In any way, it seems that by the time of "John" Christians needed to draw some of that pagan crowd, so they invented a story where Jesus imitates an annual miracle performed by the priests of Dionysus at Sidon and Eleia and other cult centers.
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"
