Sandals

By Eugene Sierras

You have walked in sandals in the footprints of Jesus (Judgement after a hypnotic regression session experienced by the 20th Century Evangelina)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trafford Publishing
• Release date: Feb 19, 2021
• ISBN: 9781698706085

Eugene Sierras

Angelita V. Lopez is a 6th generation Tucsonan (originally ranchers from Avra Valley). She graduated from the U of A (1963) after attending Catholic Schools and Tucson High. She taught elementary and middle school for a total of 39 years in different school districts in the cities of Anaheim and Burbank, California and Tucson. In anticipation of retirement she and her teaching partner, Colleen DiBiase (also a 2nd generation U of A graduate and Tucson educator) opened a retail Catholic store in the historic Sam Hughes neighborhood. It remained open for 15 years and due to health problems had to be sold, much to the sadness of its loyal customers. Eugene Sierras attended local Tucson schools and graduated from the University of Arizona in 1964. He served in the United States Navy and retired as a Commander. He has completed extensive research in plasma physics, mythology and the Electic Universe and has written not only fiction but about the synthesis of plasma physics, mythology and religion.

Book preview

Copyright 2021 Eugene Sierras.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written prior permission of the author.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

Illustration on previous page is Queen of Heaven by AVL 12/15/2001

ISBN: 978-1-6987-0607-8 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6987-0609-2 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-6987-0608-5 (e)

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Trafford rev. 02/19/2021

33164.png www.trafford.com

North America & international

toll-free: 844-688-6899 (USA & Canada)

fax: [phone]

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Introductioni

Prologue

Chapter 1 Journey to Jerusalem

Chapter 2 Capernaum

Chapter 3 Jerusalem

Chapter 4 Gavriel Bar Meshullam

Chapter 5 Dedication

Chapter 6 The Way Lies Open

Chapter 7 The Nazarene

Chapter 8 Quest

Chapter 9 Nazareth

Chapter 10 Rebirth

Chapter 11 The Shekinah

Epilogue

1.jpg

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I AM EXTREMELY GRATEFUL to Colleen DiBiase for the dedication and skill it took to proofread and edit this s tory.

I am also grateful to Angelita Lopez for her recommendations, preliminary proofreading and editing suggestions which have enhanced this work.

INTRODUCTION

You have walked in sandals in the footprints of Jesus - Judgement after a hypnotic regression session experienced by the 20th Century Evangelina

T HE INSPIRATION FOR this story was not a gradual reckoning but a revelation within a brief period: a series of conversations over a matter of a several weeks with a beautiful, intelligent, and spiritual woman. This woman, whom I shall refer to as Evangelina, the name of the main character in the story, would rather not be identified. She is a devout and pious Catholic who also has a passion for learning and is ever exploring the boundaries of human knowledge including religion, science, history, and mysticism. She is well versed in the disciplines of astrology and reincarnation. She deeply respects the beliefs and traditions of all people and would be dismayed to bring doubt or questioning of belief to anyone, including some of her friends, who share her catholic faith. She and I share a common prayer to the Holy Spirit asking enlightenment as well as other graces of health, protection, and salvation, however we describ e it.

Although we have both travelled separate pathways to where we are today, our understanding of the universe in which we live, shares mutual agreement in most areas, if not all. One of those shared beliefs is that there is a force that pervades all of human existence and history and is universal and found in the farthest reaches of the Creator’s work.

We have both read and agree with the belief expressed so eloquently by Jacob Needleman in his Foreword to the book The Gospel of Mary Magdalene by Jacob Needleman¹:

It is clear that in both root and essence the teaching of Jesus is a vision and a way that has been given to mankind from a source far above our known qualities of mind and sensibility.

This story is a work of fiction; historical fiction, based on the author’s religious upbringing and his experience in the study of many thinkers and writers. Whether or not we have experienced previous lives, all humans share a collective memory, a collective subconscious, which has been embedded in the human psyche as archetypes, akin, I believe, to a spiritual DNA. The same force that drives the formation of stars and galaxies in space connects all things and is the force that drives human experience and understanding, as well as shaping and moving the universe. In the last chapter of this story, Chapter Eleven, Athanasius, a former priest of the Temple at Delphi, explains to Evangelina that the age they were living in, in which Jesus was born and, as he said, came to fulfill the Law, not to destroy it, is ending. The Age of Aries was coming to an end and a new Age, that of Pisces, was about to begin. He tells her:

It is my ardent desire that one day we will come to understand more about this universal force and realize that this is perhaps what Jesus was speaking about. Knowledge will give us enlightenment and we will truly be the sons and daughters of the light.

