Steven Carr

C.S.Lewis wrote
"Jesus made some extraordinary claims about himself;
so extraordinary that if he really believed them and
they were false he'd have had to be entirely insane,
that if he didn't believe them he'd have had to be
terribly dishonest, and that if they were true then
we'd have to concede that he was God incarnate. Since
his recorded teaching and behaviour are obviously not
those of a madman or a charlatan, we must conclude
that he was God incarnate."


That was precisely the view of the disciples when they deserted him at
the crucifixion.

They had observed that his teaching and behaviour were clearly not those of a madman or a charlatan, so they scarpered.

What other alternative did they have? The wise teaching of Jesus proved that he was clearly neither a charlatan, nor a liar, so they had no other option than to regard him as a God.

And you desert Gods, don't you?

I don't think Lewis thought this one through, did he?

Chili

They represented his sanity and could not afford to be crucified with him. Jesus was not God because Gods do not get crucified but when Jesus gets crucified that which remained is the Lord who's completion (the 11 as in Lord and God side by side) were the disciples.

These disciples once were his shepherds that were out on the night when Christ was born. They were called to be his apostles and here now abandon him to be crucified. They will return and sup with him again in the upper room where heaven is at.

cajela

The "lord, liar, lunatic" trilemma omits "lied about, legendary" and possibly more options starting with L

Nice point, Steven Carr.

Dean Anderson

Lego?

Chili

I helps to try and see who was speaking when Jesus was speaking. Was it the Christ in him of the ex Jew he was trying to annihilate? Wasn't it Jesus who said: I must decease while he must increase?

Of course there was nothing wrong with Jesus the Jew since only upright Jews make it to heaven. The point here was that 'uprightness' is not a Jewish quality but a God given quality to Jews and therefore was it only the Jew in Jesus that needed to be crucified and for that his sanity needed to prevail. I would like to point out here that the many sins he was crucified for was the very cross he carried.

noah

I've never been impressed with the Trilemma. I think it's weak logically and sensibly and crude intellectually.
The Trilemma is a heavy handed maladroit attempt to shock and maneuvre the person into three false extremes forcing the person to choose the one they feel is least offensive orshocking to them. People don't usually want to say someone was nuts or evil.

The posing and poser of the Trilemma makes several untenable assumptions:

1) That you will accept being put into a three sided box when asked who you think JC was.

2) That you will be so naive as to accept that there are only three choices when you decide who JC was.

3) That you will believe that the three categories the Trillema comprises are the only three categories into which to slot JC.

4) That the three categories in the Trilemma are the only categories. They are not.
Let me suggest a few others:

-JC was simply mistaken. Does that make him a looney?

-JC was misunderstood (the most logical most realistic option in my opinion)

-JC is misunderstood. Perhaps there is more to know about him than our present understanding of him allows.

-JC never existed

-JC was a composite figure

- JC is a mystery that will never be solved.

- Turn the Trilemma back on itself: JC was a fable spun by evil or looney people.

- I choose not to pick an option. I am beyond JC spiritually and/or logically.

noah

I forgot to add another couple of possibilities and that is that JC was misrepresented intentionally by his followers and/or his enemies.
Or how about the possibility that JC's message was simply lost, that what has come down to us are not his actual teachings?

Anonimus

That's making the assumption that the testimony from the authors of the Gospels, which were written 30+ years later, is accurate. We have good reason to regard much of what is written in the Gospels with deep suspicion; we simply can't take it for granted that Jesus said what the Gospels claim he said.


Quite the contrary. Claiming to be divine and a miracle worker, possibly faking miracles, and throwing a completely irrational temper tantrum (in the temple) are all just the sorts of behaviors one expects from madmen and charlatans.

With every quote I see from C.S. Lewis, I find it harder to believe that he was the brilliant apologist he's made out to have been. Or maybe this is good stuff by apologetic standards? :huh:

Doug Shaver

Yes. Apologists judge arguments by whether their conclusions support apologetic dogma. The conclusion of Lewis's argument is that Christianity is true. Therefore, it is a good argument.

Yes, I'm being facetious. But after reading enough apologetics, it isn't hard to start suspecting that they really do think that way.