It’s all about who the most important prophet is, and anyone that disagrees is wrong and we hate them.
Religion is wild.
To be a bit pedantic but Christians don’t believe Jesus was a prophet.
Really? I’m no expert, but I wouldn’t think being the son of god excluded being a prophet.
The whole point of the holy Trinity is that Jesus is God not separate
My personal head Cannon is that God is nth dimensional programmer /scientist and our universe is equivalent to a simulation running on his computer. He built this place. Gave the people some rolls and was flabbergasted that they continually fucked it up and didn’t listen to the rules. So then he basically uploads himself to The matrix lives for 30 years experiences humanity and realizes that we are fundamentally fucked and forgives us after merging that slice of his consciousness back into the main consciousness.
Old English Crīst, from Latin Christus, from Greek Khristos, noun use of an adjective meaning ‘anointed’, from khriein ‘anoint’, translating Hebrew māšīaḥ ‘Messiah’
I would argue that Jesus, as Christ/Messiah is also a priest and prophet, thus fulfilling all of the various other prophecies about Him. He is these things and more: God’s decisive revelation of Himself to humanity, as well as one who redefines what humanity fundamentally is.
The reason why Christians have a tense relationship with the other “Abrahamic faiths” has to do with the understanding that Jesus is God. To deny Jesus’ divinity, from a Christian standpoint, is to define God apart from Jesus which is not consistent with Christian belief. The other problem comes from the idea (more or less later introduced into Christianity) that anyone who doesn’t believe in Jesus goes to Hell. This idea, so deeply held by many many Christians, actually misses what the gospel is all about: the minute Jesus forgives His murderers, He effectively declares that there’s no sin beyond His ability to forgive. Which means that all of humanity is forgiven, full stop.
Eastern (Orthodox) Christianity has a very interesting and different view: Hell and Heaven are the same place, just experienced differently—“Heaven” for those who love God on His terms, “Hell” for those who demand God behave on their terms. The basic idea there is that, in the end, most people will come face to face with Jesus and go “oh, it’s you! Cool!” and experience Heaven. But there are those who will see Him and still refuse (at least for a time—I believe that the scriptures are pretty clear that God is merciful and patient and that, given enough time, everyone winds up in “Heaven”).
Matthew 21:11
And the crowds replied, “This is Jesus the prophet, from Nazareth in Galilee.”
Context is key I may have done 12 years of theological studies but I’ll be using AI to summarize this
John 8:58: This verse is found in the Gospel of John, where Jesus makes the statement “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM.” Moses and Exodus 3:14: In the Old Testament, God revealed Himself to Moses in a burning bush, declaring, “I AM THAT I AM.” This name, often translated as “I am who I am” or “I will be who I will be,” is a declaration of God’s eternal and self-existent nature, says the Bible Gateway. Jesus’s Claim: By saying “before Abraham was, I AM,” Jesus is claiming to be the same eternal, self-existent God who revealed Himself to Moses. Context: The statement is made in the context of a discussion with Jewish leaders who were disputing his authority. Implications: This verse is a central pillar of Christian theology, affirming Jesus’s divinity and eternal nature. The Jews’ Reaction: The people who heard Jesus make this claim were shocked and disturbed, understanding that it was a direct challenge to their understanding of God’s identity.
This is what makes him not a prophet.
I don’t see how you’ve made your point here. Jesus being a prophet isn’t mutually exclusive with his being the son of god, or so it would seem to a layperson like myself. If he can be the father, the son, and the holy ghost, it stands to reason he can be a prophet. Lots of hats, I believe he wore.
The key point that I’m trying to make here though is that all of the Jewish profits foretold of the Christ and he was the Christ as far as all the Christians see it. However, all of the Jews and islamists would call him a prophet as they do not believe that he was the Christ.
“Prophet” has a specific meaning, it’s not just a soothsayer. Prophecy is tied to the ends of eras, and for the Semitic people, most of their history was, at that point, servitude of one form or another, punctuated by suffering and occasionally vengeful conquest. The Jewish Prophets fortold the Messiah, who would lead them from suffering to paradise.
Christ, in Christian theology, upended that order. He said he was the new Law, and the only way to God was through him. He was pretty clear on the subject. It didn’t take long before new Prophecies came about - but now, the people of God weren’t just a specific tribe, they were potentially the whole species. So the prophecies had to be Apocalyptic.
Christ wasn’t a Prophet. He brought God’s message (according to him and his fans), but he didn’t say jack about the End Times.
