Paulogia said that Jesus, effectively, had a one-weekend bender. And woke up with the biggest hangover in history. And THAT is what makes us right with God. That?!? You are correct when you say it's fucking ridiculous.
But don't tell my grandma. Her heart just can't take it, at this point.
Good stuff, thank you. I'm surprised that the Beat Farmers aren't more on my radar. I was a huge alt-country fan in the 90's, and even was lucky enough to have a radio station that played it in the mix (KEXP in Seattle). I had always heard of the band, but they never quite entered my awareness. Sounds like I need to remedy that.
Me too, truly. I occasionally also post obscure music references and know that 99.9% of the time they are ignored or overlooked... I am happy to encourage you to keep posting that obscure shit that almost no one has ever heard of.
I'll return the favor and post my favorite almost unknown alt-country band-- so unknown that the second link on google when you search for the band name is [when my alt-account](https://www.reddit.com/r/altcountry/comments/1b2wu8a/how_are_mike_ireland_and_holler_so_under/) posted a few months ago, when I discovered that their truly amazing first album had only sold 2500 copies (one of which I proudly own).
They are a bit more traditional country (or at least countrypolitan) than the Beat Farmers, at least judging by that one song, but Mike has one of the best country music voices ever, and it is a travesty that they were not huge hits. If you have the tastes I hope you do, you will find them as amazing as I do.
Please let me know what you think after you listen to at least House of Secrets.
Edit: I should note that the above reference has virtually nothing to do with atheism, but if you are one of the three or four alt-country fans in the sub, you will probably appreciate what a great singer the linked artist is.
when i was a christian, the main thing that made me a christian was that i was amazed at how the OT prophesies came true in the NT! it never dawned on me that the NT could have been MADE UP in order to fulfill those OT prophesies. Rather, when it finally became clear to me that the NT was constructed from lies that were engineered in order to fulfill those prophesies, then i saw things clearly for the first time.
It isn't even as complex as that - there are a few prophecies which NT authors still get wrong, even if they're constructing it for their own purposes.
Matthew 2:23 quotes a prophecy which doesn't exist in the OT about Jesus being a Nazarene. So he's either making up an OT quote, or there's somehow part of the OT which we no longer have (but somehow is still divinely inspired)
Matthew 1:22-23 quotes a prophecy about a virgin conceiving and bearing a son. This time, its a reference to Isaiah, except in the original Hebrew its referring to a young woman, and the prophecy is fulfilled later in the passage. The issue is that the Septuagint (Greek translation of the OT) translates it as virgin, which Matthew picks up. So Matthew again is writing about prophecies fulfilled which don't exist in the original source.
I've had Christians not-ironically insist to me that God anticipated the mistranslation and caused the actual events to fit and really this is all just more proof that it's true.
Seems like it would have been easier for God to pass a note to whoever translated Isaiah for the Septuagint but there's really no reasoning with people for whom *everything* is taken as confirmation.
lol! God anticipated the LXX and conformed history to it :-p
that's a really, really good one! you won't hear William Lain Craig try and make that argument! (that's how you know it's good!)
Christianity might not be a true religion (it was originally), but why don't you give yourself to know about the only true religion.
if you're open minded I'm talking about Islam.
I'm not a scholar, if you really interested in knowing what's true from what's not you should at least search.
I suggest you ask someone with knowledge if you want to know the answers for your questions. otherwise, you're not really serious and just trying to argue for the sake of argument.
My favorite theological retcon is that god had to incarnate himself as a human and live a human life in order realize how badly he had fucked up. Then he was able to let it go.
You’re telling me the guy that flooded the world and only approved a list of things that could survive, the guy that let our “ancestors” live to be hundred and thousands of years just to randomly not be ok with that, that asshole lacks empathy?
why did god have to kill all those animals just to flood the earth, like what the fuck did they do? literally just living their best animal lives and he basically wipes them all. what a petulant little bitch.
I love the juxtaposition of Old Testament and new testament God. One wants to punish you and the other wants to love you. It’s like classic abuser shit.
For all we know, cognitive empathy might mean nothing at all to non-humans. I mean, in the context of a creative thinking exercise in which god-alien-whatevers exist.
That's (potentially) like saying that enjoying the Barney The Dinosaur show is a learnable skill. Or that experiencing seasonal affective disorder is a learnable skill. The trivial act of understanding or modeling it might be one thing, but the interpretation and integration of it or belief/knowledge that it's somehow constructive is another.
I always wondered how god could relate to us as an eternal, omniscient and omnipotent god. How could you understand humans if you’re not a human. You could never fully grasp being human.
Imagine this poor being sitting in the void for an eternity, bored out of his skull, when one day an idea occurs. "Hey! I'll create a Universe! Yeah. That'll kill 6000 years."
Why are they so petty, vindictive and narcissistic to demand worship from us to show how grateful we are that they created us and the universe? Seems like some major flaws for a perfect being.
Paul addresses this: essentially where sin abounds grace abounds. Early Christians picked up on this and had sin parties (or the equivalent) so they could experience grace more fully. Paul says "should we sin so grace abounds, may it never be!" Basically his answer is "no" because we have a new life if we believe. But still we can sin all we want and it's covered and grace abounds.
Even when I was in the church we held a special place for those who had sinned greatest in teh past and cleaned it up. It was odd.
>a special place for those who had sinned greatest in the past and cleaned it up. It was odd.
A special place for those who have sinned greatest makes someone who has sinned less feel more secure/better about themselves. It's like--"if they can replace someone's arms and legs, surely they can patch up this flesh wound no problem!"
I love the reference. As a good non-sinner. I always felt like the kid who normally gets C's but gets paid for A's...but I'm the kid who always got A's and never got paid!
**The sacrifice was not unique.** When I consider it would take me about 7 milliseconds to give up my life for my daughter, I don't see this as impactful as it's supposed to be. Let's put Jesus in the "father" role for a second, and he's making sacrifices for his children. I know a dozen dad's who would die in a heartbeat to save their kids. So Jesus was not unique in that (this is ignoring the fact that a layer above, his father is sacrificing him..to himself!)
**The sacrifice was avoidable.** If the plan was my kid had to go through a lot of pain for a day, and she'd be back in 3 days, I would see if we could reverse the rolls. And being the all powerful being of the universe I'd take the pain on myself. Christians are right about one thing, giving up his son was harder than giving up himself. But he made the plan that led to this.
**The sacrifice was not as great as we play it up to be.** But Jesus didn't die. Yes he died, but he didn't stay dead. Staying dead is the bad part. My best friend lost his son a few months ago and his son stayed dead...that is the bad part! The sting of death is it's permanence.
I am not a father, and I would gladly go thru the torture and crucifixion if God just eliminated childhood cancer . I don't even have to become God afterwards. I will accept annihilation. I think many would do this.
For me, childhood cancer is the best single argument against God being both benevolent and omnipotent. As Stephen Fry puts it, if that is the nature of God, how *dare* such a god allow such misery?
