Jesus Christ -The greatist man to ever live

[Leaper]

I dunno, considering that Jesus (at least in the context of the OP) was the son of (or an aspect of ) God and all, is it really fair to call him the “greatist [sic] man to ever live”? Doesn’t that set an impossibly high standard for actual mortals? Why not put Him on a level all His own, which He would deserve as a diety, and look to other mortals for such a title? After all, we could follow Jesus’ teachings without making His perfection a goal that we must obtain at the risk of feeling incompetent or incomplete…

[Dunderman]

@Excalibre

I know it’s hard to understand what he’s saying, but I did see “Jehovah’s Witness” amidst the commas and misspelled words. If he is indeed a Jehovah’s Witness (and it sounds like it) then they don’t hold Jesus to be divine. There’s one single God, and Jesus was just a pretty cool dude.

Yeah, I was thinking “Jehovah’s Witness” too. The use of the name Jehovah, the denial of Jesus’s divinity, the idiosyncratic interpretations of the Bible to support their tortured theology, it’s all there.

Hey, brewster2, was Jesus crucified?

[Dunderman]

I changed my mind. He does refer to himself as a “Christian”, which Jehovah’s Witnesses tend not to do. I’m stumped.

[Homebrew]

:: takes a toke ::

*I don’t care what they may say
I don’t care what they may do
I don’t care what they may say
Jesus is just alright, oh yeah
Jesus is just alright

Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo doo doo
*

<cough>

/Doobie Brothers

Can you imagine Doobie in your Funk?

[Alice_The_Goon]

@brewster2

Jehovah Witnesses do not engage in wars we stay neutral ,we will not use violence or kill anyone.

Looks like a Witness to me.

[Mangetout]

Oooh. I’ve often wondered why I’ve never bumped into a Jehovah’s Witness on the net before; this should be interesting.

[Aldebaran]

Well, I don’t know that much about all the different Christian based interpretations of the Bible except for the Catholic standpoint.
So I find this view on Jesus interesting (yes, I have occasionally met JW’s and saw their magazine, yet I have no diea of their doctrine).

OP, if Jesus is not God in your belief,… How do you see him? Is he a prophet? And where do you make the link with Christianity. As far as I know it stands on the belief the Jesus is the son of God.

Others who seem to feel a call to attack spelling and grammar errors: Pointing out such errors in a post with the aim to be helpful is in my case always appreciated.
Not every poster on this board has the Great Luck to be part of the Most Intelligent Group On Earth = Those Who Have English As Their First Language.
However, doing this while making fun of it makes you look like unadult arrogant fools who indeed live under the delusion that they are The Most Intelligent on the globe because they have English as a first (and in many cases ONLY) language.

Salaam. A

[cdnguy]

@brewster2

Jesus prayed did he not?If your God why do you pray?

Spiritual Masturbation perhaps?

[Mockingbird]

@cdnguy

Spiritual Masturbation perhaps?

Which pales in comparison to the real thing, though it is less messy.

Oh wait… that’s a sin. OOPS.

Oh… but I’m a heathen pagan. SPANK TIME!

[FriarTed]

I’m staunchly Trinitarian but I also know brewster2 is giving a sadly inadequate presentation of JW teaching, which is unitarian, but not Unitarian G

Essentially, JW theology is- there is One God, Jehovah, the Father. Jehovah’s only direct creation is His Son who is known as the Word, the Angel of Jehovah (that OT character who practically speaks as Jehovah), Michael the Archangel, and, in his human form, Jesus Christ. Together, Jehovah and Michael created everything else by the energy (“the holy spirit”) emanating from Jehovah. Michael/Jesus is a god, but not The God, and is to be honored above all creation but not worshipped as God. The historic precedent for this is in the teachings of the Alexandrian bishop Arius in the early 300’s. The debate between Trinitraianism & Arianism was a focal point of the Council of Nicea in 325 AD.

Now to Jesus’s words in John 20:17 “I go to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.” The Trinitarian understanding is that Jesus as God the Son is eternally begotten of God the Father, and therefore the Son derives being from the Father, but has done so forever and that the Son’s being is as much Divine as is the Father’s (think of an Eternal Mind which has Eternally Thought- the Mind represents the Father & the Thought represents the Son). Also, by His Incarnation in a human body, God the Son has become a created being of God the Father. Thus, both by His eternal begettal & His temporal incarnation, Jesus while being fully of God-nature can regard the Father as His God.

Now brewster2, tell me why later in John 20:28, Jesus lets Thomas call Him “my Lord and my God” without correction or clarification.

[Excalibre]

@FriarTed

Jehovah’s only direct creation is His Son who is known as the Word, the Angel of Jehovah (that OT character who practically speaks as Jehovah), Michael the Archangel, and, in his human form, Jesus Christ. Together, Jehovah and Michael created everything else by the energy (“the holy spirit”) emanating from Jehovah. Michael/Jesus is a god, but not The God, and is to be honored above all creation but not worshipped as God.

Fascinating! So ultimately God didn’t directly create the earth. Is there any historical connection with Gnostic teachings here? It certainly bears some resemblance (although only some).

[clairobscur]

@lambchops

• Are you proposing that God and Jesus are separate entities?
• If yes, do you propose that Jesus is divine?
• If yes, are you aware that such a mindset would NOT be monotheistic?

If you ask me, I would say that believing that “Jesus is divine” and “Jesus is the son of God” is enough to not be monotheistic…

Reminds me of some quote about people having things of various sizes in their eyes…

[clairobscur]

@FriarTed

The historic precedent for this is in the teachings of the Alexandrian bishop Arius in the early 300’s. The debate between Trinitraianism & Arianism was a focal point of the Council of Nicea in 325 AD.
.

