The-Gospel-of-Caesar_Press-Release
Content
THE GOSPEL OF CAESAR Discovering the historical Christ
To premiere on November-2-2007
The Gospel of Caesar, a documentary film by Dutch Public Broadcast VARA-TELEVISION and director Jan van Friesland, makes its world premiere at the Louis Hartlooper Complex in Utrecht, Holland, on November 2nd 2007. Following the tracks of two investigators on their quest for the historical Jesus this enthralling documentary about the life, death and apotheosis of ‘the greatest of mortals’ unravels the hidden origin of Christianity. Francesco Carotta, an Italian linguist, philosopher and engineer, discovered that the story of Jesus Christ is based on the life of Caesar. (Carotta, F. (1999) War Jesus Caesar? Munich.)
Carotta: ‘Everything in the story of Jesus can be found in the biography of Caesar. The Gospel appears to be the history of the Roman Civil War, a ‘mis-telling’ of the life of Caesar – from the Rubicon to his assassination – mutated into the narrative of Jesus, from the Jordan to his crucifixion. Jesus is a true historical figure, he lived as Gaius Julius Caesar, and resurrected as Divus Julius, later transformed into Jesus.’
Inspired by Carotta’s publication in order to verify this hypothesis, together with Pedro García González, a Spanish priest, they investigated Roman traces of the passion in the Semana Santa, the Holy Week, and compared it with the reconstruction of the funeral of Caesar, according to the ancient sources, which lead to fragments of an earlier passion about the betrayal, death and ‘crucifixion’ of Caesar.
García González: ‘The death and deification of Caesar is the essence and origin of Christianity, which happened on the Forum Romanum in Rome.’
Scholars speak of a paradigm shift with respect to the history of Christianity:
‘This is a shift of paradigm in the history of religion.’ - Fotis A. Kavoukopoulos, Ph. D. ‘The author draws parallels between the founder of religion Jesus and Julius Caesar, the Roman emperor, whose name was given to all succeeding emperors.’ - Erika Simon, Ph.D.
2
The Passion of Caesar – Discovering the historical Christ ‘This report is of the same order of importance as the scientific discoveries of Darwin and Galileo… Carotta’s discovery will turn the entire history of civilization upside down.’ - Paul Cliteur, Ph.D. ‘I try to explain this theory to my pupils at the gymnasium and give arguments for its plausibility and they react very enthousiastic.’ - Gerard Janssen, MA ‘As a work hypothesis it is very important, especially because it fills a gap, what, from the point of view of the investigation, heuristic, was never made.’ - Francisco Rodríguez Pascual, Ph.D.
For more than four years the documentary maker accompanied the two investigators, the linguist and the priest, on their combined search for traces of the historical Jesus in several locations in Europe, among others Cyprus, Athens, Rome: Saint Peter and the Forum Romanum, London: British Museum, Madrid: Escorial, Utrecht: Geldmuseum, Rascrafría, Segovia en Bercianos de Aliste (Spain), Oberried and Kirchzarten (Southern Germany), Colmar (France), Leeuwarden: Piter Jelles Gymnasium. Van Friesland filmed in churches and monasteries, at scientific congresses and in Holy Masses. He recorded a reconstruction of the historical funeral of Caesar, which resembles the crucifixion story of Jesus, in a Spanish village. Carotta, García González and residents from a Spanish village performed on the basis of texts about Caesar’s death and funeral. After the presentation of the documentary there will be a press conference in which some of the main persons of the film will answer questions: • Francesco Carotta, author of ‘Jesus was Caesar. On the Julian origin of Christianity’. • Pedro García González, Spanish priest. • Mr. Drs. Gerard Janssen, Plutarchus translator and classics scholar at the Piter Jelles Gymnasium in Leeuwarden. The film came about in collaboration with VARA and the Cobo-fonds. Location: Louis Hartlooper Complex Tolsteegbrug 1 3511 ZN Utrecht http://www.louishartloopercomplex.nl Time: 10.30 a.m.
