Apparently this is somewhat mainstream, but it wasn’t even on my radar until I saw this video.
I have no idea whether it holds together, but it would answer two big questions:
First, it could help explain Paul’s sudden conversion. People who have mystical experiences are capable of all sorts of unexpected behaviors and beliefs.
Second, it could explain why Paul could find success proselytizing gentiles. I’ve asked before why gentiles–who didn’t already have the religious context that makes apocalypticism make sense– e.g., Daniel–would find a Jewish apocalyptic sect appealing. Well, that is a lot less perplexing if it was wrapped in some form of arcane Jewish mysticism: mysticism would presumably have had a more universal currency than straight up apocalypticism.
As to it holding together, on the one hand, I don’t know about the details of merkahva mysticism or how directly it influence Paul’s theology. The presentation seemed sort of thin at points.
On the other hand, that Paul was some sort of mystic is right there in Paul’s letters, so i feel sort of stupid for not having considered it seriously until now.
That is interesting isn’t it?
Second Temple Judaism was funky as all get out.
Paul clearly had an active mystical life. (And what is this thing he has about angels? Read all the strange comments he makes about angels.)
If Jesus and his original disciples were practiced seers of visions then maybe it casts a different light on the Resurrection experience.
The Merkabah mystics, apocalyptic and gnostic, were scrupulous of the Torah and orthodox in practice which explains why they were never driven from the synagogues. Merkabah mysticism lasted well into the Middle Ages and influenced Kabbalah. I’m told a couple of the Merkabah hymns are still used in Jewish liturgy. It gives us a glimpse of ‘what might have been’ if Christianity had remained a Jewish sect, torah observant, and not split off into a world religion composed of ex-pagans.
…how directly it influenced Paul’s theology…
Yeah, the kicker. Showing a possible influence is only a part of it.
If Jesus and his original disciples were practiced seers of visions then maybe it casts a different light on the Resurrection experience.
It sure would. I hadn’t thought about the possibility that the apostles were also involved in this sort of thing, but, if that is an option (and it appears it is), it would make their claiming to have seen Jesus alive after the crucifixion trivial to explain.
But it is more than a possibility? I do wish we knew whether Secret Mark was authentic.
The Events of October 1 1997
On Wednesday, 1 October 1997 Luke Woodham committed matricide, made his way to Pearl High School and would go on to kill his ex-girlfriend, another young woman, and injure seven others. In the days that followed, six young men would be arrested, including myself, and were charged with participating in a satanic conspiracy with Woodham – part of the wider Satanic Panic of the 1980s-1990s. The charges against me would all eventually be dropped. This FAQ answers some questions not covered in the Esoterica episode on the wider Satanic Panic. Please note that Dr. Sledge will not take questions about the events of Oct 1 1997 via his website, on public venues like podcasts or Youtube.
Why did Woodham give you his ‘manifesto’?
Woodham instructed me to pass the documents to a mutual friend. That friend, who had graduated by that time, would also be arrested and would prove to be the only conviction in the case, aside from Woodham, though for “conspiring to prevent a principal from doing his job.”
Why didn’t you give those documents to law enforcement and, instead, go to the media?
I attempted to turn the documents over to the police while I gave my statement at the station in the ensuing chaos following the shooting. I later came to think that the police would mishandle the case and, rather than make another attempt to turn them over, went to the media. This was, in many ways, a mistake on my part and I regret it.
Did you defend Woodham’s action in the media and disrupt a prayer/memorial service to do so?
No – I never tried to defend or excuse these dreadful crimes. I tried to explain them as a symptom of larger societal problems. I was invited to speak at the memorial service and my message was “if society does not change further such violence would continue to occur,” or something to that effect. These sentiments were taken to be a threat rather than as social criticism. Looking back, that was clearly inappropriate timing and messaging given the trauma and grief that everyone, including myself, was experiencing.
Did you “pin a note” to the school threatening further violence?
No, that perverse note (printed and not hand-written as in some accounts) was posted to a memorial at the school sign on the road leading to the school days after the arrests were made and “The Alliance of the Immortalz (sic)” claimed to be the author. I have no idea who did but they should be ashamed of themselves for such a grotesque prank.
What was the “Kroth” and were you a member of a Satanic Cult?
To this day I have no idea what the “Kroth” was, where this concept emerged, what “kroth” even means. I have never been involved in any ‘cult’ of any kind. To my knowledge, no evidence of this “satanic cult” has ever emerged and it played no role in Woodham’s eventual trial. While Woodham would eventually testify that demonic activity was at work in the crimes, there is no such mention of ‘cults,’ ‘demons,’ ‘the kroth,’ or ‘satanism’ in his initial confession. I am skeptical that the ‘kroth,’ or any other such cult, ever existed.
