasian, was the second coming of Chris.” Simply false! Josephus never said this, yes Josephus praised Vespasian and called him a great King but never Messiah, never a Christ or anything religious. Yes it is true that Messiah means “anointed” and in Israel Kings were anointed with Holy oil but so were priests and other important people, and yes Christos is a Greek translation of the word anointed. However Messiah, Mashiach nor Christ is a synonym for king on face value. The Jewish Mashiach or Messiah or Christ in Greek was specifically a King who would usher in the return of the Davidic dynasty of ancient Israel. So the statement alone one is a great king is not Messianic at all.

Can linguistics prove the New Testament was not contrived by Roman intellectuals? Short answer is yes and I will cite Messianic Jewish Rabbi Yirmeyah ben Avrom (although many others are aware of this) who can be found online and has written books. The New Testament was written in Koine Greek yes but the authors used Jewish idioms and phrases that Roman scribes could not have replicated on their own. My articles are written in English mostly outside of some Hebrew content. If you were reading a book in English could you recognize subdialects or know where someone is from by the terms or idioms used, yes of course. Where I am from in the New England region of the US we call carbonated sweet drinks with sugar “soda” but in the Midwest region they call these drinks like Coca Cola or Sprite “pop”. Terms like “wicked good” or “frappe” are idiomatic to the Boston area or terms like bloke, posh or bloody are obviously English slang terms. So does the Greek New Testament employ Jewish idioms that Roman writers either likely did not know or did not know enough to build a book on it. Here are just a few.

Here is the beginning of Luke 19:15 for example

 Καὶ ἐγένετο (kai egeneto) meaning “and it came to pass” consistent with the Hebrew vayhi ויהי meaning “and it was or it came to be”.

Here is a quote from a Greek language blog called “Mr greek geek”

Λέγει αὐτῇ ὁ Ἰησοῦς, Τί ἐμοὶ καὶ σοί, γύναι; Οὔπω ἥκει ἡ ὥρα μου. John 2:4

Here’s the NET Bible note (tn #8) for John 2:4
Grk “Woman, what to me and to you?” (an idiom). The phrase τί ἐμοὶ καὶ σοί, γύναι is Semitic in origin. The equivalent Hebrew expression in the Old Testament had two basic meanings:
(1) When one person was unjustly bothering another, the injured party could say “What to me and to you?” meaning, “What have I done to you that you should do this to me?” (Judg 11:12, 2 Chr 35:21, 1 Kgs 17:18).
(2) When someone was asked to get involved in a matter he felt was no business of his, he could say to the one asking him, “What to me and to you?” meaning, “That is your business, how am I involved?” (2 Kgs 3:13, Hos 14:8).
Option (1) implies hostility, while option (2) implies merely disengagement. Mere disengagement is almost certainly to be understood here as better fitting the context (although some of the Greek Fathers took the remark as a rebuke to Mary, such a rebuke is unlikely).

Another main point is New Testament writers having knowledge of lesser known and more esoteric book like Enoch. The book of Enoch was not included in the Septuagint which Roman author would have known the Septuagint but not likely the Book of Enoch, a non canonical book.

  • Jude 1:14-15: Direct quotation of 1 Enoch 1:9, referencing Enoch as the “seventh from Adam”.
  • 2 Peter 2:4: Echoes themes from 1 Enoch regarding the judgment of disobedient angels (bound in Tartarus).

I doubt that even if Roman scribes in on this so called conspiracy had heard of the Book of Enoch they surely would not have known it in depth to quote it. Remember that the canonical Old Testament or the Tanakh was translated into Greek in the Septuagint. The Book of Enoch was extra esoteric in that is had no copy in Greek or Latin but even still no copy in Hebrew. Only Aramaic and Geez (a Ethiopian semitic language) have copies of Enoch have been found, to me this is a absolute coffin nail in any theory that the New Testament was contrived by Rome. Even if those who claim that Josephus was in one the conspiracy, Josephus never ever mentioned the Book of Enoch in his writings.

Here is a quote by prominent Atheist Professor of history Richard Carrier, which by the way I do not in any way endorse his overall historical or theological views obviously. However his review of works by Atwill, Valliant and Fahy show that even staunch atheists are not buying these theories.

