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Originally Posted by Anij
Hmmm ... what would lead you to believe Jesus would have belonged to the Essenes? - It's highly likely that John that Baptist was an Essene (possibly in the area of Qumran) ... but I'm trying to think of a source text that would imply this of Jesus??
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The Essenes were supposed to be very.. well, unusual. If we notice, John talked about the Pharisees and Sadducees negatively. If Jesus were aligned with either of the other two, then John would have been contradicting himself. Also, the Essenes are the ones who eventually founded monasteries. I'm not sure if monasteries had been set up in Buddhism at that time, but apparently the Essene view of religion was much more mystical, which is why they went to retreats--similar to Buddhism.