Thu 5 Jul 2007
Jesus never claimed to be God?
Posted by Darren under Apologetics , Bible , Faith , God , Jesus , Skeptics
"At this gathering [the Council of Nicaea]," Teabing said, "many aspects of Christianity were debated and voted upon – the date of Easter, the role of the bishops – and, of course, the divinity of Jesus – until that moment in history, Jesus was viewed by His followers as a mortal prophet – a great and powerful man, but a man nonetheless. A mortal." (Dan Brown, The Da Vinci Code, Chapter 55)
The Da Vinci Code repeats a common claim: That Jesus never claimed to be God, and this belief was made up by much later followers. Let's take a look at just one way that Jesus claimed divinity: He accepted worship.
First, Jesus (quoting the Old Testament) claimed that God is the only legitimate object of worship: "Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only." (Matthew 4:10; Deut 6:13).
Second, Jesus accepted worship many times, including just a short time later when the disciples all worship Him (Matthew 14:33). Additionally:
Jesus accepted worship from Thomas (John 20:28); all the angels are told to worship Jesus (Heb. 1:6); wise men worshiped Jesus (Matt. 2:11); a ruler bowed before Him in worship (Matt. 9:18); a blind man worshiped Him (John 9:38); Mary Magdalene worshiped Him (Matt. 28:9); and the disciples worshiped Him (Matt. 28:17). [source]
Note carefully what we never find Jesus saying. He never corrected anyone by saying something like "Woah guys, you've got it all wrong, I may be a good teacher but don't worship me!"
Third, in Acts we find the early Christians doing exactly what Jesus didn't do, objecting strongly when people try to worship them. In Acts 10, Peter goes to visit a man named Cornelius, where we read: "As Peter entered the house, Cornelius met him and fell at his feet in reverence. But Peter made him get up. "Stand up," he said, "I am only a man myself." (Acts 10:25-26) This is exactly what we don't find Jesus saying! A similar example occurs to Paul and Barnabas in Acts 14:11-15.
To state this briefly:
- Jesus claimed only God should be worshiped.
- Jesus accepted worship.
- Therefore, the earliest Christians considered Jesus divine and Jesus affirmed their belief.
All of this accords with what was preached in the early Christian church. In fact, the usual tenancy that often needed to be corrected was to emphasize Jesus' divinity at the expense of His humanity!
The only way to attempt escape from this conclusion is to argue that the New Testament is not an accurate historical record. Now, besides the fact that the earliest records we have of what Christians believe are the New Testament documents, there are also many other good reasons to believe the New Testament is an accurate historical record.
Further reading:
- Jesus: A Biblical Defense of His Deity – Online version of a book which defends Jesus' claim to deity.
- The Historical Accuracy of the Gospels – Dr Craig L Blomberg gives reasons to believe the historical accuracy of the gospels.
- Jesus? Who is He? – A quick Flash-based presentation for your kind consideration.
13 Responses to “Jesus never claimed to be God?”
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July 6th, 2007 at 4:28 pm
Please go read this….
http://www.nexusmagazine.com/articles/NewTestament.html
Then try to open your mind and rethink your statements
July 7th, 2007 at 1:59 am
Elsie, thank you for the link. I looked through it briefly, although I don't have time at the moment to read through it in its entirety. I did notice some very disturbing things in this article that destroys the credibility of the author and the website. I do try to keep my mind open, but I do need to keep the screen door closed to keep the bugs out!
Here's a quote from that page:
The Church admits that the Epistles of Paul are forgeries, saying, "Even the genuine Epistles were greatly interpolated to lend weight to the personal views of their authors" (Catholic Encyclopedia, Farley ed., vol. vii, p. 645).
Hmm, that sounds like a rather odd thing for the Catholic Church to say! Let's look it up online (the Catholic Encyclopedia is online, after all) and see the context for this quote:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07644a.htm
Scroll down to the "Colletions" section. The "Nexus Magazine" page claims this quote refers to the letters of Paul but clearly it does not. The quote from the Catholic Encyclopedia refers to a collection of letters supposedly written by St Ignatius which were collected by Eusebius. The text has been quoted carefully to hide what it really says, and the author (or whoever he got his information from) has deliberately lied.
A similar example occurs when the author of this article claims the Catholic Encyclopedia "admits that the Gospels "do not go back to the first century of the Christian era" (Catholic Encyclopedia, Farley ed., vol. vi, p. 137, pp. 655-6)." Read for yourself what it really says:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06655b.htm
It ACTUALLY says that the titles on the gospels don't go back to the first century; ie, when the author originally wrote the Gospel of Matthew, he didn't write "Gospel of Matthew" at the top of the page. Again, the quote has been dishonestly misrepresented.
Another example of the dishonesty of this article: Here's a quote that supposedly applies to the Council of Nicea: "As yet, no God had been selected by the council, and so they balloted in order to determine that matter… For one year and five months the balloting lasted…" Wow! That would be quite interesting if it were true. Now, let's look up their source (which they are using as proof for their views on the Council of Nicea). The citation is "(God's Book of Eskra, Prof. S. L. MacGuire's translation, Salisbury, 1922, chapter xlviii, paragraphs 36, 41)".
Hmmm, "God's Book of Eskra"? Perhaps an ancient history text composed around the time of the council? Actually, no, it was written by "a 19th century dentist named John Ballou Newbrough". It's described as "a hallucinogenic reworking of cosmology and ancient history". Read it for yourself here:
http://www.sacred-texts.com/oah/oah/oah531.htm
So it's really a writing composed in 1882 by some dentist, probably while high. Again, trying to use this quote as evidence is devious in the extreme.
I looked up 3 quotes from the page, and all three were totally misrepresented!
