Like many people I believe much of what is attributed to Jesus in the NT is simply not true, that there are many things attributed to him he never said or did. I have my doubts about many of these as well, but for now have taken the NT whole.
All comments appreciated.
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1. In multiple places encouraged family members to turn on each other.
2. Becomes so upset with his own people he calls “Jews” en masse the children of the devil. This verse is still used today by neo- nazis to justify their anti-Semitism.
3. Approves of and signs off on the OT.
4. Says its OK to handle snakes. This may seem trivial to some but in reality the hills of Southern Appalachia are dotted with the graves of people who actually believed and acted on this verse.
5. Speaks of an unpardonable sin. Many people down thru the ages have agonized imagining they or a loved one had done this.
6. Doesn’t make speaking out about the evils of slavery a priority.
7. Dispenses the very bad advice that one need not wash their hands before eating…a teaching moment about germs lost.
8. Cast demons out letting them land in pigs where the poor creatures, intelligent sentient beings, run off a cliff terrified.
9. Advances and propagates the idea of an eternal hell for a short finite life simply for believing the wrong things.
10. Thought a new kingdom that would destroy and replace the Roman Empire once and for all was imminent, coming in the lifetime of those listening to him.
11. Tells people to give no thought for tomorrow.
12. Never writes anything down that we know. Quite probably, because he couldn’t write.
1. In multiple places encouraged family members to turn on each other.
Get specific and I’ll address your concerns. How, where, when did He encourage family members to turn on each other?
To save time, if you are referring to how our love for Him must exceed our love for all others, that makes sense.
If you refer to how He will send a sword between family members over loyalty to Him, been there, done that. To the most open-minded, liberal, intellectual elites on earth, my parents, when Jesus became real to me as my Savior, God, and best bud, they were betrayed in a terrible, vicious, ultimate attack on all they stood for including their emphasis on their kids making up our own minds regarding religion.
Steve Clark said
Like many people I believe much of what is attributed to Jesus in the NT is simply not true, that there are many things attributed to him he never said or did. I have my doubts about many of these as well, but for now have taken the NT whole.All comments appreciated.
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1. In multiple places encouraged family members to turn on each other.
2. Becomes so upset with his own people he calls “Jews” en masse the children of the devil. This verse is still used today by neo- nazis to justify their anti-Semitism.
3. Approves of and signs off on the OT.
4. Says its OK to handle snakes. This may seem trivial to some but in reality the hills of Southern Appalachia are dotted with the graves of people who actually believed and acted on this verse.
5. Speaks of an unpardonable sin. Many people down thru the ages have agonized imagining they or a loved one had done this.
6. Doesn’t make speaking out about the evils of slavery a priority.
7. Dispenses the very bad advice that one need not wash their hands before eating…a teaching moment about germs lost.
8. Cast demons out letting them land in pigs where the poor creatures, intelligent sentient beings, run off a cliff terrified.
9. Advances and propagates the idea of an eternal hell for a short finite life simply for believing the wrong things.
10. Thought a new kingdom that would destroy and replace the Roman Empire once and for all was imminent, coming in the lifetime of those listening to him.
11. Tells people to give no thought for tomorrow.
12. Never writes anything down that we know. Quite probably, because he couldn’t write.
Quite a lot of this is not the original teaching of Jesus, but a mixed bag of developments in later communities.
He drove the merchants out of the temple. Probably wasn’t a good idea. It got him arrested, and then killed. He was a hothead.
He ignored the Gentiles. He would have had a better chance of promoting his teachings if he had included the Gentiles. As it was, Paul took over and used the Jesus story to create his own version of Christianity. Probably not what God wanted.
How about God? If he had wanted to create a non-Jewish religion, maybe he would have done a better job if he had incarnated a Gentile son in Rome. Maybe one who could write.
OK, how about this? Jesus was a real person, we mostly all agree on that. Did he think of himself as God after all the non-Jesus sayings and happenings are stripped away? Was most of the thinking that Jesus was God merely made up by later followers as it appears? There seem to be some Buddhist thoughts in his teachings. Did he visit India where Buddhism was an established religion by that time? Or was he a charismatic person who lived simply and taught great human truths in a more simple way that the people of the time could relate to? Was he perhaps the last prophet of God? Were people willing to die for the new Jesus religion because of the enticing thought of eternal life? (I’ve got to think of all the charismatic people who have lived since Jesus and convinced people to take their own lives ala Jim Jones) And, is the life of Jesus worth pondering and copying? Does his life add value to our lives even today as the life of Buddha is still pondered and many attempt to follow the life he lived? Could Jesus be the first “saint”? But with all these questions I still think that God is God and there is no other God and neither is there a “co-God” but that we have the concept of God all wrong. We think of God much as cave dwellers thought of the Creator, in mists and superstitions but that’s another discussion.