Now, I’m learning something. I had no clue that JW and arianism could be related.

Though…by precedent do you simply means that the arianists and the JW share a common belief (the fact that Jesus was created), in which case, I’m actually not surprised, or that the JWs do believe there’s some direct link between them and Arianism?

[Chefguy]

@MEBuckner

Moderator’s Note: Chefguy, what part of “Don’t flame people outside the BBQ Pit” are you not clear on?

Don’t do that again.

Oops, so sorry. I think the third homophobic thread in one day tipped over my common sense.

[FriarTed]

@Excalibre

Fascinating! So ultimately God didn’t directly create the earth. Is there any historical connection with Gnostic teachings here? It certainly bears some resemblance (although only some).

Just some superficial resemblence between JW/Arian doctrine & Gnosticism-

JW/A teaching is that Father & Son together created everything, thus both work together & the Creation is good.

However, “Christian” Gnostic doctrine was that the Supreme Purely-Spirit God created the Demiurge (Jehovah) who then created the physical universe (the Supreme God being pure spirit & thus unable to sully Himself with grubby physical creation). The Demiurge being rather grubby himself enslaved his creatures with Judaism. The Supreme God sent Jesus in the appearance of a man (tho not in a true incarnation, Jesus being too pure for that) to free the enslaved human creations from the Demiurge Jehovah so they could become pure spirit & return to the Supreme God.

[FriarTed]

@clairobscur

Now, I’m learning something. I had no clue that JW and arianism could be related.

Though…by precedent do you simply means that the arianists and the JW share a common belief (the fact that Jesus was created), in which case, I’m actually not surprised, or that the JWs do believe there’s some direct link between them and Arianism?

I don’t have my JW books at hand, but I do think that Charles Taze Russell’s (the founder in the 1880’s) STUDIES FROM THE SCRIPTURES cites Arius as a doctrinal predecessor, as does the late 1980’s JW pamphlet SHOULD YOU BELIEVE IN THE TRINITY? .

[Brandus]

@FriarTed

tell me why later in John 20:28, Jesus lets Thomas call Him “my Lord and my God” without correction or clarification.

Probably because Jesus had been emphasising throughout his whole minister that to see him is to see the Father. Because Jesus did his father’s will exactly, every action Jesus did is really God’s action. When Jesus healed a man born blind, etc, God actually wanted the blind man to see again. So to see Jesus heal him, is to see God heal him. Thomas finally believed that when you look at Jesus, you see God also, since Jesus “is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being”.

The prelude to Thomas’ comment are in John 14.

Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”
Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”
Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.”
Jesus answered: "Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work.

More clues to the relationship between Jesus and God are found in 1 Samuel 8; Israel Asks for a King.

“…now appoint a king to lead us, such as all the other nations have.”
But when they said, “Give us a king to lead us,” this displeased Samuel; so he prayed to the LORD . And the LORD told him: "Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king.

1 Samuel 10; Saul Made King

Samuel summoned the people of Israel to the LORD at Mizpah and said to them, “This is what the LORD , the God of Israel, says: ‘I brought Israel up out of Egypt, and I delivered you from the power of Egypt and all the kingdoms that oppressed you.’ But you have now rejected your God, who saves you out of all your calamities and distresses. And you have said, ‘No, set a king over us.’ So now present yourselves before the LORD by your tribes and clans.”

1 Samuel 15; the LORD rejects Saul as King (after Saul disobeys the LORD’s orders to destroy the Amelakites completely)

Then the word of the LORD came to Samuel: “I am grieved that I have made Saul king, because he has turned away from me and has not carried out my instructions.” Samuel was troubled, and he cried out to the LORD all that night.

Hopefully these quotes provide the framework from which I’m writing. Please feel free to consult 1 Samuel yourself, too!

Before Saul, God was Israel’s True King. He was the true Judge, Leader, General, Shepherd, everything. Yet Israel wanted a man to be their king, to be “normal” like the other nations. They wanted a visual leader they could look to.

God, ever patience and compromising, let’s them have a man as their king. Yet Saul disobeys God and thus proves himself unworthy to be Israel’s king. So we see a dilemma here; Israel wants a man to be their visual leader, and God wants to make decisions for Israel directly. The wisdom of God finds a solution to both in Jesus Christ.

Jesus proves himself to be worthy of being Israel’s King by dying for them. This is the point of his life 2,000 years ago; John 14 “the world must learn that I love the Father and that I do exactly what my Father has commanded me.”

Thus, in Jesus, Israel has (did have 2,000 years ago but didn’t recognize him / will have upon his return) a visual King to look to, AND God will rule Israel directly, since Jesus does just what the Father commands him.

[Mr.Blue_Sky]

@clairobscur

“Jesus is divine”

I always thought Harris Glen Milstead was Divine.

[vanilla]

Yes, but when Glen died, Jesus took over the role on stage.

[Atticus_Finch]

@clairobscur

If you ask me, I would say that believing that “Jesus is divine” and “Jesus is the son of God” is enough to not be monotheistic…

Reminds me of some quote about people having things of various sizes in their eyes…

Hey, I’m not a Christian, so all I’ve got in front of my eyes is my rose-coloured glasses. But the thing about the Trinity is that it allows three different entities, but by saying they are all aspects of the one God, it allows Christianity to claim that it is strictly monotheistic. It may be only a conceit, a legal fiction if you will, but it’s a very important one to Christianity.

What I’m asking is: If JWs don’t have this belief (fiction or not), do they consider themselves polytheistic?