What if Jesus had failed?

[Minimalist]

What happened?

Do you really think a first-class asshole like yourself is worth that kind of effort. You are HAPPY to believe in bullshit. You'll never change. I don't think you are smart enough.

For you, keep reading your stupid fucking bible. It's about all you can handle.

Leave the heavy thinking to the rest of us.

[FallentoReason]

...God forgives sin by simply willing it, and offers the same thing he does now, but no sacrifice.

Did he will it, or did he also require a "mechanical" process to occurr - Jesus dying for the sins of humanity?

[Ryantology]

The sacrifice was a physical repersentation of the Spiritual 'pain' God went through to provide you with chance at attonement.

If any action on God's part causes him spiritual pain, that asserts limitations and weaknesses in God. A truly all-powerful and all-knowing being could not go through 'spiritual pain' if his every act is good, just and righteous because there can be no doubt or reluctance.

Put another way, it costs God nothing, not time, energy, or even patience, to offer 'atonement', especially when we are 'atoning' for acting according to our nature as he specifically and carefully designed it. It would have been effortless for God to have simply said "I forgive you and require nothing in return", because by definition, God needs nothing in return. The whole Jesus story is a fraud of the worst sort, proven by the fact that the only limitations God ever has are those Christians assign him, so as to make sense of their very senseless fairy tales.

[max-greece]

Well, I'm gathering that your critique of the OP is that it isn't considering *all* that Jesus did - that, as you said, there's more than just the physical sacrifice. So my question to you is: does Christianity still work if he hadn't been sacrificed? If the answer is "yes", then that means the OP really is flawed and the point is moot. If the answer is "no" i.e. the crucifixion is *necessary*, then your appeal to "option 5" is a waste of time i.e. stop being alternative by creating a 5th option

What if is neither yes or no?

Not saying this to be difficult for the sake of being difficult. But think about it. In essence God forgives sin by simply willing it, and offers the same thing he does now, but no sacrifice. No attempt to have understand the cost of not only forgiveness but the wage of sin it self. So why the need to 'convert?' The big question or argument then becomes why can just God will me into heaven as he willed away my sin?

Christianity would still work to a degree, but our understanding of God and His standards would be a mystery to us. As it is now we know who we are, why Christ had to die and have some idea of the cost to God.

---

Jesus was only seen by the Jews. They weren't convinced. Doesn't appear to have been a resounding success to me. That he thought of himself as the Jewish messiah only makes it worse.

The way it comes across in marks gospel the non Jews were a booby prize that Jesus got for a good try.

Not true. A large portion of the Jewish population was not only convinced, but converted. But once they converted the Jews who did not, did not want the converted Jews to call themselves Jews. Hence the term Christian.
Once a Jew converted he was no long a member of the tribe. That is why there are no "Jewish" believers in Christ.

---

According to the jews jesus was a total flop. Just some schmendrick who did none of the things that moshiach was supposed to do and got himself killed in the process.

Feh!

oi-veh...

See above.

---

True, it's a nonsensical story, both the typical version and yours.
I agree, seeing as there are thousands of "versions" of it.
Biblical Christianity itself is something that someone made up, and that people continue to interpret and re-interpret as time goes on. The lack of any unified interpretation and the poor/sloppy explanations of god, his nature, and his actions in the Bible make it quite easy to point out the paradoxes.

---

For the sake of fun and pedantry, you can consider it philosophically!

I selected option 3 because it seems the most plausible one if the god of the Bible exists. If we are made in his image, why wouldn't this be the third or fourth universe he created? Men are imaginative and inventive, but we tend to have to go through many iterations of a design before we get it right, then we improve upon it as we go.

If we reflect god's qualities and god really is the pinnacle of perfection, he'd have to be the ultimate inventor... constantly creating stuff that didn't work and improving as he went until he wound up with something workable and could start to improve it. The current reality is probably Beta Phase 2, or something. Drich is what god would call an "unhandled exception."

Actually biblical christianity is the version of Christianity that must adhear to the bible as its one and only source for its doctrine.

Do you have any numbers for this large proportion of Jews that converted? I can't find anything on it but at the same time there doesn't appear to be any great reduction in the number of Jews in the century following Jesus' death.

