Non-Christians - what do you know about Jesus ?

[Babybirdmum]

Atheists, agnostics, maybe raised as a Christian’s but not that into it…
I am just interested to see what ideas you have about Jesus. I was talking about it to my dad the other day and I said that I felt that a lot of people think Jesus is a made up fairytale, they don’t realise he is an actual historical figure.

But you believing in that requires faith?

To add: whoever that person (or persons) was, he wasn't god, or the son of god.

I think its s bit insulting to assume non Christians don’t “know” about Jesus. I think I have been forced to know a shitload. Catholic Jesus, Protestant Jesus, Evangelical Jesus, baby Jesus, historically relevant Jesus—the Jesus in whose name men, women, and children were forcibly converted, or killed, or enslaved? Why, yes, I know a lot about him.

Nothing, because there simply aren't any convincing contemporary accounts. There could well have been a historical Jesus, but I don't know it. I do know a bit about the apocalyptic cult that adopted him as a messiah though but nothing much about the many messiahs/christs that precided him either.

Because it’s just stories. The plural of anecdote is not evidence. And any stories from so long ago, whether or not they had kernels of truth in them or not, are not especially likely to retain much realistic truth. Newspaper reports written the day after can be way off.
But as I said earlier - I don’t believe in any higher power, I have absolutely no sense of one, no longing for one. No “deep down I know there must be SOMETHING”. No “I’m not religious I’m just spiritual”. Maybe if I wanted there to be something in it, I’d be happy to pick a religion. But I don’t! I just don’t feel any need. So it all comes down to faith, not evidence. The evidence works for you - you have faith. I have no faith - so the evidence appears to me exceptionally shaky.

I just think it’s very difficult as an adult to not find Bible stories silly. I really don’t mean to be offensive by that, I just mean I struggle to relate to adults who can leave skepticism aside and believe in heaven/hell/miracles etc. and also believe that things that did happen (flood etc.) were sent by god.

I don't doubt Jesus being real - I’m sure there was a man with a couple of tricks up his sleeve that people didn’t understand back then for various reasons at the time (lack of education/scientific knowledge), and I’m sure news about him probably spread and people wrote stories and word was passed around and exaggerated and added to etc along the way, as stories often are. It’s not like anyone would have been fact-checking his Wikipedia! 😂

I just don’t believe that there is any connection with such a person and a “god” of any kind.

Although I don’t believe in any god, I do very much believe in the power of blind faith, and if that’s a gift you have that helps you in trials in your life then more power to you. I hope it brings you peace/comfort.

No it doesn't.

I also "believe" in Gravity.

Gravity is an accepted scientific fact but your theory of universes exploding and making a new universe is not… the Big Bang theory just states an explosion caused the universe. I saw god was the initial cause but you say another universe was, how is that different to me saying god caused it?

"What do you know about Jesus?"

He was a man that lived in Judea. He wasn't a magic sky fairy.

Not all that much.
That in the bible he's the son of god. He was Jewish but 'invented/pioneered' Christianity.
That he was born in a stable in Bethlehem to a virgin.
That he was friends with prostitutes and didn't judge people for their sins as long as they repented?
That he was sacrificed on a cross by the Romans and then he came back to life on Easter.
I think that's about it...

Who created God?

If you think God can just exist, why can't the universe just exist?

You have a God of the Gaps OP, but many other Christians reject the Big Bang theory, say the Earth is no more than 4 thousand years old, and dinosaur fossils were put there as a test of faith. Why is your version of God better than theirs? They obviously have more faith than you do.

My references to where Paul views Jesus as a man, nearly all come from those letters commonly agreed as written by by him.

the Big Bang theory just states an explosion caused the universe

No, it doesn't.

Bing Bang is the origin point of the universe, but it didn't "create" anything.

But how do you know what his “will” is if there is not one single proof of “his” existence, and no one has ever met this entity? Where did you get the information that pertains to knowing what this wii is?

There has to be something that exists outside energy matter time and space that started everything, which is God

This is an irreconcilable absurdity.

I would say that is a small proportion of modern day Christians (mostly in USA?) as the Catholic Church certainly accepts both the Big Bang and evolution as being the ways God made the world.
Universes stretching back into infinity is not something we have evidence for (mind you would be hard to think what the evidence could be)

Its easy to found a new cult and not uncommon to create an offshoot of a more sucessful cult and garner enough folliwers to become a full fledged religion. Mohammed with Islam? Ron Hubbard founded a very successful religion as a joke (scientology) and Joseph Smith founded an enormously popular schismatic cult (the Mormons). None of them were deified after death but then they didn’t die early enough, as Jesus is supposed to have died, so that they each built up a corpus of documentation and followers presupposing a higher or alternate power.

The fact that Jesus’s followers ended up settling on s version of his life and death that retconned him into being a part of the godhead was quite surprising and formed the basis of conflict in the early church. If he’d lived (if he lived at all) extravagant claims of his divinity might have never arisen and he would simply have vanished with his sect of Jewish followers. There were plenty if other schismatics at the time.

Atheist here

i am prepared to believe there was a man known as Jesus of Nazareth. He might have been the inspiration for Christianity, certainly stories and legends built up around someone and caused the splinter from Judaism.

I do not think it follows that therefore the Gospels are true or he was the son of god and result of a virgin birth, no.

OP, you come across as someone from a cult - like you’ve been programmed with thr official response to all objections

Ah that’s where we differ. I think it’s quite a complex multilayered book. Take for example this Geneology Name acrostic,

Not a single contemporary of Jesus wrote about him so there isn't really any proof of his existence in historical terms. The stories of him may contain some truth but they would have been vey distorted due to the number of times they were passed on verbally. He could even be a mixture of people as there were many itinerant rabbis back then and I'm sure many of them knew a few basic magic tricks that would have amazed the uneducated masses.

I do not believe there was a bloke called Jesus (or anything else) who was born of a virgin (a very popular claim for various holy men and gods), walked on water, performed miracles, was crucified and rose from the dead.

It doesn't matter how many there are (and it's a huge number, and not just in the US—my in-laws are young Earthers / fossil deniers), my question is why doesn't the OP believe in that version of God?

Ok. I think by the time you’re finding codes and acrostics in the bible, and suggesting that these are good evidence, you’re starting to come across as a bit cult like. In a book that big, I expect people could find all sorts of other hidden meanings and secret concealed codes on any topic. But the people looking for them are trying to back up their thinking. This isn’t evidence. It’s looking for reinforcement.

This articulates exactly what I think.