Solving the Mystery
There are about 18 years unaccounted for in the life of Jesus in the Gospels of the New Testament. The only things that we are told about were a few supposed things about his childhood until he was 12 and then the story recommences at the age of about 30 which are the 3 years of his main ministry.
18 Years Unaccounted for in the Life of Jesus
The information we are given is basically to show that he is the Messiah, the Son of God, and the virgin birth, peppered with quotes from the Old Testament to prove how he is the fulfillment of messianic prophecies. Then, after a time huge gap, there is the important part of his life that recounts his Earthly ministry and teachings.
What is presented to us is what represents only about 3 years of his life, after those 18 “missing years”. According to the story, his life is cut off at about 33 years of age culminating in the crucifixion and resurrection and shortly thereafter he ascends into heaven to return to “his Father and his God”, as the record quotes him to have said.
Salvation from their enemies
Now, remember that the Messiah, according to Messianic prophecies and the Jews themselves, was NOT to be some god-man, but a great king like king David, with a mother AND a biological father, a descendant of King Solomon, with a throne and an army and yet a very righteous man. This is how the Messianic prophecies and the Jews themselves describe the Messiah, and also the kind of man the Jewish people were expecting:
“And hath raised up an horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David;”
As he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets, which have been since the world began:
“That we should be saved from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us…”
“That he would grant unto us, that we being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might serve him without fear” (Luke 1:69-74)
As you can see from the verses, according to messianic prophecy and the expectation of the Jewish people themselves, the “salvation” they were awaiting for from the Messiah was not salvation from sins, but salvation from their enemies.
And the “deliverer” would be a warrior king who would raise up an army against the Romans. When Did He Get His Education? However, as said before, there are about 18 years of his life — between about 12 and 30 years of age that are completely unaccounted for. There is a complete period of silence during this period. These would be the prime years of his life when most young people get their education and preparation for life — especially those who are to be a king.
These would be the prime years of his life when most young people get their education — especially a king!
Now, since he was considered from before his birth that he would be the long promised Messiah, and king of Israel, one would assume that those closest to him who believed this, such as his parents, relatives and leaders of the Jewish sect of his parents, would prepare him for the important life of a king that was to come.
What happened to his education?
One would also assume that he would need an extensive education, including all the duties of a king, studies in scripture and doctrine of Judaism and the Mosaic Law, education about the world and politics of the time, and particularly what prophecies he would be fulfilling and how his actions should affect the world in which he lived and especially the nation he would be ruling.
However, we don’t even get a hint of what kind, if any, of the education he received during these 18 prime years of his life. Remember, Messiah was to be a king, not a divine man incarnated with “God” himself, the creator of the Universe!. Well of course, “God knowing everything, wouldn’t have need of an education.”
Did He Spend Those 18 Years as a Carpenter?
What the majority of the religious world believes is that Jesus, being the son of a carpenter, spent all those long years learning carpentry, the trade of his father, building furniture and houses or whatever carpenters created in those days — for 18 years.
And then at 30 years old, he all the sudden takes on his role as Messiah king of the Jews — just like that! — with no education at all! He has all the knowledge and abilities, plus healing powers he needs for his ministry, never having studied anything at all. Of course… the reason he is able to do this without any preparation is because he is God incarnate, come to Earth in the form of a man. I don’t buy it.
At 30 years old, he all the sudden takes on his role as Messiah king of the Jews — just like that! — with no education at all!
Did He Leave the Country?
Now, there have been many writings claiming where Jesus went during these so-called “lost years” of his life. Some suggest that there is evidence he spend some years of his life in India others talk about Jesus traveling to Egypt, etc. It is not for sure there is concrete historical evidence for this — it may just be lots of conjecture written to sell books — or maybe there is evidence. But this is not the point of the writing of this article.
The Main Point: WHY is There a Huge Gap in the Story?
The main point to be made is the fact there is a large gap in the story of with one of the most famous and important men in the history of the world and one of the most influential books ever written and the question is: Why?
Someone who recognized that Jesus was and would be one of the most important persons in all of history, had to have recorded something about those most important and prime years of Jesus’ life. The question is, “what is the reason such information as this wasn’t included in the Bible?” And if this information originally did exist, which it must have, why was it left out or cut out?