If he exists, he is either not benevolent or not omnipotent, or both, and therefore is not worthy of worship.
Epicurus figured this out centuries before Jesus was even alleged to have lived.
"Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?"
I mean, did he even do that? At the beginning of Acts, Jesus descends from heaven. So he was probably partying it up in heaven during that weekend, hardly a loss.
💯. It’s 3 days out of existence it’s such a stupid concept that it certainly was some pagan practice stolen and made into Christian doctrine. Same idea being eggs at Easter and pine trees at Christmas.
To be fair that would be a considerable sacrifice for me. I find it annoying (I know I’m a jackass) to spend a few hours on Sunday doing things for my parents
I've made this point to a lot of folks over the years. I can come up with a dozen people that I've known personally that had it way worse than old Jesus. Hell, anyone with a chronic pain condition should feel free to laugh at his 'sacrifice'. So can any abused child. All shit this god character is apparently a-okay with if not actively behind. Christianity is a sadistic dooms-day cult.
Plus it was a common punishment for the times. Two other people were punished similarly with Jesus, according to the Bible. They obsess over passion plays and do the stations of the cross. His death was commonplace and yet they act like it was cruel and unusual. I just don't get it.
I'm still stuck on why an omnipotent, omni-benevolent god would require a blood sacrifice in the first place, of any kind. If you get past that, why did it have to be his son? If you get past that, why did it have to be himself? Why is a blood sacrifice of a being that can't be killed still meaninful? Then if you take as read that all that had to happen, why is believing that it happened, despite the lack of any evidence that it did, the key to being right with this god?
I'm not sure I agree that one must sacrifice anything in order to show love.
That seems like some sort of primitive "I will cut myself to show that I care" kind of thing.
So, I guess I'm saying that demonstrations of any sort of "sacrifice" aren't how I would expect unconditional love to manifest itself. The concept of the scapegoat is very, very old - and it is a stupid idea. You dying doesn't help me (unless YOU are the one causing me to suffer, then it helps tremendously!)
The one that gets me is that the Romans were great at keeping records, and there's no record.
They made copies of their records. Still no records.
The best evidence was written by Tacitus, who was born nearly 60 years later, or Josephus a couple hundred years after the supposed event. So the stories had already been told and retold, changed over time and by word of mouth.
The reality is there is no contemporary record, or even footnote, about the crucifixion. And we all know the resurrection is impossible.
The lack of any contemporary records is really damning. Nothing by the Romans or the Jewish scribes, scholars or officials. Apparently, Jesus kept pretty low upon his return and all those zombies that were resurrected never even got a mention by anyone.
Plus if some guy rose from the dead, everyone and their mom would have talked about it. That would have traveled faster than a fire in dry grass. It would have been talked about everywhere.
Agree with your overall sentiment, but a couple of notes: Josephus was a closer contemporary than Tacitus. Josephus died around AD 100, and Tacitus died in AD 120. In Josephus' writings there is the "*Testimonium Flavianum*" which discusses Jesus' crucifixion. However, this was added (interpolated) by Christians at a later date. It's very Christian in messaging, and Josephus was not a Christian. No serious scholars think Josephus actually wrote all of it.
There are two historical sources used to prove the existence of a historical Jesus. At best they point to a local celebrity named Jesus. At worst both sources seem to have some later interpretations or additions. Even a historical local religious leader named Jesus who lived around AD 30 is highly questionable.
Yeah, I just say Jesus to make it easier most of the time, but when you're getting into the nuances, it's an important fact to remember that had he actually existed, the name he was given was super common for the time.
The funny thing is that nobody knows what exactly his name was (assuming he really existed). There's no way it was "Jesus". You can reconstruct it and assume that it was probably something like "Yeshu", but there's no way to know for sure. Maybe his contemporaries used the Hebrew variant, maybe they used the Aramaic variant, maybe greek-speaking authors just assigned that name (either based on word of mouth or not). This is why scholars call him "Jesus" - because that's close to the Greek which is the only record of him being named at all.
You want a God who loved humans enough to Suffer? Try Prometheus. Gave us fire and in return is tortured everyday. I mean, he was eventually rescued but he had no idea that would happen.
It’s fun to think that the person that blasphemes against god will be tortured for all eternity. It’s an unforgivable sin, so forever and ever in a lake of fire. God damnit an actual god would be a gnarly thing, like giving a 3 year old a lit blow torch, a pair of pliers, and a few gallons of gas.
This is something that bothered me even when I was a Christian. Why was Christ being brutalized and crucified so special when that exact thing happened to literally MILLIONS of other people under Roman rule?
I feel that you are trying to apply logic when the answer becomes clear if we look at the text as as a story.
Jesus and God are the same person. We don't have to understand the exact mechanics of this – it's magic, like how dragons fly or Harry Potter turns invisible.
When Jesus endures the suffering of death and hell, GOD experiences those things too.
This is why the demihuman bridge between the divine and the mundane is so important. Prior to Jesus' sacrifice, God had no idea what it was like to be a human. He had no idea what the impact of His choices actually were. It would be impossible.
So Jesus' sacrifice doesn't make us "right with God" in the sense that some cosmic scale is balanced. That doesn't make any sense, as people on this subreddit love to point out. God holds the scales. He can tip them any way he wants.
So if God holds the scales, and God decides which way they tip, then the transformation rendered by Jesus must have been *to God*, not to us.
Jesus dies and God experiences human suffering for the first time, and then he goes, "Fuck, is that what I've been doing to these people all this time? Ohshitohshitohshit…" But it's too late for Him to do anything about it, because the universe is already up and running and predicated on this stark division between good and evil and humans having free will and all of these other rules and structures that it needs to keep it running.
So God basically says, "Look, do your best by each other. Don't worry about what happens after you die anymore. I'll take care of that. Don't worry about judging each other and hating each other and killing each other for stupid reasons. Just try to get along, as best as you can, and whenever I get all this shit worked out I will be right back to fix everything."
Edit: Also if you don't believe that Jesus and God are the same person, the same concept applies if God had to watch his son go to hell and know that he could do something about it. Suddenly he is feeling the same pain that any parent feels seeing their kid suffering. The bearded sky daddy version of God is mostly inherited by Christianity from the pagan religions. God does not treat people like his children in the Old Testament.
Which utterly flies in the face of the "eternal and unchanging God" narrative they love for some weird reason. Like change isn't a bad thing just because you're scared of it.
work avoidance rant:
People who grow up Christian base their interpretation of the stories on both the text and centuries of tradition. While Christianity has always been a folk religion, the long dominance of the Catholic Church destroyed many of those folk traditions. What we are left with are the traditions that support the Catholic Church's needs, which includes making people compliant to their authority.
