Jesus' miracles: why didn't he convince everybody?

Question

that he was divine? If I saw someone revive a truly dead person (which Jesus is said to have done all over the place) or turn water into wine, I would NEVER doubt his divinity, and would tell everybody I know about it.

I suppose my question is: why did Jesus have only 12 apostles, and not 12 million, i.e. all his contemporaries?

unless... he actually didn't perform those miracles???

I think it is possible to see Jesus as a great teacher/philosopher without all the C R A P that is attributed to him.

Read Bishop Spong's: Jesus for the non-religious.

Answer 1

the bible and religious stories are just that - stories. sure, jesus may have lived..im sure he did, but it seems that he was a medicine man, a witch doctor, a healer of sorts..and i think that his "miracles" have been grossly exaggerated (hence billions of idiot followers) over the span of 2000+ years.

Answer 2

Hello:

Well if Jesus asked people to walk around and follow him then he probably would have gotten more converts. I am pretty sure that the apostles pretty much took it on themselves to follow Jesus around.

He did however get a lot of people interested in his way of thinking which was why it was necessary in the mind of the ruling priests and King Herod to kill him.

As for the miracles...its possible that they had gotten exaggerated as will happen when a story spreads, or maybe they did really happen and they were just too fantastic for some to beleive.

I mean really we have stories from the bible and I have heard proof that there was really a man named Jesus of Nazareth and parts of his life correspond with the fella in the bible.

It sounds like you're hating on the Jesus. I'm an atheist and I deny the likelihood of his divinity, however I do think hes a pretty good guy. I would be glad to make him dinner and let him sleep on the sofa if he needed it is what I am saying.

I hope this helps.

Rev Phil

Answer 3

Ummm....why would anyone base their belief on someone's claim to miracles? Being Jewish, we are taught that we are NOT to look at or take into consideration anyone's miracles who comes to claim the title "Messiah" (and there have been thousands of men who have tried).

The reasons are:
1. Even the Egyptians did miracles, including raising the dead, as did several Jewish sages in the Torah long before Jesus. None of them were the Messiah.

2. In the End of Days, the Anti-Messiah will do miracles in order to convince people who don't know any better, and think that miracles mean he is the real Messiah. Thus, the Jews will not be fooled, as we are taught not to look at miracles, but many others will be.

3. The ONLY criteria that are acceptable for passing the test of the real Messiah, is the fulfillment of each and every one of the 16 or so ORIGINAL and still true prophecies that the Messiah is to fulfill. Forget the hundreds of false prophecies that the Church has invented and tried to back engineer into our Torah - they do not exist and are irrelevant to the truth.

Jesus did not fulfill even one of those actual prophecies. Not one. Furthermore, the real Messiah is to fulfill them DURING HIS LIFETIME. There is no such thing as a "second coming" in Judaism, the Church invented this. If he fails to fulfill all of the prophecies during his lifetime, then he was not the Messiah. Period. There are NO other criteria than that.

To find out about what the REAL Messiah will do, the actual circumstances of his birth (wholly human, born from a married Jewish man and wife in the usual way, etc.), what he is to accomplish and how, (for instance, he does NOT serve as a god/man pagan blood sacrifice for sin, but lives a long life) etc. please see the following Jewish links for the actual prophecies and circumstances as given on Mt. Sinai to the Jews by God Himself:


http://www.aish.com/spirituality/philoso...

http://www.messiahtruth.com/response.htm...

http://ohr.edu/ask/ask00j.htm

http://shamash.org/lists/scj-faq/HTML/fa...

http://www.beingjewish.com/toshuv/whynot...

http://www.askmoses.com/article.html?h=1...

http://www.jewsforjudaism.com

The Path of Righteousness for All People to merit a place in the World To Come (does not involve any human sacrifice, including the Messiah) according to Judaism:
http://www.noahide.org

Answer 4

Couple of things:
The apostles were chosen by Jesus, not the other way round. Many thousands followed him wherever he went. Many also believed in his powers/divinity: 'if only I could touch the helm of his garment', the sick laid out by the path so his shadow would fall on them as he passed and so on.
True many, especially the powerful and privileged, did not believe, probably believing would have cost them.
The miracle at Cana was a private affair between Jesus and his mother.
In raising the dead also he never claimed divine intervention. As for Lazrus, he said: 'he is sleeping'. So also with the little girl.

