Jesus Christ: Lord, Liar, Or Lunatic?
Throughout history, people have given a variety of answers to the question, "Who is Jesus of Nazereth?" Whatever their answer, no one can escape the fact that Jesus really lived and that His life radically altered human history forever.
The world-renowned historian Jaroslav Pelikan makes this clear: "Regardless of what anyone may personally think or believe about him, Jesus of Nazereth has been the dominant figure in the history of Western culture. If it were possible, with some sort of supermagnet, to pull up out of that history every scrap of metal bearing a trace of his name, how much would be left? It is from his birth that most of the human race dates its calendars, it is by his name that millions curse, and in his name that millions pray."
JESUS WAS A LIAR?
If, when Jesus made His claims, He knew He was not God, then He was lying. But it He was a liar, then He was also a hypocrite, because He told others to be honest, whatever the cost, while He, at the same time, was teaching and living a colossal lie.
More than that, He was a demon, because He deliberately told others to trust Him for the eternal destiny. If He could not back up His claims and knew they were false, then He was unspeakably evil.
Last, He would also be a fool, because it was His claims of deity that lead to His crucifixion.
JESUS WAS A LUNATIC?
If it is inconceivable for Jesus to have been a liar, then could He have thought He was God but have been mistaken? After all, it is possible to be both sincere and wrong.
But we must remember that for someone to think he was God, especially in a culture that was fiercely monotheistic, and then to tell others that their eternal destiny depends on believing in him, was no slight flight of fantasy but the thought of a lunatic in the fullest sense. Was Jesus Christ such a person?
JESUS WAS LORD!
If Jesus of Nazereth is NOT a liar or a lunatic, then He must be Lord.
Other self-proclaimed gods and saviors have come and gone upon history's stage, but Jesus is still here, standing head-and-shoulders above them all.
Who you decide Jesus Christ is must not be an idle intellectual exercise. You cannot put Him on the shelf as a great moral teacher. That is not an option (especially for Christians). He is either a liar, a lunatic, or the Lord. You must make a choice. There needs to be moral honesty in the above consideration of Jesus as either one of the three.
How did they treat liars back in the first century?
Check out: Keener, The IVP Bible Background Comentary: New Testament, (Intervarsity, 1993) and other volume by Ferguson, Everett, Backgrounds of Christianity.
Please everyone, keep the debate in good taste. Thank you.
It didn't seem like the Councel was so clear on who Jesus was...
Please read..The Christian faith was based on this councel.
The Council of Nicaea and the Bible
There seem to be a number of legends about the First Council of Nicaea (325AD) in circulation on the internet, presented as fact. Some people seem to think that the council, which was the first council of all the Bishops of the Christian Church, either invented the New Testament, or edited it to remove references to reincarnation (or whatever) or burned large numbers of heretical works, or whatever.
Here's my first example, from usenet:
> In tracing the origin of the Bible, one is led to AD 325, when
> Constantine the Great called the First Council of Nicaea, composed of
> 300 religious leaders. Three centuries after Jesus lived, this council
> was given the task of separating divinely inspired writings from those
> of questionable origin.
> The actual compilation of the Bible was an incredibly complicated
> project that involved churchmen of many varying beliefs, in an
> atmosphere of dissension, jealousy, intolerance, persecution and
> bigotry.
> At this time, the question of the divinity of Jesus had split the
> church into two factions. Constantine offered to make the little-known
> Christian sect the official state religion if the Christians would
> settle their differences. Apparently, he didn't particularly care what
> they believed in as long as they agreed upon a belief. By compiling a
> book of sacred writings, Constantine thought that the book would give
> authority to the new church.
Here's a second version of the same idea:
> The references in the Christian religion of reincarnation, I am told,
> were removed by the Council of Nicea. (See Note A)
Here's a third version of this idea:
> Also, we do know that there were many books of supposed prophets
> floating around up until 312 CE when the Council of Nicea decided
> which books were scripture and which ones were burned. Thanks to
> the notorious habit of early Christian leaders of destroying
> books/scrolls, we may never know what doctrine existed before the
> Council of Nicea.
