dog-on

Please tell me if you disagree with this statement and if so, why.

The basic premise of Christianity, as it currently is understood, is the following; A god sacrifices himself to himself to save us from himself.


If you agree that this is, in fact, a correct understanding of the basic Christian premise, can this be said to be actual evidence for the priority of gnostic or even proto-gnostic Christianity?

Could the doctrine championed by characters like Marcion be shown to be more "coherent" than the doctrine championed by, what became, the proto-orthodoxy?

Did the original Christ faith hold that YHWH was the demiurge and that the savior was a ransom paid to the demiurge for our salvation and isn't this actually a more "coherent" doctrine, on it's face?

show_no_mercy

It seems like the doctrine of the early Jewish-Christians (possibly the Ebionites) was more coherent. Jesus was simply adopted by god when he was baptized by John (the Christology presented in Mark) and then became a sacrifice, subsequently losing his powers on the cross. Jesus wasn't a god or demi-god in any way.

The Gnostics (or Docetics) were probably trying to make sense out of the later view that Jesus was a god himself and not just the righteous son of god. The reason the current Christology is nonsensical is because the proto-Orthodoxy, in trying to appeal to the widest range of Christians to form the universal (literally "catholic") church, simply meshed together a whole bunch of different Christologies into one "doctrine".

storytime

Christians can attempt to smooth it over any way they like but the NT story of Jesus is about human sacrifice. The firstborn sacrifices himself to his God and so redeems man from sin. But where in OT is human sacrifice mentioned? The closest thing I've found is where Moses offers himself to be punished for the sins of Israelites, and then God tells him no, unacceptable, because every man is reponsible for their own sins. So Moses could not redeem the Israelites. How then did the church fathers spin such a story about a man named Jesus? Did they pick out from other religions the human sacrifice concept? Maybe from the people who worshipped and sacrificed to the Molech god?

bacht

This is the problem with having a human Jesus, which Jewish believers like the Ebionites probably recognized

In the OT the most famous story is Abraham and Isaac, where God orders an animal substitute for the boy. The story of Jephthah's daughter just came up here. There are references to the fire god Molech, including Manasseh king of Judah sacrificing his child [2 Kings 21]

No Robots

Like other cultures, early Judaism was vitally concerned with the question of human sacrifice. The solution was to sublimate by substituting an animal. The eating of the sacrificial lamb became the center of the Passover. The eating of the bread at Passover also took on symbolic significance, coming to mean the eating of the Messiah. At the Last Supper, Christ took all of this and applied it to himself.

Clivedurdle

And is not this just so story too good to be true?

biblethumping

I think you are missing the point. Jesus so loved his people he was willing to sacrifice himself to his father so that we may be absolved of sin. People do some crazy things when they are in love and make all sorts of sacrifices in the name of love. now magnify love to infinite omni love and it's easy to see the only way for Jesus to care for his flock was to sacrifice himself on the cross in the name of love. Some of you need to attend some bible school because this is the first thing taught.

No Robots

The point is that Christ took this relatively trivial folklorish practice and turned it into the world's most stupendous mystical reality.

show_no_mercy

Christ didn't do that, his followers did. We actually have no idea what "Christ" did or wanted since he didn't bother to write anything or have anything dictated.

The most likely scenario is that Jesus thought the world was going to end in a couple of years (hence no reason to write anything), was executed, and his followers deified him. Thus resulting in this convoluted "god sacrificed himself to himself save us from himself" madness.

Joan of Bark

I never did understand the connection between His death and the forgiveness of everyone's sin, except as a variation of pagan rituals involving animal sacrifice to appease the god(s).