Did Jesus say he was God???

[Jeremiah]

I have been asked to produce evidence of the divinity of Jesus. This is not just good evidence, it is overwhelming evidence.


Words of Jesus

John 14:9 ... he that hath seen me hath seen the Father
John 14:10 ... the words that I say unto you , I speak not from myself but from the Father abiding in Me doeth His works
John 14:11 ... I am in the Father and the Father in Me
John 10:30 I and My Father are one
John 10:33 ... thou being a man makest Thyself God
John 8:58 Jesus said ... before Abraham was born, Jah (Jah is the short form of Jeshovah)
John 8:59 They took up stones therefore to cast at Him
Mark 2:5 and Jesus seeing their faith saith ... thy sins are forgiven
Mark 2:7 ... who can forgive sins but one, even God
Mark 10:17 ... good teacher Mark 10:18 Why callest Me good? None is good save one, even God John 10:11 I am the good shepherd
Mat. 1:21 ... call his name Jesus; for it is He that shall save his people from their sins
Prophecies of the Messiah Jesus
Isa. 45:21 ... I, Jehovah? and there is no God else besides Me a just God and savior, there is none besides Me
Isa. 7:14 ... a sign: behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call His name Immanuel (God with us)
Isa 9:6 a son is given, and the government shall be upon His shoulder, and His name shall be called: Wonderful, Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace

Attributes of God
Omnipresence
John 1:46 Nathaniel saith unto Him, Whence knowest thou me? Jesus answered and said unto him Before Philip called thee, when thou wast under the fig tree, I saw thee.
John 1:49 Nathaniel answered him, Rabbi thou art the Son of God; thou art King of Israel.
John 1:50 Jesus answered ... thou shalt see greater things than these
Omniscience
Luke 6:8 ...the Pharisees watched Him ... that they might find how to accuse him but He knew their thoughts
John 4:17 ... Thou sayest well, I have no husband
John 4:18 for thou hast had five husbands and he whom thou now hast is not thy husband
Omnipotence
Mark 4:41 ... Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey Him?

(He turned water into wine, multiplied bread, healed the sick and the blind, raised a man who was dead for four days)
Authority
Luke 4:36 ... for with authority and power He commandeth the unclean spirits and they come out
Mat 7:29 for He taught them as one having authority
Mat 28:18 ... Jesus ...spake... saying, all authority hath been given unto Me in heaven and on earth
The "I am" statements of Jesus
John 8:12 ... I am the light of the world
John 14:6 ... I am the way, the truth and the life
John 6:35 ... I am the bread of life
John 10:9 I am the door, by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved
John 11:25 ... I am the resurrection and the life
John 15:1 I am the true vine (this is a reference to Jesus being the Paraclete)

Great! Now you just have to prove the Bible is the word of God and your all set!

 

[!Fluffy!]

Great! Now you just have to prove the Bible is the word of God and your all set!

In the framework of the argument as originally put forth, it's appropriate to use Jesus' own words to define himself.

so your statement is just the beginning of a separate debate.

Unless someone has a more accurate historical record, it's really all we have as a resource for this particular discussion.

 

[logician]

Great! Now you just have to prove the Bible is the word of God and your all set!

Actually, these are the words of some unknown author making up a story to grind his particular axe.

 

[MaddLlama]

Actually, these are the words of some unknown author making up a story to grind his particular axe.

Can you prove that? Or is it just your opinion?

 

[Jeremiah]

In the framework of the argument as originally put forth, it's appropriate to use Jesus' own words to define himself.

so your statement is just the beginning of a separate debate.

Unless someone has a more accurate historical record, it's really all we have as a resource for this particular discussion.

If the OP was posted in Biblical Debates than I would agree with you. But seeing how it is in General Religious Debates I disagree with you.

To prove that the Bible proves Jesus is God we need to prove the Bible is the word of God frist. Debating anything beyond this point would be fruitless. (in respects to facts)

Also I do not consider the Bible a reliable historical record.

 

[Dirty Penguin]

The OP believes that the book is the word of God and it is of historical accuracy. There are others who believe it in a different way. Since some of them believe in God as well and believe in the scriptures they are not posing the challege of proving the bible is the word of God. They are challenging the interpertation that Jesus was God in the flesh. To pose any other challenge would be deviating from the original question.

 

[Jeremiah]

The OP believes that the book is the word of God and it is of historical accuracy. There are others who believe it in a different way. Since some of them believe in God as well and believe in the scriptures they are not posing the challege of proving the bible is the word of God. They are challenging the interpertation that Jesus was God in the flesh. To pose any other challenge would be deviating from the original question.

I think you have been slacking on your religious studies.

The question at hand: "Is Jesus God in the flesh?" (title of the thread)

Muffled than posted

"I have been asked to produce evidence of the divinity of Jesus. This is not just good evidence, it is overwhelming evidence."