Answer 5

If Christ performed all miracles then nobody would understand his purpose. He performed the miracles that he did for others to know who he was. He selected the 12 to follow him to teach them how to seek and find the lost. Having followers like that was a common practice. John the baptist had followers.... Andrew, Peters brother was one of John the baptist follower then when John baptized Jesus, Andrew became a follower of Jesus.

There is no need for all these miracles. The ultimate miracle is yet to come... the resurrection that he will perform. The first resurrection will be the Christains. The second resurrection will the rest to be judged for their sins,

12And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.

Revelation 20:

13And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.

14And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.

15And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.

Answer 6

I'm pretty sure it was only Lazarus that He raised from the dead - though it was a few days after internment and Lazarus's sisters thought ol' Lazarus might be a bit too gamy.

Remember the line from Jesus Christ Superstar, "Israel 4 BC had no mass communication!" Even word of miraculous happenings took a while to spread.

Christ new He had to die, and He didn't do much to avoid it.

What's amazing is that this small messianic movement in the backwaters of the Roman empire would rise to become the state religion of Rome.

Answer 7

Firstly, the apostles were appointed. Jesus did have other followers, disciples. But the longer I live the more I understand about human nature. Thomas, an apostle, wasn't the only person who doubted the truth. He didn't even believe Jesus was resurrected until Jesus put Thomas' hands on his wounds. Now mind you Jesus appeared to him in spirit form yet he still did not believe until he felt the wounds. People are like that today.

Answer 8

To understand the answer to that question, you must understand why we're on this earth. Prior to being born we lived as spirit children of our Heavenly Father. Because he loves us and wants us to grow and develop, he prepared this earth with certain conditions, among which are competing truths, suffering, and people making both good and bad decisions. The experiences we gain on earth can help us more fully understand the principles of happiness.

To illustrate, consider that I tell my children to love and serve each other. I hope they'll believe what I say and obey, but they will probably gain some insight into this principle of happiness as they experience the joy of service themselves. They may also experience what happens when people think only of themselves.

In other words, God can and does teach us truth, but he wants something more than for us to obey because he's powerful. He wants us to grow to understand truth as he understands it. That requires opposition and the need to develop for ourselves a true understanding of right and wrong based on experience.

This isn't just speculation on my part. God once again speaks through prophets who help us to understand the answer to this question and many others. If you'd like to know more, there are some short videos at the following web site that will help:

http://www.mormon.org

Answer 9

This fulfilled prophecy he came to his own and his own recieved him not.Jesus originally came to save his own people the jews .Had the jews accepted him us gentiles would have never had a chance for salvation because the jews were God's chosen people. This is why he went after the gentiles. The jews have ultimately paid for this over the centuries because of the constant conquests they have experienced but a few jews have actually gotten the message .These are the Messianic jews and most of the early converts to christianity were messianic jews.

Answer 10

Chris Angel seems to perform miracles and I don't see everyone following him. People tend to blow off what they see as trickery. There were magicians at the time and I am sure that some just figured He was another sorcerer.

He also had more than 12 followers. Many followed him around. The 12 were a fortunate few that JESUS Chose to be his closest friends and confidants.

Answer 11

..."He" does have over 12 million... all from that little group of 12... look around you... (In all of recorded history there has never been anyone anywhere who has motivated so many people... of all the Army's that have ever marched, all the Navy's that have ever sailed, all the Worldly kings that have ever ruled or any power on Earth had never, ever motivated humanity as has Jesus... "we" even record the days of the year by His life...some 2007 years now... Read the Book of John to get a better understanding of who He is...