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I found this statement by the Pope interesting. Some of the essene community believed in predestination. It is no wonder that Jesus would use their calander.

Pope links Jesus to mysterious sect

Pope Benedict XVI this week linked Jesus with the Essene Jews, saying that he used the Passover calendar of the mysterious sect known through the Dead Sea Scrolls.

The Pope said Jesus "celebrated Easter with his disciples probably according to the Qumran calendar, and thus at least the day before" mainstream observances at the time.

Benedict said this hypothesis was "not yet accepted by everyone" but that it was the most "probable" explanation for contradictions between the different Gospels on the life of Christ.

In the Gospel of John, Jesus dies on the cross during Passover, and lambs are sacrificed in the Temple of Jerusalem, while in the other three Gospels his last meal - the Last Supper - with his disciples was a Passover Seder.

In addition, the Pope said Thursday, Jesus celebrated Passover "without a lamb, as did the Essene community", which did not sacrifice animals. "Instead of the lamb he offered himself, he offered his life," Benedict added.

The Dead Sea Scrolls were attributed by historians and biblical scholars to the Essenes, a strict sect that split from the Jerusalem priesthood and settled in Qumran, on the shores of the Dead Sea.

Some say Jesus himself was an Essene.

French Cardinal Albert Vanhoye, former rector of the Pontifical Biblical Institute, said that in Jesus's time "the Essene calendar was more traditional than the newer one of the Jerusalem priesthood" and more in use.

He said, "Even if Jesus was able to feel sympathy for the Essenes, who were very pious, his mentality was very different from theirs because they were very attached to ritual observances, which he wasn't.". - Sapa-AFP

Published on the web by Cape Argus on April 8, 2007.
© Cape Argus 2007. All rights reserved.

[Robert R. Higby]

The idiocy here is that the Pope labels ALL of the predestinarian Jewish nonconformists 'Essenes'. The Essenes were in reality a vary narrow and kooky SECT comprising a very small percentage of the predestinarian nonconformists; Jesus would have had nothing to do with them (they rejected Him!). They survived until the destruction of Jerusalem and faded into irrelevance due to their spiritual bankruptcy after rejecting Christ.

I'm defining Jewish Nonconformist as anyone outside of the Pharisee and Sadduccee free-will cults in 1st century Judaism. All nonconformists rejected the feast of Purim instituted in Esther and were predestinarian. They also had a different Jewish calendar based on a solar and not lunar year (hence the difference in the timing of the Passover, etc.).

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The idiocy here is that the Pope labels ALL of the predestinarian Jewish nonconformists 'Essenes'. The Essenes were in reality a vary narrow and kooky SECT comprising a very small percentage of the predestinarian nonconformists; Jesus would have had nothing to do with them (they rejected Him!). They survived until the destruction of Jerusalem and faded into irrelevance due to their spiritual bankruptcy after rejecting Christ.

I'm defining Jewish Nonconformist as anyone outside of the Pharisee and Sadduccee free-will cults in 1st century Judaism. All nonconformists rejected the feast of Purim instituted in Esther and were predestinarian. They also had a different Jewish calendar based on a solar and not lunar year (hence the difference in the timing of the Passover, etc.).

Thanks for your comments Bob.

I'd like to read about the Jewish Nonconformists who were predestinarian, any ideas where I could garner some info on them?