How long were you held in police custody?
About 60 days, some of that illegally held in an adult jail facility. I was eventually given reasonable bond as charges were being dropped and the ‘satanic cult’ aspect of the case was falling apart due to lack of evidence, for instance, it turned out that several of the members of this ‘cult’ didn’t even know one another.
Why were the charges against you dropped?
The same reason they were dropped against virtually all of those charged – lack of evidence and the presence of exculpatory evidence. In my case, no evidence of my involvement with the crimes, any criminal conspiracy, or any wrong-doing was ever established. Further, law enforcement interviews with Woodham exonerated me from any involvement in the events of 1 October 1997.
Why should I trust your explanation of these events?
You shouldn’t – you should trust verifiable evidence and critical thinking. Much of the information about this case online stems from media accounts from the 90’s which uncritically reported the ‘satanic panic’ narrative as fact. My argument is that due process and rational evaluation of the totality of the evidence of the cases eventually showed the ‘satanic cult’ narrative false, resulting in the cases being ultimately dismissed. Whether or not you accept that should depend on a reasonable counter-argument based on a critical evaluation of the facts of the case.
In 2003 did you “purchase an untraceable machine-gun online”?
Kinda. After watching a documentary about WWII anti-fascist partisans who built firearms in bicycle shops, I thought I would try my hand at the same out of purely technical and historical curiosity. Of course, being in the United States, if I wanted to merely purchase a firearm I could have otherwise easily done so. But, I ordered some WWII-era surplus parts and, using a receiver stencil, created a barely-functioning Sten MK III sub-machine gun. It was stupid and illegal but, because of the judge’s leniency, I only spent a summer in jail for it.
Is there any connection between Esoterica and the events of 1 October 1997
While I had an interest in John Dee’s ‘angelic’ or ‘Enochian’ language and alchemy in high school, I had very little interest in esotericism, otherwise. All the talk of ‘satanism,’ demons,’ and the like around the trial led me to become more interested in just what all this meant. This interest would, in part, eventually lead me to the academic study of esotericism.
Why are you sharing this with us?
While I can’t go through every detail of the case in an FAQ, I’m doing so in an effort to be transparent to my viewers but also to show that medieval conspiracy theories – such as the elaborated theory of ‘witchcraft’ – can have a direct impact on our lives, as the Satanic Panic did on my own. That said, I want my work on Esoterica, for instance, to be about the content and not about my life or beliefs. One day I may be interested in discussing the events around October 1 1997 in a more public way but I hope you’ll respect my privacy in this regard until that time.
In over 35 years of legal practice in a small town in a Southern state, I was the attorney in several cases that were deemed newsworthy. The reporting in every single one of those cases was incorrect and incomplete. Not incorrect or incomplete, but incorrect AND incomplete, in significant and misleading ways. When a legal case, civil or criminal, becomes news, I always go straight to the source documents, whether that be an indictment, a civil complaint, or an actual court decision.
Short of that deeper dive, and I have no interest in digging into Mississippi state court records, the best you can do is read between the lines for skeletal remains. In this case, this is what I see:
The school shooting was a significant trauma for a small town in a very conservative, very religious state, and people wanted a big picture reason why it happened.
A conspiracy, particularly with Satanic overtones, would have fit the need for this big picture reason quite nicely.
If there had actually been evidence of a conspiracy to commit this crime, you can be sure that the prosecutors would not have dropped it. All they needed was enough evidence to get before a jury, which would then have done its job by convicting the alleged co-conspirators. I’m not saying there was no conspiracy, but I can say unequivocally that there was no evidence of it. The fact that the alleged conspirators were minors was irrelevant. Southern states love to charge minors as adults in cases involving very serious crimes.
Under circumstances like this, a dismissal for lack of evidence is extremely unsatisfying to the affected community. It is not an actual resolution of the case.
The judge’s remarks at the gun sentencing are, in my opinion, superfluous. This was probably the same judge who presided over the shooter’s case, and, despite the dismissal of the conspiracy charges, there are very likely continuing suspicions against the alleged conspirators. I suspect the judge sincerely believes Sledge lied, but he can’t prove it.
The relatively light sentence on the gun charge is evidence of the complete lack of evidence on the other charges. I have seen state court judges hammer a defendant on lesser charges when (s)he believes the defendant skated on a much more serious charge, even when the two charges are completely unrelated, as seems to be the case here.
That’s my unresearched take on this. Yours may be different. What actually happened in space and time is as lost to us here as it is with most questions involving the historical Jesus. For now, I agree that the concern should be on the content of Sledge’s video(s).
