Christ's Crucifixion and Death

[rikuoamero]

According to Christianity, the man named Jesus Christ (believed by some Christians to be God incarnate) paid the ransom price for the rebellious sin of Adam and Eve. That with Christ's death, God is now able to forgive humanity.

I'd like to explore this. So let's picture the scene. Humanity exists in large numbers on a planet called Earth. God sends his son (or himself) in the personage of Jesus Christ, to walk and talk among crowds of Jews and Gentiles for a handful of years. Eventually, what he does annoys the orthodox Jewish priests, who arrest him, bring him before Pilate who says the priests can execute him if they want. Jesus is then taken to a hill where he is nailed to a piece of wood.

I'd like to ask Christians what exactly changes regarding God and humanity in the minute before Jesus is nailed to the cross, versus the minute after he is nailed. What changes before he takes his last breath, and after. What exactly has been done? All I can see is a man, innocent according to his supporters, being unjustly executed. In previous threads, I excoriated Christians who said they would not prevent the crucifixion and execution, who said they would be willing to benefit from it. So I'd like to ask - what exactly is happening here, in these key moments, these key seconds of time?
Did humanity change? Learn, grow? Did God?

EDIT: Please answer as though you and I are standing there in the crowd on that hill.

[John Human]

[Replying to post 10 by Divine Insight]

Divine Insight says that Christianity is clearly a false, man-made religion. I think that Divine Insight might be a bit too dogmatic here. For example, from a non-Christian perspective, we could see the man-made doctrinal elements of Christianity (original sin, Virgin Birth, atonement on the cross, etc.) as packaging intelligently designed to preserve the core teaching: Jesus's re-working of the Law in his two basic commandments. Without the protective packaging of the various doctrinal "mysteries," the core message couldn't survive in the hostile religious environment of the Mediterranean world.

[Divine Insight]

[Replying to post 11 by John Human]


As far as I can see it's irrelevant what might have survived the hostile environment of the Mediterranean world.

Christianity, as it is written up in the Gospels, makes all the claims that you might like to reject.

If those claims are false, then so is "Christianity".

If there is some other truth to what might have actually happened, or who Jesus might have been, then so be it. But whatever that truth might have been, that's not what became "Christianity".

Moreover, I think my major points stand regardless.

If the idea is that a God needed to die or have his demigod son die in order to offer humans salvation through grace then this still would have been far too little too late. That offer should have been made to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.

So Christianity based on Jesus needing to die so that humans could be "saved" from damnation is clearly false no matter how we try to twist things.

You can only twist these religious fables so far before they break. They just aren't infinitely flexible.

[rikuoamero]

[Replying to post 8 by John Human]

Um hello, first-hand testimony is and always has been evidence.

Where's the evidence that what you write is true? I don't take "I remember something first hand from 2,000 years ago" as automatically being true.

It's not just a few paragraphs on that website; Ancient Demon's stories go on for about 40 pages or so.

Congratulations, all that proves is that you're a voluminous writer. I can write hundreds of pages if I want, but the sheer amount of pages does not automatically equal truth.

And your following statement would seem to show that your previous question wasn't serious, so I'll step back from that one, at least here and now.

I didn't ask for someone to say to me as though they were really there that day, as if they had memories. I asked for someone to hypothesise as if I were a person in the crowd that day, to explain to me what exactly happens (according to their theology and beliefs) between one moment and the next.
I can hypothesize being in the crowd on November 22nd, 1963 Dallas Texas, but that's a different thing to saying I have actual memories of being there, decades before my own birth.

[1213]

According to Christianity, the man named Jesus Christ (believed by some Christians to be God incarnate) paid the ransom price for the rebellious sin of Adam and Eve. That with Christ's death, God is now able to forgive humanity.
....

I just want to remind that Jesus could forgive sins even before his death.

The scribes and the Pharisees began to reason, saying, "Who is this that speaks blasphemies? Who can forgive sins, but God alone?" But Jesus, perceiving their thoughts, answered them, "Why are you reasoning so in your hearts? Which is easier to say, 'Your sins are forgiven you;' or to say, 'Arise and walk?' But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins" (he said to the paralyzed man), "I tell you, arise, and take up your cot, and go to your house." Immediately he rose up before them, and took up that which he was laying on, and departed to his house, glorifying God.
Luke 5:21-25

That is why I think the common ransom idea seems to be misinterpretation.

[rikuoamero]

[Replying to post 14 by 1213]

Okay now this is the kind of response I was hoping for.

Please outline what exactly you mean by "forgive". It always seems to me that for Christians, "forgive" means something different to how I use it. If someone say, damages my car, I have the option of forgiving them, of not holding them to account.
What is it about Jesus being "able" to forgive that makes it a wondrous thing? I thought all people have this capacity for forgiveness.
So what happened in terms of God and humanity in those crucial moments between Jesus being nailed to the cross and exhaling his last breath?