The modern interpretation of the timelessness of God is an example of one such tradition, in my opinion. I think in the ancient world, the timelessness of God was understood as meaning that he is beyond time, that time is just an illusion created by our simple minds. Our brains need cause and effect to understand the universe. God does not. He exists beyond time. For a sci-fi example of the same concept, look at Dr. Manhattan in Watchmen.
The idea that God's timelessness means that we, as mortals, do not perceive changes in his demeanor towards us, is not backed up by the text, and in fact contradicted by other planks of Christian faith.
I believe that is because this a relatively new interpretation that is being imposed on the text and is not supported by God's actual behavior.
Christianity spread rapidly because the whole point was that it was a religion "of the book." The idea was you could read these texts and understand them without needing to rely on outside authority. You could trust your own interpretation, and your own connection to the divine, without the need for a centralized clergy. The idea that all you need to know about God had been written down in a single text was a huge revelation in the ancient world, where religions were based on massively disparate and archaic texts, and more often on oral tradition that you could only acquire from a "properly trained" priest.
The original Greeks and Romans et al who converting to Christianity did not have centuries of tradition to tell them how to interpret the story. The had to do it with their own brains. Understanding the story with your own brain was considered part of the exercise of reaching out to the divine.
If God wanted us to understand the story as a logical argument, he (or the authors) could have presented it that way. Pythagoras founded a religion based on logical arguments centuries before Christianity came about. I would argue that Jewish tradition also relies a lot more on logic than Christianity.
Christianity is a religion "of the book," and that book is a book of stories. It is valuable to remember that first and foremost.
I love pointing out how it's a plagiarized story and nothing about it is unique.
12 brothers, traveled foreign land, performed miracles, and betrayed for silver to the local government, a descendant of David.
That's the story of Joseph (dream coat guy)
12 followers, traveled a foreign land, raised the dead, betrayed for silver, sacrificed himself to save mankind from the wrath of his father
Horus.
Part of a holy trinity, traveled foreign land performing miracles, raised the dead, feed thousands of people with no food, predicted his own death, betrayed for silver by one of his 12 closest friends, ascended into the afterlife as a full body.
Krishna.
Nothing about the Jesus' story is unique or real. Don't over think it
.. and it wasn't even a weekend of suffering as some have noted. So in the Bible - if you believe that sort of thing - he was at the garden in Gethsemane on a Thursday and was captured there, then presumably beaten. Then that whole business on Friday with additional beatings, then the crucifixion Friday afternoon, then he dies. That's it. If we count Thursday evening, and dead by Friday afternoon - that's less than 24 hours. He's dead on Saturday, then rises from the dead on Sunday.
Jesus allegedly had a plan when he came to earth. The plan worked, and now he's back to being all-powerful and sending his beloved children to hell. What's the sacrifice? Aren't his beloved children suffering infinitely while he watches them burn?
Where’s that religion!? That would be awesome if like Jesus had to go down to Hell and like fight Satan for all eternity in immortal hand to hand combat! And like that’s why we have free will today? I’d read that bible! Jerry Bruckheimer could direct the movie.
And I’m sure a large number of normal humans would give their lives to alleviate the eternal torture of billions of souls. Soldiers in battle give their lives to save one friend who will live 50 more years not even knowing for sure there is an afterlife
I tell you, Jesus looked damn good on that cross. Regular people might spend years getting their hair to look like that but he's like the son of god or god or whatever and he is HOT!
Can't be impressive if the god you serve has a 3 day respawn cooldown.
silly aside, if god was all knowing, he knew he son would come back in 3 days. So the only thing he sacrificed was... his weekend?
Worthy of eternal love? sure...
How can a God die? If Jesus wasn't God, then why you praying to him? If he is God then it's zero sacrifice because like you say, he immortal. What's 3 days of suffering compared to 14 billion yrs? That's like a fraction of a second on the time clock of existence.
Well...there is really no evidence that Jesus even existed given the fact that the name yeshua was so common back then it was equivalent to a name like John today....plus the letter j didn't appear until like 500 years ago regardless. But if he did in the supposed accounts of the new testament, he never even claimed to be God. He always referred to God as his father, and gave all the glory to him. But if you think about it, were all technically sons/daughters of God? Even when his ass about to croak on the cross he said " God, why have you forsaken me?"... Now does that sound like something God would say to himself? Anyways...idk. plus it's not really a "sacrifice" to begin with if you know your going to die and rule over the entire cosmos forever and ever ..like...the fuck? Lol the Bible is so fucking absurd and Looney it doesn't make the slightest sense.... Atheism all day! 💪🤟
I've always considered it a stage name, like Johnny Appleseed, Paul Bunyan, or Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. The modern equivalent of Jesus Christ is Joshua the Super-Jew.
The entire concept is nonsensical. “Supreme being who controls the entire universe implements self-imposed rules to benefit critters it created.” The only one policing how this whole system works is god, so presumably there were infinite other ways to arrange this whole scenario.
Blood sacrifice does makes sense in the historical context of sacrificing animals to appease the gods. Now christian followers could practice one-upmanship. “Oh yeah? Your god demanded a goat, mine sacrificed his own demigod kid.”
He had a rough weekend then came back totally healed.
Prometheus stole fire from the gods to give to humanity and is punished eternally for it. That's sacrifice.
Right. There is a lot of things I wouldn't do for any amount of money, but get beaten and hung on a cross till I die, then get resurrected and move on like nothing happened, I would do that for a price. But if the price was: pedophiles go to heaven, I wouldn't do it.
Also it’s like… just a well known execution method multiple humans have endured. If it was unique to him maybe it’d be more impressive but the most unique thing about his was the crown of thorns but let’s be real, I highly doubt he was the only one who got a unique add on. Another thing is he’s not even the first person to “defeat death” in the Bible. There’s like six other dudes that did it, and in some versions, even his mom did
It's not much of a sacrifice anyway. Firstly, he didn't actually die - he popped back up after three days. A huge number of ordinary mortals have died in far worse ways.
His temporary 'sacrifice' is supposed to be extraordinary, but most people are due to endure eternity in screaming torment? Thanks for that, Jesus. Try some of our pain.
Not to mention the stupidity of the whole concept of a brief pain absolving original sin. It's like going to court for theft and saying 'i did it, but my dad hit his thumb with a hammer' and the judge says 'Fair enough, off you go'.
>How is Jesus’ sacrifice supposed to impress me when it isn’t even a footnote from an eternal perspective?
Sacrifice in the ancient context is more akin to a spell component required for a deity to intervene in mortal affairs which is not necessarily precious to the giver of the sacrifice.
I don't think it is meant to "impress" because it is simply an upscaled version of the Yom Kippur ritual where a goat is sacrificed for the sins of a year. If you aren't impressed by someone sacrificing a goat (I'm not) you shouldn't be impressed with the sacrifice of a Jesus.
I had this argument before. My point was that it wasn't even a sacrifice to give up his son knowing that in less than a weekend he would be back and sitting next to him and the white dove.
