Many commentators have pointed out that when we step back from John's angry rhetoric, we can see that the very practices John denounces are those that Paul had recommended. 00:58:11 - " The Book of Revelation is the strangest book in the Bible. The site includes the Gnostic Society Library with the complete Nag. Part of the The Nag Hammadi Library (Nag Hammadi Scriptures) collection. Those whom John says Jesus "hates" look very much like the Gentile followers of Jesus converted through Paul's teaching. Excerpt from: The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels. For when we ask, who are the "evildoers" against whom John warns? we may be surprised by the answer. Revelations Visions Prophecy And Politics In The Book Of Revelation Elaine H Pagels Rather than enjoying a good ebook bearing in mind a mug of coffee in the afternoon, on the other hand they juggled bearing in mind some harmful virus inside their computer. For when John charges that certain prophets and teachers are encouraging God's people to eat "unclean" food and engage in "unclean" sex, he is taking up arguments that had broken out between Paul and followers of James and Peter about forty years earlier-an argument that John of Patmos continues with a second generation of Paul's followers. Elaine Pagels’ Origin of Satan has surprisingly little to say. And when we see Jesus' earliest followers, including Peter, James, and Paul, not as we usually see them, as early Christians, but as they saw themselves-as Jews who had found God's messiah-we can see that they struggled with the same question. Hermetic Library Fellow T Polyphilus reviews The Origin of Satan: How Christians Demonized Jews, Pagans, and Heretics by Elaine Pagels. “When John accuses "evildoers" of leading gullible people into sin, what troubles him is what troubled the Essenes: whether-or how much-to accommodate pagan culture. A Maimonides Reader: Edited with an Introduction and Notes (N.Y., 1972).