Serious Query Regarding Jesus

[Orion3T]

I was under the impression you were looking for a gentle way to allow your wife to give up the supernatural without destroying her adoration of Jesus.

Not on this basis... I'd think of it as being the most useful and still plausible and reasonably rational explanation. Technically this is the easy part - if god is taken out of the picture this falls away by itself, though having some semblance of the Jesus she thought she knew might at least supply a pillow to land on.

My apologies if I misinterpreted this as trying to deconvert gently using this idea. Its private and I do not mean to pry.

It's probably the least important point of discussion, and definitely not the basis for anything.

The basis is my plethora of scientific awareness; I'm a physicist, so the teleological and cosmological arguments are pretty easy to explain, she's always had problems with the evidential evidence of evil, she realises there are logical inconsistencies in how god could operate (free will yet knowing the future, for example) and she's been gradually introduced to critical thinking and skeptical (but non-religious) science podcasts so she does understand how many crazy beliefs are out there, and how to spot them. After that there's really nothing left to go on, it's just an emotional inertia which will take a lot of time, patience and understanding from me.

Again, unless you also claim he was massively misquoted in which case anything he said is irrelevant, or he is Liar or Lunatic according to the NT. Neither are gentle and speculation that he is rational and not divine does not seem to be supported by NT.
(Thats not to say its improbable, merely using the NT as a basis for criticism or support is unhelpful).

I'd be saying he was a liar, but a liar with good intentions and ultimately willing to die for whatever he did believe.

Absolutely not, but its speculation, and the bible, being as inconsistent as it is, is open to a myriad of possible speculations. Hence the thousands of denominations.

I'm well aware of that - nevertheless it exists and since there are competing hypotheses about what really happened 2000 years ago then I might as well run with the most useful one for the time being.

Thanks for the sensible discussion.