(This can be found at richardcarrier.info)

“Valliant and Fahy are advancing yet another “Roman emperors invented Christianity” conspiracy theory that is no better argued than Behold Babylon USA! Their approach is even more tedious and hard to follow than Joseph Atwill’s, the more-or-less inventor of their overall idea. And as far as that goes, I’ve been there, done that. See Atwill’s Cranked-up Jesus and Killing Crankery with Bayesian Reasoning: The Kooky & Illogical Postflaviana Review. It’s well known that I have very little patience for amateur Jesus mythicism. It needs to pass peer review for a reason, precisely to wash out all the bad arguments and incorrectly presented evidence, and thus justify our spending any time reading it. Otherwise all it does is spread disinformation that I then have to waste time correcting. But I’ve made that point before, so I needn’t reiterate it here. See The Problem with Varieties of Jesus Mythicism and Please No More Astrotheology.

I’ve also come to the conclusion that James Valliant is catastrophically unreliable. Of course, neither he nor Fahy have any relevant credentials, nor have ever published anything under peer review. But I mean even more than that. They are not just amateurs too incompetent to be arguing theories in any advanced subject of history, but Valliant in particular is actually anti-competent in this subject. For a glaring illustration, see my assessment in Reading Josephus on James: On Valliant Flunking Literary Theory. By comparison, Earl Doherty, with at least an undergraduate degree in Ancient History and Classical Languages, demonstrated he is competent enough to argue theories in this subject. Indeed, I think with feedback and improvements relatively easy for him to complete, his first book could have been worked into a successful doctoral dissertation at any university. Fahy might merely be comparatively bad at that. But Valliant is the diametrical opposite of that. He has no business even having opinions about history that anyone should heed.”

So enough on the nonsense Rome inventing Christianity.

Did Jews invent Christianity or the belief Yeshua ha’Notzri is the Messiah?

This not very viable being the direction that works like the Mishnah, Tosefta (which made the base of the 6th century Talmud) were taking second century Jewish thought. Although the Zohar is very New Testament in thought it was never known to late first through the second century people. The Zohar was either written by Shimon bar Yochai in the second century but was then lost and discovered in 13th century Spain by Moses De Leon. Or is was written by De Leon himself in the 13th century or as Moses De Leon claimed, he found it in a cave. I personally think the Zohar was a compilation of already existing mystical stories that De Leon put together into one book. In either case this book was not known in the time of the New Testament even if you wrongly deny the New Testament was a early first century work and try to place it in the second century. Either way the Zohar was not known because because the Talmud never quotes it. Also lets say the Zohar was available? Why not use it as your new prophetic work and why contrive the new Testament then. Also Shimon bar Kokhva was a Messianic claimant, so why a need to contrive Jesus when they had Bar Kokhva (aka bar Kokhba). Unless you concede that Jesus was early first century but that notion is proof that Jesus was who he said he was, if we are assuming a conspiracy is true in the second century then why put Yeshua in the first century instead of just going with Shimon bar Kokhva. This idea makes no sense at all.

Did the New Testament writers themselves contrive the New Testament?

This makes even less sense and first I would ask what was the motive?

So a fishermen named Shimon later called Peter (the rock) and a tax collector named Levi later called Matityahu or Matthew. John Mark a Libyan and cousin of Barnabas who there is very little known of or about. John who even little is known. Luke a Syrian doctor who was likely half Jewish on the Father’s side and Syrian on the mother’s side and he wrote the Book of Acts also. So of course Paul and Yehudah (Jude aka Thaddaeus) make up the writers of the New Testament.

First of the writer it appears only Matthew, John, Jude and Peter were the only direct desciples who wrote the New Testament, Mark Luke and paul were not desciples of Jesus during his ministry, although some believe Paul or Shaul aka Saul replaced Judus who betrayed Jesus as the new 12th after Jesus’s death and resurrection, although Acts states that Matthias the other Matityahu got that distiction but many still insist Paul is the real new 12th . There is no evidence at all these people knew each other accept for direct introduction by Jesus himself but that negates a conspiracy. So an odd group to get together and contrive a religious text and a new religion unless they actually were introduced by Jesus himself which is counter to a conspiratorial point of view. None of these individuals were professional scribes, yes a doctor and tax collector had education but enough linguistic education to fake a document so well written it changed the world together. Even Paul in the letter to the Romans admits to using a scribe now and again.