Now, I don't have the time to check all the references, but I don't really need to. The thesis of the page is that the New Testament was composed by Constantine in the 4th century is ridiculous because we have literally thousands of copies of the New Testament texts from the second and third centuries, along with lists of canons from the second and third centuries that match extremely closely with the ones agreed upon at the council (though the canon was not the main concern at the original council). Further, no scholar (be it Christian, Jew, atheist, liberal, conservative …) would ever give credit to this theory.
Sorry, but I just don't believe it. I don't go around calling people liars very often (and I am not calling you a liar) … but that Nexus Magazine page contains at least three (and I'm willing to bet a lot more than that) blatant, verifiable lies. Just because someone puts a lot of fancy citations in an article doesn't mean it's true.
July 9th, 2007 at 1:10 am
No ofense taken, I will now go look for the rest of the "quotes" myself. Nevertheless, I am rather skeptical to believe that ANY of the Canonical or Synoptics where written by ANY of the Apostles or before the 2nd century as we have been made believe. I will be back ….
July 29th, 2007 at 7:46 pm
I think this website might help to understad the whole thing better >> http://www.islamcode.com
July 30th, 2007 at 2:48 pm
Thank you for the link, but it doesn't really help to understand anything better. The site makes claims but offers no support for them, for example:
"According to the oldest and most authentic copies of manuscipts [sic] and scrolls available throughout the centuries, Jesus, peace be upon him, never claimed to be God, or the creator, or the One to pray to, nor did he tell his followers to revere him as God. These notions appear on the lips of others who came along decades and even centuries later."
No evidence is given to back up this claim, and in fact there is much against it. The earliest historical documents that we have concerning Jesus are found in the New Testament. As per my previous post here:
http://www.whyfaith.com/2007/07/10/the-new-testament-when-and-who/
We know that all of the NT documents were written in the first century. We also have very good reasons to believe they were written by eyewitnesses:
http://www.whyfaith.com/2007/03/17/eyewitness-testimony-in-the-new-testament/
Further discussion of the general reliability of the NT is available here (among many other sources):
http://www.apologeticsindex.org/r14ac.html
http://www.4truth.net/site/c.hiKXLbPNLrF/b.784441/k.C6BC/Accuracy/apps/nl/newsletter3.asp
http://www.str.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=6068
So clearly the assertion that Jesus was only claimed to be God centuries later is false. Even the notion that these ideas only appeared "decades" later is also false, since the creed found in 1 Cor 15:3-5 is dated to 3-7 years after Christ's death:
http://www.carm.org/evidence/1Cor15_3-4.htm
"While Jesus was on earth he did not claim to be the creator or ask us to revere him as God."
Again, this is plainly false from the NT texts, where Jesus is the creator (ex: John 1:3, Colossians 1:16) and accepts worship (ex: Matthew 14:33, John 9:38), after He Himself noted that it is only appropriate to worship God (Matthew 4:10). So again, based on the earliest historical texts, these arguments do not stand.
Attempting to build a historical case based on the Qur'an (which was recorded hundreds of years after Jesus' crucifixion) is only effective if a person already believes the Qur'an is the word of God, which is of course circular.
March 12th, 2009 at 12:38 am
Attempting to build a historical case based on the gospels is only effective if a person already believes the gospels are the word of God, which is of course circular.
Read scholarly, nonsectarian textbooks about the gospels and you'll see that scholars consider them to be contradictory and based on secondhand information, useful as evidence about the historical Jesus but not conclusive. Only Christians consider them reliable in all their particulars, and not even all Christians at that.
March 12th, 2009 at 11:17 am
Thank you for your comments Jonathan! You are correct that building a case based on the gospels is only effective if a person believes the gospels are accurate. I've often said that using the Bible to prove the Bible is true is indeed circular.
Of course, I do believe there are good reasons to trust what the Bible says, as outlined in my ebook "The Historical Reliability of the New Testament":
http://www.whyfaith.com/nt/
Interestingly, even if a person doesn't consider the Bible to be God's word or even generally accurate, if we study the gospels and other biblical texts seriously as merely ancient writings, a tenable (IMHO) case can still be built for the truthfulness of the Christian faith, as per Habermas' "minimal facts argument" here:
http://www.growthtrac.com/artman/publish/1the-facts-concerning-the-resurrection-815.php
April 13th, 2009 at 7:55 pm
[…] of Jesus’ divinity in the synoptics. I’ve explained one of these ways in depth in my post “Jesus Never Claimed to be God?“. I think we can see in the early synoptic gospel writings how the authors are struggling to […]
February 27th, 2013 at 4:14 pm
I battle these lies, distortions, and false accusations online and in person. People who have never really taken the time to read any real scholarly works on the subject, believe whatever some web site has to say as long as it "looks" convincing, ie; offers quotes, footnotes, or some other bogus references. Satan is the father of all lies and he has taught his followers well. I was bouncing around some of these "Christian secrets" sites when I happened here. The site (and sites like it)Elsie directed us to is literally set up to fool people who are lazy and uneducated. Sorry for being blunt, but that's just the truth. Few people get through our "education system" (high school or college)understading how to evaluate information, use logic, understand basic philosophy, or how to spot bias. The non-Christians who are educated and informed on this subject attack Christianity in entirely different ways; see Bart Erhman. Even BE isn't always honest either. The sad fact is, the people who believe such lies, have neither the desire or ability to properly evaluate the information they are being spoon fed. They are merely looking for someone to confirm what they already believe. And just FYI, I am finding more and more that these anti-Christian web sites are put up by Muslims, not atheists.
December 17th, 2013 at 11:06 pm
A large percentage of of whatever you state happens to be supprisingly legitimate and that makes me ponder the reason why I hadn't looked at this in this light previously. Your piece really did turn the light on for me as far as this particular subject goes.
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December 20th, 2013 at 10:55 am
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