Ok, so maybe (depending on the mythology one subscribes to) he wasn’t a Prophet. Nevertheless, it seems inarguable that he was a prophet. Dude was mad prophetic.
Words we use have meaning even if you don’t like them.
In English, the word “prophet” has a deep historical tie to foretelling the end times for Semitic people
It is a specific tradition you can’t just ignore. So when the question of “was Jesus a prophet” comes up, it’s important to be precise. Go ask any theologian if you don’t believe me. Conflating “prophet” with “soothsayer” was a HUGE sticking point when it came to medieval heresies.
I should note, I’m atheist.
And being “mad prophetic” is absurd. JESUS didn’t foretell the end times. He never once talked about what was to come outside extremely vague assertions like “believe in me and you’ll meet God”. If we go by the Gospel, he was clearly Not A Prophet.
Christians are the worst fucking book club I swear…
Thanks for your insight, I will study knto that topic deeper. I duckduckgoed whether Jesus was a prophet and that passage was what I found. I think the main argument for prophecy was that he was making grandeous statements about the future that were fulfilled, thus he fits the definition. But I’m just a casual reader and could be wrong.
I think in the context of this thread it’s amazing we could come up with two differing views so quickly.
See my reply to ochi in the other thread. Note I was raised Orthodox and from what I understand, reformist Christian sects do not place as much emphasis on the Trinity
time to create a polytheistic religion with 3 gods; Adonai, God, and Allah… it’ll unify those three religions into being confused and uncomfortable about my religion.
I call it the Tyrant god.
destroy all abrahamic religions for the future of humanity
if only
but didn’t he free the slaves?
happy Pesach and all that
Wait until you hear about Christians’ conflicts with other Christians! Also a lot of Islamist terror is directed at Muslims who follow Mohammed’s teachings the wrong way.
Was flabbergasted when I found out that there was a straight up murderous hate between different sets of Christianity. You can tell the book is the perfect word of a divine being, since it spawned so many different mutually exclusive interpretations
I dont think any Christian who has a sliver of religious education considers the bible to be the word of God. For starters some of the Gospels that are canon already start with an explanation that this is a recollected account. Then there is other chapters like the letters to the Romans and so on. As for the Torah it is also clear that it is containing some revelations but also a lot of interpretation and chronicles.
This is fundamentally different to the Quran, which we Muslims believe to be the word of God as revealed to the prophet Muhammad (peace and blessing be upon him) and preserved in full and in the original Arabic language. Also Muslims are obliged to treat Christians and Jews (people of the book) kindly and respectfully, unless persecuted or attacked by them.
There have been actual crusades inside europe against the ‘wrong’ type of christians
Honestly, God designed the bible, not so much that it would have many different interpretations, but that certain truths would be hidden from those that do not belong to Him. Just like when Jesus told parables, they weren’t understandable by everyone for the same reason.
There are hundreds (likely actually thousands) of Christian denominations:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_denominations
Gonna need a lot more arms.
Doesn’t Islam also have multiple different sub-cults within that hate eachothers?
Islam isn’t unique in that way. The history of Christianity is just various groups fighting over how to believe correctly.
Absolutely
Sunni and Shia are not a 70s pop duo.
It’s more like the whole Muslim world vs Iran/Iraq
There’s nothing Christians/Muslims/Jews hate more than slightly different variety of Christians/Muslims/Jews. The other 2 are far behind.
Guess leftists had to learn it from someone.
I was told by nuns in catholic school that we had more in common with Jews than with Lutherans.
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The denomination wars are real
Oh look, a circle jerk.
rELiGiOn bAD!
Christians believe Jesus is god and have a Trinity thing going on.
Jews and Muslims have an entirely different concept of god than modern day Christians.
There is at least one Christian religion that believes Jesus is below God, while believing he is the Messiah, Gods son, and much of the rest of the Christian beliefs (Jehovah’s Witnesses). They don’t believe in the Trinity. Holy Ghost/Spirit is just a tool like the force to them, not a distinct person
They don’t all believe in the same God though. Jews and Christians sort of do, only in part. They at least share the old testament. Muslims have a totally different God though, and totally different texts.
they all technically believe in the same God, in one version said god has a son who sacrificed himself, then Muslims built on that as well.
even though the “vibe” and lore of each God is different, technically they are all the same entity.
