How Was Jesus Even A Sacrifice?

[Guest bornagainx2]

I always wondered this secretly....how was Jesus even a sacrifice. If Jesus was God, and knowing that he would be raised up with his Father (wait, I thought you were god??) how is this a sacrifice anyway?? I might not be wording my question properly. I realize now, there are so many contradictions between the gospels on what the death and resurrection even were.

 

Did this cross anyone else's mind when you were a believer? Before you even started your de-conversion. I mean,how did God make the ultimate sacrifice by sending his son to die for us? He didn't die.....he rose again and went back to being god?! All those animals that were sacrificed/slaughtered, now they were dead.

 

It just makes NO sense!

[Phanta]

Does any believer in Heaven who dies for another make a sacrifice?

[florduh]

It just makes NO sense!

That's why it takes faith!

[centauri]

According to God's holy law, Jesus was not a legal sin sacrifice.

He fulfilled none of the key stipulations.

Of course, believers simply wave this away and claim God introduced a new and improved system, one that directly contradicts his prior word.

Christianity is revisonist theology that uses the Hebrew scriptures to launch itself and then rewrites the rules.

As you pointed out, the sacrifice itself wasn't lasting because Jesus isn't serving time in hell, he avoided that sentence.

[hereticzero]

Hang on to your hat for a bit and I'll preach some with scriptures that prove to me that Jesus was NOT a sacrifice based on OT and NT scriptures:

 

I believe the OT book of Jeremiah says it best (Jeremiah was an OT prophet):

 

(Jer 7:8) Behold, you trust in lying words that cannot do any good.

 

(Jer 7:22) For I did not speak to your fathers, nor command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices.

 

(Jer 7:24) But they did not listen, nor bow their ear, but walked in their own plans, in the stubbornness of their evil heart, and went backward and not forward.

 

(Jer 5:31) The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means; and my people love to have it so: and what will ye do in the end thereof?

 

Jeremiah believed the scribes lied when they wrote about how god gave Moses the law, he especially denied the scripture that god gave the law of sacrifice to the Jew through Moses. Jeremiah also claimed that not only were the scribes liars but that the priests were also liars claiming authority over the Jews when they had none, they bear rule by their own means. Jeremiah also claimed the prophets were liars prophesying about things that were not true and that no truth concerning the laws, what scribes wrote, what priests taught, the truth was not found anywhere in the land. Truth did not exist. My feelings are that if Jeremiah, a prophet of the Jews, did not believe what was being said, and written, then the whole sacrifice thing was a fraud created by those of religious power in order to subjugate believers. If the law of sacrifice was not given to Moses, then the whole sacrifice bit of Jesus being a 'perfect sacrifice' was also an act of fraud perpetrated by those who wrote the NT. The church taught what Paul wrote of his gospels concerning who Jesus was, in Paul's mind. Apparently whoever wrote claiming to be Paul would have known about the writings of Jeremiah, as a Jew, and would also have known the law of sacrifice was never given to Moses.

 

Mar 7:7 Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.

 

The above echoes the sentiments of Jeremiah. The priests continued to teach fraud all the way to the time of Jesus. Laws and more laws added and added and added until Israel became a nation of laws. The OT was not written until about 500 years before Jesus which meant the prophecies of the OT were indeed lies because they were written after the fact. Moses supposedly got the news from god about 1200 to 1500 years before Jesus but no one decided to write anything down for about another 1,000 years. The Jews first appeared when they came out of Babylon 500 years before Jesus and they brought their religion with them from Babylon. Exodus, the story that set the story of the Jews into motion, never happened. There is no trace of it in any historical document. Moses, like Jesus, do not live outside the religious writings of the Jews, for Moses, and Christians, for Jesus. The two characters are not compatible in the Jewish faith. Christianity is not an extension of Judaism but a bastardized version of Judaism. One thing god expressed in the OT is his love of mercy over sacrifice. This is noted in the NT:

 

Mat_9:13 But go ye and learn what that meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice: for I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.

 

This was an echo of the writings of the prophet Hosea:

 

Hos_6:6 For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.

 

God desires that man had knowledge of him rather than spending time sacrificing animals that did no good and were not of the law. To put words into the mouth of god he never spoke is blasphemy because it calls god a 'liar.'

 

Mar 7:8 For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do.

 

Mat 15:8-9 This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me. (9) But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.

 

Tit 3:9 But avoid foolish questions, and genealogies, and contentions, and strivings about the law; for they are unprofitable and vain.

