Did Jesus make a sacrifice?

It is “Saviour on a Stick Season ™” this weekend.  Christians around the globe will be celebrating the brutal torture and execution of a man followed three days later by eating chocolate poultry products in order to celebrate his resurrection and ascension- or buggering off back home as I like to call it.

For many Christians, especially the Bible literalists and Young Earthers such as those behind the “Good News” magazine, Christmas is not seen as an important festival, indeed many do not even celebrate it.  It is in fact Easter that is the main Christian celebration of the year.  I could go into a long winded explanation/ rant about how Easter is not Christian and is just another example of theft perpetrated against the fun loving Pagans who have had one of their many nature based festivals hi-jacked.  Even the name “Easter” harks back to its Pagan origins- Eastre or Eostre was a Germanic Goddess who not only lent her name to the Christian festival, but was also the name given to the month of April in the old Pagan calendar.  I could also point out that chocolate has nothing at all to do with Jesus or Christianity- eggs are linked back to the Pagan festival and chocolate, well chocolate is yummy and contrary to popular belief does not give you spots, though may force you to buy new trousers.  I could talk about any number of these things considering they are the origins and the real reasons for Easter celebrations.

But I won’t.

You see for a large portion of the population Easter means acknowledging the most important event in the Christian calendar.  We shall ignore for a moment the fact that the historicity of a physical man named Jesus whom we can attribute the biblical events to is constantly being debated and assume that Jesus did exist.  But, did he make a sacrifice?  The sacrifice made by Christ and the resurrection which followed are so vital to Christianity that one must wonder whether the cult could survive if either or both of these events were removed.  Before we address what sacrifice could have been made and whether the passages carry any historical merit, lets first look at what the bible says happened, we shall use the King James Version:

Jesus was arrested by the Romans

“And Jesus said unto him, Friend, wherefore art thou come? Then came they, and laid hands on Jesus and took him.” Matthew 26:50

Okay.  Lets say this happened.  Nothing out of the ordinary here.

Jesus was put on a cross and executed

“And they crucified him, and parted his garments, casting lots: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, They parted my garments among them, and upon my vesture did they cast lots.”  Matthew 27:35

Despite the fact that no contemporary records exist to suggest this occurred it is accepted as fact by many, including non Christians.  The only non Biblical accounts come as much as a century later and does nothing more than quote what Christians at the time believed

When he died the graves opened and bodies got up and walked about- zombies, yes actual fucking zombies!

“And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose.  And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many” Matthew 27:52-53

Not only do we have zombies, but people saw them.  Lots of people.  Now call me cynical, but if a city under Roman occupation was invaded by zombies, do you not think ONE contemporary historian would have written about it.  Do you not think even ONE non contemporary historian would have written about it.  Its official, Resident Evil is in fact a Biblical video game.  With Chris Redfield as Jesus and Jill Valentine as Mary Magdalene.  Wesker can be Pontius Pilot and Barry can be Judas.  There.

There was an earthquake

“And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent;”…… Matthew 27:51

“Now when the centurion, and they that were with him, watching Jesus, saw the earthquake, and those things that were done, they feared greatly, saying, Truly this was the Son of God.” Matthew 27:54

Now maybe there was an earthquake at the time, there are earthquakes recorded during the first century, but as we can’t even decide on a date when Jesus was allegedly executed it is pointless looking through the records to find earthquakes of the time.  But lets say there was an earthquake that coincided with the crucifixion, what does this prove, a man dies on the cross who we (as Romans) do not believe to be a divine being, there is then an earthquake.  I suppose it is not unreasonable to think that at that time people may have drawn a correlation between the two.  But as far as good evidence of the divine it is sorely lacking.  Without having an actual date for the crucifixion this “evidence” is useless as well as irrelevant.

Jesus was placed in a tomb and it was sealed with a stone

“So they went, and made the sepulchre [tomb] sure, sealing the stone, and setting a watch.” Matthew 27:66

Again, nothing particularly out of the ordinary here.  Nothing to disprove one way or the other.  Not an absurd thing to do, but maybe a little OTT.

Three days later his body was gone

“In the end of the sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulchre.  And, behold, there was a great earthquake: for the angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door, and sat upon it.  His countenance was like lightning, and his raiment white as snow And for fear of him the keepers did shake, and became as dead men. And the angel answered and said unto the women, Fear not ye: for I know that ye seek Jesus, which was crucified.  He is not here: for he is risen, as he said.”  Matthew 28:1-6

So we have more earthquakes, angels and women finding an empty tomb.  One of the issues with this is that each of the different versions of the tomb being discovered contradicts each other.  They all have women involved in finding the tomb, but each contains elements drastically different to the others.  This is the most extreme example; others involve men being involved, Romans and nameless women.