Muslims built on that by saying Jesus was never crucified, and someone else died in his place. Christianity is based on Jesus both being crucified and being God. They all disagree on who God is, so they can’t all worship the same God.
Three people all say they saw Santa Claus last night. They each claim they ate cookies with him. First person says Santa told him that chocolate chip cookies were his favorite. Second person says Santa told him peanut butter cookies were his favorite. Third person says Santa told them that Oatmeal cookies were his favorite.
1 none of them ate with Santa and are all lying. Or 2 only one of them ate with the real Santa, and the other two ate with fakes or are lying.
But they did not all eat cookies with the same Santa.
It is fundamentally the same Abrahamic god, but Christians believe in Jesus and the Trinity stuff while Muslims do not.
Christians believe Jesus is God. Jews (non christian Jews that is), and Muslims do not believe that Jesus is God. Therefore all three do jot believe in the same God.
Jews and Muslims have different views about God as well, so while they both may believe that their is one God, they do not believe in the same God.
Muslims believe in Jesus
They believe Jesus was a man who was not crucified. Totally different.
The Dome of the Rock seems to be claimed by all three. Abraham attempted to sacrifice his son there, before he was stopped. Muhammed’s ascent to heaven took place there (figuratively, not literally), and Jesus threw the moneymen out of the temple at that location.
I always wondered what is so special about that location.
Islam and Judaism: this place is holy for important religious reasons
Christianity: this place rocks because Jesus beat up greedy capitalists.
Muhammed’s ascent to heaven took place there (figuratively, not literally)
Just looked it up, Muhammed died in Medina. I kind of assumed he died somewhere in the the vicinity of Jerusalem and that’s why his name is connected with the Dome of the Rock
The Dome of The Rock isn’t just a nickname for Dwayne Johnson’s head?
Jews don’t really hate anyone for not believing in their God. Unlike Christianity and Islam, Jews don’t believe that everyone has to follow their religion. They don’t really believe in Heaven and Hell, and they don’t proselytize to people who aren’t already Jews. Judaism is for the Jewish people and that’s it.
Yeah, the religion with the “chosen people” . Yep. Definitely tolerant of non-believers.
God’s wrath? This only is directed at believers right?
Lol
Jews are welcome to believe in whatever they like provided they’re not hurting anyone, but let’s not pretend their religion as written, or hell even widely practiced, is somehow more tolerant compared to other religions.
Have you read the Bible? Half of the Old Testament is God getting mad at Israel and punishing them with wars and diseases. I haven’t done the math but more of God’s wrath in the Bible seems to be directed at Israel rather than her enemies.
To me any religion that excludes people or exalts people on the basis of tribe is not tolerant end of story.
I haven’t read the entirety of the Bible. But happy to be persuaded that my understanding of God and his chosen people is inaccurate.
For example, this was incredibly easy to search for: Destruction of the Canaanites
I would wager there are many such stories. Judaism, like most religions, is pretty fucked up.
If anyone really believes God chose their people over others, you inherently believe your tribe is more special, more righteous, or favoured by God. To me, that belief is nothing short of dangerous - *gestures broadly throughout human history*
I’m not really out of line here to assert that makes the orthodox belief foster ethnic/tribal supremacy.
I’m not saying everyone who believes in Judaism believes this way, but as a whole it’s pretty hard to argue their shit doesn’t smell as bad as the others.
Exclusion is just not a sign of tolerance. Sorry ¯_(ツ)_/¯
People are individuals, and I’d assert there’s a spectrum of views across believers.
If we’re talking about the religion in general? I’ll have to strongly disagree that it’s only inward looking.
No, but a key tenet is the belief that Jews have a “higher purpose” in life than gentiles, and unfortunately this manifests as ethno-religious supremacy in the more conservative circles. A lot of the rhetoric surrounding Gaza is that Jews have a biblical right to the land over…the people that actually live there.
maybe I’m naive but that concept “or la’olam” translates to " light to the world"
i grew up thinking it meant that we have the obligation to be a source of good to the world, like we don’t have a responsibility to be good to ourselves but to the whole world, we need to become scientists, engineers, … we aren’t superior to anyone, but we’ve been chosen to dedicate our lives to improve the world.
however in many conservatives circles that is interpreted as being superior and that everyone else will eventually accept it and they will willingly become our slaves. it’s insane how the same concept is interpreted so differently.
