>From: Alex Ferguson <abf_at_yeats.ucc.ie>
>Subject: Christian Essenes?
>
>aelarsen on the Essenes:
>> They're not Christians either. They were an explicitly Jewish sect
>> that predates Christ by about 150 years. There is a theory that John the
>> Baptist was an Essene originally, but it's just a theory with no evidence,
>> and even if it's true, it's pretty clear that he must have departed from
>> the sect to undertake his ministry.
>
>Note the phrase "_original_ Christians" (my emphasis). There's a
>medium-respectablew theory doing the rounds that the 'Jewish' faction
>in the Peter/Paul split, which would basically be the faction converting
>Jews in Judea and Galilea was at least very like the Essenes, as
>converted by the apostles and Jesus's relatives.
Hmmm. I'd be interested in knowing what the evidence for this is.
It seems rather tenuous to me. It seems easier to account for any
similarity of world view by the fact that both groups were operating in the
same culture at the same time and were influence by the same body of ideas.
Andrew E. Larsen