Last time we were trying to establish
if ancient Hebrews had tattoos,
and if they did not, then why?
Today, we shall see if there is any
historical evidence that God the Father,
Jesus Christ, Paul of Tarsus, and
early Christians could have had tattoos.
I'm Damian, this is "Religion without baloney".
I warmly invite you to watch
the next episode.
Religion without baloney
Religion without baloney
An obscure character of the
Book of Revelation
made early Christians relatively
seldom use it.
The book became the source of inspiration
for such individuals from the 20th c.
like : Charles Manson, called by the Rolling Stone magazine
"the most dangerous man
who has ever walked on earth";
preacher Jim Jones,
not to be confused with the UFC champion, Jon Jones.
The preacher was the founder of Peoples Temple,
whose members in 1978
committed a mass suicide
on the territory of Guyana;
and finally, David Koresh,
a charismatic leader of Branch Davidians,
whose majority of members died
during a siege by FBI forces
of the farm in Waco,
in Texas,
in 1993.
The Book of Revelation
has arguably the only reference to
Jesus possibly having tattoos.
In chapter 19, verse 16 it is written:
"On his robe and on his thigh he has this name written:
king of kings and lord of lords."
There are, however,
two fundamental problems regarding this verse
Firstly, some conservative biblical scholars think
that the writing
was not on Jesus' thigh
but on his robe,
which was on the thigh. Secondly,
in the Book of Revelation we deal with
an apocalyptic, eschatological Jesus,
after his resurrection.
His body is very much different than
an average mortal.
It has some prerogatives
about which an ordinary mortal
can only dream of. For instance,
Jesus can walk through the closed doors
He can also be unrecognizable
for the people who know him very well.
In other words, a question arises :
did walking-on-water
Jesus
have tattoos?
No, no, no.
What about an eschatological, apocalyptic,
post-resurrection Jesus?
I don't know, it is a betrayal of Poland and Christianity!
Let's move to Paul
In Gal. 6:17
it is written: "From now on, let no one
cause me trouble,
for I bear on my body
the marks of Jesus."
The Greek word used by Paul,
and which is translated as marks
in the NIV version, was
στίγματα (stigmata). We can obviously
link that to modern stigmata, that is wounds
resembling the wounds of Jesus.
There is, however, one huge problem.
The 'stigmata' phenomenon
came into existence only in the 13th c.
The first person who had them
was Francis of Assisi.
For the ancient Greeks
it was an unknown phenomenon.
Even some modern
Orthodox Greeks are
quite reluctant and
and suspicious towards it.
For ancient Greeks
the word στίγματα (stigmata) could mean
what for ancient Hebrews קעקע,
for me 'tattoo', and for my mum
a total idiocy.
Obviously stigmata
could have referred to something else.
Actually stigmata is plural,
singular is stigma.
So stigmata could have been translated as tattoos.
It is, however, still
more than a reference to tattoos.
Stigmata could have denoted
ordinary scars.
We know from elsewhere that Paul was flogged for his faith
then...
is there any evidence he had tattoos?
Was it like that? Have no idea.
Finally, what about God the Father?
To answer the question
if God the Father had tattoos we have to leave
the Scripture behind
and make use of Papirus Rylandsa 103
103
which can be found
at Manchester University
According to deceased religious studies professor,
Marvin Meyer,
this papirus contains a text
claiming that God the Father on his chest
has tattoed seven vowels
AEEIOUO
We don't exactly which ancient group
was responsible for manufacturing the text.
We know only that it most likely come from
Egypt
and was composed somewhere in the 3rd or 4th c.
and had magical purposes.
Beacuse tattoos occasionally go hand in hand
with evil spirit possession
so we better put it aside and
move foreward.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
