"The" Easter question

[jake-the-peg]

How exactly does this Jesus saving everybody by dying on the cross work?

I'm seriously interested because I've never quite gotten my head around how it is that Christians think this works.

Is it that God needed to see a sacrifice from Jesus (part of his own being) to see humanity worth saving? - How does that work with omniscience?

Or is it some sort of PR thing that this event "proved" God existed so that non-Jews would prey to him - because he could only save people who believed in him (could / would?) being good wasn't enough.

How specifically do the mechanics of this work?

[naomi24]

Chakka, for that very reason, I don't believe he died on the cross.

[Octavius]

Well in that you accord with what the Qur'an says, Mohammed didn't believe it either.

Ultimately, the mode of death in crucifixion was suffocation. in order to breathe, the victim would need to push up on their feet to allow for inflation of the lungs. So it was customary for the Roman soldiers to break the legs of the crucified to hasten death.

On coming to Jesus they found he had already died (or at least was unconscious). A soldier then pierced his side with a spear.

[naomi24]

Yes, we know all that - but dead bodies don't bleed - and when his side was pierced, his did - which would suggest he wasn't dead.

[jake-the-peg]

How do you know he bled when stabbed Naomi?

You don't believe what you read in the Bible do you? ;c)

[chakka35]

Octavius is right in saying that they died of suffocation - well, cardiopulmonary problems that sent them into a coma long before death. Which makes nonsense of the idea that Jesus cried in a loud voice just before he died: totally imposssible for someone about to expire on the cross.

If I believed the gospels at all, naomi, I wouldn't believe that either. After only a few hours he would have suffered a sore back from the scourging, pain in his feet and wrists (not palms) from the nails and much aching in his muscles.
Nothing that couldn't have been sorted by Nick and Joe with their hundred pounds of ointments before getting him out of it before the Romans came back.

To believe that he came back from the dead when there is no reason to believe that he was dead in the first place is daft.

[naomi24]

I believe most myths have a basis in reality, Jake, and that there's a good deal of history contained within the bible, but trying to separate fact from fiction is the problem. In this instance, if we look at the evidence volunteered by the author of the gospel, then we can only say he's shot himself in the foot, because he writes an account of what he wants us to believe is a dead body, and yet from his description we know that the victim could not possibly have been dead. It seems the author wasn't au fait with the effects of death on the human body.

Chakka, I agree. According to the bible, Pilate was astonished when told that Jesus had died so quickly. It seems there was something very fishy going on there!

[Octavius]

"Nothing that couldn't have been sorted by Nick and Joe with their hundred pounds of ointments before getting him out of it before the Romans came back.

Roman soldiers were forbidden from leaving the scene of an execution until death had occurred.

[mibn2cweus]

. . . bingo!

[Octavius]

Mark 15

Joseph of Arimathaea, an honourable counsellor, which also waited for the kingdom of God, came, and went in boldly unto Pilate, and craved the body of Jesus.

And Pilate marvelled if he were already dead: and calling unto him the centurion, he asked him whether he had been any while dead.

And when he knew it of the centurion, he gave the body to Joseph.

I would suggest that perhaps Pilate was mocking the claim that Jesus would survive death and rise again.

[naomi24]

Octavius, that wouldn't, by any chance, have been the same Centurion who at the crucifixion, announced, according to Mark, 'Truly this man was the Son of God', would it? I smell a conspiracy helped along by a fat backhander.

[Octavius]

It would not have been unusual for friends and relatives to offer bribes to soldiers, for the release of the bodies of the executed person.

[naomi24]

No, that theory doesn't work. Bribing the Centurion to release the body would have been pointless, since he clearly had no authority to give that permission. If he had, it wouldn't have been necessary for Jesus' friends to seek Pilate's consent. The bribe could only have been offered to ensure that the Centurion declared, before Pilate, that the victim was indeed dead.

[joggerjayne]

Are you sure this is nothing to do with Creme Eggs ???

[naomi24]

Sorry Jayne, no, but if you want to talk about great big eggs made of thin, smooth, delicious, chocolate, then I'm more than happy to change the subject. ;o)

[Octavius]

I didn't suggest bribery happened, you did.

I was merely imparting that Roman soldiers would not have been immune to bribery and corruption.

[naomi24]

Oh, right - but we already knew that.

[Octavius]

Well there you are then.

[andy-hughes]

I am an atheist, but my understanding of the points raised is this -

Jesus was born a man, and thus felt all the temptations and fears that any mortal man would fear, including the hideous common criminals' death - crucifixion. It was for these reasons that Jesus was afraid and asked for the burden of this death to be taken from him, not as a part of God in heaven, but as a mortal man, knowing that pain and suffering were to come, and there was no escape.

The point of Jesus joining Man on earth as a man was to absorb all Man's sins and pay for them with his own death, thus allowing Man to enter Haven for all time.

I thiknk the idea that it was a 'PR stunt' is a little wide of the mark - Jesus was willing to die for Man, those who believe in God, and those who do not..

[Octavius]

Andy, always an island of light in the ocean of darkness.

Very well put, even if you don't believe in any of it.