THE RAELIAN MOVEMENT: RAEL AND THE BIBLE

The French cult leader, Claude Rael, claims to have received messages from extra-terrestrials called the Elohim, which he says denotes “those who came from the sky”, who purport to have scientifically made the human race. He founded the Raelian Movement which apparently has 40,000 members in 80 countries (page 11 and 197, The Final Message, Tagman Press, London, 1998)

He met an alien we are told.  The alien told Rael to buy a Bible and bring it to him to explain it. No worse interpretation could anybody imagine. One would not expect anything else of anybody who rejects evolution like Raelianism does (page 103).

The messenger gives a totally unjustified interpretation of the first few chapters of Genesis to make them seem to be talking about the Elohim. The serpent who tempts is said to be a small group of rebel Elohim who wanted to train Adam and Eve in science (page 23). Fanciful! There is no hint in the story that it is non-literal. Interpretations like that can make the serpent be anything.

There is no need to understand the burning bush as a rocket behind a bush (page 33) or to attribute the parting of the waters as a repulsion beam (page 34). The text says that the bush was burning but not being consumed unlike Rael’s interpretation. The serpent of brass the snake-bitten Israelites had to look at to survive is interpreted as a syringe (page 38). But then why does the Bible stress looking at it? All that is just speculation. Yet Rael says it is what the Elohim say.

I had to laugh at page 35 which says the Elohim had to come down on Mount Sinai and cause smoke and fire because they were afraid of being attacked by the Israelites! Primitive tribes would have posed no threat to them when they were able to cause the fire and smoke. There is no hint in the story that Israel was willing to attack. The contrary is what is hinted at for if the aliens appearing to Moses were frightened then they could have appeared to him quietly without the people knowing of the meeting. Also when they were able to land on top of the mountain why could they not use a force-field or flee if the people came too close? Had Rael really been in contact with aliens they would have been able to correct his error for they could not risk their work and message being made to look stupid.

There is no evidence that Psalm 8 ever said that man is equal to the Elohim before it was changed to say less than them. Yet Rael says it was. The Bible would not refer to the Elohim as he and one person if it meant a plurality of space-beings. Elohim is plural but it is only a name for God. Even Genesis uses the name to refer to a single being just like Joan Rivers is one person despite the plural name. Elohim denotes one being with a plural of majesty. Supreme majesty of majesty perhaps.

The Elohim bragged that they destroyed all life on earth apart from Noah and some of his friends at the time of the Flood because their scientific progress jeopardised the security of the Elohim. What a laugh! Murderers is what I would call them when they had no need to kill.

It was thoughtful of the Elohim to confess that they lied to the bible prophets (page 47) and even asked mega-dope Abraham to commit filicide to try his devotion. Following their revelations, Raelians understand the apparitions of Mary as visits from an extra-terrestrial and not the real Mary. Anyone who flicks through Mary’s messages with their pleas for more faith in God and in magic can see that if this is true then nothing that comes from the mouths of the Elohim can be called believable when they are such deceivers.

The Elohim say that the miracles of religion were just tricks done by their advanced science. They are evil beings if they exist for they command blind faith for if miracles are deceptive then how do we know that the message given to Rael was not deceptive?

Rael says that Moses and Elijah came out of a spaceship to talk to Jesus during the transfiguration. There is no mention of a spaceship in the gospel.

It takes quite a huge flight of fancy to interpret the parable of the sower in Matthew 13 as referring to the attempts made by the Elohim to create life on other worlds (page 77). Jesus interpreted it differently but here is Rael coming centuries after the people who would have known better had died to tell us that this parable does not mean what the records say. He just plucks out of the Bible whatever suits his argument regardless of the context and has no reason for this but his own peculiar prejudices.

The messenger told Rael that Jesus had to die so that the truth about the Elohim would be known on earth and that the biblical writings would give clues so that we could recognise them as benevolent creators when they come back (page 83). All of this is ridiculous for Jesus is two thousand years dead and nobody in the early Church believed in aliens as a result of his work and only comparatively few Raelians walk the earth. And the clues could back up anything for they are simply not there and just imagined.

I don’t like the references to the Ages of Pisces and Aquarius and to their main characteristics being predicted centuries ago (page 91-94). That is approving of the unscientific and anti-scriptural practice of astrology. The Elohim say they are not infallible and have made mistakes and do not know the future so the fulfilment of the predictions must have been engineered by some other kind of force, the stars.

The errors of the Elohim like the pagan gods were a good excuse for charlatans to say, "I am a messenger.  I am a prophet".  They blamed the source when their material proved wrong.