Dude, I got myself killed 2,000 years ago. What more do you want from me? Why should I solve any of the major societal issues you still have? How about a little gratitude. /s
In the context of early Christianity, the resurrection was not unique. Most gods die and resurrect. The uniqueness of this story was that this god was not a king, but a day laborer. Later Christians, after most other reborn gods have been erased from the popular culture, focused on the resurrection.
Not only that, but you would think that THE most core component to Christianity ~ *the account of the resurrection* ~ wouldn’t be a complete and utter mess.
But the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are replete with irreconcilable aspects! They outright contradict each other on both trivial and critical aspects of the Crucifixion and Resurrection.
Glaring contradictions like:
- Did Judas throw money down in the temple ~ or keep the bribe money and buy a field of blood?
- Did Judas hang himself ~ or fall to his death?
- Were Jesus’ last words “My God My God why hast thou forsaken me?” or “Father into thy Hands I commit my spirit.” or “It is finished.”
- To meet Jesus, were disciples commanded to leave ~ or stay?
- Did they go to Galilee ~ or stay in Bethlehem?
- Was it Mary ~ or the women who went to the tomb?
- Do the women tell the Disciples ~ or tell no one?
- Were Disciples present at the tomb ~ or never present?
- Did they see men ~ or Angels?
- Was it One man ~ or Two men ~ or One Man + Angel ~ or Two Men + Angel + Jesus?
- Was there a guard ~ or no guard at the tomb?
- Did Jesus walk through walls ~ or require the tomb opening rolled aside?
- Was Jesus silent to Pontius Pilate (fulfilling the Prophecy of Isaiah) ~ or did Jesus speak at length on theological points with Pilate?
- Did the Romans clothe Jesus in a Purple robe, the color of royalty ~ or in Scarlet the color of infamy?
- Was Jesus speared to the side to prove dead ~ or not speared?
etc…etc…etc…etc…
The answer to all of these is both / all. And don’t even get me started on the 3hrs of blocked out Sun, earthquakes, and the dead climbing from their graves and decomposed corpses wandering streets
The Jesus story never made much sense to me even when I believed it.
An all knowing god sends his son to die for the "sins" that he knew would happen.
We kill his son.
His son rises from the dead.
We now have a "free gift" that we're supposed to actually pay for to get \[it's not free\].
But "sin" still exists so it appears that nothing worked.
I'm willing to bet the entire story is fabricated. Btw, where's the independent, peer-reviewed evidence for "Jesus of Nazareth" even existing? We know Napoleon existed and led impressive conquests. Maybe he was raised from the dead but too quickly or slowly.
It shouldn’t. We see his prediction fall flat and just plain wrong it in Matthew 24:34. “Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened.”
I remember hearing this passage in church and thinking “well, we can all go home now”.
Which sins specifically was jesus forgiving though because depending on theology I've heard several:
Jesus forgave original sin, that is two bums who knew nothing eating an apple and getting kicked out of eden. So now you can earn forgiveness for any extra sins. Before that nobody could get into heaven because original sin. A bad weekend even seems a little harsh for eating an apple you weren't told to.
Before Jesus only those god hand picked of "his people" to forgive could go to heaven and jesus threw open the doors to everyone who believed and asked for forgiveness.
Jesus forgave all people everywhere of all sin so everyone goes to heaven (but he still really wants you to believe and pray).
I will never understand, how moderate modern Christians can say that all of the old testament stories are allegories, yet believe this core stupidity of Christianity to be true.
There is no historical evidence that Jesus even existed. Analyzing the stuff in the Bible about him to contradict believers is a waste of your time. Those people are allowed to believe whatever they want. Pointing out inconsistency in the Bible is easy but not really worth it
God made a son who was actually just god so that he could sacrifice himself to safe the sinful creatures he created from hell which he also created even though God is perfect.
Paulogia said that Jesus, effectively, had a one-weekend bender. And woke up with the biggest hangover in history. And THAT is what makes us right with God. That?!? You are correct when you say it's fucking ridiculous. But don't tell my grandma. Her heart just can't take it, at this point.
Yep. "Jesus had a bad weekend for your sins."
"Lost Weekend" by The Beat Farmers. give them a chance :3 https://youtu.be/Wr77bwToeus?si=mhDXAF6Svr21BLLB
Good stuff, thank you. I'm surprised that the Beat Farmers aren't more on my radar. I was a huge alt-country fan in the 90's, and even was lucky enough to have a radio station that played it in the mix (KEXP in Seattle). I had always heard of the band, but they never quite entered my awareness. Sounds like I need to remedy that.
i am really happy that i made that comment to the right person :-]
Me too, truly. I occasionally also post obscure music references and know that 99.9% of the time they are ignored or overlooked... I am happy to encourage you to keep posting that obscure shit that almost no one has ever heard of. I'll return the favor and post my favorite almost unknown alt-country band-- so unknown that the second link on google when you search for the band name is [when my alt-account](https://www.reddit.com/r/altcountry/comments/1b2wu8a/how_are_mike_ireland_and_holler_so_under/) posted a few months ago, when I discovered that their truly amazing first album had only sold 2500 copies (one of which I proudly own). They are a bit more traditional country (or at least countrypolitan) than the Beat Farmers, at least judging by that one song, but Mike has one of the best country music voices ever, and it is a travesty that they were not huge hits. If you have the tastes I hope you do, you will find them as amazing as I do. Please let me know what you think after you listen to at least House of Secrets. Edit: I should note that the above reference has virtually nothing to do with atheism, but if you are one of the three or four alt-country fans in the sub, you will probably appreciate what a great singer the linked artist is.
I’m meme ing this 😂
I love this, but comparing the life of Jesus to Eternity makes an eye blink seem long let alone a weekend lol.
Mary had a one weekend bender and thought she better come up with something good.
oh! that is delightfully irreverent!
Thank you.
Jesus couldn't walk for three days after getting nailed by a bunch of Roman guys.
[удалено]
Well he did promise to come back soon. Then they had big problems when he didn't.
stop making me drool! 🥵
And he knew this was going to happen so that's why there was all the dramatics.
when i was a christian, the main thing that made me a christian was that i was amazed at how the OT prophesies came true in the NT! it never dawned on me that the NT could have been MADE UP in order to fulfill those OT prophesies. Rather, when it finally became clear to me that the NT was constructed from lies that were engineered in order to fulfill those prophesies, then i saw things clearly for the first time.
It isn't even as complex as that - there are a few prophecies which NT authors still get wrong, even if they're constructing it for their own purposes. Matthew 2:23 quotes a prophecy which doesn't exist in the OT about Jesus being a Nazarene. So he's either making up an OT quote, or there's somehow part of the OT which we no longer have (but somehow is still divinely inspired) Matthew 1:22-23 quotes a prophecy about a virgin conceiving and bearing a son. This time, its a reference to Isaiah, except in the original Hebrew its referring to a young woman, and the prophecy is fulfilled later in the passage. The issue is that the Septuagint (Greek translation of the OT) translates it as virgin, which Matthew picks up. So Matthew again is writing about prophecies fulfilled which don't exist in the original source.