Than Muffled presents the Bible as the evidence. Verifying the validity of the evidence is the next step and is well within the bounds of the topic. Now keep in mind that this is in the General Religious Debates, not the Same Faith Debates or Biblical Debates.

 

[Popeyesays]

Well, I look at Muffled's list of cherrypicked verses and KNOW that I interpret them better than he does. So, in short, those quotes have nothing to do with a claim to the Godhead by Jesus.

Regards,
Scott

 

[!Fluffy!]

I'm terribly sorry to have to say it, but it seems a bit pretentious to dismiss Muffled's list of verses out of hand so flippantly, especially without offering overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

Those verses are only the tip of the divinity iceberg. And of course his views have been shared by the greatest minds of our faith from the disciples themselves to the ECF to current day theologians, not to mention the vast majority of Christianity in general as after all, this is without doubt the entire focal point of our faith: that Jesus our Savior was the only son of God, fully God and fully human, sent here to redeem humanity, crucified and resurrected breaking the bonds of death, and then ascending into heaven. Around this revolves our entire religious heritage and belief system. I would just like to remind everyone these claims are taken seriously by adherents, not because we are idiots lacking a proper education or because we are close minded or because we have been brainwashed, but because the Biblical claims upon which our faith is based resound with truth and continue to do so today. For the record I do not personally know of any Christians who are NOT converts. That is to say one may be baptized into a church of some kind at an early age, but unlike other religions the process of conversion is mandatory, and membership to the body of Christ is not assumed. At some point the Christian is asked to confirm. At some point every Christian is either going thru the motions or a true believer converted by faith, and is hopefully capable of demonstrating this through words and actions.

There is much more biblical evidence regarding Jesus' claims to divinity, supported by hundreds of years and perhaps millions of pages of exegesis. Here is a particularly well researched resource from Tektonics:

The Divine Claims of Jesus

It's alarmingly simple, and a common suggestion to make: That Jesus either a) never made any claims to deity; b) that His claims were altered by His biased followers; or, c) His claims were misunderstood by His ignorant followers. Do these ideas hold any water?

*snip*

The claims of Jesus, at any rate, can be understood and interpreted in light of the context and setting in which they were made: first-century Judea. But what of defending the authenticity of these claims as being the words of Jesus, rather than the invention of his followers? Generally, how valid is this idea that Jesus never claimed divinity? Broken down, it can never be more than a rhetorical and speculative argument; until some device is invented to pluck long-enunciated words from the air, we can not prove, or disprove, that any given historical personage prior to recording technology said anything - and even then there is the possible problem of tampering and doctored records. We can't absolutely prove that Jesus said "Blessed are the meek"; we cannot demonstrate beyond doubt that Julius Caesar said "Et tu, brute"; we can't even be sure that Henry the Eighth burped right after breakfast! Not all is thought of as this hopeless, of course; but there are those who think that they have solutions to determine "who said what" in hand. Specifically, the Jesus Seminar professes to use certain guidelines to determine what Jesus actually said: One, for example, is that any saying of Jesus that reflects a teaching of the early church is probably not authentic. This is indeed a dubious guideline. Is it not more probable, rather, that the early church based their teachings on the actual sayings of Jesus? Is this not the normal method whereby any person gains a following?

*snip*

If Jesus never claimed to be divine, and never claimed it in the sense that is indicated in the Gospels, it is reasonable to expect that:

• The enemies of Christianity and the early church would have declared that Jesus never made such claims, or was misunderstood. Some did indeed do this, but wrote quite some time after the fact. There is no record contemporary or closely contemporary with Jesus (first century AD) that indicates that He never made any special claims for Himself, or that the church invented the claims. Even after that time, however, the major skeptics of the first several centuries never argued this point. Celsus, for example, said that Jesus called Himself the Son of God, but wrongly. Porphyry, one of the most-feared skeptics in the early church, did not deny Jesus' claims to divinity, but instead tried to 'downgrade' Jesus into a hero-type deity (a third-class deity in the Roman hierarchy!). This adds up to strong evidence that (a) the Jesus-never-claimed-divinity argument had not been advanced by skeptics of the time, and (b) if it was used, perhaps by some skeptic whose works we have totally lost, it was so easily dismissed or so lacked adequate credibility that it could not be used by the best anti-Christian skeptics.
• A parallel movement, that acclaimed Jesus as merely a good teacher, would have emerged alongside Christianity. To be sure, there are those such as Burton L. Mack, author of The Lost Gospel, who would have us believe that a such a movement did exist; but conveniently enough, he tells us, it came and went too quickly to leave behind any concrete physical evidence for us to know what happened to them!

It's an interesting article, well researched but an entertaining read as is most of the Tektonics apologetics stuff. It gives you a lot to think about anyway.

 

[Popeyesays]

Dear Fluffy;

Read back further in this thread and you will see where i have dealt with those verses individually.