Well, it is true that unlike other religions, Jews don’t try to necessarily recruit new people, They do try to recruit non-religious Jewish people into religion, which is still bad. And the Jewish religion still has a bunch of terrible, racist, misogynistic and overall just terrible beliefs that are inherent to the religion. And there are still a bunch of Jews who just hate all other religions, especially Orthodox Jews.
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A few things here-
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The Talmud isn’t the same as Christian Scripture and this isn’t something all Jews will see and say “Yeah that’s what I believe and it’s super cool.”
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Jesus’s “crime” here is being a Jewish heretic and leading other Jews astray. It’s not because he’s a different religion. During the time of Jesus, most non-Jews were polytheistic Pagans, and they didn’t really have a problem with other people practicing their religion. The issue the author takes with Jesus is precisely because he was a Jew and not a gentile.
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Damn, that’s crazy. I’ve never heard of this. Got any other cool, obscure “scripture?”
Edit: after looking it up, I think the part right after is just as interesting:
The Gemara comments: Come and see the difference between the sinners of Israel and the prophets of the nations of the world. As Balaam, who was a prophet, wished Israel harm, whereas Jesus the Nazarene, who was a Jewish sinner, sought their well-being.
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I said “just as interesting,” to be a bit pedantic. But it’s interesting because I grew up a crazy form of fundamentalist Christian, which involved a lot of fuzzy support for Judaism, by definition, as well as political support based on Israel, because…uh…God or something.
But this portion, referring to Jesus as a sinner, would cause conniptions in any evangelical church. But the idea of Jesus as a sinner is far more interesting than a perfect Jesus. Like Batman vs. Superman.
Interesting. That’s almost the opposite of Baha’is. Baha’is don’t proselytize because everyone is a Baha’i. They just haven’t discovered it for themselves yet, and they have to do that, it’s not the job of the Baha’is to do anything but live the best way they can. Their “Kingdom of God,” or afterlife is also distinctly different from the concept of Heaven and Hell as well.
christians learned their lesson after the crusades. muslims are currently on their way of learning it
This is a really poor understanding of the crusades as well as religious violence in general.
please educate me on religious violence
Well for starts the crusades were about more than just religion, and it’s pretty obvious that they weren’t the end of Christian religious violence and that nobody “learned their lesson” from them.
were about more than just religion
of course but they also were about religion
they weren’t the end of Christian religious violence
I’d say they were the epitome of christian violence (against non-christians) and from then on it decreased overall
nobody “learned their lesson” from them
after enough of the desasters that were the crusades they stopped doing them altogether
are you kidding me? do you have any idea what they did in the name of the lord to the indigenous people of the new world throughout the 14th century onwards??
Number of deaths in the crusades- 1,000,000
Number of deaths in the colonization of the Americas- 59,000,000+
Actually the hate is mutual. Muslims hate Christians and Jews, but Jews deffinetly hate Muslims and Christians and Christians hate Muslims and Jews. Abrahamic religions are the doom of the humanity.
Al-andaluz my beloved
dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb
Ask Jews and Muslims if they believe in the trinity. It’s not the same god.
They all claim to believe in the god of Abraham so they are stuck with each other while disagreeing on fundamental stuff.
that’s like saying Toby Maguire and Tom Holland are Spiderman.
yes, they both are the same character, but different interpretations made by different people with different contexts.
this is the dumbest thing I’ve said which I think is sort of correct
The Trinity isn’t actually fundamental, it’s just a syncretic cope. The fundamentals are the same, everyone who doesn’t believe in your god is subhuman and deserves to be conquered for their “own good” but at least they aren’t women.
It is a fundamental. Christians worship Christ as God - which Muslims believe just to be merely a prophet and Jews believe to be a sorcerer and a blasphemer.
Muslims dont think Mohammed was the son of God, but he’s treated with at least the same amount of reference Christians reserve for Jesus. The difference is just in name, the practice is very much the same.
So Mohammed is worshipped as God?
Yes, they just dont call him that
Wonder how the muslims who criticise us for worshipping a Man will feel about your comment, lol
Religion has a tendency to cause cognitive dissonance. Many christians (depends on the denomination of course) don’t realize that they way they talk about satan is not that different from how polytheistic religions treat some gods.
Just because only one group believes that Jesus was God doesn’t mean it isn’t the same God.
So starting from a schizophrenic as the lineal foundation resulted in a three headed god concept never contained in any canonical part of their book, the mulligan do-overs completely disconnected from their ancient ways, and the other brother magic tripping LSD globe trotter of the desert. Does that surprise anyone. What is surprising to me is that something so obviously nonsense is still so accepted.