And another even more extreme example:
Author: Laulak Siddique <[email protected]>
Date: 2000/12/06
Forum: alt.religion.islam
In article <[email protected]>,
"Laulak Siddique" <[email protected]> wrote:
> Christianity consisted of many sects. By converting Constantine
> (The Great) the Paul heresy triumphed as the concept of trinity and the ending of the
> Mosaic law (which made swine flesh permissible) brought this version of
> Christianity very close to the Hellenic paganism that was practiced in Rome
> and Greece. At Nicea Constantine had 300 versions of the Bible burnt, thus
> legitimising and patronizing only the Paulic heresy.
And another (I'm not making any of these up):
Subject: Re: Snipper continues trying to shift the burden of proof to the atheists
From: "St. Clarence" <[email protected]>
Date: 2001/01/07
Newsgroups: alt.atheism,alt.agnosticism,alt.christnet.atheism,alt.christnet.calvinist ...
>Actually, legend has it that at the Council of Nicea, Constantine was
>unsure of what else to include as a holy scripture (which later the batch
>became the Bible). He threw the batch that he was to choose from onto a
>table. Those that remained on the table were in, those that fell off were
>out.
(See Note B)
A new version of the story (June 2001), which also includes a very confused version of the 'Secret Mark' theory of Morton Smith (not 480, obviously):
Dave Crisp <...> wrote in message news:<[email protected]>...
> There are one or two places where there is evidence of which is 'right',
> the most famous example perhaps being the account of the raising of Lazarus
> which was removed from Mark on the instructions of the Council of Nicea as
> it hat overtones of a 'mystery cult'.
[source queried - answer:]
> If you could give me a couple of days, I could probably dig out the entire
> text, which was contained in a letter sent in 480 by the Bishop of
> Alexandria to one of his underlings; who was involved it trying to stamp
> out a group of 'Heretics' who were still using the original version.
And another:
Newsgroups: soc.culture.jewish, (etc)
Date: 1996/05/08
> The Roman Catholic Church created the canon of Christian
> scripture at the Council of Nicea, at the same time that they determined
> the doctrine of Trinity (through the assasination of a few of the voting
> bishops, by one vote). (See Note D)
These all sound individually quite confident and authoritative. But how do we find out if they are true? The answer must be to assemble all the primary data; any documents issued by the council, and any ancient accounts of its proceedings.
Documents Issued by the Council
The 318 bishops issued a creed (Symbolum), 20 canons, and a letter to the church of Alexandria. An English translation of these is available from http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3801.htm
This man Constantine, THE FOUNDER OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH, was spruced up later in history. HE DIDN'T EVEN HAVE A VISION OF THE CROSS, because the cross wasn't part of the Christian faith yet.
That Fabulous Fable
A nonsense repeated ad nauseam is the fable of the ‘writing above the sun’ which advised Constantine of his divine destiny. In its worst form, the legend has it that the words ‘In this sign, you shall conquer’ and the sign of the cross were visible to Constantine and his entire army. The words would have been, perhaps, Latin ‘In Hoc Signo Victor Seris’, a bizarre cloud formation unique in the annuls of meteorological observation.
however we discover that the vision was in fact a dream reported some years later by Constantine to his secretary Lactantius (On the Death of the Persecutors, chapter xliv; ANF. vii, 318.) The fable was later embellished by the emperor's ‘minister of propaganda’, Bishop Eusebius, in his Life of Constantine (1.xxvi-xxxi). The ‘sign of the cross’ was an even later interpolation (the cross was not a Christian symbol at the time of the battle – nor would be until the 6th century!). Any ‘good luck emblem’ at this date would have been the chi-rho – ambiguously the first two letters of the word Christos, the Greek word for ‘auspicious’ and also Chronos, god of time and a popular embodiment of Mithras!
What is perhaps most significant about this ‘origins’ fantasy is that ‘lucky charms’ had entered the parlance of Christianity. Constantine did not need to be a Christian; invoking its symbols was sufficient to win divine patronage. But did he invoke its symbols? Coins issued at the time celebrating his victory showed only Sol Invictus: his triumphant arch, still standing, refers only to ‘the gods’. In truth, Constantine was not a particularly pious man. Famously, he delayed his baptism until he was close to death for fear of further sinning – with good reason: among his many murders was that of his first wife Fausta (boiled alive) and eldest son Crispus (strangled).