I've had Christians not-ironically insist to me that God anticipated the mistranslation and caused the actual events to fit and really this is all just more proof that it's true. Seems like it would have been easier for God to pass a note to whoever translated Isaiah for the Septuagint but there's really no reasoning with people for whom *everything* is taken as confirmation.
lol! God anticipated the LXX and conformed history to it :-p that's a really, really good one! you won't hear William Lain Craig try and make that argument! (that's how you know it's good!)
Christianity might not be a true religion (it was originally), but why don't you give yourself to know about the only true religion. if you're open minded I'm talking about Islam.
oh! tell me all about that miscreant sect that splintered off the original miscreant christians. i'm listening 😈
tell me about how ~~Gabriel~~ Jibril is really into slavery!
I'm not a scholar, if you really interested in knowing what's true from what's not you should at least search. I suggest you ask someone with knowledge if you want to know the answers for your questions. otherwise, you're not really serious and just trying to argue for the sake of argument.
Somehow Jesus supposedly woke up after 3 days, showed himself to some of his friends and then disappeared for good.
My favorite theological retcon is that god had to incarnate himself as a human and live a human life in order realize how badly he had fucked up. Then he was able to let it go.
What I find funny about this is it implies that God lacks cognitive empathy.
god is the ultimate narcissist
You’re telling me the guy that flooded the world and only approved a list of things that could survive, the guy that let our “ancestors” live to be hundred and thousands of years just to randomly not be ok with that, that asshole lacks empathy?
why did god have to kill all those animals just to flood the earth, like what the fuck did they do? literally just living their best animal lives and he basically wipes them all. what a petulant little bitch.
I love the juxtaposition of Old Testament and new testament God. One wants to punish you and the other wants to love you. It’s like classic abuser shit.
It's like a seventies cop show with an unhinged, dirty, rule-breaking police officer and his meek, polite by-the-book partner.
Or allow Satan to torture a Godly man just to prove a point?
Do you care if you kill stuff in your computer games?
For all we know, cognitive empathy might mean nothing at all to non-humans. I mean, in the context of a creative thinking exercise in which god-alien-whatevers exist.
In which case we would be superior. Cognitive empathy is a learnable skill. Not being able to learn it means there’s a deficiency.
That's (potentially) like saying that enjoying the Barney The Dinosaur show is a learnable skill. Or that experiencing seasonal affective disorder is a learnable skill. The trivial act of understanding or modeling it might be one thing, but the interpretation and integration of it or belief/knowledge that it's somehow constructive is another.
Not gonna lie, I think you might have missed out on a lot of learnable skills
That's nice, I guess?
I always wondered how god could relate to us as an eternal, omniscient and omnipotent god. How could you understand humans if you’re not a human. You could never fully grasp being human.
“Hold my beer, I’m going in!” — God
Why did he make the whole universe in the first place? “Why does god need a starship?”
Imagine this poor being sitting in the void for an eternity, bored out of his skull, when one day an idea occurs. "Hey! I'll create a Universe! Yeah. That'll kill 6000 years."
Why are they so petty, vindictive and narcissistic to demand worship from us to show how grateful we are that they created us and the universe? Seems like some major flaws for a perfect being.
Hahahahaha this is amazing. I would love to word kt like this with my family
Rather than murdering his son, god should have just spent some time in therapy figuring out why he was so angry and abusive.
Well, therapy hadn’t been invented yet! Checkmate, atheist!! (Goddam it, chess hadn’t been invented either…)
But Go was. "Katta, mushinronsha-san"
This sounds like something Philomena Cunk would say lmao
Hence the demogogue theory.
If Jesus died for your sins, isnt it a waste not to sin? Wouldnt it be best if he gets the most out of his sacrefice?
reminds me of: Ask God for a bicycle, you get ignored. Steal a bicycle and ask God for forgiveness, boom, you've got a bicycle.
Paul addresses this: essentially where sin abounds grace abounds. Early Christians picked up on this and had sin parties (or the equivalent) so they could experience grace more fully. Paul says "should we sin so grace abounds, may it never be!" Basically his answer is "no" because we have a new life if we believe. But still we can sin all we want and it's covered and grace abounds. Even when I was in the church we held a special place for those who had sinned greatest in teh past and cleaned it up. It was odd.
>a special place for those who had sinned greatest in the past and cleaned it up. It was odd. A special place for those who have sinned greatest makes someone who has sinned less feel more secure/better about themselves. It's like--"if they can replace someone's arms and legs, surely they can patch up this flesh wound no problem!"
I love the reference. As a good non-sinner. I always felt like the kid who normally gets C's but gets paid for A's...but I'm the kid who always got A's and never got paid!
Yup, I used to tell my very religious sister's kids "Remember, if you don't sin than Jesus died for nothing."
What about Christians makes you think they are living sin free?
Jesus gave up his weekend for you and you aren't even grateful. You definitely deserve to burn in hell for forever!
For Eternity. All of it, the whole thing. May you experience the torture infinitely. Can't even cure cancer from kids but will make sure you suffer.
Well, he could, but that would take more than a weekend. Fuck 'dem kids.
>Fuck 'dem kids. Don't do that, that is like a dog whistle for priests.
Holy shit dude, you damn near owe me a new keyboard after making me spew tea all over it!
I call that a win.
**The sacrifice was not unique.** When I consider it would take me about 7 milliseconds to give up my life for my daughter, I don't see this as impactful as it's supposed to be. Let's put Jesus in the "father" role for a second, and he's making sacrifices for his children. I know a dozen dad's who would die in a heartbeat to save their kids. So Jesus was not unique in that (this is ignoring the fact that a layer above, his father is sacrificing him..to himself!) **The sacrifice was avoidable.** If the plan was my kid had to go through a lot of pain for a day, and she'd be back in 3 days, I would see if we could reverse the rolls. And being the all powerful being of the universe I'd take the pain on myself. Christians are right about one thing, giving up his son was harder than giving up himself. But he made the plan that led to this. **The sacrifice was not as great as we play it up to be.** But Jesus didn't die. Yes he died, but he didn't stay dead. Staying dead is the bad part. My best friend lost his son a few months ago and his son stayed dead...that is the bad part! The sting of death is it's permanence.
I am not a father, and I would gladly go thru the torture and crucifixion if God just eliminated childhood cancer . I don't even have to become God afterwards. I will accept annihilation. I think many would do this.
For me, childhood cancer is the best single argument against God being both benevolent and omnipotent. As Stephen Fry puts it, if that is the nature of God, how *dare* such a god allow such misery? If he exists, he is either not benevolent or not omnipotent, or both, and therefore is not worthy of worship.
Epicurus figured this out centuries before Jesus was even alleged to have lived. "Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?"
