TO ALL THE CHRISTIANS ,pls read this part2?

Question

Their contact and interchange with Indian religion-Brahminical practices in particular-were manifested in several ways among the Essenes:

1) They practiced strict non-violence.

2) They were absolute vegetarians and would not touch alcohol in any form. Nor would they eat any food cooked by a non-Essene. (Edersheim says: "Its adherents would have perished of hunger rather than join in the meals of the outside world.")

3) They refused to wear anything of animal origin, such as leather or wool, usually making their clothes of linen.

4) They rejected animal sacrifice, insisting that the Torah had not originally ordered animal sacrifice, but that its text had been corrupted-in regard to that and many other practices as well. Their assertion was certainly corroborated by passages in the scriptures such as: "Will I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats?"5 "To what purpose [is] the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? saith the Lord:...I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he goats."6 "For I spake not unto your fathers, nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices."7 The quotations from Isaiah are particularly relevant since he was himself the Master of the Essenes.

It was the Essenes' contention that the "animals" originally offered in sacrifice were symbolic effigies of animals that represented the particular failing or fault from which the offerer wished to be freed. (Appollonius of Tyana taught this same thing in relation to the ancient Greek sacrifices, and urged a return to that form. Long before that, in India dough effigies were offered in "sacrifice."8) In the Essene practice, each person molded the effigies with his own hands, while praying and concentrating deeply on the traits he wished to have corrected, feeling that it was being transferred into the image. The effigies were made of five substances: powdered frankincense, flour, water, olive oil, and salt. When these had dried, they were taken to the tabernacle whose altar was a metal structure with a grating over the top and hot coals within. The effigies were laid upon this grating and burnt by the intense heat. As they burned, through the force of the heat the olive oil and frankincense liquefied and boiled or seeped upward. This fragrant liquid was called "the blood" of the sacrifice. It was this with which Moses consecrated the tabernacle, its equipment, and the priests,9 not animal blood. And it was just such a "lamb" whose "blood" was sprinkled on the doorposts in Egypt.10

For the Passover observance, the Essenes would bake a lamb effigy using the same ingredients-except for the frankincense they would substitute honey and cinnamon. (Or, lacking honey, they would use a kind of raisin syrup.) This was the only paschal lamb acceptable to them-and therefore to Jesus and His Apostles.

Consequently, the Essenes refused to worship in Jerusalem, but maintained their own tabernacle on Mount Carmel. They did not have an actual building on Mount Carmel, but a tent-tabernacle made according to the original directions given to Moses on Mount Sinai. They considered the Jerusalem temple unacceptable because it was a stone structure built according to Greco-Roman style rather than the simple and humble tabernacle form given to Moses-a form that symbolized both the physical and psychic makeup of the human being. Further, the Jerusalem temple was built by Herod who, completely subservient to Rome, disdained Judaism and practiced a kind of Roman agnostic piety. Because of this the temple was ritually unclean in their estimation. They placated the Jerusalem Temple priests by sending them large donations of money. On occasion they gave useful animals to the Temple in Jerusalem, but only with the condition that they would be allowed to live out their natural span of life.

5) They interpreted the Torah and other Hebrew scriptures in an almost exclusively spiritual, symbolic, and metaphysical manner (as did the Alexandrian Jewish philosopher Philo). They also had esoteric writings of their own which they would not allow non-Essenes to see. But even more objectionable to the other Hebrews was their study and acceptance of "alien" scriptures-the holy books of other religions-so much so that an official condemnation was made of this practice. In contrast to all those around them, the Essenes held a universal, eclectic view of religion.

6) Celibacy was prized by them, being often observed even in marriage, and many of them led monastic lives of total renunciation.

7) They considered their male and female members-all of whom were literate-to be spiritual equals, and both sexes were prophets and teachers among them. This, too, was the practice in Hinduism at that time, women also wearing the sacred thread.

8) They denied the doctrine of the physical resurrection of the dead at the end of time, which was held by some Pharisees-who usually believed in reincarnation-and later became a tenet of Mediterranean Christianity.

9) They believed in reincarnation and the law of karma and the ultimate reunion of the soul with God. This is clearly indicated by the Apostles asking Jesus about a blind man: "Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?"11

10) They believed that the sun was a divine manifestation, imparting spiritual powers to both body and mind. They faced the rising and setting sun and recited prayers of worship, refusing, upon rising in the morning, to speak a single word until the conclusion of those prayers. They did not consider the sun was a god, but a symbol of the One God of Light and Life. It was, though, felt that appropriate prayers directed toward the sun would evoke a divine response. (See Jesus' words to the king of Kashmir as recorded in the Bhavishya Maha Purana that are given later on.)

11) They believed in both divination and the powers of prophecy.

12) They believed in the power of occult formulas, or mantras,12 as well as esoteric rituals, and practiced theurgy (spiritual "magic") with them.

Answer 1

I use the Dead Sea Scrolls as my source for what the Essenes teach. You provide no source for your statements here.