Nobody's perfect

fodders said:

We seem to forget that only one man ever walked this earth in perfection.

Did he?

The man you're talking about wasn't perfect. He tried pretty hard, but had his moments of anger and rebellion just like the rest of us. He was petty enough that he cursed a fruit tree for not having any fruit for him. And he had his limits: This is the guy who, at one point, went ape-shit at the merchants in the temple and started breaking stuff. Other people's stuff, even. And this is only the stuff that history recorded; we're left in the dark about a good thirty years of the man's life.

Jesus was a punk. He walked all over the religious and cultural standards of his time, violating all kinds of taboos and not caring who he pissed off. When people called him on it, he never answered their questions directly, if at all. He just sat there like a smarmy bastard because he knew he was right. He fought the power and bucked the system even when it had its hands around his throat. He had the balls to get out of a death penalty after the fact.

You don't have to worship him. In fact, the man probably wouldn't like to be worshipped. Not his style. But you've gotta respect the guy for his attitude, his dedication, and his consummate nerve.

Amen

People seem to forget that nowdays

Jesus was an anarchist. He was like the first person in 2000 years either way to think about crap like human rights.

The odd thing about him is that he stands against at least half of everything that the old Hebrew religion stood for. I mean, he was against violence of any kind, yet in the Old Testament, the Jews were slaughtering thousands of people for their God. And Jesus was pretty much against dogma. I remember a specific instance in the New Testament where Jesus is arguing with some priests or whatnot. THe priests say that the people must wash or something before eating or something, and he's just like "Its not what you do in action, but what you do in deed", or something. It was pretty cool.

But basicaly, Jesus was an anarchist because he believed that everyone should be entitled to their own rights and such, and that no one should have to listen to their leaders (yet he supposedly preached for a monotheistic religion, which I find odd).

Personaly, I believe that Jesus was probably real, but being an atheist, I seriously doubt his divinity.

Jesus was real. Christianity happened when people bastardized his teachings.

Liam the Bard said:

Jesus was real. Christianity happened when people bastardized his teachings.

Pretty much.

the_Danarchist said:

... I mean, he was against violence of any kind,...

Jesus contradicts this first in the story of the moneylenders in the temple. Even though he compared anger and insults to murder in Matthew 5:22, he drives out the moneylenders, overturns their tables and insults them by calling them "robbers" in Matthew 21:13. Then Jesus pitches a big hissy fit in verse 19 when he curses a fig tree because it has no fruit. The tree dies immediately.

Well, we all have our issues.