carole2easton said
OK, how about this? Jesus was a real person, we mostly all agree on that. Did he think of himself as God after all the non-Jesus sayings and happenings are stripped away? Was most of the thinking that Jesus was God merely made up by later followers as it appears? There seem to be some Buddhist thoughts in his teachings. Did he visit India where Buddhism was an established religion by that time? Or was he a charismatic person who lived simply and taught great human truths in a more simple way that the people of the time could relate to? Was he perhaps the last prophet of God? Were people willing to die for the new Jesus religion because of the enticing thought of eternal life? (I’ve got to think of all the charismatic people who have lived since Jesus and convinced people to take their own lives ala Jim Jones) And, is the life of Jesus worth pondering and copying? Does his life add value to our lives even today as the life of Buddha is still pondered and many attempt to follow the life he lived? Could Jesus be the first “saint”? But with all these questions I still think that God is God and there is no other God and neither is there a “co-God” but that we have the concept of God all wrong. We think of God much as cave dwellers thought of the Creator, in mists and superstitions but that’s another discussion.
His self-understanding may have been that of a prophet selected by God, eventually devoping it into a belief that he also had a messianic role of a non-military type in an apocalyptic framework. Once the end-of-the-world elements are removed, his ethical teaching is Jewish. So, his attraction on his disciples probably rests more on his personality than on any brilliant religious thinking. He taught his disciples to love their enemies while simultanously shoveling invectives on his opponents.
prestonp said
We can go to the source for what He said and did very easily. It has been preserved and handed down to us with great care and sacrifice on the part of many. If we think He stood for something in particular but we aren’t sure, we can scour the N.T. to find out.
You cannot use the New Testament to prove the validity of what is said in the New Testament. Not really. It is circular reasoning. What actual scholars do, in order to trace what Jesus actually said, is find the things which seem to be consistent throughout the Gospels and Epistles, those that conform to what we know he taught, and those which don’t conform, etc.
You cannot scour the N.T. taking it literally in order to figure out what Jesus actually said. The NT, like the OT, features propaganda, alterations, edits, redaction, scribal error, etc and cannot be trusted as a historically accurate source just as is.
I’d like a citation for that. Doesn’t matter anyways. He still writes in his books how Jesus didn’t say half of what he did. I could point you to several lectures he has done where he points out several things that Jesus probably never said and such.
Stop pretending that he holds the New Testament to be reliable history. He has actively argued against the Gospels being reliable history in debates against Mike Licona, Craig Evans, and others.
How about you read his books, and stop speaking for him.
1. Do you mean like Mark 3:21, 31ff.
2. Being a Jew himself, and seeing himself as a messenger (prophet, messiah) to his people, it’s not likely that he said these words. That’s not to say he wouldn’t have argued with his fellow Jews. He obviously had some different ideas than some of them.
3. Not the “Old Testament,” since he was Jewish, not Christian! He grew up with the Law so it should be no surprise that he thought in terms of the Law. But he interpreted at least some of it differently than other Jews. (Eg. Mark 10:2-12 and parallels). Whether that can be characterized as “signing off,” not sure that’s the best way of putting it.
4. Mark 16:9-20 is held by pretty much all New Testament critics to be a later addition to the Gospel. It isn’t in the earliest mss.
5. For some reason I doubt Jesus said this. It seems to me to be part of the dialogue, often nasty, that developed later between Christians and Jews, each claiming to represent the one true god on earth, and to be the one true community of god.
6. In a way it might be possible to see his teachings about freedom from Rome as a round about comment on and condemnation of slavery. Maybe he decided to let Paul try his hand at dealing with the issue in the letter to Philemon! 
7. Maybe not such bad advice after all as we learn that the gut microbiome needs a variety of microbes to do its thing! 
8. Feel sorry for the pigs, do you? Me too. But culturally we know how Jews, especially ancient ones, viewed swine!
9. Hard to say. Got a specific verse in mind?
10. It looks like it. He wasn’t the first to think so, and obviously wasn’t the last. Probably more to come too — it’s such a popular way of thinking amongst those who belong to the Abrahamic family of faiths.
11. Follows on point #10.
12. Likely so: a peasant from the Galilee would have little occasion to learn to read and write.
BenZoma said
He appeared to me in a vision and confirmed it. Can’t get better than that!
I know. It is something else. The fact that He is alive and can come to us, that He hears us, And He is God. GOD. That He is God and that we can know Him personally, as our own. That we can be washed clean in His blood, born again, forgiven, redeemed, paid for, joint heirs with Jesus, grafted in, His own kids.
Never had a vision. But, He became real to me, just like He became real to Bart. And He is real to me at this moment and He loves me and He is my buddy. My best buddy, just like He was Bart’s best friend. And He wants to be everyone’s best friend.
Bonus Time
13. Has such a sadistic unnatural view of human sexuality he advises people to start physically mutilating themselves if they lust after someone other than their partner…Or else your goin to hell !!!!! (Matthew 5 29)
Other verses/stories in the bible also greatly contributed to the practice of Self-harm and Self-flagellation (mortification of the flesh) that has always been a part of Christianity, even by some Popes.
There are more 🙂
BDEhrman
FreedomBen
evgendob
Robert
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