Why wouldn't Jesus be an asshole??

U

UberDragon

The Freak at the Computer
Registered Senior Member
Ok, religion isn't very firm ground to me, but i've been thinking about this for a while. Jesus' purpose on Earth was to die for their sins (all the preachers say he died for "our" sins, but i wasn't alive back then so, i used "their sins" instead) and if he knew this, why wasn't he just a complete asshole to everybody?? There had to be some people who just said they believed in him to get more wine from water or be cured of their leprosy. I mean, at anytime he could have just said, "Hey, I'm here to die so you aren't guilty, so I don't have to help you." Right? Couldn't this have been possible??
 
Your right,thats an interesting paradox,
the way to solve a paradox is say that he didnt know he was dying for our sins,
and that only the people after him decided he died for our sins,cos they believed he was a messiah.

This could indicate he didnt know he was a messiah or called himself that,however he may have become deluded into the belief he was the son of god when he was put on the cross and shouted "why have you forsaken me?"
then again how do we know he was shouting at god?
 
Read, reread, and rereread the new testament.

This "saving grace" of his appears to be exclusively enjoyed by christians and everyone else is condemned to be following "whores".
 
Ill take copies of the bible for free gladly,cos toilet roll is expensive
and im a tight git.

Seriously though,i see religions as all the same,why you would choose christianity over any other is beyond me,
if it wasnt for constintine in 300ad (roughly) you wouldnt have christianity,the romans would have continued killing you lot off and it would have stayed in rome with a minimum of followers,constintine made it legal and christianity spread through rome then them bloody missionaries started spreading it elsewhere.
 
Originally posted by UberDragon
...why wasn't he just a complete asshole to everybody??
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Actually, I think Jesus WAS an asshole, and that's why I love him. He told people what they needed to hear the most but wanted to hear the least. He hung with drunks, whores, tax-collecters and other scum of society, and they liked being around him. And every time he started teaching, he pissed off all the religious hypocrites who were in charge at the time. He pissed them off so bad that they plotted several times to kill him and finally succeeded. If he came back today, the first people in line to snuff him would be 'religious' fundamentalist hypocrite types who call themselves Christians but condemn everyone and love only themselves. Praise Jesus - my kind of scum :D
 
The New Testament??? Do they have a CLiff's Notes for it? All that prose makes me nausious(sp?)
 
Can we say jerk instead of ***hole.

First, Im sure that Mother Teresa was a real jerk, ya know helping people whenever she could... But when she couldn't she'd get it thrown in her face. Thus is the life of a saint, which is why many of them are killed... Look at Joan Of Arc.

Actually, I think Jesus WAS an asshole, and that's why I love him. He told people what they needed to hear the most but wanted to hear the least.
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Your darn skippy!:D He told people what they needed to hear and do.

I think that society is better because of Jesus, and go ahead and start mentioning how all of these wars and deaths are the result of CHRISTIANITY.
 
How is society a better place because of bejeesus? I definitely disagree with that. What of the retarded expeditions, such as the crusades? All the anti Jew hatred? All the unreasonable supporting of Israel (before you jump on me and bomb me, think about what the US is being COST here...diplomatically...we've totally, do you hear me, TOTALLY, lost the support of ALL the muslim nations...stupid thing to do...)?

The world is not a better place. It's pretty much the same, except that it's slightly crappier.
 
Your darn skippy! He told people what they needed to hear and do.
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Therein the problem. By compelling people to carry out simplistic moral absolutes in a complex and chaotic world he fucked the place. What people should do and what people need to hear are different things.
 
this is an interesting question. i can only answer from a non-christian perspective...

to me, the "sins" jesus died for are really simply that "we" (humanity) put a non-violent (non-asshole) man to death. many consider jesus a prophet, some say he was a moral teacher, and as we know, many others believe he is the "messiah." whatever your religious affiliation, it seems clear (unless you question his actual material existance, as at least one person on these boards does) that his being a "non-asshole" is the essence of his teaching. that is, to be peaceful in the face of violent acts is what very well may "save" humanity.
 
Originally posted by Zero
How is society a better place because of bejeesus? I definitely disagree with that. ..... It's pretty much the same, except that it's slightly crappier.
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Not jumping on you, ok?

