Perhaps the most interesting 5 words in this presentation are: "That's not how we think." Jews don't think like Christians-or anyone else, for that matter. Even after turning away from the Christian belief system, the Christian mode of thinking remains with many of us. It takes not months, but sometimes years to reorient our thinking until our reactions and responses come from a Jewish matrix.
Based on what we know of them, it seems very likely that John the Baptist was an Essene. Even Jesus himself may have been, since Christianity started out as essentially a first-century Jewish doomsday cult.
Perhaps the most interesting 5 words in this presentation are: "That's not how we think." Jews don't think like Christians-or anyone else, for that matter. Even after turning away from the Christian belief system, the Christian mode of thinking remains with many of us. It takes not months, but sometimes years to reorient our thinking until our reactions and responses come from a Jewish matrix.
Based on what we know of them, it seems very likely that John the Baptist was an Essene. Even Jesus himself may have been, since Christianity started out as essentially a first-century Jewish doomsday cult.