Most sources I have seen cite the majority of Jews as not being convinced and therefore remaining Jewish.

[rexbeccarox]

I mean, Zombie Jesus aside, something more exciting happened: Drich learned to spell "sacrifice"!

[smax]

Even if you take the Bible as the Gospel Truth, you are still faced with the harsh reality that Jesus must have failed because his his most critical prophesy failed to come true. In Matthew 24 Jesus is asked to reveal the signs of the end of the age and of his coming. In response to that he gives several examples of things to look for, but more importantly, he puts a strict timeline for when to expect the events of his second coming to have transpired:

"Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened"

This verse, and it's implications, are reinforced in several other locations of scripture.

Now, of course Christian apologists have went to great lengths to explain this away because accepting the implications would thoroughly destroy their entire basis for belief. It's funny how Christians have turned the bible into some sort of super code book that only the most spiritually enlightened can understand.

LOL

Meanwhile, Jesus is at least 1900 years past due, so it might be time for religious fanatics to consider a different religious angle to commit/waste their time with. Scientology is waiting with open arms, I hear.

[Minimalist]

"Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened"

And the apologists have sprained their balls a thousand times over making excuses for the little fuck up. I'm sure Drippy will pull one out of his bag of bullshit.

[Drich]

...God forgives sin by simply willing it, and offers the same thing he does now, but no sacrifice.

Did he will it, or did he also require a "mechanical" process to occurr - Jesus dying for the sins of humanity?

Both.

If the mechanical process was all that was required, then what happens to the souls of men like David, (a man after God's own heart) Abraham, Isac, Jacob, Moses, Daniel, and everyone else not under this new covenant/mechanical/Christian scrifice??? A mechanical sacrifice (like the animals sacrificed before) repersents the cost of sin and the forgiveness God gives. That is why Isaiah records in chapter 1 These thoughts of God:11 “The multitude of your sacrifices—
what are they to me?” says the Lord.
“I have more than enough of burnt offerings,
of rams and the fat of fattened animals;
I have no pleasure
in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats.
12 When you come to appear before me,
who has asked this of you,
this trampling of my courts?
13 Stop bringing meaningless offerings!
Your incense is detestable to me.
New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations—
I cannot bear your worthless assemblies.
14 Your New Moon feasts and your appointed festivals
I hate with all my being.
They have become a burden to me;
I am weary of bearing them.
15 When you spread out your hands in prayer,
I hide my eyes from you;
even when you offer many prayers,
I am not listening.

Your hands are full of blood!

16 Wash and make yourselves clean.
Take your evil deeds out of my sight;
stop doing wrong.
17 Learn to do right; seek justice.
Defend the oppressed.[a]
Take up the cause of the fatherless;
plead the case of the widow.

18 “Come now, let us settle the matter,”
says the Lord.
“Though your sins are like scarlet,
they shall be as white as snow;
though they are red as crimson,
they shall be like wool.
19 If you are willing and obedient,
you will eat the good things of the land;
20 but if you resist and rebel,
you will be devoured by the sword.”
For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.


Clearly from what was written above, God is not bound to the mechanical. And, that is exactly what the sacrifices of the jews had become in the days of Isaiah. Empty and mechanical, that is why He did not accept them. This Means God is not obligated to follow through with the forgiveness the sacrifices made in the above passage. for it is not the 'mechanical' sacrifice that brings forgiveness itself, (It is not the process or cermony) but God who gives one forgiveness.

The 'mechanical' part of the sacrifice, is for our benefit and not His. (That is why I believe there will be so many shocked "death bed converts" on the otherside.) Same principle applies under the covenant of Christianity. God is not the 'fool' many think Him to be. He is not bound by the chanting or recitation of a given prayer nor our participation in a given cermony. The sacrifice Christ gave us is for us to know what the Spiritual cost was to God. 'We' are supposed to acknoweledge and respect this sacrifice. Not in the physical beating and death Christ took (which was a very big deal in of itself) but the lengths it took to explain the pain and perhaps even death of the part of God that Requires/Demands Death to all who sin against Him. What it truly cost God we may never know in this life, but what He has shown us to be the cost mirrors the most horrid and feared way to die. (in that time, maybe even in this) with a beating of all beating piled on top of it. Because of this we can have some sense of the price of our attonement, and as such should prompt those who seek a relationship with God to not only look in to what had happened and why, but to also do what has been asked of the believer to do.

