Gerald Massey's Lectures - Society in evolution - Awardspace

simplicity. That significance which the esoteric misinterpreters try to read into it was not
in the nature of it originally--always excepting the phenomena of Spiritualism. There is a
regular manufacture of the old masters carried on by impostors in Rome. The modern
manufacture of ancient mysteries is just as great an imposition, and equally sure to be
found out. Do not suppose I am saying this, or waging war, on behalf of the mysteries
called Christian, for I look upon them as the greatest imposition of all. Rome was the
manufactory of old masters 1800 years ago. I am opposed to all man-made mystery, and
all kinds of false belief. The battle of truth and error is not to be darkly fought now-adays
behind the mask of secrecy. Darkness gives all its advantage to error; day light alone
is in favour of truth! Nature is full of mystery; and we are here to make out the mysteries
of Nature and draw them into day-light, not to cultivate and keep veiled the mysteries
made by man in the day of his need or the night of his past. We want to have done with
the mask of mystery and all the devious devilries of its double-facedness, so that we may
look fully and squarely into the face of Nature for ourselves, whether in the past, present,
or future. Mystery has been called the mother of abominations, but the abominations
themselves are the superstitions, the rites and ceremonies, the dogmas, doctrines, delusive
idealisms, and unjust laws that have been falsely founded on the ancient mysteries by
ignorant literalisation and esoteric misinterpretation!
NOTE TO LECTURE ON "PAUL"
In quoting evidence of the double doctrine ascribed to Paul, I omitted one of the most
conclusive illustrations of the fact. We read in Galatians iii. 13--"Christ hath redeemed us
from the Curse of the Law, being made a Curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every
one that hangeth on a Tree." The object of hanging the Condemned One on the tree was
to make him Accursed. But what says the voice of Paul the Gnostic in another text (Cor.
xii. 3)?--"No man speaking by the Spirit of God calleth Jesus Accursed, and no man can
say that Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Spirit." That is, the Christ of the Gnosis could
not become accursed, could not be hung upon a tree, and no Gnostic would say that Jesus
was the KURIOS save in the mystical or esoteric sense. Here the Historic and Gnostic
doctrines are directly antipodal. This again is the teaching of Paul--"Say not in thy heart,
Who shall ascend into Heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down;) or, Who shall descend
into the abyss? (that is, to bring Christ up from the Dead.) The Word is nigh thee, in thy
mouth, and in thy heart." That is, the Word as preached by Paul. Then follows the
interpolation. Also, as an illustration of the statement made by Clement Alexander--that
Paul said he would bring the Gnosis or Hidden Wisdom to the Brethren in Rome--it
should have been shown by me that the teaching of the Epistle (ch. i. 23-32) is taken
almost bodily and repeated nearly verbatim from ch. xiv. 12-31 of the "Wisdom of
Solomon."
THE KARAST=CHRIST OR MUMMY-TYPE OF IMMORTALITY.
The Karast, which I claim to be the Egyptian original of the Greek Christ, was an image
of rising again--a representative of the resurrection; and in speaking of this symbol I
ought to have pointed to the fact that the alleged historic resurrection of Jesus has never
yet been found pourtrayed on the so-called early Christian Monuments, including those
discovered in the Roman Catacombs. But what do we find there in place of the missing
fact? The scene of Lazarus being raised from the dead. This is depicted over and over
again as the typical resurrection where there is no real one! Christ of Egypt reproduced in
Rome like the other Mythical types perpetuated there by Gnostic Art. As the image is