Was Jesus a great teacher?

[McCulloch]

Christianity's biggest strength is the teachings of Jesus. They're the very foundation of Christianity. Jesus was a great teacher and being a Christian myself, I see no one who has ever topped Him, nor have I found any of His teachings too difficult to defend.

Questions for debate:
Was Jesus a great teacher? Are all of his teachings easy to defend? Is there anything that he could have made clearer? Did he make mistakes? Did he leave out anything important? How could he have improved as a teacher?

[Ooberman]

As Deepity goes, Buddha was a master.

I agree.

And I also agree that just because Buddha as a better teacher doesn't mean that everything he taught was the absolute truth.

I personally feel that most of what Buddha taught (and Jesus incompetently tried to teach) is mostly common sense.

Things like do unto others as you would have them to unto you. That's common sense and doesn't require any Deepity, to understand.

In other words much of what Buddha taught can be understood even as a matter of pure secular common sense.

The same could almost be true of much of what Jesus taught, except that Jesus was constantly trying to use Deepity analogies that often fell flat on their face.

Plus there is also a lot of external rumors concerning the idea that Jesus was supposedly a demigod born of a virgin women and had risen from the grave in a physically battered body like a zombie, etc.

Any teachings that Jesus might have gotten right were totally destroyed by all the Deepity superstitious mumbo jumbo that accompany the rumors about him.

So to best understand what Jesus was trying to teach we're far better off turning to Buddha. That's probably where Jesus got most of his ideas anyway. He clearly didn't get his ideas from the Old Testament or the Old Testament God.

We agree on so much! It's fascinating. At some point, we'll have to have that debate, or maybe a discussion, about where we start to diverge.

[Divine Insight]

We agree on so much! It's fascinating. At some point, we'll have to have that debate, or maybe a discussion, about where we start to diverge.

My guess is that where we most likely will diverge would be on the topic of conscious awareness and precisely what it is that might actually be capable of having a conscious experience.

And that becomes a very deep philosophical or even scientific question that is extremely difficult to get a handle on.

The only "saving grace", is that I won't pass any judgements on you if you take a purely secular view of the topic. I would only ask the same of you, that you don't pass any judgements on me if I see a profound mystery in it.

[99percentatheism]

McCulloch

Christianity's biggest strength is the teachings of Jesus. They're the very foundation of Christianity. Jesus was a great teacher and being a Christian myself, I see no one who has ever topped Him, nor have I found any of His teachings too difficult to defend.

Questions for debate:

Was Jesus a great teacher?

Yes

Are all of his teachings easy to defend?

Probably

Is there anything that he could have made clearer?

Jesus didn't speak english. (You know that right?)

Did he make mistakes?

No

Did he leave out anything important?

He said He did.

How could he have improved as a teacher?

Spoke in English?

[Ooberman]

We agree on so much! It's fascinating. At some point, we'll have to have that debate, or maybe a discussion, about where we start to diverge.

My guess is that where we most likely will diverge would be on the topic of conscious awareness and precisely what it is that might actually be capable of having a conscious experience.

And that becomes a very deep philosophical or even scientific question that is extremely difficult to get a handle on.

The only "saving grace", is that I won't pass any judgements on you if you take a purely secular view of the topic. I would only ask the same of you, that you don't pass any judgements on me if I see a profound mystery in it.

I wouldn't pass judgements. My biggest question is why you have a brain type that is willing to jump into the unknown with some assurance, while I seem to have a brain type that doesn't. If I don't know, I leave it at not knowing.

Consciousness: I don't know of any scientist that makes his or her living studying it who declares they know what it is.

To say it is supernatural vs natural seems a leap. My position is that we know consciousness is affected by natural events, and we know nature exists... seems a very small slide to presume consciousness is a natural phenomenon. But not knowing, sure, I can't say it's not - but I haven't been offered ONE example of the supernatural. So, I simply can't presume it's supernatural. I can't even think of why I'd consider the supernatural when the supernatural has such a horrible track record.

Given this, there only seems to be the natural. Just because we don't know how consciouness works doesn't means it's because of the gods, or the supernatural or something else, or even "natural vs. I don't know".

Nature exists.
Consciousness exists.

Given these two facts, why presume we can't explain consciousness eventually?


Maybe we should break this out.....

[Divine Insight]

Maybe we should break this out.....

Breaking out,...

On the Topic of Consciousness

[Zetesis Apistia]

Do you realize that birds compete with each other for food? They will even kill and each other, although they usually kill a species of bird different from themselves, and this is usually very large birds killing and eating very small birds.


