As we approach that most wonderful time of the year, I thought I’d take a few moments to discuss the ubiquitous failure of the Christian faithful to acknowledge the more horrific, maniacal and absurd positions of their Lord and Savior, relishing instead in the nuggets of peace, love and understanding-although I’ll argue those aren’t all they’re held up to be either-that one can find in his preaching.
Let’s start with the underlying premise, because without it, the Nazarene would be just another street corner preacher with his “Repent! For the end of the world is near” sign.
The promise of Jesus is that of a heavenly kingdom, where the most righteous and holy will live after death. Jesus himself will decide who gets saved from what is in store for them if Jesus himself doesn’t save them:
…the Son gives life to whomever he wishes. The Father judges no one but has given all judgment to the Son, so that all may honor the Son just as they honor the Father”. (John 5:21-23)
“Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all people, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him.” (John 17:1-2)
“I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” (John 14:6)
“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” (Matthew 28:18. See also Luke 10:22.)
“I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved.” (John. 10:9)
So Jesus is pretty clear that only he can give us access to the pearly gates. What’s in store if we aren’t worthy? Why hell of course, and Jesus talks about it a lot. Considerably more often than he discusses heaven. Jesus describes hell as a real place, where there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth. It is the outer darkness, a place of eternal fire, a fire that is unquenchable. There are maggots that never die, and the anguish and punishment is eternal. Talk about your cruel and unusual punishment. What kind of grievous crimes would warrant such a horrific fate? Why saying bad things about the Holy Spirit for one:
“Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters. Therefore I tell you, people will be forgiven for every sin and blasphemy, but blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. Whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.”
If you reject Jesus and his teachings, well off you go to hell. If you didn’t know about Jesus, well you’re still going to hell, but the punishment will be a little less severe (although seeing how it’s eternal, I don’t think less severe is really an option). If you were a teacher though, the standard for you is higher so a stricter punishment is in order.
Jesus’s dad, God, is an angry and jealous God. He sees all humanity as fallen, sinful creatures. He can get quite pissy:
“Therefore the LORD’s anger burns against his people; his hand is raised and he strikes them down. The mountains shake, and the dead bodies are like refuse in the streets. Yet for all this, his anger is not turned away, his hand is still upraised.”
God despises haughty eyes; in fact they’re an abomination to Him. Liars, people who sow discord among brothers. All hated by God. Why is there hell in the first place? God created it, initially as a place for the devil and his angels. But Jesus tells us it’s a just punishment for the wicked.
So here we have our premise; the underlying worldview that must be accepted in full by anyone who calls themselves a Christian. That their God created a place of eternal torment, a fiery abyss where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth, a place so horrifying that Jesus tells us it is best to cut off a hand or pluck out our own eye and live our lives maimed than to risk being cast into hell. This is a place intended for the devil himself, yet God is fine with tossing us all in there too for having an arrogant look in our eyes.
Now Christians will argue that God is loving and just, merciful and forgiving. That’s why he plotted to have Jesus murdered. After inseminating a young Palestinian woman, seemingly against her will in one version of the story, God’s son was delivered so that he could grow to adulthood and tell everyone who would listen that hell awaits them all unless they believed in him and followed him. Then he was murdered because God needed a human sacrifice to appease His anger against all of the humanity that He created. God’s omniscience should have warned Him that all His creations would be sinful assholes, but He created humanity all the same. Now God’s sacrifice of his son is held up as something to be revered and thankful for, but it was completely unnecessary. There was no reason to have a filthy, bloody human sacrifice in the middle of the desert to forgive anyone of anything. The death of one person does nothing to pay for the crimes of another person. It’s a completely absurd concept of which I’ve written previously. Nonetheless, this is the foundational belief all Christians must accept.
Some might choose to argue that Jesus didn’t create hell or doom the large majority of humans to be tortured there, his Dad did. Well, Jesus sure claimed he was his Dad on many occasions. In the Gospel of John he said that he and the Father were one. He said that before Abraham was, he was. The Gospel of John begins in fact, with proclaiming the deity of Jesus, saying that in the beginning was the Word, that the Word was God and that the Word became flesh and blood and walked amongst us. He never corrected any of his disciples who insisted he was God and worshipped at his feet. He claimed he could forgive sin, he had the power to raise the dead, he prayed “And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.” So I don’t think we can give him a free pass on having no input on the lake of burning sulfur as man’s final destination.
To wrap up the premise, consider that in order to avoid the maggot filled, unquenchable fire, the permanent torment in a smoke filled abyss that God created for us all, one must believe everything Jesus said, and follow him until their dying day. Easy enough right? Well, probably not, for the gate is narrow, and there are few who find it. Our own deeds won’t gain us access to the kingdom, however good they may be. Jesus himself told us that even if we prophesy in his name, cast out demons in his name and do many mighty works in his name, when it came time to enter the magic kingdom, he would say he never knew us, and to depart from him. Buddhists? Hellbound. Taoists, Hindus, Jainists, Jews, Muslims and all followers of other religions are all hellbound. Most Christians will be joining us there.
Let’s assume we’ve bought into this premise and want to avoid being cast into flame. How shall we follow the Lord so as to meet with his approval? The price is steep Faithful Reader.
“If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.” Luke 14:26
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes?” Matthew 6:25
“And if your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life crippled or lame than with two hands or two feet to be thrown into the eternal fire.And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into the hell of fire.” Matthew 18:8-9
“I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” John 14:6
“You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. I told you that you would die in your sins, for unless you believe that I am he you will die in your sins.” John 8:23–24
“Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn ‘a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law – a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.” Matthew 10:34-39
“I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak, for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.” Matthew 12:33-36
‘If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.’ Matthew 19:21-22
Well, all I can say after considering that list is, see you all in hell friends. And now for the cherry picking. Jesus was all about love, and grace and peace wasn’t he? The second greatest commandment is to love your neighbor as yourself. Think about it for a moment and you’ll see it’s just another pitfall into the abyss. It’s literally impossible to do, and will leave you feeling unworthy and guilt ridden. How can you love anyone as you love yourself? What if your neighbors are awful people who do you harm? You must love them. In fact, you must love your enemies and pray for them. That’s right friends, you must love the terrorists, the rapists, the pedophiles. Love them as you love yourself or you are falling short. I don’t need to say that this cheapens actual love to such an extent as to make it meaningless. Jesus already told us he wasn’t about bringing peace to the world but fire and blood. If he had a dragon he could be a Targaryen. Understanding? He wouldn’t even let his disciple bury his own father.
I can’t possibly summarize my thoughts on this better than this one passage from CS Lewis:
“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him:
‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.’
That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic–on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg–or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse…. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come up with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”
I know clearly where I fall on that scale. If Jesus said any of the things attributed to him, the man was deranged. A narcissistic megalomaniac on a level rarely seen. A man, who if encountered today, would be given a wide berth by the rational amongst us and would likely be picked up and taken in for psychiatric evaluation. I encourage you to read your Bibles, but not for the reasons one might think. A critical reading of this collection of old pamphlets is the surest path to atheism, which we sorely need more of. You won’t fall for the easy bumper sticker slogans about how groovy and peaceful Jesus was, because he wasn’t. You won’t accept the easy cherries people fill their Christian baskets with about how blessed are the poor in spirit. You’ll see the Bible for what it really is: poorly edited horror fantasy.
JD Espinoza 