The idea that Constantine created Christianity is the biggest myth in the history of the world. Even a little bit of research will show that this is not true. One of the best things that came out of the Da Vinci Code is that it made well known this idea, and as a result the truthful information has now become more prominently and widely availbile.
I am not going to get into incredible details here because it's simply not worth it, but to just get to the point:
Constantine had decided to reorganize, rebuild, whatever word you want to use, the Roman Empire under Christianity. At the time, however, there were countless different sects of Christianity, which had sprouted off, most notably gnosticism. It had gotten so bad that not many people actually knew what correct Christianity actually was any more. Constantine knew that it was important from both a government and a religious (as he had accepted the religion) standpoint that Christianity be defined, so as that it would be possible to tell the difference between real Christianity and "fake" Christianity. Because of this, he convened the Council of Nicea as a means to sort things out and have knowledgable persons work together to sort out the rubbish from the truth.
The idea that Constantine created Christianity has SO many problems; I'll list a few here:
Constantine himself had ZERO ecclesiastical authority (in other words, he had no power to define, set, or create and beliefs or practices.)
Most who say Constantine created Christianity say he set the canon of the Bible, most noteably the four gospels. Many blame him for eliminating the gnostic gospels. This is not true, and there is plenty of evidence against it. One of the most important pieces is that Irenaeus wrote about the four gospel canon over one hundred years before the council!
Also, it is very popular to say Constantine created the idea of the divinity of Jesus. This is not true either, and has equally as many problems. Here we have Paul's letters which refer to him as divine, and are dated by the majority of scholarship to 50-60 CE (AD).
It is said that Constantine changed the day of worship from Saturday to Sunday. This is not true, either. Writings from Ignatius, Barnabus, Irenaeus, Cyprian and many others speak of worship on Sunday and were written long before Constantine was even born.
There are many other problems with the idea of a Nicean creation of Christianity. However, there are a few facts which are true about Nicea. At Nicea the "state" of Jesus was debated. Not whether He was divine or not, but things like, did He always exist, or was He created upon His conception. The date of Christmas was selected, and it WAS taken from pagan holidays, because it seemed like a good way to help convert the pagans, by celebrating on a day they were familiar with celebrating on. There is a pagan background to some Christian traditions, however not to its doctrines.
I'm not even scratching the surface of the problems with this theory.
The idea that Constantine created Christianity is the biggest myth in the history of the world.I would say Atlantis is way bigger.
Here we have Paul's letters which refer to him as divine, and are dated by the majority of scholarship to 50-60 CE (AD).goodie, before the majority of so called scholars date the gospels
You're right, because they were written before the gospels, or at least contemporarily.
I wouldn't call them so-called scholars, because most of the scholars that are dating these things aren't even religious and are usually pretty skeptical. Their work is not biased it's done from a purely scholarly standpoint.
The majority of scholarship today has abandoned the idea for late gospels, and place them around between 50-90 AD. There are actually works which refer to the gospels which were written in the 70s and 80s, so we know that some of them had to have been completed at least by then.
Remember that Paul's letters were functional. They were too specific people. The people Paul was writing to had already heard the gospels by way of missionary journeys by Peter, James, Stephen, etc. etc., and especially Paul.
There is no problem with Paul's letters being dated before or contemporarily to the gospels. The gospels were not derived from his letters. He does not refer to many gospel facts in his letters, which is one reason people criticize his writings, because they say that if they were real they would contain more about the gospel (and when I say it here I mean it in the sense not of the 4 writings but of the "gospel," the story of it). The reason they don't say much is because like I said, he had no need to, he was writing to people that already knew that and needed clarification on a few things.
The gospels aren't usually claimed to be first hand stuff. It is always very, very important to understand what each gospel really was. They weren't just written to tell the story, they all had a specific purpose.
Mark was a man who followed Peter around on all of his journeys. Mark's gospel was intended as a record of Peter's preaching. He listened to what Peter told the people and wrote it down. (this is why it contains no geneology)
Luke was written as a historical record. Luke was a historian, and his writings are regarded by modern historians as the best historical records of his time, comparable only with Josephus. He, being a historian himself, went to great lengths to include specifics, and to be thorough. His gospel was written in the same way a book would be today; he, while following Paul around on his Journeys, interviewed anyone and everyone he could find that had been around during the ministry of Jesus and prepared a report based on this.