To premiere on November-2-2007
3
Enclosure belonging to the press release on the documentary ‘The Gospel of Caesar’ Carotta’s theory on the origin of Christianity – the life of Caesar has been transformed into the hagiography of Jesus – rests on several pillars. General similarities of the two lives Both Caesar and Jesus start their rising careers in neighbouring states in the north: Gallia and Galilee. Both have to cross a fateful river: the Rubicon and the Jordan. Once across the rivers, they both come across a patron/rival: Pompeius and John the Baptist, and their first followers: Antonius and Curio on the one hand and Peter and Andrew on the other. Both are continually on the move, finally arriving at the capital, Rome and Jerusalem, where they at first triumph, yet subsequently undergo their passion. Both have good relationships with women and have a special relationship with one particular woman, Caesar with Cleopatra and Jesus with Magdalene. Both have encounters at night, Caesar with Nicomedes, Jesus with Nicodemus. Both of them are great orators and of the highest nobility, descendant of Aeneas and son of David, yet nevertheless both are self-made men. Both struggle hard and ultimately triumph, hence each has a ‘triumphal entry’: Caesar on horseback and Jesus on a donkey. Both have an affinity to ordinary people—and both run afoul of the highest authorities: Caesar with the Senate, Jesus with the Sanhedrin. Both are contentious characters, but show praiseworthy clemency as well: the clementia Caesaris and Jesus’ Love-thy-enemy. Both are maligned as the friend of publicans and sinners. Both have a traitor: Brutus and Judas. And an assassin who at first gets away: the other Brutus and Barabbas. And one who washes his hands of it: Lepidus and Pilate. Both are accused of making themselves kings: King of the Romans and King of the Jews. Both are dressed in red royal robes and wear a crown on their heads: a laurel wreath and a crown of thorns. Both get killed: Caesar is stabbed with daggers, Jesus is crucified, but with a stab wound in his side.
4
The Passion of Caesar – Discovering the historical Christ
Both die on the same respective dates of the year: Caesar on the Ides (15th) of March, Jesus on the 15th of Nisan. Both are deified posthumously: as Divus Iulius and as Jesus Christ. Both leave behind priests: Marcus Antonius and Peter. Both have a posthumous heir: Gaius Octavianus adopted by Caesar’s Last Will and Testament and John the disciple whom Jesus adopts while on the cross (‘Woman, behold thy son!’). Resemblances in names The names of people and places in both stories hardly differentiate: Gallia and Galilaea, Corfinium and Cafarnaum, Junius and Judas, Mària and Marìa, Nicomedes of Bithynia and Nicodemus of Bethania, Pontifex Lepidus and Pontius Pilatus, etc. In addition, other names, dissimilar to each other, seemed to be translations: the Caecilii as the blind, the Claudii as the lame, Metellus as mutilated, the man with a withered hand. And those conquered by Caesar are found again, as those healed by Jesus. And those besieged by Caesar are possessed in the Jesus story – whereby it was noticed that ‘besieged’ and ‘possessed’ are both obsessus in Latin. Even the respective figures close to them correspond with each other. For example, Caesar’s precursor and opponent, the great Pompeius, was beheaded and his head presented in a dish, and the very same thing happens to John the Baptist. There are differences to be ascertained. Both were murdered; Caesar, however, was stabbed while Jesus was crucified – but with a stab wound in his side. A Cassius Longinus gave Caesar the deadly stab with a dagger, while Jesus was stabbed with a lance on the cross – but also by a Longinus! (This Longinus became a saint, and his feast day is on March 15 – the same date as the ides of March, on which Caesar was murdered by the homonymous Longinus). Caesar’s corpse was burned unlike Jesus’, but it was shown to the people as a wax figure hanging on a cross-shaped tropaeum. And cremo in Latin means ‘to cremate’, but the similar sounding Greek word kremô means ‘to hang’, ‘to crucify’. Equivalency in titles and symbols All the symbols of Christianity are anticipated in the cult of Divus Iulius, the posthumously deified Caesar: the titles (God, Son of God, the Almighty, the Merciful, the Savior or Redeemer, etc.); the Mother of God; the cross in all its variations; the crucified one; the face on the Pietà; the crown of thorns; the long hair; the beard, the loincloth; the rod; the halo; the star of Bethlehem; the resurrection; the ascension, etc.