In the scriptures, it is written: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the word was God.²

The beginning is understood as creation in both Hebrew and Christian scriptures. The Creator is the Creator of the universe, whether it is infinite or finite, and of other conscious beings. For men, time is a linear process, a series of events no matter where in the universe it occurs. But for the Creator, time is not linear because the Almighty is omniscient. For those who seek enlightenment, a deeper knowledge can be revealed. Before there were conscious men on the earth, creation existed and those who were able to learn could do so before mankind on earth had evolved to the point in time where it became known to it and could marvel at its splendor. It is possible that before men on earth came to be conscious, that is, introspective, much of what he witnessed in the world around him, often in cataclysmic events, became the archetypes of religion. These archetypes are mostly ancient and are common to most religions in the world. Throughout the years mankind has developed a complex theology and ritual to express them.

I believe that the hope Athanasius spoke about has come to fruition. We now know that it is the electromagnetic force, more properly referred to as the electrostatic force that truly connects all things. It is a force greater than gravity by a factor to the 39th power. It is the force that shapes and moves the universe and has been active long before mankind evolved to the point where it developed language and could seek to understand its manifestations of how it shaped our planet, solar system and concept of creation, original sin, and our most fundamental concepts of religion. It is also the life force measured among other factors as pH and voltage.³

Early Christianity was a Jewish faith and those who were the earlier followers of Jesus were Jews. Like him, they kept the Law. Just like Judaism struggled for centuries to become monotheistic, Christianity struggle in the early years until the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD met under the auspices of Constantine to formulate its canonical belief⁴.

There are many references used in this story. Two, are the Gospel of Mary and the Gospel of John. Although listed by Christian scholars as gnostic gospels, they are not truly gnostic. Although they share a common belief in inner knowledge, or gnosis, they do not share the … elaborate cosmology of the treatises from the Gnostic sects.⁵ It was because Irenaeus was familiar with the elaborate cosmology of gnostic texts, including Jewish texts, that he was adamant in proscribing them. But it was also Bishop Irenaeus who wrote the Doctrine of Recapitulation which supports the idea of a married Jesus. Irenaeus taught that Jesus symbolically entered every critical stage of human existence and sanctified it. This included a person’s family and sexual life.⁶

This story is not a treatise on religion but the expression of an inspiration from many sources, not the least, my muse, Evangelina.

PROLOGUE

SANDALS

Know thyself-inscribed on the Temple of Apollo at Delphi

H ER PARENTS NAMED her Evangelina. Her father, Demetrius, was of noble birth and had served in the Spartan state’s Gerousia under Roman rule after the Roman general Lucius Mummius had conquered the Greeks during the Achaean War . Because Sparta had played no role in this war against Rome, when Rome defeated the Achaean League , it was granted the status of a free city. Some of the institutions of Lycurgus were restored permitting the Spartans relatively free self-rule under Roman law. Evangelina had been born premature and underweight. Although the Gerousia did not have the ultimate authority under Roman law ⁷ that it had enjoyed when Sparta was a kingdom, her parents were concerned that she would never be granted full rights as a woman in the society that prized perfect health and physical fitness. She was at risk of being placed in the wilderness to die. They decided to dedicate her life to the god Apollo as one of his priestesses at the Oracle in Delphi. They were able to hide her in a secluded country home under the care of the midwife who had delivered her in secret. When she was two years of age her father and mother undertook the lengthy journey of sixty-five stadia to the Oracle where they remained for six months. During that period, they gave her to the Pythia, the High Priestess to be hers to rear and to educate. They also provided a generous donation to ensure that their daughter’s needs would be met. They promised an annual stipend to ensure her support and higher education, which they faithfully kept until the child was eighteen years of age. They departed after six months to never again see their daughter who would only know that her parents, because of their great love and affection for her, chose what they considered to be her best way of life; a way of life where she would be esteemed and honored for her dedication to the god enthusiasmos ⁸.

Evangelina flourished under the care and tutelage of Aristonike, the Pythia. She lived in the same domicile as the high priestess and was cared for by her mistress’ servants. From the very first time the Pythia had seen her as an infant she had recognized that this girl child, given to her to rear and induct into the priesthood, would grow to be a beautiful and intelligent woman. Evangelina matured into a woman who personified the attributes of those women who had dedicated their service to the sun god. She grew to be an athletic, slender beauty with dark brown hair and green eyes. She was schooled not only in rhetoric, philosophy and the classic works like the Odyssey and Iliad but also learned language and grammar as well. In a time when such