The Jesus Itinerary

[Lion IRC]

I am having a hard time understanding why you need to appeal to a tiny, gnostic sect, miniscule in popularity compared to early Christianity,

It wasn't. If anything, the evidence indicates Christianity was the small, unnoticed sect at that time.

If John the Baptist - a Jew - had told every single one of his followers NOT to follow Jesus, [...]

I never said he did.

Well what is this then?

...During the first few centuries CE, the early Christians were rivals of the followers of John the Baptist, known today as the Mandaens. The Mandeans believe that John the Baptist was the messiah. All four Gospel accounts include passages where JtB puts himself down, declaring that he is merely a forerunner for Jesus. One has to either assume that the Mandaens stubbornly refused to listen to their religious leader even as he, on no uncertain terms, told them he wasn't the messiah...

Surely the Mandaeans were mistaken in their beliefs about John the Baptist precisely because they WERENT hearing his message fully/properly. They didnt need to ''refuse'' to listen to John in order to reach a mistaken conclusion about Jesus. Tons of Jews didnt initially understand what was going on.

Isnt it much more likely that the Mandaeans were a small group of folk who only got part of Johns (pre-Jesus) sermons or who, like many other Old Testament Jews, agreed with “the voice crying in the wilderness” but didn’t think Jesus fit their idea of Messiah and so were left with no one else but John the Baptist to revere as a messenger of God. (The same God worshipped by Jesus’ followers in case you had forgotten.)

No.

Thats it? Gainsaying?
A one word response?
Sheesh!