It may be that this information raised too many questions. But due to the vacuum that this hole left in the Gospels, there is little to nothing to work with within the boundaries of the New Testament. Outside the NT there seems to be mostly conjecture.
And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written. Amen. (Jn 21:25)
Many Dubious Things in the Bible
It seems evident that there are many other blank spaces in the little information that we are given in the NT. What’s more as has been pointed out in other articles that the corruption is extensive. Not only is there important information left out, there are many interpolations and forgeries.
WHY was this Part of the Story Left Out?
It may be impossible to ever know what he did or where he went during this time. But all this leads us to the question, why were these parts of the story left out? What were the motives that caused scribes, correctors, churchmen and such, to make such huge modifications to such important and powerful words (The Bible) that were supposed to have been sent to Earth by the Creator of the Universe Himself? How could they dare?
The MOTIVE: to Hide Something!
First of all, I would venture to say that the main motive for this was to hide something. But what would be so telling as to provoke these men to make such a drastic change in the NT? Now, if Jesus had to spend years being prepared for what he had to do and needed an education, it would surely expose the fact that he was NOT God come in the flesh.
The Stuff They Needed to Hide!
Much of the material in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke are dedicated to showing information that gives “proof” to the claim that Jesus was not only the promised Messiah, but also God come to the Earth in the form of a human being.
And of course, any god-man in that day and age had to be born of a virgin woman. Furthermore, the god-man, eventually turns into the second person of a triune godhead by a group of bishops in Rome, such as a god that the Greeks had which they inherited from the Egyptians — but that’s a story for another day.
If Jesus had to spend years being prepared for what he had to do and needed an education, it would surely expose the fact that he was not God come in the flesh.
But to “cover their bases” so-to-speak, many other things in the Gospels and the epistles may have also had to be cleaned up so as not to not create any contradictions with the rest of the Bible. Well, they must have done a pretty decent job of covering their tracts, seeing that billions of people have swallowed their modifications, mixed with much truth — “hook line and sinker”.
But they didn’t do a perfect enough job since they were not able to cover all of their tracks. There are still lots of contradictions, inconsistencies and other irregularities that were created by just by inserting their inventions, the likes of which makes one scratch one’s head wondering: “what happened here?” and “Why is this in here?” and “It seems like something is missing here that should be here.” (– that is for one who studies deep and objective enough.)
Probably the biggest reasons they had to cover up by cutting out years of the historical details of Jesus’ life, was the fact that they tried to make Jesus into a god and Mary a virgin. And then they needed a whole lot of prophecies to “prove” that Jesus was actually God come in the flesh and the second person of the trinity. The virgin Mary story mostly was needed to prop up their god-man story and give their religion exclusivity over other religions.
There was just too much that he must have done that would be too hard to explain — so they just cut it out and told people he was just a simple carpenter all those years, just like his father.
Jesus wasn’t a real king in the political sense
A bigger item yet is the obvious fact, or at least it should be obvious, that the Messiah would be a real Jewish king who would deliver his people from their enemies, according to messianic prophecy. The Israelites were expecting an actual king who would raise up an army and lead them to defeat the Romans.
Consequently, he did not turn out to be an actual literal king and did not deliver the nation from their enemies as was promised in prophecy, but was instead captured and executed for sedition — at least that’s what the sign said on Jesus’ cross: “King of the Jews”. Being a king was considered sedition when Rome ruled over that part of the world — the only legitimate king was Cesar.
The Messiah was supposed to be the Jewish king who would deliver his people from their enemies
The Great Cover-Up: Such a Tangled Web!
This last failure of the would-be messiah became such a serious complication for the future church that made it necessary to modify the narrative even more. To cover up his failure as the expected deliverer, the story had to be created that he actually expected to be crucified and that it was a part of the prophecies being fulfilled and his blood washed away the sins of the world, etc.
Then to cover up for the fact that he most likely survived the the execution and escaped, the story was probably made up that he was raised from the dead and ascended into heaven — when no one actually knows for sure where he did go.
