The Urantia Book Jesus stay in Rome

POSTING that Gonod was carrying the greetings of the princes of India to the Roman governor Tiberio, both Indians and Jesus appeared before him the third day of his arrival in Rome. The ill-fated emperor was exceptionally cheerful that day and talked for a long time with the three. When they had withdrawn from their presence, the emperor, referring to Jesus, commented to the helper standing at his right: "If I had the royal port of that kind and its elegant ways, it would be a true emperor, right? ?

 While in Rome, Ganid had regular hours for study and to visit places of interest in the city. His father had many business to do, and wishing his son to mature and grow with the ability to succeed him in the management of his vast commercial interests, he thought the time had come to present the boy in the world of business. There were many citizens of India in Rome, and often one of Gonod's own employees accompanied him as an interpreter, so that Jesus sometimes had whole days free; This allowed him to get to know this city of two million inhabitants well. He was often found in the forum, the center of political, legal and commercial life. He often went up to the Capitol and there he was considering the slavery of ignorance in which the Romans were sunk, while contemplating the magnificent temple dedicated to Jupiter, Juno and Minerva. He also spent a long time on Palatina hill, seat of the emperor's residence, the temple of Apollo, and the Greek and Latin libraries.

At this time the Roman Empire included all of southern Europe, Asia Minor, Syria, Egypt, and northwest Africa; Among its inhabitants were counted citizens of all the countries of the Eastern hemisphere. His desire to study and mix with this cosmopolitan set of Urantian mortals was the main reason why Jesus had agreed to participate in this trip.

Jesus learned a lot about men during his stay in Rome, but the most valuable of the multiple experiences of his six-month stay in that city was his contact with the religious leaders of the capital of the empire and the influence he exerted on them. Before the end of his first week in Rome, Jesus had already located, and had become aware of the main leaders of cynics, stoics, and mystery cults, in particular those of the Mistra group. Whether or not Jesus knew that the Jews would reject his mission, he foresaw, surely, that his messengers would soon come to Rome to proclaim the kingdom of heaven; And therefore he was dedicated to preparing, in the most surprising way, the path to the best and most secure reception of his message. He selected five among the stoic leaders, eleven among the cynics, and sixteen of the mystery cults and spent much of their free time for almost six months in close association with these religious teachers. This was his method of instruction: he never attacked his errors, nor did he ever mention the defects in the teachings of these leaders. In each case, he selected the truth within what they taught and embellished and illuminated it before their eyes so that in a very short time this expansion of truth moved on its own to the error accompanying it; So these men and women educated by Jesus prepared for the subsequent recognition of additional and similar truths in the teachings of the first Christian missionaries. It was this early acceptance of the doctrines of evangelical preachers that gave so powerful impetus to the rapid growth of Christianity in Rome and from there to the whole empire.

The significance of this remarkable action can be better understood when we tell you the fact that, from this Roman group of thirty-two religious leaders instructed by Jesus, only two did not bear fruit; The other thirty became pivotal individuals in the establishment of Christianity in Rome, and some of them even contributed to the conversion of the main Mistress temple into the first Christian church in that city. We, that contemplate human activities behind the scenes and in the light of nineteen centuries of time, recognize only three factors of fundamental value in the early preparation of the ground for the rapid expansion of Christianity throughout Europe, namely:

1. The election and maintenance of Simon Peter as an apostle.

2. The conversation in Jerusalem with Esteban, whose death led to the conversion of Saul of Tarso.

3. The preliminary preparation of these thirty Romans for the subsequent leadership of the new religion in Rome and throughout the empire.

In all his experiences, neither Esteban nor the thirty elected ones ever realized that they had talked with the person whose name would become the subject of their religious teachings. Jesus' work for these thirty-two was entirely personal. By working with these individuals, the Damascus scribe never met with more than three of them at the same time, rarely with more than two, and most of the time taught them individually. He could carry on this great work of religious teaching, because these men and women were not tied to traditions; They were not victims of established bias in the future development of religions.

Many times in the coming years, Peter, Paul, and the other Christian masters of Rome heard about this damascus script that had preceded them, and who obviously (and, as they thought, inadvertently) had prepared the path for the arrival of New gospel they brought. Although Paul never came to suspect the true identity of this scribe in Damascus, shortly before his death, due to the similarity of certain descriptions of the person, he came to the conclusion that the "Shopper of Antioch" was also the Same «write of Damascus». On one occasion, while preaching in Rome, Simon Peter, hearing a description of Damascus's scribe, suspected that this individual might have been Jesus, but quickly rejected the idea, knowing very well (as he believed) that the Master had never been In Rome