As to "Son of God" it is perfectly acceptable under Judaic tradition for anyone to make that claim. Indeed, we are all sons and daughters of God according to the traditions of the TaNakh.

"Son of God" is perfectly reasonable as an apellation for Jesus. It is symbolically intense, like "Friend of God" or "Gate of God", or "He Who Spoke with God"

"Son of Man" is much more persistently claimed by Jesus in the Gospels, and one would do well to research what that meant.

Regards,

Scott

 

[Muffled]

Perhaps you should spell syllogism correctly.

How about this:

God does not have partners.

Jesus bore a Divine Revelation to mankind.

Therefore: Jesus is not God.

Regards,
Scott

It's been a while since I had my class in Logic. Your conclusion does not follow from the premises. God is able to bring a divine revelation, so Jesus is not precluded from being God by bringing a revelation and you would have had to have had another premise saying that God does not bring a divine revelation in order to reach your conclusion. Do you believe that your missing premise is true?

 

[Muffled]

If the OP was posted in Biblical Debates than I would agree with you. But seeing how it is in General Religious Debates I disagree with you.

To prove that the Bible proves Jesus is God we need to prove the Bible is the word of God frist. Debating anything beyond this point would be fruitless. (in respects to facts)

Also I do not consider the Bible a reliable historical record.

The only sure proof that the Bible is the word of God is hearing God say so. This is something you have to do for yourself by asking God and waiting for an answer. I have never asked the question so I couldn't give you a definitive answer.

The Bible is a record because it was written down. It is historical because it was written down in the distant past. It is reliable because God keeps it so.

 

[logician]

"It is reliable because God keeps it so."

Whose god? The Xian bible is the ultimate in fiction and myth, reliability is not one of its merits.

 

[Jeremiah]

The only sure proof that the Bible is the word of God is hearing God say so. This is something you have to do for yourself by asking God and waiting for an answer. I have never asked the question so I couldn't give you a definitive answer.

The Bible is a record because it was written down. It is historical because it was written down in the distant past. It is reliable because God keeps it so.

Faith holds little weight in the world of facts.

There is a reason the Bible is found in the religious section at a book store and not the history section.

 

[Popeyesays]

Muffled,

I agree that God protects His Own Word; however, that does not force me to accept your interpretations as FACT. Your interpretations--to me--are wrong.

Regards,
Scott

 

[Dirty Penguin]

I think you have been slacking on your religious studies.

The question at hand: "Is Jesus God in the flesh?" (title of the thread)

Muffled than posted

"I have been asked to produce evidence of the divinity of Jesus. This is not just good evidence, it is overwhelming evidence."

Than Muffled presents the Bible as the evidence. Verifying the validity of the evidence is the next step and is well within the bounds of the topic. Now keep in mind that this is in the General Religious Debates, not the Same Faith Debates or Biblical Debates.

You want him to prove it is the word of God. He doesn't have to prove that at all. He is already under the impression that it is. His statements and claims are his interpertaion that Jesus "IS" God in the flesh. To pose the challenge that it is the word of God starts a whole new debate.

I know the scriptures and I have commented on them, using them. You seem to be attempting to answer his question with a question. Are you equipped to scrutanize the information contained in the bible and backup his claim or refute them?

Next you will want him to "prove" that a god exist.

 

[Jeremiah]

You want

You presume to much.

 

[Jacob]

tough subject, as we all know, the "GodHead" is one of the most debated subjects in religion... is god and jesus the same person.. is jehovah god or jesus Christ.. everyone has there scriptural backing for there argument.. and everyone will try to look for the right answer through in-depth scriptural study.. This is one of the most devastating discrepencies of the bible and christian religion.. because if we only knew for sure the answer to this, many problems and differences between christians would become similarities.. i will say this, Scriptural study with the intelect of the human mind will not produce the answer to this question.. only god knows his true personality and only he can give you the answer. this principle of prayer has been proved through the ages and through by stories of prophets in our beloved bible Moses, saw god face to face, Enoch walked with god. Steven (not a prophet but the first martyr) saw god and jesus christ at his right hand. and A 14 year old boy saw the father and the son one spring morning in the year 1820... Christ left his spirit to "teach us all things" the spirit will bear witness of the Personality of god and his son. Just as the gospel of jesus christ teaches us to be one... as he and the father are one.. the divine answer from the holy ghost is what will unite us and finally answer the question of questions.....

 

[Dirty Penguin]

You presume to much.

Not really......

It was your challenge. You came a day late and a dollar short wanting him to prove something that you can't disprove. This causes the debate to shift in a different direction thus the focus is lost on the original question.

 

[Jeremiah]

How do we even know Jesus was real?

Is there any other documentation than the Bible to substantiate this?

Also any suggestions on what books I can use to cross reference the verses contained in the Bible?

And what about the accuracy of the Bible?