Jesus was not a nice man

[sarahmichigan]

I'm sorry, but Jesus was not a nice guy. He was a fucker. I know a lot of New Agers want to believe that all the awful teachings in the Bible are confined to the Old Testament or to the teachings of Paul. But according to the New Testament, Jesus wasn't all love and light, and he even contradicted himself a bit.

-He said he came to bring a sword, not peace.
-He advocated disowning your family once you became a follower.
-He suggested cutting off body parts to keep yourself from sinning.
-He said that looking at another person with lust was as bad as committing adultery (Thought Police extraordinaire!).

So, if you are a "Cafeterian" and like to uphold the nice teachings in the Bible and ignore the not-so-nice ones, fine. Just don't try to tell me what a loving, peaceful teacher Jesus was.

What do you really know about what the Bible says?

http://www.ffrf.org/quiz/bquiz.php

Comments

[bernmarx.livejournal.com]

I don't see a problem with affiliating oneself with a particular religion. Like you, though, I have had trouble understanding why someone would choose Christianity specifically, given all its weaknesses.

[sarahmichigan.livejournal.com]

I understand picking a certain religion because of family tradition or because you feel a sense of community with those people. But I've never found a specific religion or sect whose beliefs exactly matched mine, and I'm sure that's true for most people. Thus, I can understand having a vague sense of "there's something bigger than us out there" but affiliating with a specific belief set is just a foreign concept to me.

Does that make any sense or am I just muddying the waters?

[bernmarx.livejournal.com]

It makes sense, and I also tend to forget (despite my own background) that people in this country don't so much "choose" Christianity as they choose to either attend church or not, or to buck tradition. I think many people are unaware of other religious options, as anything other than those things that people from other cultures do, and many others who become aware of other religions tie it to those cultures ("Israelis are Jewish, Middle Easterners are Muslim, Indians are Hindu ... it's all really one religion, with social color.").