Question for Atheists?

Question

Hey. I'm doing a research paper and I need to know the opinion of Atheists (and only atheists please) on what they think about Jesus.

That's all. Thanks.

Answer 1

jesus was a man

Answer 2

I am one who believes in all probability Jesus did exist. He was a very clever illusionist for his time. Of course some of our illusionist of today could do much better. Still he probably had no problem turning water into wine or walking on water. The thing with Lazarus could have been easily set up. The question in my mind was he able to pull off the biggie. The Crucifixion. It could all have been arranged as the greatest illusion of them all. Was it probably not. Then he might not even have been crucified someone could have been put in his place. this is all just speculation of course. At any rate we know he was not a God.

Answer 3

It is rather difficult given the quality of the documentation about him. The Gospels are not biographies but rather theological statements by believers to believers.

I think there are two issues with Jesus. The first is does he inform the world's moral discourse, outside of Christianity. I think he does. In the study of morals and ethics it has been observed that religion's primary role is to determine who is in the in group and who is in the out group. People are willing to see the outgroup murdered or tortured regardless of religion. So American's torture "suspected terrorists," Protestants tortured Catholics and other Protestants and Catholics tortured heretics.

Jesus, in the Good Samaritan story said that there should be no out group. There is but one group and we are it. In this, he informs the moral discourse of the world.

The second side of Jesus however is the non-secular ethics side. Is he God? The accounts of the Last Supper as it is called by Protestants or the First Supper as Catholics and Orthodox call it make it clear. All who eat his body and drink his blood get into heaven. Following this, Judas leaves and betrays him. Was he a cult leader who really believed this? Did Judas suddenly wake up, the practical treasurer of the group, and turn him over? Was he a Jim Jones or a David Koresh?

We cannot know. We cannot even know what he thought because we only know the reminisences of the second generation as told by the first generation. The earliest complete manuscripts we have are from around 350, codex Vaticanus and codex Sinaiticus. We have 400,000 variant passages from the early copies so we have more variations than we have verses. We can also read the early writings of the apostolic fathers, some older than the scriptures. They were the people the apostles trained and include Clement, the third Pope and Ignatius of Antioch the third Patriarch of Antioch. Both were ordained by Peter and/or trained by John. As well, Polycarp was the redactor of John's Gospel, so to read Polycarp is important to understand the Johannine literature.

So Jesus is important in that he is the earliest expression of the idea that there is no out group in the Western world, though in the East Jains hold that title. Christian agape and Jain samayika are the same thing. This implies that there is a strong survival value as well as a natural impulse to expend oneself for the wellbeing of others.

Jains surpass Christians in this regard, at least in practice, but are likely less successful as a religion as a result of this. Radical pacificism makes it easy to limit a community when it is adjacent to militant religions such as Islam and Christianity.

I have not decided for myself on who Jesus was. Was he mistaken, were the apostles mistaken, was he a con man or was he simply insane? On the postive side, he informs an ethic of loving others. On the negative side, it is combined with an exclusiveness and power structure that is probably harmful to man. Apostolic succession is at best neutral. That Protestants reject the apostolic succession, even though it is clear in the historical record back to the beginning, shows that there is some perception that the power structures the apostles created are at best neutral and hold problematic elements to them.

I think it is impossible to understand Christianity and in particular the New Testament apart from its liturgical proclaimation. Likewise it is impossible to understand the liturgies of ancient Christianity without the New and Old Testament. They are so intertwined that the newer innovations such as Lutheranism and other newer inventions make less and less sense and I think push atheism as a better alternative.

If Jesus is to be understood, you must attend the Catholic and Orthodox liturgies because it is there that you see the early proclaimations made alive as they first were, in the todah service of the synagogue. As such, they hide the historical Jesus but provide us with the Jesus of the apostles as the apostles seem to have understood him.

Once you strip away the religious component, much of what Jesus has to say isn't unique. Even with the religious component, he was one of many leaders of similar movements at the time. He is unique in that his group actually survived and the others disappeared with time, just as the Branch Davidians will someday or the Wiccans.

Answer 4

From what I read Jesus appears to be well ahead of his time in terms of a universal ethic. Before Jesus, most societies (including the Hebrews) instructed its members to respect the humanity of its own elite and/or enfranchised citizens and mistreat/maim/enslave/exploit everyone else. Jesus may have been among the first western thinkers to emphasize treating everyone with dignity irregardless of nationality or status. Unfortunately, the gospel records present a skewed view of Jesus because they are second hand sources. If we are to attribute the quotes of which he claims deification as actually things he said he may have suffered from delusion and/or megalomania.

Answer 5

I think that Jesus is a legend. From the sources available, it might be possible that one or more persons existed who became a root for this legend. It seems that there was a strong yearning for a messiah personality, and there were many prophecies announcing one, and from all these wishes combined at some point the legend was formed and stories were written down.

Answer 6

For atheist people the doctrine teach by Jesus which is to love and respect everybody the same way you love and respect your self and the message of peace and kindness for humanity is taken as a person that teach something good to humanity, just like the examples of Mother Teresa, Gandhi, to mention a few, but that's it just a Human teaching something good to people but nothing in-mortal or holy. I believed that without getting into big controversy that if he was a supreme been or not the important thing is to follow the good things he teach humanity.

Answer 7

A so called legend that has grown wholly thus, from the perspective of time.


Basically like how Santa was just a man who gave presents to the kids then time warped him into a magical man with flying reindeer.

Answer 8

The evidence for his existence is scant. The majority of the evidence is hearsay and "written" at least 30 years later It took them close to 300 hundred years to come up with a final plan.

Answer 9

There are some Atheist that think Jesus was made up. Look Apollonius of Tyana. The say he was killed for healing with scientific means and the religious killed him and build the Jesus character around Apollonius.

Answer 10

Jesus was a composite fictional Biblical character, all details of his life are deliberately vague and there doesn't seem to be any contemporary reference to him outside of the Bible at all unless they were later additions (faked).
So much of his story seem to be composited and taken from characters who featured in earlier religions. In other words the Jesus story is Mythological or historic fiction if you like.

Answer 11

I think if he was a real person, then he was just a well known person who went around preaching about god. But there's really no physical proof he actually existed. No paintings or pictures of him during the time when he lived, no artifacts, nothing. So I doubt his existence.