The King James Conspiracy
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3. The gospels of Thomas, Mary, and Philip referred to in The King James Conspiracy are quite real. They belong to a body of work often called the Gnostic Gospels. Quotations here come from The Nag Hammadi Library in English from Harper & Row in 1977; James Robinson was the general editor.
From The Gospel of Thomas:
These are the secret sayings that the living Jesus spoke and Didymos Judas Thomas recorded. 1. And he said, “Whoever discovers the interpretation of these sayings will not taste death.” 2. Jesus said, “Those who seek should not stop seeking until they find. When they find, they will be disturbed. When they are disturbed, they will marvel, and will reign over all.” 113. His disciples said to him, “When will the kingdom come?” “It will not come by watching for it. It will not be said, ‘Look, here!’ or ‘Look, there!’ Rather, the Father’s kingdom is spread out upon the earth, and people don’t see it.”
From The Gospel of Philip:
Some said, “Mary conceived by the Holy Spirit.” They are in error. They do not know what they are saying. When did a woman ever conceive by a woman? Mary is the virgin whom no power defiled. She is a great anathema to the Hebrews, who are the apostles and the apostolic men. This virgin whom no power defiled [ . . . ] the powers defile themselves. And the Lord would not have said “My Father who is in Heaven” (Mt 16:17), unless he had had another father, but he would have said simply “My father.”
Those who say that the Lord died first and (then) rose up are in error, for he rose up first and (then) died. If one does not first attain the resurrection, he will not die. As God lives, he would [ . . . ].
No one will hide a large valuable object in something large, but many a time one has tossed countless thousands into a thing worth a penny. Compare the soul. It is a precious thing and it came to be in a contemptible body.
From The Gospel of Mary:
[Peter] questioned them about the Savior: “Did he really speak privately with a woman and not openly to us?” The Mary wept and said to Peter, “My brother Peter, what do you think: Do you think that . . . that I am lying about the Savior?” Levi answered and said to Peter, “Peter, you have always been hot-tempered. Now I see you contending against the woman like the adversaries. But if the Savior made her worthy, who are you indeed to reject her. Surely the Savior knows her very well. That is why he loved her more than us.”
From Thunder, Perfect Mind
I am the first and the last/I am the honored one and the scorned one/I am the whore and the holy one/I am the wife and the virgin/I am the mother and the daughter.
The Bye Plot
The Bye Plot was a somewhat addled conspiracy by William Watson, a Catholic priest, to kidnap King James and force him to repeal the anti-Catholic laws in England at the time. The plot was uncovered by English Jesuits, especially Father Henry Garnet, who reported it to the Crown. Garnet’s motives were not entirely altruistic. The plan was doomed to failure and he feared regal reprisal against all Catholics.
Thomas Dekker
Some of the language describing the London streets is taken from Thomas Dekker’s The Seven Deadly Sins of London, 1606, “In every street, cars and coaches make such a thundering as if the world ran upon wheels . . .” and The Dead Term, 1608, “. . . what casting open of cloaks to publish new clothes. . . .” For Dekker quotes the volume Shakespeare’s England was used. It was edited by R. E. Pritchard and published by Sutton Publishers LTD Gloucestershire in 2000.
Shakespeare
Though he is never mentioned by name, Shakespeare is quoted by several characters in The King James Conspiracy. Included are lines from Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, The Winter’s Tale, The Tempest, and Macbeth. A great deal of speculation concerns Shakespeare’s participation in the poetry (Psalms, Song of Solomon) of the King James Bible. A far-fetched bit of numerology is sometimes cited as evidence. Shakespeare is said to have been born on April 23, 1564, and died on April 23, 1616. The sum of 23 and 23 is 46. The King James Bible was first published in 1611, when Shakespeare was 46. The name William Shakespeare can be the anagram: Here was I, like a psalm. And if Psalm 46 in the King James Bible is examined, the 46th word from the beginning is found to be shake, and the 46th word from the end is spear.
For Shakespeare quotes the Riverside Shakespeare was used; published by Houghton Mifflin Company in 1974.
A short bibliography of sources and further reading:
The King James Bible. Plume Books, 1974.
Daemonologie. King James VI of Scotland. Originally printed Edinburgh, 1597. E. P. Dutton & Company, 1966.
The Nag Hammadi Library in English. New York: Harper & Row, 1977. James Robinson, general editor.
Riverside Shakespeare. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1974.
The quote from Aristophanes’ play The Birds was recalled from a 1966 production in which I played the part of Tereus, the hoopoe. Alas, there is no memory of which translation was used for that production. The quote has been checked against several current translations of the play and is relatively accurate.
The Nag Hammadi Library in English (Hardcover) by Coptic Gnostic Library Project (Corporate Author), James McConkey Robinson (Editor), Richard Smith (Editor). Boston: Brill Academic Publishers, 4th revised edition, 1997.
The Timetables of History. Bernard Grun. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1991.
Shakespeare’s England. Edited by R. E. Pritchard. Gloucestershire: Sutton Publishers Ltd, 2000.
Shakespeare. Anthony Burgess. Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, Inc., 1970.
Giordano Bruno’s The Heroic Frenzies. A translation with introduction and notes by Paul Eugene Memmo, Jr. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1964.
This book came out too late for use in research for The King James Conspiracy but is an excellent volume on the life of Giordano Bruno:
Giordano Bruno: Philosopher/Heretic. Ingrid D. Rowland. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008.
Online Sources
The Geneva Bible online at http://www.genevabible.org/Geneva.html
Translators of the King James Bible online at http://www.learn thebible.org/king_james_translators.htm
A timeline of English bible history online at http://www.greatsite.com/timeline-english-bible-history/
Nag Hammadi library online at http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/gosthom.html
Life in Elizabethan England online at http://elizabethan.org/compendium/home.html
Life of King James online at http://www.luminarium.org/sevenlit/james/jamesbio.htm