To premiere on November-2-2007
5
Analogous sayings Famous citations of Caesar and Jesus are very much alike. Often verbatim: Caesar: ‘Who is not on any side, is on my side.’ Jesus: ‘Who is not against us, he is for us.’ Caesar: ‘I am not King, I am Caesar.’ About Jesus: ‘We have no king but Caesar.’ Caesar: ‘The best death is a sudden death.’ Jesus: ‘What you will do (i. e. lead me to death) do quickly.’ Caesar: ‘Oh, have I saved them, that they may destroy me?’ About Jesus: ‘He saved others, himself he cannot save.’ Sometimes with a small, discreet shift of meaning: Caesar: ‘Alea iacta esto—Cast the die.’ Jesus: ‘Cast out, fisher’ whereby the Greek word (h)aleeis, ‘fisher’, instead of the Latin word alea, ‘die’, is used. Caesar: ‘Veni vidi vici—I came, I saw, I conquered.’ And in the Jesus story the blind man, who has been healed, says: ‘I came, washed and saw,’ whereby enipsa, ‘I washed’, replaces enikisa, ‘I conquered’. Important is also that in both stories these citations appear in the same chronological order. Explanatory power of the theory Contradictions in the Gospels become understandable if they are traced back to the Caesar sources. One example: The Galilean ‘Sea’, which is made up of fresh water and is thus not a ‘sea’, is named correctly however, because it is originally the ‘Gallic Sea’, a part of the Adriatic. Christian traditions not described in the Gospels In Spain (Semana Santa), Greece (Theofany) and other parts of the Christian world, several holy traditions do not find their origin in the Gospels, but are easily explained using the Caesar sources. A number of them are shown in the documentary The Gospel of Caesar. The earliest Christian iconography The images on the oldest Christian sarcophagus, crucifixions and ivory reliefs are much better explained by the Caesar sources than the Jesus story. Some of them are treated in the documentary The Gospel of Caesar.
6
The Passion of Caesar – Discovering the historical Christ
To premiere on November-2-2007
The Gospel of Caesar, a documentary film by Dutch Public Broadcast VARA-TELEVISION and director Jan van Friesland, makes its world premiere at the Louis Hartlooper Complex in Utrecht, Holland, on November 2nd 2007. Following the tracks of two investigators on their quest for the historical Jesus this enthralling documentary about the life, death and apotheosis of ‘the greatest of mortals’ unravels the hidden origin of Christianity. Francesco Carotta, an Italian linguist, philosopher and engineer, discovered that the story of Jesus Christ is based on the life of Caesar. (Carotta, F. (1999) War Jesus Caesar? Munich.)
Carotta: ‘Everything in the story of Jesus can be found in the biography of Caesar. The Gospel appears to be the history of the Roman Civil War, a ‘mis-telling’ of the life of Caesar – from the Rubicon to his assassination – mutated into the narrative of Jesus, from the Jordan to his crucifixion. Jesus is a true historical figure, he lived as Gaius Julius Caesar, and resurrected as Divus Julius, later transformed into Jesus.’
Inspired by Carotta’s publication in order to verify this hypothesis, together with Pedro García González, a Spanish priest, they investigated Roman traces of the passion in the Semana Santa, the Holy Week, and compared it with the reconstruction of the funeral of Caesar, according to the ancient sources, which lead to fragments of an earlier passion about the betrayal, death and ‘crucifixion’ of Caesar.
García González: ‘The death and deification of Caesar is the essence and origin of Christianity, which happened on the Forum Romanum in Rome.’
Scholars speak of a paradigm shift with respect to the history of Christianity:
‘This is a shift of paradigm in the history of religion.’ - Fotis A. Kavoukopoulos, Ph. D. ‘The author draws parallels between the founder of religion Jesus and Julius Caesar, the Roman emperor, whose name was given to all succeeding emperors.’ - Erika Simon, Ph.D.