---

If any action on God's part causes him spiritual pain, that asserts limitations and weaknesses in God. A truly all-powerful and all-knowing being could not go through 'spiritual pain' if his every act is good, just and righteous because there can be no doubt or reluctance.

Look at the Story of the Prodigal son. The 'Father' was pained by the son's decision to leave, and over joyed when he returned. Even though the Father was pained at His sons departure, it does not mean the Father lost his position as the Father, just because he felt pain.

Put another way, it costs God nothing, not time, energy, or even patience, to offer 'atonement', especially when we are 'atoning' for acting according to our nature as he specifically and carefully designed it. It would have been effortless for God to have simply said "I forgive you and require nothing in return", because by definition, God needs nothing in return. The whole Jesus story is a fraud of the worst sort, proven by the fact that the only limitations God ever has are those Christians assign him, so as to make sense of their very senseless fairy tales.

How can you possiably know what it did or did not cost God if you refuse to accept anything written in the bible about it?

---

What if is neither yes or no?

Not saying this to be difficult for the sake of being difficult. But think about it. In essence God forgives sin by simply willing it, and offers the same thing he does now, but no sacrifice. No attempt to have understand the cost of not only forgiveness but the wage of sin it self. So why the need to 'convert?' The big question or argument then becomes why can just God will me into heaven as he willed away my sin?

Christianity would still work to a degree, but our understanding of God and His standards would be a mystery to us. As it is now we know who we are, why Christ had to die and have some idea of the cost to God.

---

Not true. A large portion of the Jewish population was not only convinced, but converted. But once they converted the Jews who did not, did not want the converted Jews to call themselves Jews. Hence the term Christian.
Once a Jew converted he was no long a member of the tribe. That is why there are no "Jewish" believers in Christ.

---

oi-veh...

See above.

---

Actually biblical christianity is the version of Christianity that must adhear to the bible as its one and only source for its doctrine.

Do you have any numbers for this large proportion of Jews that converted? I can't find anything on it but at the same time there doesn't appear to be any great reduction in the number of Jews in the century following Jesus' death.

Most sources I have seen cite the majority of Jews as not being convinced and therefore remaining Jewish.

So, what was the book of Hebrews? Who was it written to?

What of the recorded arguements between Peter (who was converting people to Judaism first and then to Christianity) and Paul in 2Galations?
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?sea...ersion=NIV

In this chapter Paul (The Gentile apstole) rebuked Peter and the other Apstoles for keeping their distance from the gentile believers and giving all of their time to the Jews, Unles the Gentiles first converted to Judaism.
Even in scripture there is a clear line (in the beginning) between the Jewish side of the Church and the gentile side. In the 1st century only one apstole was needed to minister to the 'gentile' part of the church. The rest spoke to Jewish converts.

---

Even if you take the Bible as the Gospel Truth, you are still faced with the harsh reality that Jesus must have failed because his his most critical prophesy failed to come true. In Matthew 24 Jesus is asked to reveal the signs of the end of the age and of his coming. In response to that he gives several examples of things to look for, but more importantly, he puts a strict timeline for when to expect the events of his second coming to have transpired:

"Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened"

This verse, and it's implications, are reinforced in several other locations of scripture.

Now, of course Christian apologists have went to great lengths to explain this away because accepting the implications would thoroughly destroy their entire basis for belief. It's funny how Christians have turned the bible into some sort of super code book that only the most spiritually enlightened can understand.

LOL

Meanwhile, Jesus is at least 1900 years past due, so it might be time for religious fanatics to consider a different religious angle to commit/waste their time with. Scientology is waiting with open arms, I hear.

