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December 21st, 2006
Santa Cruz, California
Received by FAB
I am here, Jesus.
I come this morning to write about the exact nature of the
charges brought against me at my trial.
It is evident that the religious hierarchy wanted me out of the
way and silenced. They had been looking for ways to trap me, and
most of the time were unsuccessful. But my comments in the Temple,
which precipitated a riot (I did not turn over the tables, but merely
voiced my opinion out loud), were the thing that they felt could
finally ensnare me.
It was not a normal trial of due process of law; it was a
hastily convened meeting, done this way so there would be
no chance of public protest or reversal of the decision.
So, the charge was inciting to riot in the sacred place of
the Temple. Also, there were a few who testified against
me falsely, claiming that I had said blasphemous and
disrespectful things about Judaism.
Now inciting a riot by itself could not have produced the
death penalty, so these other false witnesses were brought
in to do the job. Their comments were distortions of
things I had said.
Under normal circumstances, they could not have had
recourse to these statements, since they corresponded to
opinions that others at the time held. But in the charged
atmosphere, and with the malicious embellishments, these
trumped up charges enabled them to judge me a seditious
traitor to my religion with blasphemous opinions.
Also, they were inimical to my views, which tended to
stretch their own more rigid approach to the Torah.
In those times, the death penalty was indeed meted out to
those who it was felt had acted or spoken against the
sacred things of Judaism. It was then "proven" that my
behavior in the Temple corroborated these false charges.
Since I never claimed to be God, the Orthodox view, that I
claimed to be God, and thus incurred charges of blasphemy,
is not true.
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