Jesus' Sacrifice

[Drich]

Although there is no doubt that crucifixion is a horrible way to die, I have problems viewing the mythological story of Jesus' death as a great sacrifice for humans. (beyond that it isn't true, of course)

crucifixion was just a physical representation of what God the Son endured for us Spiritually. Remember He not only died is the worst possible way (scourged the crucified) he was also seperated from the Father Spiritually. We identify this seperation for our selves as being sent to Hell.

In the story, Jesus knew that he would be raised against to live an eternity being pampered and adored. He knows he will win. Granted, I don't like the idea of pain but if I was part of an all knowing god, I would realize the pain was temporary and, compared to eternity, short.

That's the thing. We truly don't know what the whole Cost was. The bible does not tell us everything Christ endured or will/has lost for His sacrifice on the cross, but I believe it did go beyond what He experienced on the cross. I don't think eternity future will look the same for Jesus as eternity past did.

No one asked Jesus to temporarily die for them and Jewish people didn't always require a blood sacrifice for forgiveness. For proof, I give you the link below
http://jewsforjudaism.org/knowledge/arti...icus-1711/

In the Torah, blood sacrifices were not the only path to atonement; there were other ways to achieve forgiveness. For example, incense served to atone for the people in Numbers 16:46-47, and giving charity is described in Exodus 30:15-16 and Numbers 31:50 as `making atonement for your souls’ – the same expression as in Leviticus 17:11. In reality, blood sacrifices were the least effective of all the means of atonement mentioned in the Bible. One important limitation to the effectiveness of sacrifices is that they were only brought for unintentional sins (ie. someone didn’t know that kindling a fire was prohibited on the Sabbath, or they were aware of this, but thought it was Sunday when kindling the fire). Sacrifices did not help to atone for sins that were done intentionally (Leviticus 4, and Numbers 15:22-31).

What if the christian response is not based on the catholic doctrine that centers on lev 17?
http://www.gotquestions.org/animal-sacrifices.html

There doesn't seem to be any reason for a god sacrifice except for Christians to explain why their messiah was killed in such a degrading fashion.

this maybe true if your a jew who just read your artical. However if one is honest and looks beyond how your artical focuses on every aspect of lev 17 other than the highlighted portion, even in lev 17 the importance of blood sacrifice is indeed spelled out as it is in the other passages my artical points out.

If Jesus was supposed to be a direct link to animal sacrifices, shouldn't he have been killed in the same manner as the sacrificial animals and had his throat cut?

you need to finish the prerequisites: by levitical priests, who under when a cleansing ceremony, on a special alter in the temple... Which forbade human/God sacrifice.

Which would suggest that Humans were never meant to sacrifice another Human for the attonement of sin. This was an act reserved for God alone. Therefore He got to do it any way He saw fit.

If suffering pain was part of the deal(which is pretty sick in itself), why not be flayed alive or drawn and quartered.

being drawn and quartered would mean bone breakage which would not be consistant with one of the prophesies.

Being scouraged is similar to being flayed. But with a cat of nine tales, it can only take a couple inches of flesh at a time... Think instead a slow cutting action of a blade removing large areas of skin, a violent slash/whipping motion from a leather whip with a dozen or so with metal hooks at the end of it, ripping small chunks out of you every time your struck..

Cruxifiction is horrible but some forms of historical capital punishment seem worse. Jesus didn't even take as long to die as his fellow thieves.

because scourging was a death sentence in of itself. His sentence from Pilate for being found not guilt was the same as a convicted felon getting leathal injection and the electric chair as he was dying from the injection.

In fact, I read it took him about six hours to die when it took other men days. So, what was the point of being crucified over just having his throat cut?

remember he was also ran through the heart with a spear, and the other two had their legs broken so they would all die by the end of Day.

Was it just because bible god needs blood or that he needs to see suffering? How can his death be a glorious sacrifice when Jesus knew he would get an eternity of being pampered and loved?

actually we need to see blood and suffering to know what the spiritual cost of our attonement is, so we can respect and understand why we need to follow the simple things God would have us do, and why this attonement is just given to anyone whether they want it or not.

Compared to an eternity in hell, Jesus's suffering seem laughable. Also, Jesus's so called perfectionism and perfect goodness actually make his sacrifice meaningless. If someone perfectly good dies for someone else, aren't they just following their nature? I am not an all good person. If I die to save a child, wouldn't the fact that I am not perfect mean that I am working against my own nature and thus my death be more impressive?

In the symbology of Christ death and our death and resurection in baptism as explained by Paul: when we put on Christ in baptism we shed our sin and adopt his perfection. That is what is meant by being "born again, or born by the Spirit." Our old selves die sin and all to Christ. When we do we take on Christ's righteousness, and leave our own.[/quote]