Jesus held on the cross with nails in his hands

[TaFox]

DD5 is in year 1 and has been learning about Jesus at school. Great stuff in the spirit of Easter.

The RE teacher told the class how Jesus was NAILED to the cross.

This is quite graphic for a little girl who believes that the Easter bunny will leave eggs in our garden.

Should I tell school that this is too much info for little ears?

The gospels aren’t in themselves historically credible documents, as compiled by believers, and only one was written within the lifetime of anyone who could have been an eyewitness. There are precisely two references to the life and death of Jesus from non-Christian historians of the period. Most historians do now think that there was, on balance, a real Jewish preacher who was executed in the first century CE, on whose life and sayings Christianity is based, and that his crucifixion and baptism in particular are likely to be historical (criterion of embarrassment), but that’s about it.

I went to a church secondary school as an atheist (my mum taught at the catchment school). We used to have our half termly church services at the local cathedral (pictured).

As the youngest, sat at the front, my friend was worried about the very imposing stone Jesus sculpture over our heads was held up. “Nails?,” she wondered? “Surely not!,” I replied. 😂😂😂😂

Yes but people on this thread are claiming Easter is not about bunnies and eggs.

Ds was shown a video in school where Jesus was nailed to the cross when he was 5. He's never stopped talking about it and how awful it was seeing Jesus scream in pain.

I think talking about it is fine, I think showing ds and his class a graphic programme on how they did exactly that was too far. Lots of parents complained, me included.

For those of us sent to Sunday school, years ago, and those that attended school, this was taught to everyone. We all survived, no one appeared to be traumatised.

Easter isn’t really based on chocolate and fluffy bunnies.😗. It’s, for believers, our most religious time - which is why all shops must shut on Easter Sunday.

The Romans DID keep very good records, you're right, and they have no record of him or any man vaguely fitting his description.
the four gospels were written by people who never met Jesus and were not born until several years of centuries after his death.
Jesus, or anyone fitting his description, was NOT crucified. As you said, the Romans kept very good records.

All we have id word of mouth stories written down by people decades to centuries after the supposed events.

Horrible histories is much worse. Should kids also not be taught about the reality of the world wars etc? I don't see the problem.

Would you ever cop on. This is why so many children and young adults are struggling with living in the real world. Parents want to censor everything. Then when kids are in the big wide world they cannot cope because Mammy and Daddy have shielded them from everything. Ridiculous.

And I agree with them. They are two different things.

Easter is different things for different people, same as Christmas. If you’re not religious, Easter and Christmas are celebrated as time off work, lots of nice food and drinks and family time.

Easter is 100% about bunnies and eggs to some people! Not everyone is religious or Christian

I'm surprised that you haven't brought your daughter into a church, when there isn't a mass or celebration going on, to simply walk around inside the church, for educational reasons. Even if you don't practice a religion yourself or in your family, having a look around a church can be an interesting way to spend a short time with a kid. They see things so differently to us adults and it can spark great conversations with them.

My little boy was also very upset about this graphic description in school recently, OP. He cried a lot, and it gave him nightmares. He’s also 5. To my knowledge, they sensitively describe or omit horror or graphic detail from every other subject, and I don’t see why religion should be any different at that age.

I find it super interesting too! I especially love the mish-mash of modern christmas, with its merging of ancient traditions with a thousand years of being a culturally Christian country.

I don't think the timing of Easter was appropriated by the early church at all. In the biblical Easter story Jesus celebrated Passover (aka the Last Supper) the day before he was killed. The date of Easter is loosely connected to Passover, although, due to various technicalities around different calendars that I don't really understand, they don't exactly coincide. Proximity to pagan festivals is just coincidental.

The name being appropriated, well yes, in England with our Anglo Saxon heritage we do seem to have gone down the route of using a word that could been derived from Eostra. But worldwide, the Christian festival is often named after words derived from Passover. Pascua in Spain, Paques in France etc.

Fascinating stuff!

Crucifixion was (possibly is) a fact of life. That is a given.
But there are facts that we do not detail to children when they are small and quite rightly.
Let's have a lesson for 5 year olds on electric chairs, hanging, guillotines ... I don't think so.
Religion should not override basic principles of making learning age appropriate.

The Romans DID keep very good records, you're right, and they have no record of him or any man vaguely fitting his description.

I thought the Romans did have a record of a Joshua Ben Joseph being crucified, but he didn’t fit the classical description of Jesus as depicted in renaissance paintings, being about 5ft 3in tall and dark skinned.

Horrible Histories age range is established by the publisher as appropriate for 7-9. Not 5yr olds.

Our history and the Christian festivals are all rooted in Paganism and if Christianity shaped our culture and Judaism shaped Christianity, then both had a lot of influence. It would be hard to find a traditional Pagan Temple though I agree!

But if you think a child should attend church just in case they get invited to a Christian wedding, funeral or baptism as the person I was replying to stated, then you should really cover all religions just in case.

It’s not about “surviving” or “trauma”, it’s about age-appropriate material. They could describe the plot to Nightmare on Elm Street to a bunch of 5yr olds and have them “survive”, but it doesn’t mean it’s age appropriate.

When DD was 5 she was taught about the gunpowder plot including quite graphic details about being hanged drawn and quartered😫she's fine though even if though it was a shock for her!

I suppose it's what level they need to know at that age.

Jesus was killed by being attached to a cross.
Jesus was nailed to a cross.
Jesus was flailed, had his skin taken from his back, had a crown of thorns put in his head, nailed to a cross and left in the sun to die.

How much detail do you need to get into to get over the key details. That he was executed on a cross?

I am sure that if the entire details about the flagellation were taught to a 5 year old, then there would be complaints on here.

Just don't read her the biblical account in the Gospel of Matthew. Reduces teenagers to tears.

About the nails... usually people were fastened to their crucifix (which wasn't necessarily a cross) by ropes round the wrists. If you try to support the weight of the body with nails through the hands, the hands tear and the body slumps or falls - inefficient. Romans crucified many people, they knew how to do it.

I learnt this in reception - didn't give it a second thought . My brother on the other hand got the wrong end of the stick and thought we had got cross buns because Jesus died on a big hot cross bun

I'm not sure the nails through the wrists are the worst bit of crucifixion - the slow death bit is probably worse.

I've never quite worked out why some forms of execution are considered more child friendly than others. On Cbeebies they react walking the plank everyday in a way in which they just wouldn't do for a hanging or other forms of pirate execution.... Or at the pantomine it is for the audience to short walk the plank for Captain Hook but if you called for him to be stoned to death you would probably be kicked out the theatre

Some children who's parents go to church will have heard this from they were babies though, church doesn't give out a content warning for sermons!

The whole point of Easter is to celebrate Jesus death, burial and resurrection. Kids see and hear far worse through normal every day life nowadays sadly.