But still, just look at how the birds get their supposed "God Given Food".

If we were to act like the birds, we'd have to go around stealing food from each other. Chasing other people away from food sources that we do find, and being chased away from food sources that others found before we got there, etc.

In other words, if we were to live like the birds we'd be an extremely barbaric species, that simply preys on anything we can eat, and it would basically be every man for himself, just as it is every bird for itself in the bird kingdom.

Birds don't have laws and they appear to be a quite peaceful bunch except for maybe the birds of prey. They are thieves tho. Heck just today I saw a few of them stealing worms and bugs from my yard. Or whatever it was they were stealing. And only a couple made it out alive when the fight over the food was finally over.

So this parable of Jesus is absolutely ignorant and stupid. Even if we take it as a mere parable. Jesus made a huge mistake proclaiming that a Father God "feeds" the birds when his parable is really suggesting that a "dog-eat-dog" world with no laws or civility at all is "God's Way".

I think humans could learn a thing or two from birds on how to live and let live.

Yet this is precisely what his parable suggests.

Jesus was basically rebelling against civilization.

He was nothing more than an uneducated hippy who could not see the value in becoming civilized.

Excuse me while I have a good laugh.

To live like the birds, we'd need to return to being like cavemen in a dog-eat-dog world where it's basically every man for himself.

The birds don't even SHARE. They have no understanding of anything other than to survive and feed their own offspring. No God feeds the birds. It's a really though world the birds live in.

We really should do something to curb all of the bird violence don't you think?

Jesus was simply anti-establishment. And that's really the same as being anti society. Jesus was a rebellious hippy who clearly hated the establishment.

Show me one verse where Jesus taught people to rebel against the establishment.

[10CC]

Birds don't have laws and they appear to be a quite peaceful bunch except for maybe the birds of prey. They are thieves tho. Heck just today I saw a few of them stealing worms and bugs from my yard. Or whatever it was they were stealing. And only a couple made it out alive when the fight over the food was finally over.

Is this like a creationist thing? What the hell are you talking about? How many dead birds do you accumulate in your yard each day and night.
I guess you don't take them worms fishin' with ya'.

[A Troubled Man]

I think humans could learn a thing or two from birds on how to live and let live.

We really should do something to curb all of the bird violence don't you think?

A huge problem in many suburban areas is the increase in crow populations. Many other birds such as songbirds that frequent yards and gardens are being killed or run off by crows. A small murder of crows can easily kill an eagle and they will always attack them and try to kill them. There are now areas in which the folks are lobbying to their municipal governments to allow them to shoot crows on sight because of these issues.

[Zetesis Apistia]

I think humans could learn a thing or two from birds on how to live and let live.

We really should do something to curb all of the bird violence don't you think?

A huge problem in many suburban areas is the increase in crow populations. Many other birds such as songbirds that frequent yards and gardens are being killed or run off by crows. A small murder of crows can easily kill an eagle and they will always attack them and try to kill them. There are now areas in which the folks are lobbying to their municipal governments to allow them to shoot crows on sight because of these issues.

Maybe we should build bird prisons so we can prosecute these rogue creatures. OK I'm joking but it sounded good.

[Fundex]

Questions for debate:
Was Jesus a great teacher? Are all of his teachings easy to defend? Is there anything that he could have made clearer? Did he make mistakes? Did he leave out anything important? How could he have improved as a teacher?

Hard to say. His teachings were reported by several authors who probably all put their own spin on them to some extent. And no doubt much has been mixed up in translations. His reported teachings ranged from the

gentle:

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.

Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

to the harsh (there were quite a few of these):

Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person's enemies will be those of his own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

to the bewildering:

Then the disciples of John came to him, saying, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast but your disciples do not fast?� And Jesus said to them, “Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast. No one puts a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch tears away from the garment, and a worse tear is made. Neither is new wine put into old wineskins. If it is, the skins burst and the wine is spilled and the skins are destroyed. But new wine is put into fresh wineskins, and so both are preserved.

to the confusing:

In the synoptic Gospels, Jesus stresses works, behavior, and following him as the way to eternal life. In the Gospel of John he stresses belief in him as the requirement for eternal life.


So there's no way to tell from reading the Gospels whether he was a good teacher or not. But when you consider that his words and his story have had an enormous impact on world history for lo these 2000 years one would think that he must have been a pretty darn good teacher after all.

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