The 'word' in Koine greek that we translate into 'generation' is:γενεά genea which can mean:
1) fathered, birth, nativity

2) that which has been begotten, men of the same stock, a family

a) the several ranks of natural descent, the successive members of a genealogy

b) metaph. a group of men very like each other in endowments, pursuits, character
1) esp. in a bad sense, a perverse nation
3) the whole multitude of men living at the same time

4) an age (i.e. the time ordinarily occupied be each successive generation), a space of 30 - 33 years

It even has been translated into the word Nation.

You have to remember the bible (most of them anyway) are literal translations, as apposed to contextual translations. Meaning they are translated in such a way as to give a syntaxtually correct translation (as close to the orginal) as possiable. Meaning things like illiterations, sayings, cultural usages of a given word maybe lost in the initial translation. It is up to the reader to either find a contextual translation or a bible with commentary or to do the research for himself.

[Tonus]

If the mechanical process was all that was required, then what happens to the souls of men like David, (a man after God's own heart) Abraham, Isac, Jacob, Moses, Daniel, and everyone else not under this new covenant/mechanical/Christian scrifice???

I agree that David was a man after god's own heart. He certainly acted the part.

In any case, are you saying that god cannot forgive sins without a physical sacrifice, or that he refuses to do so?

Also, those who were under the OT laws (Moses, David, etc) presumably performed the necessary sacrifices with the proper frame of mind and were cleansed by the final cost of sin, which is death. Why would they need Jesus to atone for sins that they paid for, possibly twice?

[gall]

Did he will it, or did he also require a "mechanical" process to occurr - Jesus dying for the sins of humanity?

Both.

If the mechanical process was all that was required, then what happens to the souls of men like David, (a man after God's own heart) Abraham, Isac, Jacob, Moses, Daniel, and everyone else not under this new covenant/mechanical/Christian scrifice??? A mechanical sacrifice (like the animals sacrificed before) repersents the cost of sin and the forgiveness God gives. That is why Isaiah records in chapter 1 These thoughts of God:11 “The multitude of your sacrifices—
what are they to me?” says the Lord.
“I have more than enough of burnt offerings,
of rams and the fat of fattened animals;
I have no pleasure
in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats.
12 When you come to appear before me,
who has asked this of you,
this trampling of my courts?
13 Stop bringing meaningless offerings!
Your incense is detestable to me.
New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations—
I cannot bear your worthless assemblies.
14 Your New Moon feasts and your appointed festivals
I hate with all my being.
They have become a burden to me;
I am weary of bearing them.
15 When you spread out your hands in prayer,
I hide my eyes from you;
even when you offer many prayers,
I am not listening.

Your hands are full of blood!

16 Wash and make yourselves clean.
Take your evil deeds out of my sight;
stop doing wrong.
17 Learn to do right; seek justice.
Defend the oppressed.[a]
Take up the cause of the fatherless;
plead the case of the widow.

18 “Come now, let us settle the matter,”
says the Lord.
“Though your sins are like scarlet,
they shall be as white as snow;
though they are red as crimson,
they shall be like wool.
19 If you are willing and obedient,
you will eat the good things of the land;
20 but if you resist and rebel,
you will be devoured by the sword.”
For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.


Clearly from what was written above, God is not bound to the mechanical. And, that is exactly what the sacrifices of the jews had become in the days of Isaiah. Empty and mechanical, that is why He did not accept them. This Means God is not obligated to follow through with the forgiveness the sacrifices made in the above passage. for it is not the 'mechanical' sacrifice that brings forgiveness itself, (It is not the process or cermony) but God who gives one forgiveness.

The 'mechanical' part of the sacrifice, is for our benefit and not His. (That is why I believe there will be so many shocked "death bed converts" on the otherside.) Same principle applies under the covenant of Christianity. God is not the 'fool' many think Him to be. He is not bound by the chanting or recitation of a given prayer nor our participation in a given cermony. The sacrifice Christ gave us is for us to know what the Spiritual cost was to God. 'We' are supposed to acknoweledge and respect this sacrifice. Not in the physical beating and death Christ took (which was a very big deal in of itself) but the lengths it took to explain the pain and perhaps even death of the part of God that Requires/Demands Death to all who sin against Him. What it truly cost God we may never know in this life, but what He has shown us to be the cost mirrors the most horrid and feared way to die. (in that time, maybe even in this) with a beating of all beating piled on top of it. Because of this we can have some sense of the price of our attonement, and as such should prompt those who seek a relationship with God to not only look in to what had happened and why, but to also do what has been asked of the believer to do.