Romans 16:22

 I, Tertius, the one writing down this letter, greet you in the Lord.

Papias an early church Father though Mark was a scribe who put Shimon/Peter AKA Keifa into words. That Peter really wrote Mark’s Gospel but Peter only spoke Aramaic and Mark put his testamony into Greek. Hence John Mark was Peters scribe. However Peter was from the north of Israel and Mark from north Africa-Libya, so they did they meet? by coincidence, I would doubt that. If the New Testament was contrived then Mark could have simply wrote it himself, why write down Peters words. If the NT was contrived why four Gospels? For instance the Quran is a tenth the size of the Bible and that book converted the middle east and much of Africa and Turkey. So were four Gospels, 21 letters or epistles and 1 prophetic book. This much was hardly needed to trick millions. Why 3 synoptic Gospels telling a similar story from three perspectives plus John the theological Gospel. If the NT was faked why not one Gospel like Matthew for the life of Jesus and a shorter John for theology? One more key point is that people from different areas of the world especially in ancient times without media and travel was harder. So how did if we assume a conspiracy did the New Testament writters get together and work it all out. The fact that secular history knows nothing of the the NT authors and often sees them as anonymous. So if Peter was from the Galilee and Mark from Libya, Luke from Syria then how possible did NT writers pull of such a conspiracy. They could not have.

This below from Roman history:

“Nero blamed Christians for the 64 AD Great Fire of Rome to deflect widespread rumors that he started it himself to rebuild the city. As a small, misunderstood, and disliked minority, Christians were an ideal scapegoat. Their clandestine meetings and talk of a coming judgment by fire made them easy targets for this political maneuver”

If Christians existed 6 years before the Temples destruction then (this applies to all three theories presented) the Jews lacking a Temple would not have been a motive to contrive Christianity, so then what was the motive? Answer, there was not a valid motive at all! Here below is a list of secular scholars who believe that the New Testament is reliable history and accurate, scholars like Richard Bauckham, Craig Keener, Simon Gathercole, Peter J. Williams, Martin Hengel, and N.T. Wright. Here is more from a blog site called “Stand to Reason”

“Now, think about why this matters. If the Gospels started out anonymous and then were copied and circulated and recopied and copied again and circulated for decades around the Roman Empire—from Judea to Rome to Egypt to France—then here’s the question: How did the scribes and early church fathers conspire to unanimously attribute all the Gospels with the exact same four names? No confusion. No disagreement. No alternatives. That’s not how anonymous documents behave.

Just compare this with the book of Hebrews, which is genuinely anonymous. Notice how there was lots of debate about its authorship then, just as there is today. That’s what we should expect if a writing is truly, originally anonymous.”

The New Testament makes the most sense with divine intervention and not that all these people most of whom did not know each other conspired to create the NT and Christianity. So let’s throw out any notion that the NT writers themselves contrived their own document!

So were paul’s letters faked altered or originally written by Marcion? First who was Marcion? Marcion of Sinope was a second century ce Byzantine Christian heretic who created the original Gnostic movement within fringe Christianity which led to all the others. Medieval Cathars and modern Mormons are part of the Gnostic movement. Unlike Arius who proposed that Jesus was distinct and inferior from the Father, Marcion proposed that the Father was distinct from Jesus and that the Father was a evil Demiurge which Jesus more or less killed of or something like that. Marcion was excommunicated by Rome for denying the Trinity. Some people including notable Dr. David Litwa have proposed that Marcion actually wrote Paul and Paul’s letters were contrived.

So what are the facts here:

  1. Marcion proposed a new Christian canon in 140 ce. Yet there was clear evidence of Christianity in the first century. Josephus and Tacitus who both died before 140 both were aware of Christianity from their known historical writings indicated their knowledge of Christianity. This proves that Marcion if anything doctored the canon and did not write it as an original.

2. Marcion only quotes 75% of the New Testament and Marcions letter to the Romans only has 14 chapters missing chapters 15 and 16.

3. Marcions Paul lacks a editorial tendancy. So it appears Marcion tried to sanitize or whitewash Pauls letters of any Jewish persepective in order to trivialize the God of the Old Testament “Adonai יהוה” in order to promote his Gnostic perspectives.

