What is the logic behind Jesus' crucifixion?

[Justin108]

This is arguably the core of the Christian faith that Jesus died for our sins and made it possible for us to live for eternity in heaven... but why did Jesus have to die in order for us to have our sins forgiven?

God makes the rules. There is no "God HAD to sacrifice Jesus" because God can do anything.

Christians often say that God cannot let sin go unpunished as it would be unjust; but is it any more just to sacrifice an innocent man on behalf of a guilty man? If a man rapes a little girl and the man's brother offers to go to prison on his behalf, would this be justice?

If god is satisfied by punishment without guilt (Jesus), why is he not satisfied with guilt without punishment?

[Danmark]

Getting back to the question asked in the title of this topic, "What is the logic behind Jesus' crucifixion?," it appears to be that God requires a sacrifice to be perfect in order to expiate guilt. However, I do not see the logic behind the sacrifice of a single perfect 'lamb' forgiving the sins of everyone, including those yet to be born and sins yet to be committed. Perhaps that is why Paul had to write so much about it. When one's argument is deficient in both facts and logic, there's a tendency to pile up sheer numbers of words to compensate.

[squint]

Critique wise, allow me this observation.

Whether the cross/ the crucifixion is "believed" or not, the christian dictate, generally proposed, is that it was a ONE WAY PROPOSAL, not subject to being valid by observations of the observers (i.e. their "freewill" acceptance of the matters), but of of the matter itself transpiring.

In other words, the actions of the cross, the crucifixion is a setpoint, that God took upon Himself the sins of the world and is "not counting" sins against mankind regardless of acceptance of that event.

That is why I might say it is a ONE WAY expression, not subject to the whims of the observers i.e. their freewill acknowledgements of any of it.

That is one understanding, yes. I've been more than willing to analyze such an understanding in regards to its inner coherency, i.e., presuming all of those foundational claims are true, is it logically consistent? That is what I see as the intent inherent in the topic of this thread.

That is one understanding, yes?

I directed to the freewill position of crucifixion logic, as said 'logic' of cross/crucifixion ->being essentially non-existing and ineffective other than to condemn to eternal separation.

[Which may not be all that logical to some, and may even seem INVERSE in intentions of taking away SIN.

You make it personal when you assume it of me personally before I even have a chance to show otherwise. And such an approach is ripe for strawmen discussions and emotional entrenchments of one's already held beliefs. I have no respect for such an approach, whether you end up being right or not in those assumptions.

Requesting positions is nothing personal, even though it's hard to get answers, apparently.

You have a funny way of not denigrating someone, then, by saying my posts are an 'utterly transparent charade', 'a suckering in dance', 'spiritual bullying tactics' and the like. I've seen people of your persuasion (and other persuasions) act manipulatively and all kinds of ways, but I'm not going to hold their actions against you.

Uh, no, I'm asking you to put your REAL position on the table. Got one?

First off, I didn't have to reveal my hand

I knew that before I made the first post to you.

because they were more than able to see the consequences for themselves.

So, the unbelieving freewillers already know in advance and therefore you don't actually have to say it, because "it goes without saying."

Is THIS what you're saying? "My position isn't stated, but it goes without saying?"

Not much, if any, time was spent in me convincing someone of what the consequences of free will, if true, would be in regards to hell. Secondly, I didn't hide anything.

So now we only supposing that "IF freewill" is a true position as well?

All I saw from you prior was a one liner consequence, that non freewill affirmation of crucifixion CAN result in an eternal extension of an existing situation of separation from God.

If a person is playing truth or consequences, they should maybe engage in a more solid manner?

IF freewill is true then eternal separation as an extension of an existing condition of separation can happen, seems to be your stance.

But you will pardon me for observing the "if's" and the "can's" and ask for a YES freewill is TRUE, for unbelief of freewill separation WILL be extended eternally,

I hope you can see these are legitimate questions.

I talked with non-Christians early on in this very thread about hell and what my view would mean for it and people and how that was or was not coherent with a supposedly loving God. No "suckering in dance," no sectarian game, no assumptions about how "they" have never even considered such thoughts, no proposition akin to rolling the dice. Have you been with this thread from the beginning and followed all of my posts and the responses to those posts, because it doesn't seem like it with this kind of comment.

