Essene

The community of Essenes supported and enacted the Christ drama in what is termed the Holy Land.

The Essenes

Essæans

Derived from the root words ‘esse’ (being) and ‘ene’ (source), Essene means ‘Source of Being’ or ‘Holy One’.

A common name for the Essenes at that time was hasha'im, a Hebrew word meaning “silent ones” - The Essenes: Children of the Light

Thousands of years later, in the time of Jesus of Nazareth, these were called "Essenes.”

Mount Carmel Essenes

Qumran Essenes

South of Alexandria within an Essene community on the shore of Lake Mareotis

Damascus (100BCE) (The Essenes - children of the light)

As they drew closer I recognized by their manner and clothing, that they were Nazarite Essenes, most likely from the Mount Carmel monastery.

I took refuge from time to time with the Essenes at Qumran.

Some, like the Qumran Essene community, which is more patriarchal, prefer celibacy.

But, from my limited experience, I will say that our Carmel Essene fellowship, which embraces the alchemical Magdalene practices of Isis and Osiris, encourages marriage and we have a more liberal attitude to sexuality.

As Essenes we knew that our origins were of the stars, and that at the beginning of things we were star people.

The Essenes were an ancient mystical movement originating around 200-300 BCE.

The Essenes, influenced by various spiritual traditions from Alexandria, Egypt, and other regions, emphasized ascension practices and spiritual transformation.

The Aseneans (Essenes) appeared among the scattered Faithists.

The Essenes' teachings were rediscovered in the Dead Sea Scrolls in 1947, revealing their focus on attaining a state of perfect light humans through spiritual practices.

The whole Essene effort was centered upon the coming of a great Teacher, a Teacher of Righteousness.

The only commentaries the early western world had about the existence of the Essenes came from classical writers such as Josephus, Philo, and Pliny the Elder.

Unfortunately, although their comments are interesting, I believe these authors were describing a different Essene settlement at Qumran, not Anna’s community in Mount Carmel.

Although the Essenes had their common characteristics of living as a disciplined spiritual, agricultural community of ascetic, reclusive, pacifist individuals, divorced from the mainstream of social, political, and Judaic religious practice, there were major differences as well as commonalities.

The Mount Carmel Essenes were said to maintain a strict, ritual purity, to share their possessions in common, to work hard and keep no slaves.

It was reputed that some of the Essenes could even foretell the future.

What these early writers failed to realize was that there were several Essene communities and it was the members of a small mystical group at Mount Carmel who were intensely devoted and involved in bringing a Messiah to planet Earth.

Within the pages of this book, you will come to know Anna in her role as headmistress of the Essene spiritual community at Mount Carmel, the secret enclave of the School of the Prophets, which allowed her to share her celestial knowledge with all those entrusted to her tutelage.

An extraordinary woman, able to extend her physical life for over six hundred years, Anna reveals the intimacy of the Essene community and their personal relationships against the backdrop of the Roman occupation of the holy lands.

This panorama explaining what the Essenes had to do for Jesus, Mary Magdalene and a host of other well-known disciples and helpmates of the Christ drama, emphasizes their essential role in assisting Jesus fulfil his part as the Messiah.

We see how Jesus’ resurrection allowed the formation of a church that deified Jesus as a saviour – not as an Essene teacher and healer who taught each person to express their own inner Christ.

It is interesting that until 1928 there was little information describing the Essene teachings for the contemporary public to read.

Many years before I met him, John had joined a sect of Judaism called the Essenes.

Derived from the root words ‘esse’ (being) and ‘ene’ (source), Essene means ‘Source of Being’ or ‘Holy One’.

Every Sabbath and high day, members of the Essene Brotherhood would come to John’s household to pray, read, and discuss matters of spirit.

So began my walk with the Faithful, the Chosen, or the Elect as some called themselves within the Essene Brother–Sisterhood.

I continued in the fellowship of the Essenes throughout the remainder of my long days.

The stories he told about Carmel quickened my spirit, and I felt called to go to the mount where Samuel and Elijah had taught – there to establish myself as a full initiate within the ancient Essene mysteries.

This material contained extensive information about an unusual spiritual group called the Essenes, focusing on their profound dedication to the health and healing practices as epitomized by Jesus.

For 50 years Dr Szekely continued his life work of translating and publishing these actual Essene writings, in 26 different languages, mostly in small inexpensive booklets.

His work brought the Essene beliefs to greater world attention and he was able to cofound an international Essene organization with 20th Century mystic and Nobel Prize winner, Romain Rolland.

Edgar Cayce discussed both Anna and the Essenes among his 14,000 ‘readings’.

He described the Essenes as members of a small spiritual Jewish sect that began a hundred years before Jesus’ birth in the 2nd Century BC and continued some 68 years after the crucifixion of Jesus and the destruction of the Jewish temple.

Cayce’s readings about the Essenes confirmed there was a definite connection between Jesus’ family and friends and the Essene communities.

Cayce reported that these designated Essenes were an outgrowth of the teachings of Melchizedek, as propagated by Elijah, Elisha, and Samuel, and that they consequently offered themselves as channels to receive spiritual information of divine origin.