4. Marcions Paul lacks athletic allegory or that is using sport to teach moral lessons.

5. As opposed to canonical scripture which says three years, Marcion claims Paul took 14 years to make it to Jerusalem. Which account sounds like a lie?

6. Marcions Galatians in 4:4 does not say born of a women. Here is the actually Galatians 4:4. (ESV)

 4 But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law.

So Marcion is in full denial of the Gospel accounts.

7. Marcion’s Paul has 30 Old Testament references and the canonical Paul has 90 OT references, so which sounds more authentic?

8. Marcion only had 10 letters of Paul

Galatians

1 & 2 Corinthians

Romans

1 & 2 Thessalonians

Laodiceans (a modified version of Ephesians)

Colossians

Philippians

Philemon

However the early Father Irenaeus quoted in the year 180 ce both letters of Timothy and Titus or that is the pastoral epistles. Proving that Marcions version was incomplete.

The final conclusion is that the Marcionite canon was faked in a bad attempt to to create a new type of secret society and religion based on idolatry and witchcraft.

So who exactly was paul? He was born in the modern southern Turkish city of Tarsus, a city of about 350,000 people as of 2020 census. His name was Shaul שאול (Romanized as Saul often) and was a Jew of the tribe of Benjamin and nothing about his parents or last name is known. Traditional Israelite names included a first name and the middle name was either ben in Hebrew or bar as the Aramaic, both meaning son of or son. The last was the first name of the Father. So Shimon bar Yochai means Shimon or Simon son of Yochai. David ben Gurion means David son of Gurion. Nothing like that is known of Shaul of Tarsus as we know. He was born about the year 5 or so in the Julian calendar or 3765 abouts in the Hebrew year. He was a Roman citizen and a tent maker by trade. Some say he was born as early as 4 bce which would be Hebrew year 3756 but 5 or 6 ce is more common and he died between 62-67 ce. Outside of the Bible, various Encyclopedia’s and oral Church tradition not much else is known about Shaul/Paul. He used the the Greek name Paulos to communicate with the gentiles maybe because of his reputed smaller stature. Some suggested that Paul was used because it sounded a lot like Saul which is true but Saul was never Saul really but Shaul and Paul was Paulos in Greek, so that theory is unlikely. I think an important fact to point out to those who doubt the historicity of Paul or that Paul was not who the Bible claimed. This is the fact that first gentile Church that Paul and Barnabas in Antioch of Syria was very very close to where Paul was from in Tarsus and like all things in life projects typically (not always) will begin closer to home.

There are in modern history four types acceptance of the letters of Paul

The undisputed Pauline letters:

  1. Galatians (c. 48 AD)
  2. First Thessalonians (c. 49–51)
  3. First Corinthians (c. 53–54)
  4. Second Corinthians (c. 55–56)
  5. Romans (c. 55–57)
  6. Philippians (c. 57–59 or c. 62)
  7. Philemon (c. 57–59 or c. 62)

These are the letters of disputed authenticity but have greater favor among most historians.

These next three are more disputed and are commonly known as the pastoral epistles.

Then to the letter to the Hebrews which even the Catholic church disputed if Paul wrote in the 5th century and this letter even by devout Christians is doubted to be Pauline. That being said it is still considered Holy scripture. See a big difference is that unlike the other letters, Hebrews was anonymous from beginning and was only by default, later attributed to Paul. So whether or whether not Paul wrote Hebrews has no bearing on its theological authenticity.

One point I’d like to throw out is the fact in and of itself that sketical secular historians agree that seven of Paul’s letter are indeed authentic is a strong point on face value.

“Scholars point out that whereas 1 Thessalonians stresses the immanence of Jesus’s return, 2 Thessalonians brings an emphasis on events that must transpire before the parousia or coming of Messiah Jesus to establish God’s victory everywhere (compare 1 Thess 4:13–18 and 2 Thess 2:1–12).”

My response: Big whoopty doda, who cares, I do not even see an argument on 2 Thess being inauthentic. So two different letters emphasize different things, is that unusual?.

