What if I told you, that shortly before the birth of Jesus, there lived a man, who his disciples called the Messiah, who was killed by the Romans and was raised from death after three days. This makes it plausible that Jesus heard stories about him. But did he willingly choose the path to Golgotha, because he knew, that his death was necessary in a bigger chain of effects? Was his attack on the moneylenders in the Temple not an outburst, but planned? Did Jesus plan his own execution (the gospel of Judas). Prof. Israel Knolh thinks so.

He is an expert on the Messianic and Apocalyptic rebels and preachers, active in the Holy Land, during the Roman occupation.

The historian Josephus (100 AD) gives us more information about this other Messiah, called Simon, the slave, than he does about Jesus. Simon burned down the palace of Herod in Jericho and leads his disciples into battle to crush the Roman Empire. It did not work. Simon was killed and his two thousand surviving followers were crucified. This all took place at the end of the reign of Herod the Great. In the Bible, this same Herod orders all baby's to be killed, when he learns about the birth of “The King of the Jews.” Jesus is born around 10 – 4.

What new evidence brings Knolh? He bases his discovery on a recently discovered stone, on which an ancient Hebrew text was written, in ink. It is called the “Jeselsohn”-stone, after an Jewish collector, or the “Gabriel”- stone. On this is a certain passage, in which Gabriel orders Simon, to rise in three days. But the ink is faded and the letters have almost disappeared. Even with high-tech research, the debate goes on. So far I followed a recent documentary of NGC, called “the first Jesus”.

History is politics. In Israel archeologists often don't search for artifacts, but they want to prove the (historical and religious) legitimacy of the state of Israel. But ancient artifacts can be forged, to fit that goal. Recently an inscription about the Temple of Salomon (the first proof of its existence) proved to be a fraud, as was the ossuary of Jesus. The forgers had gone to extreme detail, to fool the scientists. Skeptics say, that most "Biblical" artifacts are false.

 

JOSEPHUS, HISTORIAN

In this case professor Israel Knolh had another goal. He makes Jesus less unique, by putting him in a tradition of Messianic rebels. The “Gabriel”-stone is an obvious fraud and his proof “thin as air”. And Knolh has a hidden agenda. He underlines, that the Jews were right. Jesus was not the Messiah, but a wizard and charlatan.