People Claiming to be Gods

 Nadene Goldfoot                                                 

Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Right) was one of three white men to be cast in leading roles. The other two were Gerard Butler (Left) and Brendan Thwaites (Centre). (Summit Entertainment)  They're actors playing in the movie, Gods of Egypt.  Source: Summit Entertainment

1. There have been many people who have claimed to be G-d.  Going way back to Egyptian pharaoh days starting with 3150 BCE to 30 BCE  we see that this was the accepted position of every one of their pharaohs.  Egypt has had 170 pharaohs.  The stories of the Ancient Egyptian pharaohs undoubtedly bring us closer to a fascinating civilization  The Ancient Egyptian pharaoh's role was both political and religious. I suppose you didn't argue with your King/G-d. 

                         

Our Jewish period of history starts in the 2nd millennium BCE with Abram who changed his name to Abraham, born in about 1948 BCE. The Torah never did name the pharaoh that Moses, born in 1391 BCE had to deal with.  Moses died and was buried during the Exodus in an unknown grave.  He didn't want anyone to know as he didn't want to be worshipped as a god.  Moses was born and raised in Egypt.  He would later confront the pharaoh of that day when he was 80 to 81 years old and argue for the release of all the Israelite slaves, which he and his Israelite brother, Aaron, won.  

2. Some Japanese emperors claim to be the divine descendants of the goddess Amaterasu. This concept had an unknown beginning but went on until 1945.                                    

3. Some Chinese emperors,  deified as "Sons of Heaven", at least by some Confucianists, since the Qin Dynasty under Qin Shi Huang.  This started in 221 BCE and lasted until 1911.  

                                                 

4. Roman emperors also claimed godship.  This started in 42 BCE and ended in 363 CE.  Following Julius Caesar who in 42 BCE was formally deified as "the Divine Julius", and Caesar Augustus henceforth became Divi filius ("Son of the Divine One"), some (not all) Roman Emperors of the 1st to 4th centuries claimed divinity, including Tiberius 14–37, Caligula 37–41, Claudius 41–54, Hadrian 117–138, Commodus 161–192, Constantine I 306–312, Julian the Apostate 361–363.                        

5. Natchez Rulers: Native Americans living in Natchez, Mississippi, who claimed to be G-d from 700 CE to 1730 CE,  who said  The Natchez were a theocracy ruled by "The Great Sun." This ruler has sometimes been deemed a God-king.                     

6. Majapahit kings:   Javanese rulers from 1293 to 1597 of South East Asia's largest ever kingdom, in Indonesia. After death, they were depicted as Hindu gods (see for instance Raden Wijaya).

                                                

7. Dalai Lamas: started in 1391 and continuing, Considered re-incarnations of Avalokiteśvara in Tibetan Buddhism. Panchen Lamas are incarnations of Amitābha.  Amitābha is the principal buddha in Pure Land Buddhism, a branch of East Asian Buddhism.                                                 

8. Inca emperors:  Lasting only 95 years from 1438 to 1533, The Inca Emperors had a status very similar to that of the Pharaohs of Egypt.

 9. Nepalese kings;  from 1768 to 2008, In Nepal, the kings of the Shah dynasty were considered incarnations of Vishnu.

                                                   

10. Alexander the Great: who lived from 356 to 323 BCE, dying at 33, Some believe he implied he was a demigod by actively using the title "Son of Ammon–Zeus". The title was bestowed upon him by Egyptian priests of the god Ammon at the Oracle of the god at the Siwah oasis in the Libyan Desert. He was so popular, even beloved by the Jewish people.                                                    

11 HITLER:  from 1933 to 1945, In Nazi Germany, Nazi Propaganda and Hitler's cult of personality's promotion of the myth of Hitler as an infallible multi-faceted genius with heroic, almost superhuman qualities approached deification. He was also worshipped as a god by Nazi sympathizers in the United Kingdom, and considered to be an avatar of the Hindu god Vishnu by Savitri Devi.  Savitri was a proponent of a synthesis of Hinduism and Nazism, proclaiming Adolf Hitler to have been an avatar of the Hindu god Vishnu. She depicted Hitler as a sacrifice for humanity that would lead to the end of the worst World Age, the Kali Yuga, which she believed was induced by the Jews, whom she saw as the powers of evil.  Oy, vah ah voy!  How do people get such crazy ideas! To follow someone so evil is so shocking!  

12. Charles Manson: killer, November 12, 1934 – November 19, 2017)  led the Manson Family, a cult based in California, in the late 1960s.  He had his followers convinced that he was G-d, and they did his bidding; killing people. At least to this band, he was their god.   Drugs and alcohol helped his message.  Manson began studying Scientology while incarcerated with the help of fellow inmate Lanier Rayner, and in July 1961, Manson listed his religion as Scientology. To follow someone so evil without thinking is shocking.     

Jesus,   Greek for Joshua, b:? d: 29 BCE, was not listed.  During his lifetime, Jesus himself didn't call himself G-d and didn't consider himself G-d, and ... none of his disciples had any inkling at all that he was God.  The history of Jesus was written years after his death, and each narrator/writer had his own agenda that caused him to write.  You do find Jesus calling himself God in the Gospel of John, or the last Gospel. Jesus says things like, "Before Abraham was, I am." And, "I and the Father are one," and, "If you've seen me, you've seen the Father." These are all statements you find only in the Gospel of John, and that's striking because we have earlier gospels and we have the writings of Paul, and in none of them is there any indication that Jesus said such things.  If he was born and raised as a Jew, he would not have even thought of such a thing.  His mother might have pictured him as the messiah, but that in Jewish terms is a red-blooded human being; not a god.                                             

Scene of the Battle of Corinth (146 BC): last day before the Roman legions looted and burned the Greek city of Corinth. The last day on Corinth, Tony Robert-Fleury, 1870

Notice that the Greeks never went into such thinking.  They had kings, but not emperors.  When Rome took Greece, they too became slaves of Rome.  The Roman era of Greek history began with the Corinthian defeat in the Battle of Corinth in 146 BCE. 

This was near the date when Rome occupied Jerusalem.  In 63 BCE  the Roman general Pompey captured Jerusalem. They OCCUPIED  Jerusalem.  The Romans ruled through a local client king and largely allowed free religious practice in Judaea (notice name change from Judah), now Romanized. At times, the divide between monotheistic and polytheistic religious views caused clashes between Jews and Gentiles.  That's putting it mildly.  

Resource:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_who_have_been_considered_deities

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savitri_Devi

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greece_in_the_Roman_e

https://www.britannica.com/event/Siege-of-Jerusalem-70

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Manson

https://www.npr.org/2014/04/07/300246095/if-jesus-never-called-himself-god-how-did-he-become-one