Matthew was written by a Jewish rabbi as a missionary tool, however he wanted to try to convey the message that Jesus was Himself a Jew and followed the law of Moses. This is why Matthew has a lot of references to the law and to the Pharisees accusing Jesus of breaking the law. Matthew was trying to convert Jews.
John wrote his gospel to be a missionary tool for pagans. This is why his gospel is of a different style. Whereas the other three focus on events, his focuses on emotion and philosophy. His tries to explain what Jesus is in ways that the pagans could understand and grow with.
It is also very important to note that the gospels are considered the most accurate historical documents of their time. They have been studied by secular scholars and determined to be very accurate. It has even been said that if one were to take every historical document prior to the gospels and combine them, the gospels are a better souce then they are in terms of reliability. When we go to high school and college (I don't know what they call it over there), and learn in a way that shuns all religion, many of the facts we learn about the era of the New Testament are taken from the New Testament, and the gospels, itself. Most of the knowledge we have in general about that period of time comes from the gospels. There are no other documents of any weight compared to the gospels at the time. The only other ones that provide us with reliable details about that period are the writings of Josephus, which when they do parallel the NT, they back it up.
Also, take a look at the Didache, which was written between 60-80 CE. It speaks to many of the things that were supposedly created or decided in the Council of Nicea, and is genrally believed (based on research, as always, though there is admittedly not as much data availible to scholars on it [I say this not because I think it matters but because if I am to maintain my credibility than I must do nothing else than practice full disclosure]) to be te work of the 12 apostles. The Didache
Originally posted by Lazerlike42
Mark was a man who followed Peter around on all of his journeys. Mark's gospel was intended as a record of Peter's preaching. He listened to what Peter told the people and wrote it down. (this is why it contains no geneology)Luke was written as a historical record. Luke was a historian, and his writings are regarded by modern historians as the best historical records of his time, comparable only with Josephus. He, being a historian himself, went to great lengths to include specifics, and to be thorough. His gospel was written in the same way a book would be today; he, while following Paul around on his Journeys, interviewed anyone and everyone he could find that had been around during the ministry of Jesus and prepared a report based on this.
Matthew was written by a Jewish rabbi as a missionary tool, however he wanted to try to convey the message that Jesus was Himself a Jew and followed the law of Moses. This is why Matthew has a lot of references to the law and to the Pharisees accusing Jesus of breaking the law. Matthew was trying to convert Jews.
John wrote his gospel to be a missionary tool for pagans. This is why his gospel is of a different style. Whereas the other three focus on events, his focuses on emotion and philosophy. His tries to explain what Jesus is in ways that the pagans could understand and grow with.
.
I've heard this and it is speculation...
And why weren't the other writing by the authors included as well? Why not the other writngs from Jesus followers? Don't say it's because the were repetetive. I've read them.
Originally posted by debbiejo
I've heard this and it is speculation...And why weren't the other writing by the authors included as well? Why not the other writngs from Jesus followers? Don't say it's because the were repetetive. I've read them.
Are you referring to other writings by Matthew Mark Luke and John, or to other writers, such as gnostic gospels?
If you'rereferring to some of the other gospels (gospel of Thomas, gospel of Mary Magadalene, gospel of Peter, etc. etc. etc.), it's because there is an incredible amount of evidence against the authenticity of these. Most of them can easily be discounted because they were written around 150 CE. The few that are dated contemporarily to the canonical gospels have other problems. I would not dream to say that the apochrypal gospels are useless. They are useful for many things, however not as a basis for faith, do to a myriad of well documented reasons.
You can look at anyones denomination and find theology sources to back it up..I tend to look at what today science and the medical establishment has confirmed to be truth. Some scientific evidence you have also mentioned I believe to be true. When supported with the writing with the gnostic gospels it is in alignment more with what they have taught. I believe Jesus was probably an Essene do to the knowledge that has been confirmed today by these fields. They knew a truth about the relationship between our science as proven through some Sting Theories..etc...and also in regards to health...Jesus taught these things, and much of it us edited out of the cannon of scripture.
As far as Constantine, he is regarded as the father of our church doctrine. There are many biographies that show his intentions, and they were not as noble as we have been taught.