I'm just asking you to clarify.

Saying IF freewill is true is also saying IF freewill is not true.

We are just supposing IF freewill is true, but it may not be true, and only supposing eternal extension of existing separation from God can happen, but it may not.

None of that really says much of anything, really.

[Bust Nak]

I agree it is separate, but they can be connected. And, yes, I think the conscious decision to not divulge one's love for another because of the perceived damage it would do to the relationship is actively doing something.

Ok. I don't think there is anything else to say about this part of the discussion.

You can choose to eat something you dislike the taste of for some supposed greater benefit (say, health) which can, in turn, actually cause you to like the taste of it better (but that is beside the point).

I can choose that, but I won't. I'd rather run off the excess fat on a treadmill and take bitter gourd extracts pills than choose bitter gourd over ice-cream. I picked this example because I really do hate bitter gourd that much. I suppose if the choice was one spoon of ice-cream vs a month's supply of bitter gourd and I am stranded with no food or water weeks away from civilization then I would choose the gourds; but then again, it's a not an uncoerced choice anymore but one of bitter gourd or death.

If you really cannot envisage someone refusing bitter gourd when ice-cream is on offer every time without fail, we can use more extreme examples. Surely you can imagine someone who would rather die than kill another person - someone who refrain from killing another person every time without fail even under extreme coercion?

I would say this qualifies as free will and that the result is definitely not fixed. It is just a matter of what good you are choosing to pursue: taste or health (or whatever else).

Ok, if picking ice-cream (or sparing someone's life) every time without fail doesn't count as fixed, then I can make this simple amendment to my suggestion: Is there anything incoherent with the concept of create beings with freewill, the ability to choose good or evil, one who would choose good without fail, without the result being fixed?

The Genesis story that Christian doctrine is based on does not present sin as unavoidable. Humans could have always made the right choice without fail every time. So, we have 2 scenarios here: (a) God makes humans with free will and they make the right choice every time or (b) God makes humans with free will and they make some wrong choices. For God to make sure that scenario (a) happens is to determine the outcome and the only way to do that would be to determine every individual choice to be the right choice by whatever method you want. For God to truly allow for free will, in the sense we are talking about, is to allow humans the freedom to realize scenario (a) or (b).

It seems you are answering yes to the question above: You are saying created beings who have freewill and make the right choice every time is incoherent? You are saying some wrong choices necessarily follow from true freewill?

Then the obvious follow up questions are: the freewill I experience when I choose ice-cream over bitter gourd every time is not true freewill? Does it imply Jesus have no freewill, he made the right choice every time after all?

If by 'according to their nature' means they cannot do otherwise then I don't see how it is coherent.

I mean they can do otherwise but choose to never do. Feel free to substitute the bitter gourd scenario with killing people if picking ice-cream every time without fail is unbelievable.

First off, the Genesis story does not say this was the first moral decision they came upon, nor does it say they came upon other ones prior to this one. It's not attempting to answer that question at all.

Granted.

Your definition (which I agree with) seems to me to be a descriptive definition, not a prescriptive one. I think the Bible presents God as creating humans morally open (for lack of a better phrase) with the ability to be morally perfect or imperfect. God creating humans morally perfect or morally imperfect would be a prescriptive understanding of the term rather than a descriptive one, it seems to me.

So God didn't prescribe them to act one way or another, but if you agree with the descriptive definition, then you don't you have to accept that "God created morally imperfect beings" is an accurate description of Genesis? And if you do accept that, you are still stuck with the variation of the problem I mentioned before. God have the power to make perfection, but chooses to create imperfection instead, imperfection that lead directly or indirectly to suffering. Therefore God is less than perfectly good in creating unnecessarily suffering.

[FarWanderer]

The original wording was to make a decision (i.e. the intended implication was "What is making a decision to an entity under complete control of an external force?"). Is the entity described above making any decisions?

Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to clarify my intention, then. So, how was my original thought trivial or nonsensical? I was saying that to have a free will is to be able to make a decision, while lacking a free will means to have decisions made for you.

That's good if that's what you are saying now, but it is not true that you were saying it originally:

By free will I basically mean that no outside force is forcing one to make a specific decision.

