# So, just what was Jesus' message? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 29, 2002, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212 "2002-04-29T02:41:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/1 "2002-04-29T02:41:19Z")
Love thy neighbor as thyself? I am the light and the way? The meek shall inherit the Earth? Well? Anybody wanna take a stab at distilling the message of the four Gospels into one medium-sized post and thereby clueing us _all_ in to what Jesus was trying to get across? To me, it can be summed up as thus: Stop being such a dick to everybody. ---
**Author:** ![Muad\_Dib](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/35a633/32.png) [@Muad\_Dib](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muad_Dib)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/2 "2002-04-29T02:47:23Z")
**Go forth, and be excellent to each other** ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 3:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/3 "2002-04-29T03:13:45Z")
“This is my commandment-that you love one another.” ---
**Author:** ![Calliope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Calliope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Calliope)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/4 "2002-04-29T03:18:43Z")
Love one another as I have loved you. That’s all there is. Love. ---
**Author:** ![Soup\_du\_jour](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@Soup\_du\_jour](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soup_du_jour)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/5 "2002-04-29T03:58:45Z")
I entered this room to say something… …but Guin said it first. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/6 "2002-04-29T04:01:03Z")
Same as all the other “messiahs”. “_You should follow me because I can do a few tricks and make a few vague predictions that will be hard to define, but it doesn’t matter because I’ll be long gone by the time you realize what’s going on._” ---
**Author:** ![Tsubaki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d07c76/32.png) [@Tsubaki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tsubaki)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/7 "2002-04-29T04:06:55Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Czarcasm \* > \*\*Same as all the other “messiahs”. > > “_You should follow me because I can do a few tricks and make a few vague predictions that will be hard to define, but it doesn’t matter because I’ll be long gone by the time you realize what’s going on._” \*\* Hmm…do I sense a hint of cynicism? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/8 "2002-04-29T04:09:52Z")
“Now you just wait right here… I’ll be back.” 2000 years later, we’re waiting for his return. Anybody else getting bored? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Muad\_Dib](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/35a633/32.png) [@Muad\_Dib](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muad_Dib)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/9 "2002-04-29T04:44:17Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by JohnT \* > \*\*“Now you just wait right here… I’ll be back.” > > 2000 years later, we’re waiting for his return. Anybody else getting bored? 😉 \*\* :eek: :eek: :eek: **HERETIC!!!** :mad: :mad: :mad: We will burn you!!! ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/10 "2002-04-29T05:03:23Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Muad’Dib \* > \*\* > > :eek: :eek: :eek: > > **HERETIC!!!** > > :mad: :mad: :mad: > > We will burn you!!! \*\* No, that’s the message of his _followers_. ---
**Author:** ![ssj\_man2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9bcb4/32.png) [@ssj\_man2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ssj_man2k)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 5:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/11 "2002-04-29T05:37:50Z")
I advise you all to get a book called “Buddha’s Little Instruction Booklet.” I think Buddha and Jesus had a lot in common in the sense of their messages. ---
**Author:** ![betenoir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/258eb7/32.png) [@betenoir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/betenoir)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 5:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/12 "2002-04-29T05:51:06Z")
I belive the Great Commandment was : love God with all your heart and all your strength, and love your neighbor as youself. Then he added the big news that you’re neighbor was not only your friends, family, members of your tribe, or whoever counts as “us” in the phrase “us versus them” but actually included the "them"s, even icky Samaritains. A radical message at the time. Still is. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 7:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/13 "2002-04-29T07:39:03Z")
> [@](#): > > I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. ---
**Author:** ![robinc308](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b782af/32.png) [@robinc308](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robinc308)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 7:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/14 "2002-04-29T07:59:02Z")
That God loves you so much, that we would take on human form, with all the indignity that it entails (especially for a supreme being), in order to show you just how much he loves you, and to provide a way for you to be reconciled to him. ---
