Quote:
|
Quote by: GeminiBrian Yes, admittedly scripture is not entirely lacking in wisdom, and if it were possible to lift the figure of Jesus out of the theological muddle attached to him in the NT, I would be prepared to find many things to say in his favour, strictly as a teacher of ethics. Trouble is though, shawmutt, that is not really possible, since the whole Jesus thing is so ensnared by a pernicious superstitious overlay. But an an theist like me can certainly discover value in Jesus the man - without, however, having any time for the religious claptrap that has claimed him and used him for its own incredible agenda -- ie. A crazy, vindictive God's tool for the redemption of original sin. |
At this point we are pretty much in agreement with everything but minor quibbles--isn't that nice
I just wanted to point out that it's not impossible to lift Jesus out of the muddle, and in fact it has been done, by one of our founding fathers no less. Thomas Jefferson wrote his own version of the NT, called
Jefferson's Bible. It goes through the life of Jesus while leaving out all the mumbo jumbo. The last line of Jefferson's version is:
Quote:
63 There laid they Jesus,
64 And rolled a great stone to the door of the sepulchre, and departed.
|
The Bible is available on Amazon, and the free text is
available here