I couldn't help thinking of Jesus and Christianity here—although the analogy has some ludicrous aspects. I guess this is a universal (anti-)pattern in human aff

I couldn't help thinking of Jesus and Christianity here—although the analogy has some ludicrous aspects. I guess this is a universal (anti-)pattern in human affairs. Christianity became at every point a near-opposite of anything Jesus stood for - later Christianity has meant the 'gospel of success' and wordly prosperity, priests in gold-encrusted palaces, polytheistic worship of Mary and the saints, Greek-derived theology (heaven and eternal life is straight out of Plato), angels etc. H.L. Mencken on the subject: Treatise on Right and Wrong, 1934, p254-5: The mob, having heard Christ, turned against him, and applauded his crucifixion. His theological ideas were too logical and too plausible for it, and his ethical ideas were enormously too austere. What it yearned for was the old comfortable balderdash under a new and gaudy name, and that is precisely what Paul offered it. Notes on Democracy, 1926, p66-7: Christ, we are told, preached no complicated mysteries and demanded no pedantic allegiance. He knew nothing of transubstantiation, or of reserved sacraments, or of the adoration of the saints, or of the vestments controversy. He was even somewhat vague about original sin. Alive today, could He qualify as a bishop? He could not. Even the Salvation Army would put Him on probation, at least until He had mastered the cornet. Even the Christian Scientists would bar Him from their auctionblock, at least until He had got a morning coat and paid cash for a copy of “Science and Health.” What would the Congregatio Sancti Officii say of His theology? What would the Methodist Board of Temperance, Prohibition and Public Morals say of His ethics? What would Monsignor Manning say of His patriotism, or of His economic views, or of His probable opinion of the great spiritual filling-station on Morningside Heights? What these high authorities would say, I venture, would be a plenty.