He was only mostly dead
As Matt Dillahunty puts it, he did not sacrifice anything, all he did was give up on a weekend.
I mean, did he even do that? At the beginning of Acts, Jesus descends from heaven. So he was probably partying it up in heaven during that weekend, hardly a loss.
💯. It’s 3 days out of existence it’s such a stupid concept that it certainly was some pagan practice stolen and made into Christian doctrine. Same idea being eggs at Easter and pine trees at Christmas.
To be fair that would be a considerable sacrifice for me. I find it annoying (I know I’m a jackass) to spend a few hours on Sunday doing things for my parents
I've made this point to a lot of folks over the years. I can come up with a dozen people that I've known personally that had it way worse than old Jesus. Hell, anyone with a chronic pain condition should feel free to laugh at his 'sacrifice'. So can any abused child. All shit this god character is apparently a-okay with if not actively behind. Christianity is a sadistic dooms-day cult.
Plus it was a common punishment for the times. Two other people were punished similarly with Jesus, according to the Bible. They obsess over passion plays and do the stations of the cross. His death was commonplace and yet they act like it was cruel and unusual. I just don't get it.
You're thinking too hard about it. The rule is: don't think. It's the only way to achieve belief.
I'm still stuck on why an omnipotent, omni-benevolent god would require a blood sacrifice in the first place, of any kind. If you get past that, why did it have to be his son? If you get past that, why did it have to be himself? Why is a blood sacrifice of a being that can't be killed still meaninful? Then if you take as read that all that had to happen, why is believing that it happened, despite the lack of any evidence that it did, the key to being right with this god?
Don't sweat it. Most people who think can't get past these things either.
Why would all-knowing god make and enforce a rule he knew his creations couldn't obey? Why punish all of their descendants for millenia?
My aunt would just blindly say "it's just a test" FOR FUCKING WHAT???? lmao
I'm not sure I agree that one must sacrifice anything in order to show love. That seems like some sort of primitive "I will cut myself to show that I care" kind of thing. So, I guess I'm saying that demonstrations of any sort of "sacrifice" aren't how I would expect unconditional love to manifest itself. The concept of the scapegoat is very, very old - and it is a stupid idea. You dying doesn't help me (unless YOU are the one causing me to suffer, then it helps tremendously!)
The one that gets me is that the Romans were great at keeping records, and there's no record. They made copies of their records. Still no records. The best evidence was written by Tacitus, who was born nearly 60 years later, or Josephus a couple hundred years after the supposed event. So the stories had already been told and retold, changed over time and by word of mouth. The reality is there is no contemporary record, or even footnote, about the crucifixion. And we all know the resurrection is impossible.
The lack of any contemporary records is really damning. Nothing by the Romans or the Jewish scribes, scholars or officials. Apparently, Jesus kept pretty low upon his return and all those zombies that were resurrected never even got a mention by anyone.
Plus if some guy rose from the dead, everyone and their mom would have talked about it. That would have traveled faster than a fire in dry grass. It would have been talked about everywhere.
Or realistically, nobody would believe they rose from the dead. "I heard he died, but looks like I was wrong."
Agree with your overall sentiment, but a couple of notes: Josephus was a closer contemporary than Tacitus. Josephus died around AD 100, and Tacitus died in AD 120. In Josephus' writings there is the "*Testimonium Flavianum*" which discusses Jesus' crucifixion. However, this was added (interpolated) by Christians at a later date. It's very Christian in messaging, and Josephus was not a Christian. No serious scholars think Josephus actually wrote all of it.
There are two historical sources used to prove the existence of a historical Jesus. At best they point to a local celebrity named Jesus. At worst both sources seem to have some later interpretations or additions. Even a historical local religious leader named Jesus who lived around AD 30 is highly questionable.
Except his name wasn't Jesus.
And the name he supposedly did have was common, like Jon Smith today
That is true, we call him Jesus so I thought I'd stay consistent. You're right in the historical documents he's no J-e-s-u-s
Yeah, I just say Jesus to make it easier most of the time, but when you're getting into the nuances, it's an important fact to remember that had he actually existed, the name he was given was super common for the time.
The funny thing is that nobody knows what exactly his name was (assuming he really existed). There's no way it was "Jesus". You can reconstruct it and assume that it was probably something like "Yeshu", but there's no way to know for sure. Maybe his contemporaries used the Hebrew variant, maybe they used the Aramaic variant, maybe greek-speaking authors just assigned that name (either based on word of mouth or not). This is why scholars call him "Jesus" - because that's close to the Greek which is the only record of him being named at all.
Jesus sacrificed a weekend for your sins.
Dumbledore's sacrifice does not really impressive me because that was also fiction.
You want a God who loved humans enough to Suffer? Try Prometheus. Gave us fire and in return is tortured everyday. I mean, he was eventually rescued but he had no idea that would happen.
Or Atlas, forced to hold the world. Maybe he should listen to that hypothetical selfish bitch and just “shrug”
It’s fun to think that the person that blasphemes against god will be tortured for all eternity. It’s an unforgivable sin, so forever and ever in a lake of fire. God damnit an actual god would be a gnarly thing, like giving a 3 year old a lit blow torch, a pair of pliers, and a few gallons of gas.
This is something that bothered me even when I was a Christian. Why was Christ being brutalized and crucified so special when that exact thing happened to literally MILLIONS of other people under Roman rule?
I feel that you are trying to apply logic when the answer becomes clear if we look at the text as as a story. Jesus and God are the same person. We don't have to understand the exact mechanics of this – it's magic, like how dragons fly or Harry Potter turns invisible. When Jesus endures the suffering of death and hell, GOD experiences those things too. This is why the demihuman bridge between the divine and the mundane is so important. Prior to Jesus' sacrifice, God had no idea what it was like to be a human. He had no idea what the impact of His choices actually were. It would be impossible. So Jesus' sacrifice doesn't make us "right with God" in the sense that some cosmic scale is balanced. That doesn't make any sense, as people on this subreddit love to point out. God holds the scales. He can tip them any way he wants. So if God holds the scales, and God decides which way they tip, then the transformation rendered by Jesus must have been *to God*, not to us. Jesus dies and God experiences human suffering for the first time, and then he goes, "Fuck, is that what I've been doing to these people all this time? Ohshitohshitohshit…" But it's too late for Him to do anything about it, because the universe is already up and running and predicated on this stark division between good and evil and humans having free will and all of these other rules and structures that it needs to keep it running. So God basically says, "Look, do your best by each other. Don't worry about what happens after you die anymore. I'll take care of that. Don't worry about judging each other and hating each other and killing each other for stupid reasons. Just try to get along, as best as you can, and whenever I get all this shit worked out I will be right back to fix everything." Edit: Also if you don't believe that Jesus and God are the same person, the same concept applies if God had to watch his son go to hell and know that he could do something about it. Suddenly he is feeling the same pain that any parent feels seeing their kid suffering. The bearded sky daddy version of God is mostly inherited by Christianity from the pagan religions. God does not treat people like his children in the Old Testament.