**Author:** ![MEBuckner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mebuckner/32/2896_2.png) [@MEBuckner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MEBuckner)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 8:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/15 "2002-04-29T08:24:24Z")
Clearly, you’re getting a somewhat different emphasis than you would if you just walked around asking people in Tennessee. While evangelical Christians wouldn’t necessarily _disagree_ with at least some of what’s already been posted, there are a lot of major traditions in Christianity which place a rather different emphasis on things. Evangelicals, and the whole missionary tradition in Christianity (including pre-Reformation and non-Protestant Christianity) would probably cite the following three verses: > [@](#): > > For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. – [John 3:16](http://bible.gospelcom.net/cgi-bin/bible?passage=JOHN+3:16&language=english&version=NIV-IBS&showfn=on&showxref=on) > [@](#): > > Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” – [John 14:6](http://bible.gospelcom.net/cgi-bin/bible?passage=JOHN+14:6&language=english&version=NIV-IBS&showfn=on&showxref=on) > [@](#): > > Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age. – [Matthew 28:19-20](http://bible.gospelcom.net/cgi-bin/bible?passage=MATT+28:19-20&language=english&version=NIV-IBS&showfn=on&showxref=on) Just as different people calling themselves Christians will declare different portions of the Gospels to be _the_ central message of Jesus, so too will interpretations of that collection of verses vary. An evangelical interpretation (which has some fairly deep roots in Christian thought) would be along the lines of: [ul] [li]Human beings are sinners, but Jesus’ death and resurrection saves human beings from sin.[/li][li]Only faith in Jesus Christ (and not any other “path to God”) will save people.[/li][li]Christians have a duty to evangelize or proselytize; to convert others and thus save them from eternal damnation.[/li][/ul] Of course, many evangelicals would claim anything other than the above isn’t “real” Christianity. Personally, I would say if people self-identify as Christians and they have something at least vaguely resembling a belief in the core idea of Christianity–that Jesus of Nazareth was “the Christ”, whatever “Christ” may be held to mean–then they’re Christians, and Christians have historically been a diverse lot, all the more so nowadays. However, while your more “fundamentalist” Christians are usually the ones who are quick to claim all the other Christians aren’t “real” Christians, I think it’s important to keep their more liberal brethren honest by pointing out that what they believe, however nice it may be, is also hardly the only possible interpretation of what’s written in the Bible or the New Testament or the “red letter” portions of the Gospels, and that historically “fundamentalist” ideas have been _at least_ as important–really, more important for most of the history of Christianity–than more modern and more humanistic interpretations. As to what Jesus of Nazareth _really_ said–well, he’s dead. (Articles of the Christian faith notwithstanding; he’s no longer regularly returning phone calls, at any rate.) All we have to go on are accounts of his message written decades after his death, by people who had their own “messages” to get out, and which accounts are variously refracted and interpreted in the light of letters written by other people after Jesus’ death, plus the whole corpus of Jewish scripture in the “Old Testament”. Which has lead to quite a few different attempts at interpretation, some of which seem diametrically opposed to each other. ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 11:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/17 "2002-04-29T11:27:00Z")
There are so many good responses already that I’ll just deal with one of the ignorant ones: > [@](#): > > “You should follow me because I can do a few tricks and make a few vague predictions that will be hard to define, but it doesn’t matter because I’ll be long gone by the time you realize what’s going on.” When I was in high school, I had a keen interest in linguistics, and I was the first student in our system to take three languages together: French, Spanish, and German. I was an intellectual snob, and a resentful one at that, mostly because we were six poor little Injuns crammed into a four-room house my father built, and I had to endure much taunting in my youth even as I suffered from a form of petit mal epilepsy, a big brother drill sergeant (not my good brother who died, but my evil brother nine years older than me) who beat me, and a scrawny, underdeveloped, anemic body that made me the laughing stock in gym class. I hated Jesus, probably even more than you do, Czar. I derided the intellect of people who believed in Him simply because my brain, despite its misfires, gave me the ammunition. I especially picked on my Spanish teacher, mercilessly deriding her because she was a believer and she pissed me off by being so fucking nice all the time. She was kind and charitable, never saying a harsh word. She was gentle and patient, always giving encouragement and wide smiles of approval whenever the dumb kids finally grasped a matter of grammar. Her goodness infuriated me. Hers was the last period of the afternoon. One day, I hung around after class to shmooze with her and (mainly) the gorgeous new exchange student from Ecuador, Susana Jaramillo. She had a beautiful mane of thick straight black hair that framed a face so lovely that she starred in my masturbation fantasies for years. Her father was a general in the Ecuadorian army, and she had the class and style of nobility. I even stole one of my mother’s pieces of heirloom