He ascended to heaven

“So then after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God” Mark 16:19

Matthew doesn’t actually say that Jesus ascended, in fact it isn’t mentioned what happened to him.  But let’s go along with what Mark says.

There are other elements to the story, but these are the important ones.  So, ignoring the extreme historical inaccuracies (zombies spring to mind) we have the story here of a divine being, being executed, then resurrecting three days later and ascending into heaven.  Lets assume this is true.  We come back to the question of “What sacrifice was actually made?”.

As far as I can see there was none.  We have three options related to sacrifice:

1) Jesus was a fully mortal entity who died on the cross and did not resurrect- A sacrifice is made.

2) Jesus was either fully mortal or part god and died on the cross but was resurrected 3 days alter- not really a sacrifice, just a minor annoyance for a couple of hours.
3) Jesus was god incarnated as human flesh, “Died” on the cross and ascended back home 3 days later. No sacrifice at all.

Now if we take the first option then the whole resurrection thing is out the window. A normal human existed who spread the “good news” but he was not divine and did not resurrect.  There was indeed a genuine sacrifice made and if this was the story being stuck to we could maybe hold back on some of the criticism, but it isn’t Jesus is not a normal human being but he is divine.  Therefore number one is out the window.What about number 2?  Well it has been suggested that Jesus is half and half- sort of like when Commander Riker becomes part Q in series 1 of TNG.  The problem that arises here is, did Jesus suffer?  If he did suffer then a sacrifice of sorts was made, but not as big of a one as Christians like to make out.  Crucifixion was the most common form of execution in the ancient world and so he only endured what others did.  Painful sure, but is it enough of a sacrifice to devote your entire life to him?  But we are making the assumption that physical pain was felt, remember we’re dealing with a Human/Q hybrid.  Without any more information we simply cannot just “assume” he suffered.  We need more than that.  But even if he did suffer in pain, he didn’t stay dead and ended up in the after life as second in command.  That’s hardly a sacrifice, army officers have suffered more before being promoted.

So, what about number 3?  Number 3 includes both the crucifixion and the resurrection of a truly divine being.  But was Jesus divine?  Although he never came out and said “I am god” it is heavily implied throughout the New testament that he is god come flesh.  Looking at the wording is important, God refers to himself as “I AM” in Exodus 3:13-15 and Jesus also uses this terminology throughout the book of John.  It is also generally accepted that Jesus is god incarnate, part of the Holy Trinity, itself simply different aspects of the one god.

So if Jesus was simply God, then again, what sacrifice was made, he didn’t stay dead, a three day coma is hardly a sacrifice, and his suffering (if he did even feel anything) is feeble in comparison to some methods of execution (The Brazen Bull springs to mind).  But even if he did suffer, he suffered for a couple of days out of 6000 (Young Earth Christians) or a couple of days out of 13.7 Billion years (Old Earth/ Universe).

One way I could accept a sacrifice was made would be if we take option 2 but assume Jesus had no knowledge that he would resurrect.  In this instant a genuine sacrifice is made, it agrees with the Bible and still allows Jesus to be divine.  This would be a win situation for Christianity if Jesus had indeed no knowledge of his impending resurrection.  Sadly, that isn’t the case, not only did he know but he made damn sure others knew too:

He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and after three days rise again.  Mark 8:31

Saying, Sir, we remember that that deceiver said, while he was yet alive, After three days I will rise again.  Matthew 27:63

So that scuppers that idea.  Jesus was divine, Jesus knew he would be resurrected.  Jesus knew he would ascend to heaven to sit by his father/ himself.  So I ask again, what sacrifice was actually made.  Maybe we could say he suffered a few days torture?  Well others have suffered far worse, for far longer, for far more important reasons- Jesus suffering is nothing compared to what happened in Auschwitz.  If he thinks a few days of torture are worth salvation then the victims of the death camps should be the real divine lords.

So, we have established that the only way a genuine sacrifice could have been made is if Jesus was human or had no knowledge of his resurrection.  The Bible clearly states that neither is true and dogma supports it.  No meaningful sacrifice, if any, has occurred.  We can have either a divine resurrected Jesus or we can have a human Jesus dying on the cross, but we can’t have both.  I suggest we forget this nonsense, chow down on the eggs and celebrate the start of Spring, that is after all the true meaning of Eastre.