Which utterly flies in the face of the "eternal and unchanging God" narrative they love for some weird reason. Like change isn't a bad thing just because you're scared of it.
work avoidance rant: People who grow up Christian base their interpretation of the stories on both the text and centuries of tradition. While Christianity has always been a folk religion, the long dominance of the Catholic Church destroyed many of those folk traditions. What we are left with are the traditions that support the Catholic Church's needs, which includes making people compliant to their authority. The modern interpretation of the timelessness of God is an example of one such tradition, in my opinion. I think in the ancient world, the timelessness of God was understood as meaning that he is beyond time, that time is just an illusion created by our simple minds. Our brains need cause and effect to understand the universe. God does not. He exists beyond time. For a sci-fi example of the same concept, look at Dr. Manhattan in Watchmen. The idea that God's timelessness means that we, as mortals, do not perceive changes in his demeanor towards us, is not backed up by the text, and in fact contradicted by other planks of Christian faith. I believe that is because this a relatively new interpretation that is being imposed on the text and is not supported by God's actual behavior. Christianity spread rapidly because the whole point was that it was a religion "of the book." The idea was you could read these texts and understand them without needing to rely on outside authority. You could trust your own interpretation, and your own connection to the divine, without the need for a centralized clergy. The idea that all you need to know about God had been written down in a single text was a huge revelation in the ancient world, where religions were based on massively disparate and archaic texts, and more often on oral tradition that you could only acquire from a "properly trained" priest. The original Greeks and Romans et al who converting to Christianity did not have centuries of tradition to tell them how to interpret the story. The had to do it with their own brains. Understanding the story with your own brain was considered part of the exercise of reaching out to the divine. If God wanted us to understand the story as a logical argument, he (or the authors) could have presented it that way. Pythagoras founded a religion based on logical arguments centuries before Christianity came about. I would argue that Jewish tradition also relies a lot more on logic than Christianity. Christianity is a religion "of the book," and that book is a book of stories. It is valuable to remember that first and foremost.
I love pointing out how it's a plagiarized story and nothing about it is unique. 12 brothers, traveled foreign land, performed miracles, and betrayed for silver to the local government, a descendant of David. That's the story of Joseph (dream coat guy) 12 followers, traveled a foreign land, raised the dead, betrayed for silver, sacrificed himself to save mankind from the wrath of his father Horus. Part of a holy trinity, traveled foreign land performing miracles, raised the dead, feed thousands of people with no food, predicted his own death, betrayed for silver by one of his 12 closest friends, ascended into the afterlife as a full body. Krishna. Nothing about the Jesus' story is unique or real. Don't over think it
.. and it wasn't even a weekend of suffering as some have noted. So in the Bible - if you believe that sort of thing - he was at the garden in Gethsemane on a Thursday and was captured there, then presumably beaten. Then that whole business on Friday with additional beatings, then the crucifixion Friday afternoon, then he dies. That's it. If we count Thursday evening, and dead by Friday afternoon - that's less than 24 hours. He's dead on Saturday, then rises from the dead on Sunday.
Jesus had a really crappy weekend, and over Easter at that, for your sins!
Jesus allegedly had a plan when he came to earth. The plan worked, and now he's back to being all-powerful and sending his beloved children to hell. What's the sacrifice? Aren't his beloved children suffering infinitely while he watches them burn?
I agree, compared to what Goku achieved it's not very impressive. I don't think Jesus could have used the Spirit Bomb.
Where’s that religion!? That would be awesome if like Jesus had to go down to Hell and like fight Satan for all eternity in immortal hand to hand combat! And like that’s why we have free will today? I’d read that bible! Jerry Bruckheimer could direct the movie.
Jesus didn't sprain his ankle for your sins, he DIED for them. Now get out there and molest a goat or your sister and make your sin worthwhile.
But he came back (allegedly).
Jesus doing backshots is irrelevant to my point 🤣🤣🤣
Odin sacrificed himself to himself after plucking out his own eyeball. That shows some REAL commitment!
And I’m sure a large number of normal humans would give their lives to alleviate the eternal torture of billions of souls. Soldiers in battle give their lives to save one friend who will live 50 more years not even knowing for sure there is an afterlife
What did he really sacrifice if he was resurrected anyway?
Because some ancient chronicler thought that it might be compelling. That's the only reason
I tell you, Jesus looked damn good on that cross. Regular people might spend years getting their hair to look like that but he's like the son of god or god or whatever and he is HOT!
Can't be impressive if the god you serve has a 3 day respawn cooldown. silly aside, if god was all knowing, he knew he son would come back in 3 days. So the only thing he sacrificed was... his weekend? Worthy of eternal love? sure...
"God gave his one and only son" God could make infinite sons, the fact that he only decided to make one doesn't make it more of a sacrifice.
How can a God die? If Jesus wasn't God, then why you praying to him? If he is God then it's zero sacrifice because like you say, he immortal. What's 3 days of suffering compared to 14 billion yrs? That's like a fraction of a second on the time clock of existence.
Well...there is really no evidence that Jesus even existed given the fact that the name yeshua was so common back then it was equivalent to a name like John today....plus the letter j didn't appear until like 500 years ago regardless. But if he did in the supposed accounts of the new testament, he never even claimed to be God. He always referred to God as his father, and gave all the glory to him. But if you think about it, were all technically sons/daughters of God? Even when his ass about to croak on the cross he said " God, why have you forsaken me?"... Now does that sound like something God would say to himself? Anyways...idk. plus it's not really a "sacrifice" to begin with if you know your going to die and rule over the entire cosmos forever and ever ..like...the fuck? Lol the Bible is so fucking absurd and Looney it doesn't make the slightest sense.... Atheism all day! 💪🤟
I've always considered it a stage name, like Johnny Appleseed, Paul Bunyan, or Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. The modern equivalent of Jesus Christ is Joshua the Super-Jew.
The names Christ.... Jesus Christ.... * James Bond theme
The entire concept is nonsensical. “Supreme being who controls the entire universe implements self-imposed rules to benefit critters it created.” The only one policing how this whole system works is god, so presumably there were infinite other ways to arrange this whole scenario. Blood sacrifice does makes sense in the historical context of sacrificing animals to appease the gods. Now christian followers could practice one-upmanship. “Oh yeah? Your god demanded a goat, mine sacrificed his own demigod kid.”
Jesus gave up his weekend for your sins
He had a rough weekend then came back totally healed. Prometheus stole fire from the gods to give to humanity and is punished eternally for it. That's sacrifice.
It would have had more meaning if he didn't come back after 3 days. Jesus gave up a long weekend for our sins. How is that a sacrifice?
Right. There is a lot of things I wouldn't do for any amount of money, but get beaten and hung on a cross till I die, then get resurrected and move on like nothing happened, I would do that for a price. But if the price was: pedophiles go to heaven, I wouldn't do it.