We are? I'm not even talking about taking away freedom in the first place. You accept that being "limited" to not liking to eat rocks is not a deprivation of freedom, yet being "limited" to not liking to do evil is. You offer no explanation for this distinction, but rather just declare it into place.

Of the freedom I'm talking about, yes. We could still be free to eat rocks while being limited in our moral choices. I'm not sure I'm understanding exactly what your critique is.

Sorry I mixed up your terminology- what you meant by "limit". Allow me a re-response:

It is an issue of can vs. will. An entity that can never make a choice has no free will. An entity that never makes certain choices but could have is exercising free will. If God made it so humans can never eat rocks, then that is a limit on our free will, just like we can't fly without outside help. Not all limits are necessarily bad, even if it would be fun to take wing and fly. If God made it so humans can eat rocks (which is the actual case, right?) and we choose never to eat rocks, God isn't limiting our free will; we are exercising it. It may be unpleasant, dangerous and meaningless which factors into our exercise of our will to not eat them, but we could push through those deterrents.

Still agree with this part.

But we are also talking about a much wider limitation when we are talking about taking away our freedom to choose to do good/evil.

A wider "limitation" than what? What are you comparing it to?

Previously, I assumed you were comparing it to eating rocks. If you are comparing it to flying or whatever, then you are completely failing to address the issue. Because I was never talking about a limited activity (flying) in the first place, but an unlimited one (eating rocks).

I think this limit is necessarily bad because it makes our will meaningless in the moral sense. No matter what we will, certain things will result. It doesn't matter if I want to hurt someone or not. And it doesn't really matter that I want to love that person, because whatever I want the same result will follow. It makes feelings and acts of love, in my opinion empty. I don't want my wife to be forced into a relationship with me and forced into doing something nice to me. I may really enjoy the robot that serves me, but I don't love it like I love my wife or my kids. That is like what Christianity claims God wants with us.

And none of this is relevant, precisely because of the can/will distinction. You're just saying "can't do evil" = bad. Cool. Fine. Not the point. The point is that "won't do evil" is not necessarily "can't do evil" just like we agree that "won't eat rocks" doesn't necessarily mean "can't eat rocks".

I am reminded of a certain anime I watched a few years ago called "From the New World". It took place in the distant future where humans had developed powerful reality-altering telepathic abilities. Children had these powers too, and many could be powerful enough to kill everyone around them. So in order to keep humans from being violent with each other, humans had been genetically engineered to produce a devastating physical feedback if they knowingly hurt or killed a member of their own species. Hurting someone usually made you debilitatingly sick, and killing them would probably kill you yourself.

Did the geneticists in this story violate the free will of these future people by making them this way?

[OnceConvinced]

While things like vertigo, sicknesses, physical deformaties are limitations and we all have different limitations yet still can have free will within our limitations.

Exactly! Freewill still exists. So it would be there when it came to doing evil. If we could not say rape someone due to fear or pain or guilt, we would then still have the freewill to do something else instead. It's just that we would be physically unable ... well not exactly unable... it would just be physically extremely difficult to perform that act. Most of us rational non-mentally ill people just wouldn't do it due to the difficulty. We would be someone who was physically unable to rape.

Likewise we could be physically unable to lie or lust or steal. Imagine what a great world we would live in if people were physically unable to steal! Physically unable to murder! Physically unable to rape! We can't fly. We can't leap tall buildings in a single bound. So lets impose those physical limitations to murder, rape, sadism, etc etc. Surely that's what a sensible loving and merciful god would do?

I just think you are wrong there that they have never have had fear, guilt, remorse, pain. I've read a bit into arguments for that and have been unconvinced. You've (I think it was you) offered a book in that regard for me to check out in the future.

It may be that they have been there, just not particularly strongly. That book teaches that there are varying degrees of strength of personality. It's not about putting someone into a rigidly defined box. It's about certain percentages of boxes.

We aren't told what struggle (if any) they went through, that wasn't the intent of the author. The author focuses on the decision they ended up making and skipping this kind of detail. I don't think we should assume they had overwhelming feelings on one side or the other. They had various plusses and minuses to consider with their choice, but no one overwhelming influence. If they did, their free will would be overwhelmed.

