Jesus’ death was necessary because it drew attention to him and his alleged lifestyle & teachings. It made him a martyr. Had he been left to rot in a dungeon and forgotten along with his zany ideas, his message would be lost and salvation would remain out of reach.
Why’s it got to be more complicated than that?
Because it doesn’t rectify almost a 1000 years of god asking for and demanding sacrifices.
Which is a huge pity, if the church required the smoke of dead flesh to pay for your sins I could probably get good BBQ up here in the North West.
Ive seen variants of this statement in this thread. God did not make automatons. He created us in His image. This suggests on some levels, we are like Him.
When we were created, there was no sin. Satan, through his jealousy convinced Eve to take part in Knowledge of good and evil. Eve, a child of God, like any child), disobeyed her Father (God) and bit the apple (I think this is a metaphor). She then convinced Adam (Adam trusted Eve) and bit the apple too.
This gave Gods children the level of comprehension to determine between right and wrong.
What this says to us is that we have always had the choice to make the right and wrong decisions. As a parent, we attempt to teach our children the capability of making the right decision at a given moment. We cannot be there for everyone and they will make the wrong decisions. Sometimes, as a parent, that wrong decision has consequences of punishment. God is no different with His children. Wrong decisions have consequences.
We have always has “choice”, “Free Will”.
According to you, they didn’t know that what they were doing was wrong until after they did it.
Why were they punished for this?
More importantly why are we still punished for this? It does not seem that a “loving god” as the Christians claim theirs is would perpetuate punishment to the children of those who committed the “crime” in perpetuity.
The obvious answer to the above is that the Christian God as believed by many, if not most Christians, is a prick.
Knowing that you’re going to come back again, even if the experience is really nasty, reduces it to something akin to surgery under total anaesthetic. It’s a little like dying…and you come back from it, so it isn’t quite as scary.
And, as was mentioned above, some denominations say that Jesus, while pent in Hell for three days, did not suffer there. He was immune from the fires and pitch and torments and woe. Other denominations may hold different views.
Ah, but what if God is the place? What if God participates bodily in creation. i.e., creation is less like painting or sculpture, and more like dance?
As Dan O’Neill, somewhat hysterically, wondered, what if we’re in God’s toe? What if a snapping turtle came along and bit off that toe! Watch out for snapping turtles, God! And rocks! Don’t stub your toe on a rock!
Theology is incomplete without a Dan O’Neill reference…
To learn that it is wrong. What you have to understand is more then the action they took, but the result of the action (The ability to judge between good.evil, right/wrong)
Just because one doesnt realize they have done wrong, doesnt exempt them from a punishment per se.
Bold mine.
Yes I do agree that my beliefs have changed a lot since I started posting here. From politically conservative w/ christian leanings to hard core Christian ‘fundi’ status, to abandonment of religion and a belief in a all loving God who desires to know us and for us to know God.
You said my way could never work for you, that’s great, it’s suppose to be that way (using my beliefs in this determination). You have your own way and everyone does, the trick is to find it.
As for facts, It was by questioning them that I started to lose faith in what man calls facts, and realizing that there is so much unknown that certain things called facts are actually unknowable and just things fit into the current known model.
I know he was a Jew and all, but Jesus’ teachings (or rather, the dudes who purported to teach them) never stuck me as having a whole lot to do with Yahweh, the angry nature god and thus not a lot to do with the culture of burnt offerings. He was something new, or at least very different. IMHO
The Bible is the story of God’s accommodation to agriculture.
At first, God cursed Adam to eat bread in the sweat of his brow. God rejected Cain’s offering of grain.
But, later, Jesus not only produces bread miraculously, but, somewhat akin to John Barleycorn, he becomes bread.
God’s hatred for mankind is symbolized by God’s hatred of bread. He gets over it.
(Mmm… Gonna start a loaf of sourdough…)
What makes you think any of that is true at all. People still practice Buddism , whose moral teachings about how we treat each other are remarkably similar to those of JC. He started teaching 600 years before JC did and was not a martyr , had no need to be sacrificed.
Buddha meditated under a tree. Jesus was nailed to a wooden post, and sometimes, poetically, is said to have died on a tree. Odin was hanged on a tree. And the eldest gods created man from tree stumps… Adam and Eve gained wisdom from one tree, and nearly acquired immortality from another…
Clearly, it’s trees all the way down!
The hell it doesn’t.
Christ sacrificed His life in order to washed the sins of people because no one found righteous. The proof that no one is righteous is found on romans 3:9-18. since Jesus was conceived by Mary from the Holy Spirit (mt. 1:20) therefore Jesus is the Son of God (mt.3:17) Thus, only Jesus is qualified. His blood is greater than any sacrificial animal (heb.9:14). Conclusion Jesus suffered and die on the cross in order people can have eternal life through faith in Christ.
That’s not proof. That’s some words on a sheet of paper.
Of course that means that God isn’t omnipotent, since He wouldn’t have to go through such silliness if He were.
And now, since their sins were all washed by Jesus’ great sacrifice, they became righteous, especially those with faith in Christ.
This can be easily observed by their behavior.
I would think it was only necessary, because If the Bible story is true,God Knew they would disobey Him and still punished the human race because of it,He also knew that Satan would harm His children but let Satan harm them, so it is only necessary because God wanted sin and suffering to exist.
It doesn’t say much for a loving, caring father, so either God didn’t or doesn’t know all things, or he is not a Good loving father but a cruel one,it can’t be both ways. A human father doesn’t know ahead of time what his children will do, and he makes sure they know him and tries his best to teach each one, nor does he pick out one child and its children and then punish all the rest, even to have his favorites kill a lot of people just to give them a land,or building!
According to the Gospel writers even Jesus didn’t know the father’s will, if he did he would not have said “If” it is your will, take this chalice from me".So how a mere mortal is suposed to know the will of God is in question. And humans error, and don’t we just have the words of humans as to what God wants?
You have hit my point exactly, the word “God” means existence. Not a being,but Being.