WI No Crucifixion?

[Mysterion]

Inspired by a thread down in chat about monotheism.

WI Jesus had not been crucified? Maybe he escaped or got a good lawyer, or Herod had a sudden fit of compassion but, in ay case, Jesus does not die on the cross in 33AD.

What happens to:

Jesus himself - does he end up getting a bigger following or does his movement eventually lose steam and fade away?

- religion: what faith, if any, becomes dominant? Does monotheism still take hold as the dominant theology, or do the polythesitic faiths see a resurgance?

- calendar: without the Church, how long does it take for a standard calendar to take hold, or does one at all? If so, which one?

- civilization: Massive butterflys, no doubt. Without Christiantity what happens with civilazation globally? Do the dark ages get avoided or just happen for another eeason, etc.

- and there's aporbably a lot of other stuff I'm not thinking of at the moment.

(BTW: I, in no way mean this discussion as an affront to Christians or anyone else who believes in the divinity of Jesus.)

 

[black angel]

hard to say we know close to nothing about Jesus, what we do know comes from the Bible so its hard to say, if I had to guess it would fade, leaders get power drunk and with-out a shocking and grand story its hard to keep things going after the leader dies

 

[Alex Richards]

He'd be executed sooner or later, after all as a scion of the House of David he was a legitimate Political Threat to the establishment more than a religious one at the time. Perhaps we have a few more teachings, a different gospel as well as a new date for Easter though.

 

[Inarius]

Probably a hundred of proclaimed Jesus-like lived and died during this highly troubled period. Many people at that time thought and claimed that "the end of time was near", and taught their nearly-heretic believes in the streets.

Nobody noticed, because their were the products of this epoch. That's why there are no real historical sources about Jesus.

Only a few were remembered, because their deaths or their lives were odder than others.

Jesus was probably one of them.

So WI Jesus didn't get crucified ? He would have disappeared and never forgotten.

 

[Phaidros]

How it goes further with Jesus himself I have no idea, maybe his movement will lose steam, but the Jewish religion was in major turmoil at the time. In our timeline one can argue that Christianity started as a(one of many) reform-movement of Judaism, and present day Judaism is mostly descended from a rival faction that gained prominence after the destruction of the temple (the farisees, if remember correctly). Both were against the High Priests of the Temple, who were in power until said destruction of Jerusalem. Maybe in this timeline "Christians" become the new Jewish mainstream?

Regarding the other faiths, among the Greek and Roman philosophers there was a significant movement towards monotheim: traditional mythology painted a terrible image of the gods: adultary, jealousy, no human sin was strange to these gods. At least among the upper classes, neo-platonism was the dominant philosophy, and that supported the idea of a single omnipresent Creator Deity. Weren't there Roman emporors who tried to create a "anti-Christian" monotheistic religion? The cult of Sol Invictus seems a possibility to create a monotheistic religion with many of the trapping we know of OTL Christianity, or else the cults of Mithras or Isis, who were big-time concurrents of christianity, could rise further in prominence.

(I have this brain-flash of a trinity consisting of the Solar Pancreator, who created and sustains the universe, the Divine Mother Isis, who give Life to the world, and their First Son Mithras, who slew the Forces of Chaos personified in the Wild Bull and patronizes Order and Civilization.)

There was a website that dealt this question truly splendidly, and suggested that some form of gnosticism,with the old gods as minor spirits below the Omnipotent Pancreator, not unlike the Saints in Catholicism, but I do not remember which site that was, and I definitaly need to organize my favorites... That site also suggested that for the rest of history, the replacement of Christianity by some thing else, except for a lack of crosses, would make less difference than one might suspect. Rome would still fall, some organisation similar to the Catholic church would form, etcetera, etcetera. The writer of that document expected that the biggest difference was whether the Scientific Method and the Industrial Revolution would happen or not.

 

[Kerblo]

I've always wondered what would have happened if Jesus was killed by stoning instead of being crucified. Would we have a rock instead of a cross?

But joking aside, anyone who looks into ancient religions will realize that Christianity borrowed a lot of symbols and ideas from other religions of the same period. (Most religions do that, I don't want to seem like I'm picking on one faith.) Popular ideas were the cross, taken from the Egyptian Ankh and the use of Martyrs. Christianity still could have used the idea that Jesus was Crucified even if he wasn't. It makes a more interesting story.

 

[archaeogeek]

He'd be executed sooner or later, after all as a scion of the House of David he was a legitimate Political Threat to the establishment more than a religious one at the time. Perhaps we have a few more teachings, a different gospel as well as a new date for Easter though.

Assuming David was not a mythical king, every other jew would probably have been descended from him anyway. He was at best some rabble rouser with weird religious notions and some vague rabbinical education: those were a dime a dozen at the time. At worst it's somewhere between a mythical character and a composite character.

My assumption is that the whole deal gets written anyway. Most of the crucifixion narrative is a myth to begin with.

For the questions
1 - Some mystery cult was bound to take over once they moved to the mainstream of roman society. Or not, who knows.
2 - Calendar - er... Orthodox christians still use the Julian calendar.
3 - Fifth century cold phase will probably lead to much of the dark ages, but we might avoid the late roman persecution of intellectuals (mostly christian lynch mobs, although some emperors went down pretty hard on pagan intellectuals).

 

[Julia]

More or less in the same direction: What if Pontius Pilate thought for more than three seconds about the politics of publicly executing a popular religious leader and held a quiet, private execution instead. Without the advantage of a resurrection, I don't think Christianity as we know it would have gotten off the ground.

 

[archaeogeek]

More or less in the same direction: What if Pontius Pilate thought for more than three seconds about the politics of publicly executing a popular religious leader and held a quiet, private execution instead. Without the advantage of a resurrection, I don't think Christianity as we know it would have gotten off the ground.

Miracles go in ASB

 

[Inarius]

What if Pontius Pilate thought for more than three seconds about the politics of publicly executing a popular religious leader and held a quiet, private execution instead. Without the advantage of a resurrection, I don't think Christianity as we know it would have gotten off the ground.

Just try to think about it two seconds. Pontius Pilate wasn't the character you can read in the gospels. So, making a TL on a nearly-mythical story is just like asking what would happen if Atreus didn't cook Thyestes sons to make him eat them.

And, again : jesus was probably not a popular religious leader (or it would have been known)