jewelry and gave it to her. (I later had to get it back, certainly one of the low points of my life.) That afternoon, as the three of us chatted, I became so mesmerized by her beauty that I just blurted out, “Creo que eres la creatura la mas encantadora de todas que andan por el mundo.” (I think you’re the most enchanting creature of all those who walk upon the earth.) My heart pounded with lust as she gazed at me with her twinkling eyes and said with her soft voice and gentle trill, “Where did you get those beautiful words?” I glared at Mrs. Hale when she interrupted to compliment me on my grasp of Spanish metaphor. But it was Susana who capture my attention for the next several minutes. She doted over me, playing little games with her fingers on my chest, giggling demurely whenever I would shudder. I wanted the world to disappear and leave me with her. When she finally left the room, I proceeded to torture Mrs. Hale by criticizing points of her grammar during our conversation. I told her that Spanish was a primitive and trivial language and that any dolt ought to be able to speak it with ease. I stood in front of her desk, lecturing her on how she, and not I, ought to set the example for other students. “What good are you?” I demanded. “Just what good _are_ you?” I stifled my conscience, whose tiny voice I ignored, while I berated her, telling her she was worthless. I sneered at her teary eyes, angry that she wouldn’t respond to me. I was staring with exasperation at her quivering lip when I heard the angry voice behind me. “You stupid boy.” I jerked around, horrified, and saw Susana standing in the doorway, clutching her books to her chest, her face stained with tears, her eyes red with rage. She marched toward me and flung her books at me, knocking me backwards against the desk, leaving me stunned and bewildered as I feverishly struggled to manufacture words that might appease her. She walked over to Mrs. Hale and put her arm around her, stroking her head as she turned to me and glared at me with an emotionless contempt. “I will never speak my primitive language with you again. Your own ignorance will destroy you.” I leaned over the desk, and began stuttering apologies, begging her to let me explain. She slapped me and told me to leave the room. As I floated toward the door in a dazed stupor, wishing that none of this was real and that I could turn back time, I stopped and pondered for a moment in the eerie quiet of distant echoes, lockers slamming, kids laughing, a shriek and the sounds of running. “Mrs. Hale,” I said, not looking back at her, swallowing the knot in my throat, “I’m really sorry.” I heard her walking over to me, and she put her arms on my shoulders and gently coaxed me into facing her. She tenderly held my chin as I glimpsed Susana in a blur behind her, leering at me. She searched my eyes with her radiant countenance and said finally, “There’s a good boy in there somewhere. Find him.” The scene was profoundly jarring. I breathed in little hiccups while I sobbed like a baby, holding onto Mrs. Hale as she squeezed me in a motherly hug. Just moments before, I had been murderously ridiculing her and now she was comforting me. I could feel all my hate for her empty out of me like a river of vomit, leaving in its wake a love and adoration that I feel to this day. That was the message that Jesus brought. Love your enemies. Give God praise when people persecute you. Be meek and humble. Forgive as many wrongs as you perceive. Serve others, and hold strongly to your faith. Give. Die. And be reborn. ---
**Author:** ![BlackKnight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/eb8c5e/32.png) [@BlackKnight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlackKnight)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 11:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/18 "2002-04-29T11:47:02Z")
There go three minutes I won’t get back. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 11:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/19 "2002-04-29T11:52:09Z")
Thank you for posting that **Lib**. ---
**Author:** ![grimpixie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ecb155/32.png) [@grimpixie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grimpixie)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 11:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/20 "2002-04-29T11:53:28Z")
Jesus’ message? - “God to the rescue” ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2002, 12:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212/21 "2002-04-29T12:53:10Z")
Lib, as usual you’ve totally twisted it. I no more hate Jesus, if he ever existed, than I hate Clark Kent or Baba Yaga. The fact of the matter is that I just don’t find the teachings attributed to him to be any greater then most “messiahs” that have populated the Earth for the last two or three thousand years. Vague platitudes, telling followers that they are special, promising revenge on non-believers and a great reward in the afterlife? Jesus didn’t have a monopoly on those concepts-he was merely lucky enough to have a ruler of a major city of his time convert and then force his city to convert, which gave Christianity just enough of a headstart to pull ahead of the race. Attributing “hate” to those who would disagree with you is a cheap trick, btw. What I would believe or not believe is far more complex and would not be changed, especially if I were you in that bizarre story you posted above. Kind words and a slap changed your whole belief system? I guess my beliefs just aren’t that shallow. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-just-what-was-jesus-message/106212.md?page=2)