What do you think about Jesus?

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Why thank you.

Oh is it biography time? I have been on a quest for spiritual truth my whole life.

I was born a Catholic but was kicked out of a Catholic elementary school in the third grade for being too rebellious, asking too many questions and refusing to accept anything on faith without evidence to back it up. I was agnostic through most of my teen years, but became a fundamentalist evangelical Christian (yes, me) for a few months in my early twenties in some especially difficult times. I was turned away from that for two reasons. First most of their time was spent preaching hatred against other religions to show how "wrong" those others are (even other branches of Christianity such as Catholics, Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons), and of course their denial of the reality of evolution made me realize they probably aren't reliable sources on spiritual matters if they are so out of touch with the reality of the physical world.

I studied all the religions of all cultures in my twenties and thirties. In my thirties I spent many years as a student of comparative mythology. I took a college class that was taught by a friend and colleague of Joseph Campbell who used the TV series and book Transformations of Myth Through Time as the primary course material. In my late thirties and early forties I studied many Native American cultures at university from Native American professors. I had no desire to be a Native American. I just respected their cultures and wanted to learn more about them.

Then in my early forties I heard audio files of Alan Watts explaining eastern philosophies to western audiences. Such a speaker! Light bulbs went off over my head as I listened to him talk. I don't agree with everything Alan Watts said, but still out of all the thousands of authors and speakers I have encountered in my life, his words have touched me the deepest.

My own beliefs are closest to Advaita Vedanta Hinduism or Buddhism or Taoism, and as I see it these all have the same core beliefs just expressed differently for different cultures. To some extent that could be said of all religions. I think Jesus, if He existed, had an experience of cosmic consciousness and tried to share it with other people, but because of the limitations of his language and culture his message was misunderstood. Alan Watts said more than once that what happened with Christianity is the Christians worshiped the messenger and missed the point of the message. Christianity is the religion about Jesus, not the religion of Jesus. What Jesus taught is very much like the teachings of Buddha. so if you want to be more like Jesus become a Buddhist. Of course I could be wrong!

In spite of my great doubts as to whether or not there is a personal God, I have spent a lot of time praying nearly every day of my whole life. I don't pray for health, wealth or progeny as some might. I pray for an end to suffering and for guidance to be a better person and help others. I am becoming more and more suspicious though that all that praying was a complete waste of time as we learn more and more about the origins of the universe, the origins of life, and the origins of consciousness. Oh well!

Here is a Prayer I wrote as a song in 1994.

Yes. That is correct. I experienced it as infused knowledge. It was as though my entire mind had been reordered. So yes it was a revelation for me, a mystical experience.

Seems like a good baseball player.

I've read somewhere that there are ancient texts (don't remember which ones) that suggest that during Jesus' so called missing years in the bible, he traveled to different countries and that many of his teachings may be based on Eastern religions.

Not saying this is true, but I suppose it could be possible.

Just for the record, a number of historical scholars call Josephus' references to Jesus into question. The passages do not match his writing style, the language that would have been used by someone of his background (Josephus was a Jew who never converted to Christianity, and would not have called Jesus "the Christ" or "the truth"), and do not have the same depth as the rest of his work. It has been argued that it was a later addition. The earliest Josephus copy was from Christian historian Eusebius, who is not considered reliable.

Tacitus made no mention of "Jesus," only "the sect known as Christians" living in Rome and their persecution, and "their founder, one Christus," who was crucified. Despite all the pop culture references, there is no historical evidence that Nero persecuted Christians. Nero did persecute Jews. (Perhaps Tacitus was confused?) There was not a "great crowd" of Christians in Rome around 60 C.E., as Tacitus put it, and the term "Christian" was not even in use in the first century. No one in the second century ever quoted this passage of Tacitus. Citing Tacitus came later, and is highly suspect at best.

Philo of Alexandria wrote in depth about early first-century Palestine, naming many self-proclaimed messiahs, but never once mentioned Jesus. This proves little, though.

The Jesus story mirrors other mythical saviors/gods who were killed and resurrected, like Osiris, Attis, Mithra, and Dionysus. Which makes me question the validity of the resurrection tale.



I do believe that Jesus existed (or perhaps a group of teachers/philosophers lumped together to form a single folk hero). I do not believe he (or they) came back from the dead.

Mara Bar-Serapion (a Roman philosopher from Syria) wrote a letter to his son referring to the unjust treatment of "three wise men," including the murder of Socrates, the burning of Pythagoras, and the execution of "the wise king" of the Jews. He does not mention resurrection, but does imply that the wise king lived on through his teachings.

Pliny the Younger (a provincial governor) wrote to Emperor Trajan wrote about Christians, saying that they refused to worship the emperor, worshipping "Christus" instead.

Lucian of Samosata (a Greek satirist), wrote of Christians and insulted their beliefs, meaning he probably wasn't influenced by them. He did refer to the crucifixion, though (but again, no resurrection reference).

I believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, and the holy Son of God.

I like Moses.

Are you certain that Nero had never persecuted the early church? Even his predecessor, Claudius, had booted the inhabitants of the Jewish quarter of Rome out of the city because of riots arising from the discovery of worshipers of "Chrestos" among them. We know that the Roman authorities were aware of the early Christians, and were alarmed by the growth of what they considered to be a dangerous eastern cult.

Jesus loves me,yes he does...

If he was real he'd be just a niche political activist who's a bit too full of himself.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwbGjzF3mB0[/youtube]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fz73ygisVOU[/youtube]

Jesus doesn't mess around, he mean business!

The confines of Christianity are greatest when we forget that they began as stories by the campfire.

His spark persisted, because He took their breath away.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAywhqz1IMQ[/youtube]

So in other words he performs a maniacal act of berating the storm, they manage to ride out the storm and what gets remembered is his rage and not the fact that the storm continued unabated for several hours afterwards. Or you could believe that an all knowing, all powerful and ever present god could be taken unawares by and get his weather forecast wrong, necessitating a miracle to save himself and the rest of the crew. Why not simply teleport the ship straight to habour, more sensible and probably far less strenuous.

That people actually believe this nonsense saddens me.