Is any of this Jesus' fault?

[Elijah John]

Claims of perfection and claims of Divinity on behalf of Jesus has led to critique of his character here, on this site. Fairly or unfairly.

For debate:

1) Would any criticism of Jesus character be needed if it were not claimed that he was "perfect" and an "unblemished sacrifice for sin"?

2) Of if it weren't claimed by many that Jesus was God?

3) Is any of this Jesus own fault? Or do such claims made by others on Jesus behalf fairly provoke and invite criticism?

[Divine Insight]

3) Is any of this Jesus own fault?

That's a very unclear question since it's extremely unclear who Jesus supposedly was in this mythology and who was actually running the show?

The idea that Jesus was God actually makes no sense at all. Moreover, Jesus would have necessarily had to have been nothing more than a patsy for God (i.e. Yahweh). Let's not forget that Jesus is supposed to be the virgin born demigod Son of Yahweh and that it was Yahweh who planned out this entire scenario.

The authors of these stories even have Jesus proclaiming that he does NOT speak for himself but instead he's speaking the words of the Father God (i.e. Yahweh). So Jesus is clearly not claiming to be God when he himself is claiming not to be nothing more than a conduit through which God supposedly speaks.

So everything that's wrong with Jesus is actually Yahweh's fault.

So it was Yahweh who decided that Jesus should not write anything down but instead his message (Yahweh's message) should be passed on via extremely problematic and flawed hearsay rumors that wouldn't even be written down until decades after Jesus had died.

So all the blame is on Yahweh's hands. He's the real idiot in this mythology. Jesus was just a pawn in Yahweh's game.

[Avoice]

[Replying to post 1 by Elijah John]

Elijah John...Rome is where the guilt could be placed or those at the council of Nicea.
Truth be told they could also blame the gospel writers. Only no one knows who they were. Ah Jesus. What a mess. The NT is a theological crime scene. Id have left my name out of it too

[Avoice]

[Replying to post 1 by Elijah John]

Elijah John...Rome is where the guilt could be placed or those at the council of Nicea.
Truth be told they could also blame the gospel writers. Only no one knows who they were. Ah Jesus. What a mess. The NT is a theological crime scene. Id have left my name out of it too

[Elijah John]

3) Is any of this Jesus own fault?

That's a very unclear question since it's extremely unclear who Jesus supposedly was in this mythology and who was actually running the show?

Hopefully the first two questions of the OP clarify the third.. Allow me to rephrase a bit. Did Jesus invite Jesus-worship? Did he claim to be God or claim to be a perfect, unblemished sacrifice for sin? Perfection is a heavy burden. Did Jesus consider himself perfect?

Or was perfection and Divinity bestowed on him by others, including Paul and Roman Catholic theologians at various councils.

[Divine Insight]

Hopefully the first two questions of the OP clarify the third.. Allow me to rephrase a bit. Did Jesus invite Jesus-worship? Did he claim to be God or claim to be a perfect, unblemished sacrifice for sin? Perfection is a heavy burden. Did Jesus consider himself perfect?

Or was perfection and Divinity bestowed on him by others, including Paul and Roman Catholic theologians at various councils.

You're asking a question that is impossible to answer. Jesus never wrote anything down, so we have absolutely nothing from Jesus at all. Everything we've read about him is hearsay gossip written by other people.

So asking what Jesus might have actually claimed is a meaningless question.

However, the bottom line is simple if you want to point the figure to anyone for any fault of any misunderstandings. All of that would necessarily be on the shoulders of Yahweh himself. If Jesus had anything at all to do with Yahweh, then Yahweh is at fault for all that has gone wrong.

[Mithrae]

Claims of perfection and claims of Divinity on behalf of Jesus has led to critique of his character here, on this site. Fairly or unfairly.

For debate:

1) Would any criticism of Jesus character be needed if it were not claimed that he was "perfect" and an "unblemished sacrifice for sin"?

2) Of if it weren't claimed by many that Jesus was God?

3) Is any of this Jesus own fault? Or do such claims made by others on Jesus behalf fairly provoke and invite criticism?

If for the sake of historical plausibility we restricted ourselves to non-miraculous activities of Jesus confirmed across multiple synoptic gospels, we still see a fellow claiming to be greater than Jonah, greater than Solomon and (by his claim that he could have got Sodom and Gomorrah to repent) apparently even superior to the great patriarch Abraham (Matt. 10&11, Luke 10&11).

A fellow claiming that becoming his disciple was so crucial as to warrant 'hating' your own father and mother, giving up all your possessions, denying yourself and taking up your cross to follow him (Mark 8:34ff, Matt. 8:21-22, Luke 14:25ff etc.).

A fellow insisting that he and John had at least in some regards done away with the law and the prophets and replaced them with their preaching of the kingdom of God, with his own blood being the seal of a 'new covenant'; a feat he claimed to be even greater than the passing away of heaven and earth (Mark 14:24 etc.; Luke 16:16-17).

A fellow declaring that he would one day come on the clouds of heaven with armies of angels, "sit on the throne of his glory" and judge the nations (Mark 8:38, 13:26, Matt. 25:31ff etc. etc.)


As a pious observance of strict monotheism one might reasonably argue that none of these - not even sitting on a throne of glory and judging the world - need necessarily be claims of personal divinity. But yes, they certainly do demand that we grab our magnifying glass and scrutinize whether these are actually the words of the greatest being to ever grace this earth by his presence, or just the inane boasts of a self-delusional blowhard imagining that his people's scriptures pointed to him. From the information available to us, it's rather difficult to reach the former conclusion. He repeated many good things that had been said before, but does that really justify or even make up for that colossal hubris?

C. S. Lewis was right, I suspect; you can't get just a 'good moral teacher/prophet' without taking some scissors even to the non-miraculous stuff confirmed in multiple synoptics.

[Menotu]

[Replying to post 1 by Elijah John]

1) Hard to say, especially now when everyone seems offended over every thing. I'm sure some would say yes and others no. What really matters is what you, the individual, says.
2) Probably not much but hard to say for sure. Seems many have covered this by saying Jesus was God and not God at the same time. However that works
3) Without knowing exactly what Jesus said, you can't say for sure (at least, not honestly).

[Overcomer]

Jesus himself claimed to be God as has been pointed out many times in many threads here. Therefore, he expects and hopes that people worship him as God because he is worthy of it. In fact, when people DID worship him as God, he didn't tell them to stop (Matt. 28:17, for example). It saddens him when people are blind and refuse to do so.

By the way, the word "perfect" as it is used in the Bible doesn't mean "sin-free". It means "whole", "complete", "lacking for nothing". I have seen it misunderstood in other threads as well and just want to clarify that.

[Elijah John]

Hopefully the first two questions of the OP clarify the third.. Allow me to rephrase a bit. Did Jesus invite Jesus-worship? Did he claim to be God or claim to be a perfect, unblemished sacrifice for sin? Perfection is a heavy burden. Did Jesus consider himself perfect?

Or was perfection and Divinity bestowed on him by others, including Paul and Roman Catholic theologians at various councils.

You're asking a question that is impossible to answer. Jesus never wrote anything down, so we have absolutely nothing from Jesus at all. Everything we've read about him is hearsay gossip written by other people.

So asking what Jesus might have actually claimed is a meaningless question.

However, the bottom line is simple if you want to point the figure to anyone for any fault of any misunderstandings. All of that would necessarily be on the shoulders of Yahweh himself. If Jesus had anything at all to do with Yahweh, then Yahweh is at fault for all that has gone wrong.

By blaming God for all this, aren't you letting Jesus' "biographers" off the hook? Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, and for that matter, Paul?