We can debate to the cows come home what the intent of the author was. The Jews who wrote the book would no doubt disagree with your take on many aspects of it. Details are important anyway when writing. We are missing crucial information about Adam and Eve's true feelings and thinking. Therefore that makes it difficult to argue motives or what the characters are going through in their minds.

I disagree that their freewill would be violated. Like you keep insisting, even with those powerful influences, you can still push through them. Adam and Eve could do the same. The thing would be why would any rational person do that when they know the negative outcome of doing it?

I have never suggesting anything outside of limitations that are already on us human beings in one form or another. I'm simply suggesting a use of them to prevent spiritual damage (ie sin) as well as physical damage.

I know you are suggesting that. I'm suggesting that we do have those limitations on physical and spiritual matters. You are saying that we don't all have limitations. I'm disagreeing with that claim. You want stronger limitations then we have. I'm saying if you make them stronger, but not overwhelming you will still have spiritual damage.

At least there will be less spiritual damage. People will be less likely to lie, lust, steal, kill, etc etc if these limitations were stronger. If we all had them equally. Sin would not be the huge problem it is with mankind.

If you make them overwhelming than free will is being overwhelmed.

We all have limitations that are overwhelming, yet we don't call that a violation of our freewill. We can still choose to push through them, or we can choose to do other things instead that ARE within those limitations (just like a disabled person) so our freewill is not violated. Just like I pushed through my overwhelming fear of heights to jump out of a plane. However if jumping out of a plane was going to result in someone else being hurt or me angering God I wouldn't have done it. The incentive just wouldn't have been there no matter how much I desired a thrill. I would have just not bothered to face the fear due to the ramifications of it.

There needs to be some consistency applied in these scenarios and I'm not seeing that consistency coming from you. You want to insert special pleading into the whole affair. Making out that limitations around sinning is a violation of freewill, but anything else isn't.

[FarWanderer]

There needs to be some consistency applied in these scenarios and I'm not seeing that consistency coming from you. You want to insert special pleading into the whole affair. Making out that limitations around sinning is a violation of freewill, but anything else isn't.

This, pretty much.

We haven't seen any clear distinction between what it means to "have free will" and it means not to.

And I don't think we're going to get one. The reason being that "free will" isn't even an attribute. It's a perspective. We often see ourselves and other humans through the perspective of free will- that is to say we see people as causal starting points, rather than as links in a causal chain with action dictated by prior circumstances. But not always. When it suits us, we can see people as deterministic "robots" just as easily. We can even do this to ourselves, like when we blame our own act of stealing on the boss who fired us and "forced" us to steal (in order to survive).

All Tanager is doing is applying the perspectives as it suits him and declaring their tenants "true" for each case. Which they are, in the context of the perspective he's using. The problem is that he has provided no logical reason for why we should apply one perspective (free will) in one case and another (determinism) in the other case.

It's not such a strange thing to do. Debate aside, we all switch between these perspectives all the time in our daily lives, usually without even realizing it.

[myth-one.com]

Your post seemed to claim that Paul had already been saved from the wages of sin -- and that isn't true according to Paul's own writings.

Uh, yes, that is exactly Paul's proposal.

According to Jesus Christ, the only way to be saved and enter the Kingdom of God is to be born again of the Spirit:

I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. (John 3:5-7)

Paul details exactly how and when this is accomplished.

There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. (I Corinthians 15:44)

And each body type requires a separate birth:

That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. (John 3:6)

In a letter to the Church at Corinth, Paul states that the natural body comes first for believers, and is then followed by the spiritual body:

Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual. (I Corinthians 15:46)

Paul then describes the act of being born again and a comparison of natural versus spiritual bodies:

42 . . . It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption:

43 It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power:

44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body.

The dead Christian's natural body is buried or sown like a seed in corruption, dishonor, and weakness.

The body that is resurrected is an incorruptible, glorious, powerful, spiritual body.

Man is born first as a natural bodied being, and may be born again as a spiritual bodied being.

This is when one is saved! Spirits can never die -- thus believers are saved from death for all eternity by being born again as eternal spirits. Each human who is not born again as a spirit will perish for all eternity.

The timing of this event is at the Second Coming:

For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order: Christ the first fruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming. (I Corinthians 15:22-23)

So no human has been born again at the present time -- including Paul.