---

If any action on God's part causes him spiritual pain, that asserts limitations and weaknesses in God. A truly all-powerful and all-knowing being could not go through 'spiritual pain' if his every act is good, just and righteous because there can be no doubt or reluctance.

Look at the Story of the Prodigal son. The 'Father' was pained by the son's decision to leave, and over joyed when he returned. Even though the Father was pained at His sons departure, it does not mean the Father lost his position as the Father, just because he felt pain.

Put another way, it costs God nothing, not time, energy, or even patience, to offer 'atonement', especially when we are 'atoning' for acting according to our nature as he specifically and carefully designed it. It would have been effortless for God to have simply said "I forgive you and require nothing in return", because by definition, God needs nothing in return. The whole Jesus story is a fraud of the worst sort, proven by the fact that the only limitations God ever has are those Christians assign him, so as to make sense of their very senseless fairy tales.

How can you possiably know what it did or did not cost God if you refuse to accept anything written in the bible about it?

---

Do you have any numbers for this large proportion of Jews that converted? I can't find anything on it but at the same time there doesn't appear to be any great reduction in the number of Jews in the century following Jesus' death.

Most sources I have seen cite the majority of Jews as not being convinced and therefore remaining Jewish.

So, what was the book of Hebrews? Who was it written to?

What of the recorded arguements between Peter (who was converting people to Judaism first and then to Christianity) and Paul in 2Galations?
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?sea...ersion=NIV

In this chapter Paul (The Gentile apstole) rebuked Peter and the other Apstoles for keeping their distance from the gentile believers and giving all of their time to the Jews, Unles the Gentiles first converted to Judaism.
Even in scripture there is a clear line (in the beginning) between the Jewish side of the Church and the gentile side. In the 1st century only one apstole was needed to minister to the 'gentile' part of the church. The rest spoke to Jewish converts.

---

Even if you take the Bible as the Gospel Truth, you are still faced with the harsh reality that Jesus must have failed because his his most critical prophesy failed to come true. In Matthew 24 Jesus is asked to reveal the signs of the end of the age and of his coming. In response to that he gives several examples of things to look for, but more importantly, he puts a strict timeline for when to expect the events of his second coming to have transpired:

"Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened"

This verse, and it's implications, are reinforced in several other locations of scripture.

Now, of course Christian apologists have went to great lengths to explain this away because accepting the implications would thoroughly destroy their entire basis for belief. It's funny how Christians have turned the bible into some sort of super code book that only the most spiritually enlightened can understand.

LOL

Meanwhile, Jesus is at least 1900 years past due, so it might be time for religious fanatics to consider a different religious angle to commit/waste their time with. Scientology is waiting with open arms, I hear.

The 'word' in Koine greek that we translate into 'generation' is:γενεά genea which can mean:
1) fathered, birth, nativity

2) that which has been begotten, men of the same stock, a family

a) the several ranks of natural descent, the successive members of a genealogy

b) metaph. a group of men very like each other in endowments, pursuits, character
1) esp. in a bad sense, a perverse nation
3) the whole multitude of men living at the same time

4) an age (i.e. the time ordinarily occupied be each successive generation), a space of 30 - 33 years

It even has been translated into the word Nation.

You have to remember the bible (most of them anyway) are literal translations, as apposed to contextual translations. Meaning they are translated in such a way as to give a syntaxtually correct translation (as close to the orginal) as possiable. Meaning things like illiterations, sayings, cultural usages of a given word maybe lost in the initial translation. It is up to the reader to either find a contextual translation or a bible with commentary or to do the research for himself.

Seriously all this above...

why do you think you have a shred of a chance to get anyone to accept what you are saying when almost every person that is replying does not believe that what the bible says is the truth. They first would have to accept that for any of your statements to have meaning.

Without that you mine as well be making the most annoying sound in the world...

Seriously it makes you want to kill