A serious slip-up that was overlooked by the correctors was that he was prophetically supposed to be like Jonah — 3 days and 3 nights in the belly of the great fish. However, Jonah went in alive and was the whole time inside the fish alive! According to the stories, Jesus went into the grave dead and was in the grave dead, only to be raised from the dead and ascend to his god and his Father in Heaven.
“Oh, what a tangled web we weave, when at first we practice to deceive.” (Marmion, Sir Walter Scott 1808)
It seems the more they had to cover up, the more complicated it got. The stories got so big that Christianity was entirely different than what it began as and it was as though it became a completely new religion. And yet people actually believe all this stuff!
The more they had to cover up, the more complicated it got!
So the question is as to where Jesus was and when and what he did during those 18 years, is not as important as to why all the years of those writings disappeared. The Messianic prophecies describes a (literal) mighty king, like King David, who would rise up a great army and free them from their enemies, and cause the Jewish people to live in peace — among other things that he wasn’t able to accomplish.
What if, during those 18 years, believing he was the prophesied Messiah, as he evidently did, he actually tried to fulfill those prophecies and failed? Some people believe he actually tried to defeat the Romans with an army of zealots. That in itself would be enough to make the Romans want to make an example of him and execute him on a cross, as they did to all those who rebelled against the mighty Roman Empire’s authoritarian rule.
If that actually happened, that in itself would be enough for some to invent stories to make it look like he was actually the Messiah but one of the kind that no one was expecting — a savior not from their enemies, but from their “sins”. He wouldn’t be a political king with an army, but the “king of Heaven”.
He wouldn’t have been executed, Roman style, as an example for others not to try the same thing, but he came expecting to die “to take upon himself the sins of the world”. He wouldn’t have escaped death and fled to avoid being executed for real this time, but he actually died and rose from the dead, fulfilling his own prophecy, and ascended to Heaven.
“What happened to Jesus during all those 18 years that are missing in the Gospels?”
To me, it seems pretty obvious. Since he was to be the King of Israel he had to get the education of a king. He had a very wealthy uncle (in real life), who in all likelihood, paid for the best education money could buy in Egypt, India, etc. Since he would be the Messiah, he needed to study of the Hebrew Scriptures. Since he would be a high priest, he needed to be educated in the temple by the best scribes, etc. In his free time… maybe he worked with wood as a hobby.
As an answer to what Jesus did the rest of his life
After he escaped the execution of the Romans: my guess is that Jesus continued doing pretty much mostly what he had always done during those last 3 years in Israel — preached his message of love. He traveled somewhere the Romans were less likely to try to kill him for real; lived with his wife and had children; taught to live righteously and healed people; lived to a ripe old age, died and was buried just as any other normal human being.
After more than 50 years studying the Bible
The only thing I, or anyone for that matter, can do is just guess and having seen that the New Testament is so full of fabricated accounts of Jesus’ life, that I can prove, I think that my guesses are pretty close to the reality of what really happened to those “missing years” of Jesus — or at least why they went missing. After all, there are many other things which Jesus did … even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written.
For sure, one day we’ll be able to ask Jesus for ourselves and we’ll know what the real truth was, and where all that missing information went. Of all the volumes that surely must have been written about Jesus, someone had to have gone way out of their way to make it all unavailable to a deserving world.
And for what reason?
An ancient Greek philosopher:
“It is clear to me that the writings of the Christians are a lie, and that your fables are not well-enough constructed to conceal this monstrous fiction: I have even heard that some of your interpreters, as if they had just come out of a tavern, are onto the inconsistencies and, pen in hand, alter the originals writings, three, four and several more times over in order to be able to deny the contradictions in the face of criticism.” (Celsus * 178 CE)
A Famous English Historian:
“Orthodox theologians were tempted, by the assurance of impunity, to compose fictions, which must be stigmatized with the epithets of fraud and forgery. They ascribed their own polemical works to the most venerable names of Christian antiquity.”(Edward Gibbon **, History of Christianity, p. 598)
* Celsus was a 2nd-century Greek philosopher.
** Edward Gibbon was an English historian, writer, and member of parliament. His most important work, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.
Next: Who Was Jesus Part 1 | Today You Have Become My Son