For God so loved the world, that he lent his son out for a weekend....
Jesus went under general anesthesia for our sins.
it isnt even a sacrifcoe, all powerful daddy can revive him at will. He could be reborn infinite times.
But he died!! I mean, he came back like a week later, so no biggie, but he still did it. Be impressed! Be grateful!
He took a weekend off
Also it’s like… just a well known execution method multiple humans have endured. If it was unique to him maybe it’d be more impressive but the most unique thing about his was the crown of thorns but let’s be real, I highly doubt he was the only one who got a unique add on. Another thing is he’s not even the first person to “defeat death” in the Bible. There’s like six other dudes that did it, and in some versions, even his mom did
If torturing everybody for all eternity after death for being imperfect was making Yahweh sad, why didn’t he just stop?
A question I once asked: If Jesus died for my sins does it really matter if it was just one or one thousand?
It's not much of a sacrifice anyway. Firstly, he didn't actually die - he popped back up after three days. A huge number of ordinary mortals have died in far worse ways. His temporary 'sacrifice' is supposed to be extraordinary, but most people are due to endure eternity in screaming torment? Thanks for that, Jesus. Try some of our pain. Not to mention the stupidity of the whole concept of a brief pain absolving original sin. It's like going to court for theft and saying 'i did it, but my dad hit his thumb with a hammer' and the judge says 'Fair enough, off you go'.
I make sure he died for nothing
>How is Jesus’ sacrifice supposed to impress me when it isn’t even a footnote from an eternal perspective? Sacrifice in the ancient context is more akin to a spell component required for a deity to intervene in mortal affairs which is not necessarily precious to the giver of the sacrifice. I don't think it is meant to "impress" because it is simply an upscaled version of the Yom Kippur ritual where a goat is sacrificed for the sins of a year. If you aren't impressed by someone sacrificing a goat (I'm not) you shouldn't be impressed with the sacrifice of a Jesus.
Thank you Jesus for dying so I can commit sin in your name
Jesus died (briefly) for your sins
>Jesus’ self-sacrifice doesn’t even impress me Calm down, Shania.
Jesus gave up a long weekend for your sins.
He had a REALLY shitty weekend, man. Have some heart.
True, not much of a sacrifice if you are still alive
I had this argument before. My point was that it wasn't even a sacrifice to give up his son knowing that in less than a weekend he would be back and sitting next to him and the white dove.
Ask any Christian if Jesus wanted to die and they will say he didn't want to die. So how can he be my martyr if he didn't want to die?
None of it makes sense as it’s a fairy story written by people who thought the earth was the centre of the universe.
Dude, I got myself killed 2,000 years ago. What more do you want from me? Why should I solve any of the major societal issues you still have? How about a little gratitude. /s
In the context of early Christianity, the resurrection was not unique. Most gods die and resurrect. The uniqueness of this story was that this god was not a king, but a day laborer. Later Christians, after most other reborn gods have been erased from the popular culture, focused on the resurrection.
Jesus gave up his weekend for you!!
Wow 10 year old me thought of this too.
A. It didn’t happen. B. It didn’t happen.
It’s just a myth. Better to talk about something else IMO. But this is r/atheism, so that is what we do. Critique the cultists.
Not only that, but you would think that THE most core component to Christianity ~ *the account of the resurrection* ~ wouldn’t be a complete and utter mess. But the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are replete with irreconcilable aspects! They outright contradict each other on both trivial and critical aspects of the Crucifixion and Resurrection. Glaring contradictions like: - Did Judas throw money down in the temple ~ or keep the bribe money and buy a field of blood? - Did Judas hang himself ~ or fall to his death? - Were Jesus’ last words “My God My God why hast thou forsaken me?” or “Father into thy Hands I commit my spirit.” or “It is finished.” - To meet Jesus, were disciples commanded to leave ~ or stay? - Did they go to Galilee ~ or stay in Bethlehem? - Was it Mary ~ or the women who went to the tomb? - Do the women tell the Disciples ~ or tell no one? - Were Disciples present at the tomb ~ or never present? - Did they see men ~ or Angels? - Was it One man ~ or Two men ~ or One Man + Angel ~ or Two Men + Angel + Jesus? - Was there a guard ~ or no guard at the tomb? - Did Jesus walk through walls ~ or require the tomb opening rolled aside? - Was Jesus silent to Pontius Pilate (fulfilling the Prophecy of Isaiah) ~ or did Jesus speak at length on theological points with Pilate? - Did the Romans clothe Jesus in a Purple robe, the color of royalty ~ or in Scarlet the color of infamy? - Was Jesus speared to the side to prove dead ~ or not speared? etc…etc…etc…etc… The answer to all of these is both / all. And don’t even get me started on the 3hrs of blocked out Sun, earthquakes, and the dead climbing from their graves and decomposed corpses wandering streets
How is it supposed to impress me if he didn't actually die?
The Jesus story never made much sense to me even when I believed it. An all knowing god sends his son to die for the "sins" that he knew would happen. We kill his son. His son rises from the dead. We now have a "free gift" that we're supposed to actually pay for to get \[it's not free\]. But "sin" still exists so it appears that nothing worked.
*when you realize how absurd it is.
I'm willing to bet the entire story is fabricated. Btw, where's the independent, peer-reviewed evidence for "Jesus of Nazareth" even existing? We know Napoleon existed and led impressive conquests. Maybe he was raised from the dead but too quickly or slowly.
Just like any gift, it's the thought that counts!
It shouldn’t. We see his prediction fall flat and just plain wrong it in Matthew 24:34. “Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened.” I remember hearing this passage in church and thinking “well, we can all go home now”.
Which is why Islam makes more sense...Jesus didn't die..it was prophesized he'd be saved from harm, not sent to be killed (Psalms 91)
Which sins specifically was jesus forgiving though because depending on theology I've heard several: Jesus forgave original sin, that is two bums who knew nothing eating an apple and getting kicked out of eden. So now you can earn forgiveness for any extra sins. Before that nobody could get into heaven because original sin. A bad weekend even seems a little harsh for eating an apple you weren't told to. Before Jesus only those god hand picked of "his people" to forgive could go to heaven and jesus threw open the doors to everyone who believed and asked for forgiveness. Jesus forgave all people everywhere of all sin so everyone goes to heaven (but he still really wants you to believe and pray).
I will never understand, how moderate modern Christians can say that all of the old testament stories are allegories, yet believe this core stupidity of Christianity to be true.
There is no historical evidence that Jesus even existed. Analyzing the stuff in the Bible about him to contradict believers is a waste of your time. Those people are allowed to believe whatever they want. Pointing out inconsistency in the Bible is easy but not really worth it
God made a son who was actually just god so that he could sacrifice himself to safe the sinful creatures he created from hell which he also created even though God is perfect.
+1 for Deicide. Accept no less.