From the book "Desire of the Everlasting Hills", Thomas Cahill
"Traditions are born", says Asher Lev, "by the power of an initial thrust that hurls acts and ideas acress the centuries."" "In the case of Christianity, these acts and ideas have often been misidentified. This is because the radical society of friends, of free and equal men and women, that came forth from the side of the crucified was quickly overwhelmed by ancient patriarchy and has been overwhelmed in every era since by the social and political forms of the age. As we look back over the ages of monarchical popes and princely bishops, engaged in war games and power struggles with one another, these players of old shrink in size and begin to resemble figures on a chessboard, retaining little of lasting relevance for us. But the "ideas and acts" have been hurled across the centuries; and whenever an individual or gathering has had the courage to confront the Gospel anew, the society of its time has experienced transformation. When the apostles and martyrs were gone and Christianity had compromised itself by becoming part and parcel of the Roman state, some men and women remembered the desert of the Jews and sought it out as the natural place for a meeting with God. These hermits and anchorites became the first Christian monks and nuns, purifying a religion that would otherwise have devolved into mere political appendage and social decoration, not unlike its cultic pagan predecessors. But the desert people rediscovered the earth-shattering encounter with God that had occupied the lives of figures from Abraham to Paul; and the gave the West a consistent tradition of spirituality and mysticism. When the medieval papacy was growing into the most splendid irreligious despotism the world had ever known, a young man whose fun-loving friends called him "Francesco" stripped himself naked in the public square of Assisi in Umbria and dedicated his life to Christ's poor, definitively separating true religion from pomp of any kind and giving the Western world a conscience it can never quite get rid of...."

"Throughout the history of the West since the time of Jesus, there has remained just enough of the substance of the original Gospel, a residuum, for it to be passed, as it were, from hand to hand and used, like stock, to strengthen, flavor and invigorate new movements that have succeeded again and again - if only for a time - in producing alteri Christi, men and women in danger of crucifixion. It has also produced, repeatedly and in the oddest circumstances, the loving-kindness of the first Christians. Malcolm Muggeridge, the supremely secular British curmudgeon, who cast a cold eye over so many contemporary efforts and enterprises, was brought up short while visiting an Indian leprosarium run by the Missionaries of Charity, the sisters founded by Mother Teresa of Calcutta. He had always imagined secular humanism to be the ideal world-view but realized, while strolling throught this facility, built with love for those whom no one wanted, that no merely humanist vision can take account of lepers, let alone take care of them. To offer humane treatment to humanity's outcasts, to overcome their lifetime experience of petty human cruelties, requires more than mere humanity. Humanists, he realized with the force of sudden insight, do not run leprosariums."

"But it is also true that the West could never have realized some of its most cherished values without the process of secularization. The separation of church and state was achieved in the teeth of virulent Christian opposition, as was free speech, universal suffrage, tolerance, and many other values we would not be without. That these values flow from the subterranean river of authentic Christian tradition points up, once more, the paradoxical validity of the distinctions Jesus made between the religious establishment and true religious spirit."
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Originally posted by kidsun
his being a "non-asshole" is the essence of his teaching. that is, to be peaceful in the face of violent acts is what very well may "save" humanity.
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Actually, peace in the face of violence was more Ghandi's bag. Jesus taught about the crucial importance of love. Both Peace and Love come from God. If you don't beleive that, then how do you explain the existence of Love otherwise? I'm all ears :confused:
 
Both Peace and Love come from God. If you don't beleive that, then how do you explain the existence of Love otherwise?
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I really hate statements like this, because it belittles mankind and his abilities. Is it totally incomprehensable that man can develop love and compassion without some supernatural intervention?
 
Both Peace and Love come from God. If you don't beleive that, then how do you explain the existence of Love otherwise?
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Love is a neurochemical reaction stimulated by the existence of another human.

Nothing more, nothing less. Serotonin and dopamine have more to do with this allegedly "good" emotion than God ever has.

Inner peace is a comforting name we give to slavery.
 
i am tempted to avoid quibbling over who said what because i love both ghandi and jesus... but it is jesus that ghandi often quoted (and learned from) as saying (in so many words) turn the other cheek.

to me, ghandi and jesus are examples of our greatest potential.

someone recently said,"your spirit is alive if you live in even one person's memory." because of the way these two lived, they have been immortalized. (people often get confused about "immortality." they think it means in a material sense.)

(as for the rest of it, i don't see a need to bicker over where love comes from, so i'll resist the urge to indulge in some kind of intellectual exercise for naught ... "and half a page of scribbled lines.")

i don't need to know or explain where love comes from. all i feel i need to know is that love is a very powerful energy, and that we are capable of tapping into that energy. we've been shown how.

(maybe we've been lost in the religious mire so long that we've missed that part....."the best part ....of the trip.... i really like....")
 
How is society a better place because of bejeesus? I definitely disagree with that. What of the retarded expeditions, such as the crusades? All the anti Jew hatred? All the unreasonable supporting of Israel (before you jump on me and bomb me, think about what the US is being COST here...diplomatically...we've totally, do you hear me, TOTALLY, lost the support of ALL the muslim nations...stupid thing to do...)?
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Zero.... My point was that Jesus was not responsible for the crusades, or bombings, or any of that crap. It was all carried out in his name, but did he ever once come down and say "Good work!" No, he didn't. Jesus is not responsible for the things that have been carried out in his name, the crackheads who did it are.
 
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