Here is a quote on Colossians by scholar Bart D. Ehrman

“Colossians is linguistically distinct from undisputed Pauline letters due to its notably long, complex, and “breathless” sentences, a high concentration of unique vocabulary (including 25 words found nowhere else in Paul and 34 nowhere else in the NT), and a distinct “cosmic” Christology. Scholars often note a higher density of relative clauses and a heavy use of genitives, marking a shift in style compared to the direct, argumentative tone of earlier letter”

Another big so what here, do you know how many Hebrew words are found only once in Tanakh (Old Testament). Also Paul (as stated earlier in this article) uses scribes often and this may indicate a scribal change. Also remember still the Bible was copied by hand for centuries and millennia before the printing press. Scribes making new copies may have made small changes here and there. The same basic arguments are made about Ephesians and I make the same counter arguments. One point is that people question Ephesians because it focuses more on the resurrection than the crucifixion. I’d counter that makes it more authentic, if earlier letters focused more on one aspect it would make sense that a later letter dated to the 60’s might put the focus in a newer light.

On the pastorals: So the differences make sense in that they were directed toward Pauls leading missionaries as opposed to churches themselves. Example is differences in instructions to women. Simple answer is that the church letters dealt more with women in daily action and involvement whereas the pastorals had more to do with authority itself. So in those cases the context is totally different. To be honest I think people are grasping at straws to invalidate Paul, and invalidating Paul historically is the first step to theological invalidation. I must admitt I do not read Greek and cannot analyze the New Testament in the way I can analyze the Old Testament. However plenty of people such as CS Lewis and Derek Prince were fluent in Koine Greek and never questioned Paul.

Now moving away from Paul and to the Book of Revelation. If Rome faked Christianity then why did so many people in the history of Christianity think that the Book of Revelation was talking about Rome. Now these days the notion of the Book of Revelation being about Rome has given way to the primary notion of the Pre-Tribulation Rapture theory which dominates modern Christian thought. This was not always the case and many people thought that much of Revelation concerned Rome itself.

1. The Seven Hills (Revelation 17:9)

The most direct geographical link is found in the description of the “seven heads” of the beast, which the text explicitly interprets as “seven mountains on which the woman sits.

Here id Revelation 17:5-13 (CJB)

5 On her forehead was written a name with a hidden meaning,

BAVEL THE GREAT

MOTHER OF WHORES AND OF

THE EARTH’S OBSCENITIES

6 I saw the woman drunk from the blood of God’s people, that is, from the blood of the people who testify about Yeshua.

On seeing her, I was altogether astounded. 7 Then the angel said to me, “Why are you astounded? I will tell you the hidden meaning of the woman and of the beast with seven heads and ten horns that was carrying her. 8 The beast you saw once was, now is not, and will come up from the Abyss; but it is on its way to destruction. The people living on earth whose names have not been written in the Book of Life since the founding of the world will be astounded to see the beast that once was, now is not, but is to appear. 9 This calls for a mind with wisdom: the seven heads are seven hills on which the woman is sitting; also they are seven kings — 10 five have fallen, one is living now and the other is yet to come; and when he does come, he must remain only a little while. 11 The beast which once was and now is not is an eighth king; it comes from the seven and is on its way to destruction. 12 The ten horns you saw are ten kings who have not yet begun to rule, but they receive power as kings for one hour, along with the beast. 13 They have one mind, and they hand over their power and authority to the beast. 14 They will go to war against the Lamb, but the Lamb will defeat them, because he is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those who are called, chosen and faithful will overcome along with him.”

This was often thought to be about Rome. Also:

“The Seven Kings: Revelation 17:10 identifies the seven heads as “seven kings,” where five have fallen, one is currently reigning, and one is yet to come. This is frequently mapped to the Julio-Claudian dynasty (e.g., Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero).”

So why would Roman Emperors create a prophetic book that portrays it’s own Empire as evil, does this make sense? Contrive a religion and prophecy your Empire as a evil that God will destroy? Who does that, did Muhammad make Saudi Arabia the evil Empire of the Quran? It is true that prophecy is subjective but imagery in Revelation does at times seem to point to Rome, if Christianity was faked then why not make the evil Empire look more like Persia for example or the Goths or Celts who Romans detested. Or simply make Revelation more fantasy like and less likely to be tied to specific Nation. So finally if a fake Christianity was to appease the uppity Jews then why not promise that the traditional Jerusalem was returning soon. (see Revelation 21-22) But instead Revelation only after a temporary 1000 year reign does the “New Jerusalem” come in full restoration of Eden. This expectation of patience is not the type of appeasement that most people would use on uppity Zionist rebels!

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