 

It does not do the christian any good to cry about a sacrifice of Jesus because it is a lie (lying words of the scribe), it does a christian no good to observe the law either because the law was given to the Jew and not the gentile. To preach to the Gentile is a blasphemy. This is found in Romans Chapter Two, which goes into text about judging others. It does no good to preach to those who already fulfill the law by their acts when they never received the law. It is blasphemy to preach because those who preach also do what they preach against. More or less, preaching is blasphemy.

 

Christians talk a lot of shit about what a perfect sacrifice Jesus was to them but he is no sacrifice. A perfect religion to god is to care for widows and orphans (Book of James).

 

Jas_1:27 Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, to visit orphans and widows in their afflictions, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.

 

The lack of compassion and mercy is what destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, not homosexuality as Christians preach:

 

Eze 16:49 Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. --KJVA

 

If Christians want to preach they commit blasphemy. If they want to brag about their religious faith, then they need to practice charity and mercy, not faith built upon falsehoods and imaginary laws about sacrifice.

 

This is my sermon for the day, and what gets me booted out of most christian websites.

[Eugene39]

Another great example of what HZ was talking about is Isaiah chapter 1. There is no evidence there that God is wanting sacrifices at all.

 

The complete disconnect between the OT and the NT is what started my deconversion. That's what they get for telling me that I should read the Bible through in a year, to be a good Christian.

[Deva]

The Jews had animal sacrifice until the Temple was destroyed by the Romans. Jesus throwing a fit in the moneychangers part of the temple - they were selling animals for sacrifice.

 

Believe it or not, I never had any problem with this concept when I was a Christian. Our sins were infinite. They required an infinite punishment. Jesus, being God, was the only "person" who could take on the sins of the entire world for all time. So, it is simply a matter of faith that Jesus died for you and took your sins away.

 

Too bad I believed all that bullshit for so many years.

[Guest end3]

The Jews had animal sacrifice until the Temple was destroyed by the Romans. Jesus throwing a fit in the moneychangers part of the temple - they were selling animals for sacrifice.

 

Believe it or not, I never had any problem with this concept when I was a Christian. Our sins were infinite. They required an infinite punishment. Jesus, being God, was the only "person" who could take on the sins of the entire world for all time. So, it is simply a matter of faith that Jesus died for you and took your sins away.

 

Too bad I believed all that bullshit for so many years.

 

 

You would have quit believing much earlier if they had been sacrificing salamanders I'm betting Ms. D.

[Mike D]

Jesus came to earth as himself to sacrifice himself to himself to save us from himself.

 

[atheisteh]

 

Did this cross anyone else's mind when you were a believer? Before you even started your de-conversion. I mean,how did God make the ultimate sacrifice by sending his son to die for us? He didn't die.....he rose again and went back to being god?! All those animals that were sacrificed/slaughtered, now they were dead.

 

 

Yes, I wondered about this all the time when I was still a Christian. It was one of those nagging little questions which, when all added up together, made me start to question the whole package. The whole sacrifice for sin thing for made no sense to me, ever. I mean, if God could change the rule from the O.T. and say that now one man could take all the blame of every human (instead of ongoing animal sacrifices) then why not just change the rules a little bit more and just forgive people without there needing to be blood shed?

 

I also always thought that Jesus got an awful lot of credit for what he went through. I mean, crucifixion must be painful and everything, but he knew before hand that he would come back from the dead which is more than any of the rest of us get. Also, the Bible makes it sound like he died relatively quickly for a crucifixion. As a kid and young adult I secretly wondered why his sacrifice was that amazing. Lots of people in history have given up their lives for other people in battle and stuff, but we don't sing hallelujah to them forever.

 

Of course, I always felt guilty for thinking like that, and thought it would make me go to hell.

[Deva]

I also always thought that Jesus got an awful lot of credit for what he went through. I mean, crucifixion must be painful and everything, but he knew before hand that he would come back from the dead which is more than any of the rest of us get. Also, the Bible makes it sound like he died relatively quickly for a crucifixion. As a kid and young adult I secretly wondered why his sacrifice was that amazing. Lots of people in history have given up their lives for other people in battle and stuff, but we don't sing hallelujah to them forever.

 

Of course, I always felt guilty for thinking like that, and thought it would make me go to hell.

 

I was always taught to me that the crucifixion was particularly horrible in this case because Jesus was taking on the sins of the whole world and in the process of doing that was separated from God. This was a unique type of death on a spiritual level. How God can be separated from himself is something that I didn't find strange at the time, for some reason. Now, of course it makes no sense to me at all.

