Seems like, with all the pain God felt from the people in the Old Testament, one human death, experienced by His immortal invincible Son, would just be a drop in the bucket, not even to mention all of our pain God feels to this day for our sufferings and our sins? Mathematically, you've have to figure that Jesus's death was far less than 0.01% of all the pain God has ever felt anway... right? What with his total empathy and all..
And Jesus has this empathy too... so what would be so special about the one human death He experienced in the flesh?
He's so empathetic he experiences all of our deaths as if it were He Himself dying, anyway. He'd already felt the pain of every crucifixion before His, and all of those after... right????
2006-08-16 07:59:14 · 5 answers · asked by overseas and broke 2 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
"Infinite empathy" may be my own term... but a God who loves us so much and so perfectly, would certainly feel all of our pain as if it were his own. That's true test of love.
2006-08-16 08:09:12 · update #1
Where do you get "infinite empathy" from?
You're just making up stuff as if it's some profound dilemma.
2006-08-16 08:04:57 · answer #1 · answered by Iridium190 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
An interesting logical and philosophical question. Not quite the "can an omnipotent god create a rock so large he cannot move it?" question, but somewhat along those lines.
There may be a difference between loving and omniscient, which Christians generally believe God is, and all-empathetic. Our typical concept of empathy is more of a "been there, done that" idea. I'm not sure there is a lot of support in canon for God being all empathetic. Were He so, He'd have full understanding of what it feels like to be a sinner, despite being holy and sinless Himself. Again, another logical challenge, like the rock question...
Canon does suggest that God responded differently, whether in grief or anger or whatever, to Christ's death than to others He had seen. There were dead walking the streets, darkness, ripped temple veil, etc. (See Matt. 27:50-54.)
One possible explanation is that all persons who died before and after Christ were sinners condemned to a physical death by their own sins. (See Rom. 3:23.) Christ was sinless, thus God's pain/anger may have resulted from the apparent gross injustice (however necessary to the devine plan) of Christ's crucifixion.
2006-08-16 08:29:57 · answer #2 · answered by Jamestheflame 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
His death wasn't so special. It was his teachings that were so special. Recent evidence hints that he may not even have died on the cross. There were lots of worse things done to people over the years. The Romans were rewriting a religion in a form that would get the biggest audience and keep that audience feeling guilty and hopeless. Worked pretty good, eh?
2006-08-16 08:10:06 · answer #3 · answered by R. F 3 · 0⤊ 1⤋
You make alot of assumptions. I wouldn't want to be the one who lets you down.
2006-08-16 08:13:01 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Have you ever really read the Bible?
2006-08-16 08:09:13 · answer #5 · answered by I love my husband 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