…whether Sledge’s account on his own website is completely credible and accurate…
Sure but based on Sledge’s comments we could say the same thing about the Prosecutor and the newspaper. If I’m inclined towards Sledge it’s because I grew up in an incestuous little rural Southern fundamentalist town where the citizenry were little better than the peasants in one of those old Frankenstein movies ready to grab their torches and burn someone. The Satanic Panic was real. People were arrested for little more than liking Heavy Metal music and dressing in black. People went to prison for years because of cases based on pseudoscientific “recovered memories” by impressionable children and no evidence whatsoever. That newspaper article is little better than innuendo and guilt by association. Comparing a 22yo to Hannibal Lecter? Really?
Robert, a good point. Even if Sledge were the offspring of Satan that would have no bearing on the truth or falsity of his scholarship. I’m always amused when Creationist apologists attack Darwin’s personal life as if that had anything to do whether natural selection or common ancestry were accurate descriptions of the development of life on earth.
***
Ok if I can get back to the main subject of this thread, one source of controversy in the Merkabah scholarship is whether or not it was an active mystical tradition or if it was mostly biblical-exegetical in nature. Some heavy hitters fall on both sides of this issue. Since the 90s there have been attempts to show this as a false dichotomy and to claim that both aspects would have been present. The apocalypticists seems to have practiced. The gnostics seem to have practiced. I think there is some Rabbinical privileging of biblical exegesis and full-blown mysticism is simply considered vulgar. Especially since in their writings the Merkabah folks did not differentiate between a quest for a vision of the divine and the attainment of magical powers. In Hekhalot Rabbati you will find the quest for a vision of the divine chariot of Yahweh right beside a quest for powers over your enemies. The Merkabah mystics also held onto more ancient more corporeal images of the divine body. You haven’t truly lived until you consider the Shi’ur Qomah which measures the length of God’s body parts – including his Johnson. This agitated some of the Rabbis no end.
Here is an interesting work by the Orthodox bishop Basil Lourie combining the esoteric tradition of the II Temple, Merkabah with the Synoptic Apocalypse.
** you do not have permission to see this link **
A personal mystical experience described in a similar manner to older written sources gives clear indications that we are dealing with a fraud.
Heavy duty and non-esoteric
** you do not have permission to see this link **
Viewed from high-altitude, islands in a chain look isolated, disconnected. But penetrate the depths and you see they’re all produced by the same geological process. From the perspective of their full flowering in later centuries, Rabbinical Judaism, Christianity and Merkabah Mysticism all look disparate and even antithetical. They began to separate themselves out in earnest only after the Jewish Revolts but they all share precursors in the fructuous and spicy stew that was Second temple Judaism.
Merkabah mystics sought the vision of the Throne Chariot (Merkabah) of Yahweh. Their urtext was the vision recorded in chapter one of Ezekiel. They were also influenced by apocalyptic texts like the Book of Enoch. The journey, paradoxically identified in the literature as a Descent to the Chariot, was not for the unprepared. To attain the Vision of the Chariot one underwent intense spiritual preparation involving hymns and liturgies and chants. (There is no evidence of hallucinogenic drug use.) The mystic must successfully traverse the various palaces or mansions (Hekhalot), guarded by awful divine creatures, through possession of esoteric angelic names and cryptic passwords. The sages were expected to record and share the divine secrets and skills learned in their mystic trances.
The Hekhalot literature consists of records of journeys, liturgies to prepare for such journeys, and the wisdom attained by such journeys. If you’ve read any of the Gnostic texts you’ll realize how, what’s the word? obscure some these revelations can be. But they are examples of glorious head-spinning human imagination running riot confronting the divine.
There’s always an element of danger because Merkabah is a mystic tradition that polices its borders. This wasn’t simply private navel gazing. It’s a guided, shared mysticism. There were experiences you expected to have and places you expected to go in your journey. You prepared for them. Just the opposite from today when everyone expects to have their own revelation. (Which of course all turn out to be pretty much the same, right?)
It retains the ancient idea that words could be holy. The world was spoken into existence. To know the name of a thing was to know the essence of a thing, to have power over it. We only access this kind of consciousness today through our arts. For us a metaphor is a part of speech. For them metaphors were aspects of reality. We’re comfortable enough talking about self-induced trance states but the ancients had no concept of the personal unconscious. Visions were realities beyond the senses. Imagination was an entrance to another world. Words were magic.
Thank you, Stephen. It is well worth belonging to the blog if only for access to whatever you and Robert have to say.
“Words were magic.” I think words ARE magic. Have just finished David Copperfield. The quote “There can beno disparity in marriage like unsuitability of mind and purpose.” is exactly what’s needed now for someone thinking of getting married.
BDEhrman
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Robert
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