2
The Passion of Caesar – Discovering the historical Christ ‘This report is of the same order of importance as the scientific discoveries of Darwin and Galileo… Carotta’s discovery will turn the entire history of civilization upside down.’ - Paul Cliteur, Ph.D. ‘I try to explain this theory to my pupils at the gymnasium and give arguments for its plausibility and they react very enthousiastic.’ - Gerard Janssen, MA ‘As a work hypothesis it is very important, especially because it fills a gap, what, from the point of view of the investigation, heuristic, was never made.’ - Francisco Rodríguez Pascual, Ph.D.
For more than four years the documentary maker accompanied the two investigators, the linguist and the priest, on their combined search for traces of the historical Jesus in several locations in Europe, among others Cyprus, Athens, Rome: Saint Peter and the Forum Romanum, London: British Museum, Madrid: Escorial, Utrecht: Geldmuseum, Rascrafría, Segovia en Bercianos de Aliste (Spain), Oberried and Kirchzarten (Southern Germany), Colmar (France), Leeuwarden: Piter Jelles Gymnasium. Van Friesland filmed in churches and monasteries, at scientific congresses and in Holy Masses. He recorded a reconstruction of the historical funeral of Caesar, which resembles the crucifixion story of Jesus, in a Spanish village. Carotta, García González and residents from a Spanish village performed on the basis of texts about Caesar’s death and funeral. After the presentation of the documentary there will be a press conference in which some of the main persons of the film will answer questions: • Francesco Carotta, author of ‘Jesus was Caesar. On the Julian origin of Christianity’. • Pedro García González, Spanish priest. • Mr. Drs. Gerard Janssen, Plutarchus translator and classics scholar at the Piter Jelles Gymnasium in Leeuwarden. The film came about in collaboration with VARA and the Cobo-fonds. Location: Louis Hartlooper Complex Tolsteegbrug 1 3511 ZN Utrecht http://www.louishartloopercomplex.nl Time: 10.30 a.m.
To premiere on November-2-2007
3
Enclosure belonging to the press release on the documentary ‘The Gospel of Caesar’ Carotta’s theory on the origin of Christianity – the life of Caesar has been transformed into the hagiography of Jesus – rests on several pillars. General similarities of the two lives Both Caesar and Jesus start their rising careers in neighbouring states in the north: Gallia and Galilee. Both have to cross a fateful river: the Rubicon and the Jordan. Once across the rivers, they both come across a patron/rival: Pompeius and John the Baptist, and their first followers: Antonius and Curio on the one hand and Peter and Andrew on the other. Both are continually on the move, finally arriving at the capital, Rome and Jerusalem, where they at first triumph, yet subsequently undergo their passion. Both have good relationships with women and have a special relationship with one particular woman, Caesar with Cleopatra and Jesus with Magdalene. Both have encounters at night, Caesar with Nicomedes, Jesus with Nicodemus. Both of them are great orators and of the highest nobility, descendant of Aeneas and son of David, yet nevertheless both are self-made men. Both struggle hard and ultimately triumph, hence each has a ‘triumphal entry’: Caesar on horseback and Jesus on a donkey. Both have an affinity to ordinary people—and both run afoul of the highest authorities: Caesar with the Senate, Jesus with the Sanhedrin. Both are contentious characters, but show praiseworthy clemency as well: the clementia Caesaris and Jesus’ Love-thy-enemy. Both are maligned as the friend of publicans and sinners. Both have a traitor: Brutus and Judas. And an assassin who at first gets away: the other Brutus and Barabbas. And one who washes his hands of it: Lepidus and Pilate. Both are accused of making themselves kings: King of the Romans and King of the Jews. Both are dressed in red royal robes and wear a crown on their heads: a laurel wreath and a crown of thorns. Both get killed: Caesar is stabbed with daggers, Jesus is crucified, but with a stab wound in his side.