 

I don't find anything appealing about this whole sacrifice/substitution mythology. It IS a mythology and some people even know that but still find something compelling or attractive about it. I think it was the day that I realized what was really happening when I was taking communion or the Eucharist or whatever you want to call it, is the day I left the church for good. The symbolism that used to work for some reason, just became repulsive. The ceremony in the Episcopal Church surrounding this activity hides its true significance. The beauty of the service, the procession, the robes, the candles, the incense, the shared experience with others, etc., takes a person's attention away from what is really going on.

 

What's really going on is this whole idea of sacrifice and consuming the sacrificed person (or god in this case) in order to make you stronger, better, saved or whatever. The natives in New Guinea used to eat their enemies for the purpose of gaining power over their enemies and ceremonial cannibalism of one kind or another seems to have been with the human race a long time. I don't see anything that is true or beneficial in that type of idea anymore.

[hereticzero]

To forgive someone their sins was what 'I desire mercy and not sacrifice' meant. When someone is forgiven their sins, the sins do not count as wickedness requiring a sacrifice. Sacrifice exposed the evil a person did to someone else and supposedly brought the wrath of god against them. Forgiveness covered up those sins and a sacrifice was not required. No sin = no sacrifice. Christians used to proclaim total forgiveness of any wrong that was committed against them. Now days, Christians demand a person be prosecuted for every wrong doing against the law that offends their religious beliefs, serving time in jail is the way a Christian forgives not only nonbelievers but each other as well. Christians sue each other left and right with no forgiveness. They win their cash awards and thank god for blessing them with such a big haul! It's OK to destroy another Christian's life as long as the righteous get what they want. Praise god for law suits. If a Christian practiced half of the forgiveness they preach about, the courts would not be over run with trivial and petty lawsuits. I can remember when going to church, Christians asking for prayer requests requested prayers for them to win their pissy lawsuits, some against other church members! Hypocrites. Christians are whitewashed hypocrites.

[Foxy Methoxy]

It just makes NO sense!

That's why it takes faith!

 

Believing God sacrificed himself to himself to change a rule he made takes a huge leap of faith and minimal use of the brain.

[Kaiser01]

the god of the OT and jesus were probly seen by people originaly as seperate beings but over the years has religion has evolved through the telephone method christians have developed the notion there is 3 parts too one whole. totaly rediculus that a god would sacrifice himself to himself in order to save humanity from the wrath of himself.

 

but ti takes faith ! lol

[♦ Fuego ♦]

I was just reading a blurb making up excuses for him not fulfilling the Jonah "three days and three nights" clause (Matt 12:40). They said three days and three nights is the same thing as "on the third day", especially because the latter phrase is used twice. When I was a believer, I did the same thing because I wanted it to make sense somehow. But if it happened the way it was described, he was barely in the grave on Friday before sundown, and up again at sunrise on Sunday, which means he was in there slightly over 1 day. They'll take things extremely literally in some instances, and using nuances of Greek verbs to try to prove a point, but when there is a glaring boo-boo, out come the excuses and rationalizations.

[VacuumFlux]

I was just reading a blurb making up excuses for him not fulfilling the Jonah "three days and three nights" clause (Matt 12:40). They said three days and three nights is the same thing as "on the third day", especially because the latter phrase is used twice. When I was a believer, I did the same thing because I wanted it to make sense somehow. But if it happened the way it was described, he was barely in the grave on Friday before sundown, and up again at sunrise on Sunday, which means he was in there slightly over 1 day. They'll take things extremely literally in some instances, and using nuances of Greek verbs to try to prove a point, but when there is a glaring boo-boo, out come the excuses and rationalizations.

 

The best explanation I heard for that was that it's a cultural misunderstanding. To us, day = 24 hours. To them, days were split at sunset, and a fraction of a day counted. So what they meant by three days was more of "a span of time covering portions of three days". If that's true, then the three days thing isn't a problem. It does, however, raise the question of how much else is taken the wrong way due to cultural differences. What bothered me more was the idea that god would communicate in such a culturally-specific way that his message wasn't really timeless, and that we were expected to get the interpretation right.

[♦ Fuego ♦]

The best explanation I heard for that was that it's a cultural misunderstanding. To us, day = 24 hours. To them, days were split at sunset, and a fraction of a day counted. So what they meant by three days was more of "a span of time covering portions of three days". If that's true, then the three days thing isn't a problem. It does, however, raise the question of how much else is taken the wrong way due to cultural differences. What bothered me more was the idea that god would communicate in such a culturally-specific way that his message wasn't really timeless, and that we were expected to get the interpretation right.