[brunumb]

[Replying to post 1 by rikuoamero]

What changes before he takes his last breath, and after. What exactly has been done?

That is the question I too have asked many times. To my mind, nothing happened. The whole charade was unnecessary given that Jesus did not actually stay dead. It's like someone giving you a cheque to pay off your mortgage and then immediately afterward cancelling the cheque. It's also rather bizarre to think that God can forgive us our sins, but only after we brutally murder his innocent son. Even then we aren't actually forgiven. We have to believe that the story is actually true for that to happen. Pretzels anyone?

[rikuoamero]

[Replying to post 1 by rikuoamero]

What changes before he takes his last breath, and after. What exactly has been done?

That is the question I too have asked many times. To my mind, nothing happened. The whole charade was unnecessary given that Jesus did not actually stay dead. It's like someone giving you a cheque to pay off your mortgage and then immediately afterward cancelling the cheque. It's also rather bizarre to think that God can forgive us our sins, but only after we brutally murder his innocent son. Even then we aren't actually forgiven. We have to believe that the story is actually true for that to happen. Pretzels anyone?

Exactly. If Christ's death is what was important, why did it have to be a murder, an execution? Why not just hang himself, or live his life and die of old age? What is it about humans nailing their messiah to a piece of wood with the intent to kill him that now means everything is hunky dory with God?

[JehovahsWitness]

What changes before he takes his last breath, and after. What exactly has been done?

Excellent question in view of the season (Jehovah's Witnesses will soon be commemorating Christ's death on 19 April 2019).

QUESTION What changes came as a result of Christ's death.

ANSWER The way immediately became open for God to legitimately eradicate adamic sin and death and offer humans the opportunity to live forever. Jesus by dying faithful as a perfect, sinless human fulfilled a crucial commission, one on which the future of all humanity hung in the balance. He settled the issues raised by Satan in the garden of Eden, namely that a perfect human can remain perfectly faithful to Jehovah Gods souvereignty despite pressure and thus vindicated his Fathers name.

He also provided the means by which all faithful humans could effectively be "repurchased" or "ransomed". Jesus thus became the "second Adam" mankind's adopted father if you like and as of that instant, the instant Jesus breathed his last breath, humanity had a solid hope to return to the "original" garden paradise and enjoy everlasting life as per God's original purpose.


4 min explanationary VIDEO: Why did Jesus die?
[youtube][/youtube]

Those standing at Golgotha witnessing Jesus death did not initially understand the implications of what they had seen, and it would be just over a month later that Jesus disciples would begin to understand the full significance of Jesus death, but when they did, this little band of couageous believers would set the world ablaze with this message, a message that still moves millions today and will move at least 20 million to meet together out of gratitude this April 19th.

JEHOVAH'S WITNESS

To learn more please see my previous posts on this subject
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 731#946731

NOTE All posts I write represent my personal faith based beliefs as one of Jehovah's Witnesses

[dio9]

What changes before he takes his last breath, and after. What exactly has been done?

Excellent question in view of the season (Jehovah's Witnesses will soon be commemorating Christ's death on 19 April 2019).

QUESTION What changes came as a result of Christ's death.

ANSWER The way immediately became open for God to legitimately eradicate adamic sin and death and offer humans the opportunity to live forever. Jesus by dying faithful as a perfect, sinless human fulfilled a crucial commission, one on which the future of all humanity hung in the balance. He settled the issues raised by Satan in the garden of Eden, namely that a perfect human can remain perfectly faithful to Jehovah Gods souvereignty despite pressure and thus vindicated his Fathers name.

He also provided the means by which all faithful humans could effectively be "repurchased" or "ransomed". Jesus thus became the "second Adam" mankind's adopted father if you like and as of that instant, the instant Jesus breathed his last breath, humanity had a solid hope to return to the "original" garden paradise and enjoy everlasting life as per God's original purpose.


4 min explanationary VIDEO: Why did Jesus die?
[youtube][/youtube]

Those standing at Golgotha witnessing Jesus death did not initially understand the implications of what they had seen, and it would be just over a month later that Jesus disciples would begin to understand the full significance of Jesus death, but when they did, this little band of couageous believers would set the world ablaze with this message, a message that still moves millions today and will move at least 20 million to meet together out of gratitude this April 19th.

JEHOVAH'S WITNESS

To learn more please see my previous posts on this subject
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 731#946731

NOTE All posts I write represent my personal faith based beliefs as one of Jehovah's Witnesses

Why do your JW images show a different form of crucifixion that the Catholics?

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 19 by dio9]

Because we don't believe Jesus died on a two beam cross but rather that he was nailed to a one beam upright stake.
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 515#835515

Further Reading
https://www.jw.org/en/publications/maga ... -biblical/

RELATED POSTS

How can we say that Jesus' torturous death was the equavalent of Adam's act of disobedience?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 240#852240

Would Jesus need to "stay dead" for the Ransom to be valid?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 280#875280

Why would animal sacrifice not suffice?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 905#848905