Sequoia

was he a man of peace or a man of war?

was he a man of love or a man of hate?

Tigers!

That's always a tricky one. We need to separate the man and his message from the reactions that the man and his message engendered.

For example HJ told people to "turn the other cheek". Sounds like a message of peace. Yet he also stated that he and his message would turn father against son, mother against daughter etc: Which sounds like a message of man of war.

I have no easy answer except to try to hold both aspects in tension. Both are true yet can appear diametrically opposed to each other.

JEST2ASK

Is man an agent of peace or of war?

Is man an agent of love or of hate?

It seems to me that (agreeing with Tigers!) it is not a simple black / white issue.

Assuming a historical basis how do we determine what was the authentic message and in what context do we frame that message? :huh:

motorhead

I think the canonical gospels try to paint Jesus as the man who fufilled all the various expectations of the Jews at that time. He's the expected end times prophet, he's the Messiah, he's the Son of Man from the book of Daniel, etc.

As many have done, you can wade through all the canonical gospels and try to come up with some coherent picture of who Jesus was and what he meant to do. Of course, as a result of this, there are many different views on who Jesus was and what what his purpose.

Personally, I think the most coherent picture you can get of Jesus from the canonical gospels is he was an end times prophet who felt himself called by God to preach the imminent arrival of the Kingdom of God. The central message of Jesus is this Kingdom of God, what it will be like and who will be welcomed into it.

So, was he a man of peace or war? He preached that God was arriving any moment to overthrow the current world order. Evil people would be condemned and justice and peace would prevail because God would rule. Righteous people would be welcomed into the Kingdom. This had been a Jewish belief prior to the time of Jesus. I think Jews refer to it by various names, such as, the age to come. I'm not sure this falls into either category of peace or war. Depends on how you look at it.

Was he man of love or hate? I'm sure Jesus would not have seen his mission as hateful. If anything, he would've seen it as loving. He's warning people to prepare for the imminent arrival of the Kingdom. He's telling them what they have to do to make sure they're welcomed into it. Like above, to decide if it's loving or hateful depends on how you look at it.

Mythra

Well, if we're assuming he existed, and we're assuming that he said everything that the gospel stories say he said - such as this:

Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn
" 'a man against his father,
a daughter against her mother,
a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law -
a man's enemies will be the members of his own household.'
"Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.

I'd put him in the same category as most any narcissistic cult leader.

I can picture the Reverend Jim Jones or David Koresh making very similar statements to their prospective flocks.

Nismo

Jesus was just some guy with a persecution complex.

Nismo

Okay, lame jokes aside, if we assumed he existed, and his quotes in the bible are accurate, then I think he was a man of peace and love, but may not have been all there mentally.

aa5874

He would have been, based on the NT, a sorcerer, a magician and a trickster who betrayed the ideals of Judas the Galilean.

Lucretius

The highlighted part is of course the problem even if we assume that there was a HJ how would we defintively know that every single "quote" attributed to him is genuine .
Misattribution of quotes or deeds to famous people still goes on all the time so not only would we have to asume his existence but also that nothing has been added or subtracted from the account of his life as well.
That makes two assumptions rather than just the one.

No Robots

The contradictory traits in his character, its positive and negative aspects, his harshness and his gentleness, his clear vision combined with his cloudy visionariness—all these united to make him a force and an influence, for which history has never yet afforded a parallel.—Joseph Klausner