 

Yeah, that's what I mean. Sometimes they say the nuance of a Greek tense makes all the difference, and other times the actual words are discounted to avoid contradictions. Same for "Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened." (Matt 24:34). Suddenly, his words are made to take on meaning he didn't speak. And you'd think he would be as unambiguous as possible (unless he didn't actually say those words at all and the unknown writer of Matthew wrote it in for him, or maybe he did say them as part of his role as an ancient apocalyptic cult leader and really intended it to mean that generation).

[mwc]

The best explanation I heard for that was that it's a cultural misunderstanding. To us, day = 24 hours. To them, days were split at sunset, and a fraction of a day counted. So what they meant by three days was more of "a span of time covering portions of three days". If that's true, then the three days thing isn't a problem. It does, however, raise the question of how much else is taken the wrong way due to cultural differences. What bothered me more was the idea that god would communicate in such a culturally-specific way that his message wasn't really timeless, and that we were expected to get the interpretation right.

It's not true unless you need it to be. Ask a Jew today what a "day" is. You may get a number of answers. The same holds true for the ancients and their writings bear this out. A day was dusk to to dusk (proper) but, more commonly, it was similar to our day. You wake up each "day" and go to bed when the "day" ends. It's pretty simple life-based interpretation. But "night" may be shoved in there if you're requiring it and it's like our night. It's the dark part. The not "day" part. Strictly speaking there was 12-hours of day and 12-hours of night no matter how long each actually lasted (the hours just got longer or shorter as required but there were always 12 of each). So people started the day at dawn, or noon, or dusk or midnight depending on who and where they were but the common usages were similar to how they are now and things would, and could, happen "days" from now, or "days" ago and it would just be a relative count from the current day.

 

And even if the "day" started at dusk that didn't mean that the literal "day" portion started at that time. It wasn't until later that "day" preceded "night" like it does now. So we have Monday which is to say even though it technically starts at midnight, we perceive the "day" of Monday to come first and that is followed by Monday night. Then comes Tuesday and so on. It used to be the opposite. Monday night would precede the day. So Monday night then Monday day then Tuesday night and so on. So what we would consider Friday night in the biblical crucifixion story is really Saturday night since Friday night came before Friday day. So Friday day->Saturday night->Saturday day->Sunday night->Sunday day would have been the progression.

 

The did often count inclusively so that does differ a bit from our way of thinking. The example of this would be the Olympics were held every five years, by their reckoning (ie. Beijing Olympics 2008[1], 2009[2], 2010[3], 2011[4], 2012[5] London Olympics), but it's clear to see that they were being inclusive in the count and it was always held every four years by our way of doing the math (they also used a lunar count which corresponds to a four year cycle among other things that help check that four is the proper number).

 

There's more but I think this should help add to the confusion. I think the biggest thing is that nowhere in the bible is there an actual calendar defined so we don't actual know what calendar(s) were being used at the time. People always apply the much later Jewish calendar anachronistically to this whole period but Josephus doesn't use this calendar and there's nothing to support anyone else using it either (though the Babylonians and some others were using a very similar calendar so something like it does appear...just not where it is needed for these arguments).

 

mwc

[Guest bornagainx2]

It just makes NO sense!

That's why it takes faith!

 

Believing God sacrificed himself to himself to change a rule he made takes a huge leap of faith and minimal use of the brain.

 

^^ For sure! I mean, taking faith to believe in something that makes No sense really just requires you to wear blinders. This is how it is...don't question it..no, it doesn't make a lick of sense but that doesn't matter. Jesus died for you!!!

[ExFundiDCLawyer]

I always wondered this secretly....how was Jesus even a sacrifice. If Jesus was God, and knowing that he would be raised up with his Father (wait, I thought you were god??) how is this a sacrifice anyway?? I might not be wording my question properly. I realize now, there are so many contradictions between the gospels on what the death and resurrection even were.

 

Did this cross anyone else's mind when you were a believer? Before you even started your de-conversion. I mean,how did God make the ultimate sacrifice by sending his son to die for us? He didn't die.....he rose again and went back to being god?! All those animals that were sacrificed/slaughtered, now they were dead.

 

It just makes NO sense!

 

That was always one of the nagging doubts in the back of my head for many years. He didn't just rise from the dead, he was god, so he knew that he really wasnt going to die. This question would periodically come to the forefront over the years, especially as a yound adult, but I was always to afraid to dwell on it or even put voice to it and ask my pastor. I was always afraid that speaking it aloud would somehow jepordize my "salvation" even though my church believed in the "once saved, always saved" version of christianity. Later, as I started to seriously question the literalist version of the bible that I had been taught, this was one of the nagging questions that helped to push me over the edge to see christianity for what it really is - mythology and fables that is used for personal power by preying on the deepest fears of mankind.