I view it as slightly better than that interpretation. The Old Testament is what links the three. The interesting thing about the Old Testament is that it was written over a few thousand years starting around the time of two major historical events that could have precipitated what would look like a potential “apocalypse,” to anyone at the time.
The Green Sahara period had just come to an end, denying Egypt what I would imagine was a substantial breadbasket for the Egyptian, and possibly Assyrian Empires. That event may not have directly caused The Bronze age collapse, but they happened quickly enough together, that I would imagine it was a factor.
So in a period of a few hundred years, a savannah that had plentiful game and foraging turned into the largest desert in the world. The Levant went from a seemingly temperate mediterranian climate, aka “the promised land,” to a desert mediterranian climate. All the empires that you know of just collapsed in a period of 150 years. You might just get a bit superstitious, and borrow some ancient creation myths to write down the “history” of your people.
Lots of cultures did this. We know from archeological evidence that the Israelites weren’t ever in Egypt, so everything up to, and including Moses, was made up to try to teach their descendants how to live in this new horrible dying world. It’s just absolute random chance that the Israelite texts survived long enough to spawn the other two belief systems.
The green Sahara was gone 5 000 years ago when Egypt barely started being Egypt and long before Assyria, the Bronze Age Collapse happened 3 200 years ago, and the Old Testament started getting written a bit before 600 BCE over a few hundred years. The Egyptians and Assyrians already had their breadbasket, it was the fertile crescent from the Nile to the Tigris and Euphrates, it was not a desert there.
The israelite texts survived because they were written right when some big empires (Babylon and the Achaemenids) came around and then carried them over until the Greeks and Romans came by.
There is no archaeological evidence to say the Israelites weren’t in Egypt. In fact, quite the contrary
in my personal edgy opinion, religions are a cope & a great tool of control.
They give you hope against the biggest fear ingrained in us - death, and even worse - death being equal for everyone, good person, bad person, both will die. It’s a nice thought to believe that there is fairness to it all, that good actions should be done despite bad actions being easier. It’s a nice thought to believe there is something else after you die, and none of your good (or bad) deeds go unnoticed, that you, a good person, will live in paradise, and your enemies will finally suffer the consequences of what they’ve done.
it also helps bring people together, creates a unified peoppe and a culture of those who believe in the same thing & allows a potential leader to have an easier time rallying everyone towards the same goal.
religion is a wonderful tool for both coping with existential dread, and unifying people. but as a tool it has the capacity for explaining away both good and bad things quite equally (helping poor, crusades, personal growth, bigotry).
what relgion is based on is close to irrelevant, it just has to be something, preferably a good overall story with many smaller stories that teach the common folk how to be a good [insert religious identity]. Try reading ancient Egyptian mythology, i suspect most of that shit was written on heavy doses of psychedelics, and despite how completely insane all of it is - it unified people and was an integral part of the biggest empire of the ancient times.
honestly i don’t want to “debunk” people’s religions, if it’s something that keeps them going then why take it away, i personally tried but failed multiple times at believing in any god, but i can’t lie the existential dread of “one day i will die, no matter how much i managed to achieve, no matter how good of a person i was, i will die the same as every murderer or war criminal, and there will be no justice in that, and then, one day my name will be spoken for the last time, and i will be forgotten” is a heavy thought to bear, no wonder that as a species we’ve always tried to find some reason, any reason, for that not being the case
They give you hope against the biggest fear ingrained in us - death, and even worse - death being equal for everyone, good person, bad person, both will die.
Or they teach us to fear death. Nothing to worry about death unless you will live afterwards forever and take your memories with you. Now you have to make good memories soon.
nah i’m pretty sure evolution taught us to fear death, no species looks like it feels neutral about dying
The receptors for psychedelics aren’t there for no reason, heavy prayer and meditation can trigger similar effects. Substances are just a shortcut, that’s why religion don’t tend to like them. Personally I think that as long as it isn’t used as a crutch it’s totally fine to buy a day pass.
the receptors for psychedelics are the same as normal happiness receptors, just constantly stimulated by the drugs binding to them (similar to SSRI). prayer and meditation can have partially similar effect, fractals, feelings happiness, and even ego death yes, but there is more to psychedelics than those, they can completely alter your perception of reality and thoughts
So can meditation, if you are good enough and go deep enough. I’ve heard stories of Buddhist monks that think LSD is weak stuff.
