Opinion of Jesus Christ

[DemPGH]

Jesus Christ alone minus the church and all the religious bureaucrats who followed? FF. That's based upon the sermon on the mount and the beatitudes wherein Jesus Christ, a man, a teacher, sought to stop the tribal nonsense and vindictive craziness that was the order of the day. And certainly to overturn the Old Testament focus on legalism, clearly.

Now the HPs are the religious bureaucracies that followed and which crushed the very nature of the human adventure as well as the great human capicity to love and to learn. I haven't words to express my disdain for those people.

[DemPGH]

Interestingly, the conversation proves that it depends upon interpretation. It's possible to see him as a rebel who opposed the awful legalism of the sadducees and religious bureaucrats, or as a cult leader who is not THAT different from the ones of today. In addition to what afleitch has pointed out, the parable of the gold coins is another passage that could be interpreted in a less-than-flattering light. But readings of Jesus Christ as an immoral person and teacher are underrepresented at least in American culture. Atheists will rarely argue this in my experience; rather, they play the game on the turf of religion - that is, to point how the actions of churches and Christians are not compatible with Christ. If atheism ever debated on its own turf, we might see the view that Jesus was actually immoral become far more standard. While I don't routinely listen to atheists or read atheist books, I seldom if ever hear this argument made.

I think Jesus Christ belongs among those ancient philosophers whose teachings survive only in snippets, and it's impossible to determine to whom to precisely credit those snippets. The miracles could have been easily staged or made up, we don't know, but they clearly were intended to enhance the legend of this teacher and philosopher, positive, negative, or perhaps ordinary.