"Born again" Christians do not exist. Christians are heirs to salvation:

That being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. (Titus 3:7)

The will or covenant will be probated at the Second Coming. That is when believers will receive their inheritance:

Behold, thy salvation cometh; behold, his reward is with him... (Isaiah 62:11)

And behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me... (Revelation 22:12)

=========================================================================

As a Christian, I am not concerned whether people are saved or not -- that is a personal decision, and I will be ok with each person's choice.

My concern is that each person has the correct information to base that decision upon.

[squint]

According to Jesus Christ, the only way to be saved and enter the Kingdom of God is to be born again of the Spirit:

I'd consider that a blanket statement that most believers try to blanket themselves, the entirety of themselves with, that will NEVER LOGICALLY compute.

It's much more interesting than you might propose. And I've given some simple examples of why such proposals are invalid.

For example, in this equation, how Paul described his own situation:

2 Cor. 12:
7 And lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure.

In the above example, IF we are paying attention, Paul, the child of God, will be saved. The messenger of Satan would NOT be saved and will instead burn in hell.

Therefore, if we pay attention to the parties, MAN will live by every Word of God, EVEN the bad WORDS, IF applied correctly.

Chew on that concept for awhile and get back to me.

I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. (John 3:5-7)

Paul details exactly how and when this is accomplished.

There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. (I Corinthians 15:44)

And each body type requires a separate birth:

That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. (John 3:6)

In a letter to the Church at Corinth, Paul states that the natural body comes first for believers, and is then followed by the spiritual body:

Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual. (I Corinthians 15:46)

Paul then describes the act of being born again and a comparison of natural versus spiritual bodies:

42 . . . It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption:

43 It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power:

44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body.

The dead Christian's natural body is buried or sown like a seed in corruption, dishonor, and weakness.

The body that is resurrected is an incorruptible, glorious, powerful, spiritual body.

Man is born first as a natural bodied being, and may be born again as a spiritual bodied being.

I would entirely disagree with your proposal. Man, in Adam's case was ALWAYS a son/daughter of God. See Luke 3:38 for Adam being God's son as an example.

BUT Adam was planted in a dust body of corruption, weakness, dishonor and a body that was "subject" to both "death" and "disobedience."

If we look at the previous example of Paul, we may in fact see Adam identically as Paul showed himself.

This is when one is saved! Spirits can never die -- thus believers are saved from death for all eternity by being born again as eternal spirits. Each human who is not born again as a spirit will perish for all eternity.

And none of that will do the "messenger of Satan" who was assuredly in the flesh of Paul one single bit of good. You have to observe 'both parties' in the equation. There is MAN and there is the TEMPTER or "evil present", internally.

One will be saved. The other, uh, not so much.

It does bring a much more interesting flavor to the matters.

The timing of this event is at the Second Coming:

For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order: Christ the first fruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming. (I Corinthians 15:22-23)

So no human has been born again at the present time -- including Paul.

"Born again" Christians do not exist. Christians are heirs to salvation:

That being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. (Titus 3:7)

The will or covenant will be probated at the Second Coming. That is when believers will receive their inheritance:

Behold, thy salvation cometh; behold, his reward is with him... (Isaiah 62:11)

And behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me... (Revelation 22:12)

As a Christian, I am not concerned whether people are saved or not -- that is a personal decision, and I will be ok with each person's choice.

And I'd submit the blanket you employ is a little to small for the positional bed you are attempting to lay on.

My concern is that each person has the correct information to base that decision upon.

No child of God will be lost. Every person is a child of God.

Therefore any proposals to eternally kill them arise from the EVIL within such persons. Of course I do not blame such people as there is obviously more to the subject than meets the eye, as "evil" is present within everyone, and this evil tends to get 'inflamed' when exposed to Gods Words.

[myth-one.com]

Paul, the child of God, will be saved.

Yes, he will be saved at the same time that all other Christians will be saved -- at the Second Coming.

No child of God will be lost. Every person is a child of God.

Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. (Matthew 7:13-14)

"Many" is more than half.

[Zzyzx]

.

"Many" is more than half.

Correction: Many is defined as "a large but indefinite number"

An indefinite number can NOT be restricted to "more than half"