[atheisteh]

...even though my church believed in the "once saved, always saved" version of christianity.

 

This might be a bit off topic, but I've always thought, in jest, that this is the perfect answer to Pascal's Wager. Sign up in a church that takes this view of salvation, do your time so that you are actually "saved", and then walk away and live your life as you please. It is the ultimate in eternity insurance!

[Sybaris]

how was Jesus even a sacrifice.

 

 

I have always thought of it the last step in the evolutionary process of sacrifice. It started out as whatever item was of value to the individual then it had to be something living but not human then whoever created the Jebus myth came up with the ultimate sacrifice, a suicidal god.

 

It always struck me funny, those passion plays because people would get all weepy over Jebus' suffering. Really? What does an omni-everything need with a human body?

 

It's about as rediculous as John 3:16.

 

So your god, the creator of all living things, could create only one offspring?

[DT761138]

Well, in fairness not every Christian sect or denomination ascribes penal substitution to Jesus' crucifixion. Eastern Orthodoxy doesn't have this as a major theme, for instance. The most common Orthodox understanding is that God assumes human nature in the person of Jesus Christ into divinity, there's a point of contact between the human and divine. But to be fully human Jesus must also die as a mortal human being, being subject to a fallen world as everybody else for the purposes of sanctification of a fallen world (as Paul says in Ephesians 4, "so that he might fill all things"). So, his sacrifice in Orthodoxy really begins at the Incarnation (God choosing to be born man, putting aside the glory that people generally think of as part of God- in this way Orthodoxy descirbes it as condescension, a coming down to our level.

 

It's an interesting idea, maybe it resonates with some people. Anyways, not understanding the crucifixion is not why I left Eastern Orthodoxy. Themes of condescension or grace are found in many religions, in Buddhism or Taoism for instance (real Buddhism or Taoism with Bodhisattvas and Immortals and so forth). Basicly this is all the crucifixion is about, its meant to elicit pitty or feelings, "Oh, Jesus is dying just like us". Its pretty messed up that many people also use it as an oppurtunity to sell an image of an angry God on top of this, but this is what has happened at various times in Christian history, the punitive themes weight heavily, possibly because fear is a good way to control ignorant people.

[DT761138]

I was always taught to me that the crucifixion was particularly horrible in this case because Jesus was taking on the sins of the whole world and in the process of doing that was separated from God. This was a unique type of death on a spiritual level. How God can be separated from himself is something that I didn't find strange at the time, for some reason. Now, of course it makes no sense to me at all.

 

I think the real meaning of the Cross in the head of the authentic Christian is that we are used to wanting to see God as rewarding the faithful with good things and punishing the wicked with bad things in this world (as Jews and gentiles of Jesus' day often did), and the crucifixion reavels a more mysterious and less simplistic view of reality. Actually, the crucifixion, if taken seriously, should be deeply troubling to fundamentalists and evangelicals, we simply do not live in a world where a god is going to swoop in and rescue you because you pray for it. Read a book like Rick Warren's Purpose Driven Life or some Prosperity Gospel nonsense, and you could be forgiven for thinking that there's a God watching every bit of your life holding your hand, and Jesus death reveals the opposite, there are times that God is distant and silent, even to the best of people that do everything right. As Bonhoeffer put it, "Before God and with God we live without God in a godless world". We live in a godless world where people have to become the responsible for their own actions, there are no real saviors out there up in the sky ready to hand out bailouts. Whether you are theist or atheist, this is the message of Jesus' cross.

[Klym]

I thought the same thing all the time I was a Christian. I wondered how it could be a sacrifice if Jesus and God both knew that he would not really die but would rise from the dead. I don't have children, but I think that if I did, it would not be nearly so traumatic to see one of them suffer and "die" if I knew they would come back to life in a couple of days and be healthy and whole again. It also bothered me from a very early age that God needed a blood sacrifice to make me acceptable to him. Why didn't God just automatically love me already---he created me, didn't he? So why would he immediately reject his own creation---at birth, according to the fundamentalist church I grew up in? As I look back on it, I wonder what took me so long to get away from those ideas. Why did those things have such a hold on me for so long? I remember going to see a live play once where a big production was made of Jesus dieing on the cross, writhing and groaning and fake blood flowing. Instead of feeling moved, like everyone else seemed to be, I felt embarrassed. It embarrassed me to think that I was so depraved that another human being would have to suffer such agony to make me acceptable to God. It's really a sick idea when you think about it. I don't understand how it ever gained so much power and popularity.