Above all, the Essenes believed in a divine plan for human evolution and deliberately prepared themselves to be worthy of hosting a Messiah in the world.

He was also of a lineage that he belonged to — something different from the Essenes, although they’re part of it — something more ancient.

From Jesus and the Essenes by Dolores Cannon through past life regression

D : I have heard the Essenes are like a secret organization.

They have the women's terrace." I wondered why women were allotted this honor with the Essenes.

D : Is there any dissension between the Essene teachers and the Jewish teachers in the area?

If there were ever an attempt to wipe an entire group of people off the face of the map, that was what happened with the Essenes.

Essenes were considered communistic in the purist sense of the word.

There was always a core group in the Essene Brotherhood, ever since the Kaloo first established the communities.

Sound, Light and Colour are the technologies we use as Druid–Essene Magdalenes.

So the Druids had some links with the Essenes?

The priests among the Druids knew much, and they recognized the Essenes as another branch of a wider family.

Joanna: So both the Essenes and the Druids were taught by the Kaloo?

Knowledge then flowed from Watchers → Kaloo → Essenes (and others).

Brother Geoffrey is a descendant of Anna and an initiate of the Druid–Essenes, who lives in the growing Celtic-Christian monastery in Glastonbury.

Myriam’s children, Johannes and Miriam, are establishing a new Celtic–Essene community in Fortingall.

During that time we also visited and participated in the healing work being done at various Essene–Therapeutae hospitals, hospices and monasteries scattered through these regions.

Essenes and Therapeutae were ancient Jewish (or Jewish-influenced) ascetic sects active roughly from the 2nd century BCE to the 1st century CE.

They are known primarily through ancient writers: Philo of Alexandria, Josephus, and Pliny the Elder for the Essenes, and almost exclusively Philo for the Therapeutae.

Essenes exemplify the active philosophical/religious life (practical, communal, in Judea/Palestine, often linked to Qumran).

Many scholars view the Therapeutae as a contemplative or Egyptian branch of the broader Essene movement, though their exact relationship and even their strict Jewish identity remain debated.

Joanna: What about the Jews who are not Essenes.

Daniel: We have a little in common with them, yes, but we feel like Essenes first and Jews second.

We see them as sons of darkness, whereas the Essenes are Sons of Light.

I am thankful for our Essene practices of cleanliness and eating only vegetables, fruits, nuts and grains.

The heart holds the essence of things, and as Essenes we are concerned with the essence rather than the outer husk.

The Essenes teaching come from:

All Essenes shared a great reverence for angels, and especially for the Elohim, very high angelic beings who stand above the level of archangel.

Whereas the passing of the cup was strictly a rite of the Essenes, other religions did use the incense, even the Romans.

And of course we interpreted the whole of the Essene Way as a Tree of Wisdom.

ANNA: Yes, on a basic level, we are exploring some regenerative practices – those that are a routine part of the Essene way of life.

Over the course of our history these four major strands came together to create the Essene Way: Egyptian, Zoroastrian, and Pythagorean ideas, and the Jewish Law.

Some Essenes preferred one strand to another - for example, many of the priests clung to the Torah.

And for most of this time there was no general consensus which the majority of Essenes would accept.

One of the theories about the origin of the Essenes is that they descended from the Zealots who were led by this man.

Do you know anything about an Essene group in Alexandria?

BASING themselves on the Sayings preserved in the canonical Gospels and on the description of the communities given in the Acts, many have supposed that Jesus was a member of or intimately acquainted with the doctrines and discipline of the Essene communities.

Who then were these Essenes or Healers?

For centuries before the Christian era Essene communities had dwelt on the shores of the Dead Sea.

These Essenes or Essæans, in the days of Philo and Josephus, were imbued with the utmost reverence for Moses and the Law.

The Essenes, therefore, were evidently in contact with Chaldæan "kabalism" and the Zoroastrian tradition of the discipline of purity; logic and metaphysics, however, were eschewed as injurious to a devotional life.

In this brief sketch it is of course impossible to point out the striking similarities between the discipline of the Essenes and that of the Therapeutæ of Egypt and of the Orphic and Pythagorean schools.

But before leaving this most interesting theme, it will be necessary to point to the identity between many of the Essene regulations and the Gospel teachings and traditions.

Not only did the Essenes despise riches, but they lived a life of self-imposed poverty.

Love of the brotherhood and of one's neighbour was the soul of Essene life, and the basis of all action; and this characteristic of their discipline called forth universal admiration.

Finally, the end of the Essenes was to be meek and lowly in spirit, to mortify all sinful lusts, to be pure in heart, to hate evil but reclaim the evildoer, and to be merciful to all men.

Philo distinguishes the Essenes from the Therapeuts by saying that the former were devoted to the "practical" life, while the latter proceeded to the higher stage of the "contemplative" life, and devoted themselves to still higher problems of religion and philosophy, and it is in this direction that we must look for the best in Gnosticism.

Solomon, head of the Essene order