4
The Passion of Caesar – Discovering the historical Christ
Both die on the same respective dates of the year: Caesar on the Ides (15th) of March, Jesus on the 15th of Nisan. Both are deified posthumously: as Divus Iulius and as Jesus Christ. Both leave behind priests: Marcus Antonius and Peter. Both have a posthumous heir: Gaius Octavianus adopted by Caesar’s Last Will and Testament and John the disciple whom Jesus adopts while on the cross (‘Woman, behold thy son!’). Resemblances in names The names of people and places in both stories hardly differentiate: Gallia and Galilaea, Corfinium and Cafarnaum, Junius and Judas, Mària and Marìa, Nicomedes of Bithynia and Nicodemus of Bethania, Pontifex Lepidus and Pontius Pilatus, etc. In addition, other names, dissimilar to each other, seemed to be translations: the Caecilii as the blind, the Claudii as the lame, Metellus as mutilated, the man with a withered hand. And those conquered by Caesar are found again, as those healed by Jesus. And those besieged by Caesar are possessed in the Jesus story – whereby it was noticed that ‘besieged’ and ‘possessed’ are both obsessus in Latin. Even the respective figures close to them correspond with each other. For example, Caesar’s precursor and opponent, the great Pompeius, was beheaded and his head presented in a dish, and the very same thing happens to John the Baptist. There are differences to be ascertained. Both were murdered; Caesar, however, was stabbed while Jesus was crucified – but with a stab wound in his side. A Cassius Longinus gave Caesar the deadly stab with a dagger, while Jesus was stabbed with a lance on the cross – but also by a Longinus! (This Longinus became a saint, and his feast day is on March 15 – the same date as the ides of March, on which Caesar was murdered by the homonymous Longinus). Caesar’s corpse was burned unlike Jesus’, but it was shown to the people as a wax figure hanging on a cross-shaped tropaeum. And cremo in Latin means ‘to cremate’, but the similar sounding Greek word kremô means ‘to hang’, ‘to crucify’. Equivalency in titles and symbols All the symbols of Christianity are anticipated in the cult of Divus Iulius, the posthumously deified Caesar: the titles (God, Son of God, the Almighty, the Merciful, the Savior or Redeemer, etc.); the Mother of God; the cross in all its variations; the crucified one; the face on the Pietà; the crown of thorns; the long hair; the beard, the loincloth; the rod; the halo; the star of Bethlehem; the resurrection; the ascension, etc.
To premiere on November-2-2007
5
Analogous sayings Famous citations of Caesar and Jesus are very much alike. Often verbatim: Caesar: ‘Who is not on any side, is on my side.’ Jesus: ‘Who is not against us, he is for us.’ Caesar: ‘I am not King, I am Caesar.’ About Jesus: ‘We have no king but Caesar.’ Caesar: ‘The best death is a sudden death.’ Jesus: ‘What you will do (i. e. lead me to death) do quickly.’ Caesar: ‘Oh, have I saved them, that they may destroy me?’ About Jesus: ‘He saved others, himself he cannot save.’ Sometimes with a small, discreet shift of meaning: Caesar: ‘Alea iacta esto—Cast the die.’ Jesus: ‘Cast out, fisher’ whereby the Greek word (h)aleeis, ‘fisher’, instead of the Latin word alea, ‘die’, is used. Caesar: ‘Veni vidi vici—I came, I saw, I conquered.’ And in the Jesus story the blind man, who has been healed, says: ‘I came, washed and saw,’ whereby enipsa, ‘I washed’, replaces enikisa, ‘I conquered’. Important is also that in both stories these citations appear in the same chronological order. Explanatory power of the theory Contradictions in the Gospels become understandable if they are traced back to the Caesar sources. One example: The Galilean ‘Sea’, which is made up of fresh water and is thus not a ‘sea’, is named correctly however, because it is originally the ‘Gallic Sea’, a part of the Adriatic. Christian traditions not described in the Gospels In Spain (Semana Santa), Greece (Theofany) and other parts of the Christian world, several holy traditions do not find their origin in the Gospels, but are easily explained using the Caesar sources. A number of them are shown in the documentary The Gospel of Caesar. The earliest Christian iconography The images on the oldest Christian sarcophagus, crucifixions and ivory reliefs are much better explained by the Caesar sources than the Jesus story. Some of them are treated in the documentary The Gospel of Caesar.
6
The Passion of Caesar – Discovering the historical Christ
Sponsor Documents
Recommended
No recommend documents