Obviously I'm not Jesus, but if Jesus were to blog, what would he write?
This question is not a biblical one. Instead it is a philosophical one. What was the message of Jesus when you get right down to what he was teaching? If the message was one of truth and goodness, then it should be able to stand alone without all of surrounding relgious aspects to it.
Let us look at the fundamental truth that Jesus was teaching throughout his lifetime. This teaching is associated almost always with The Golden Rule. "All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye so to them; for this is the law and the prophets."
Matthew 7:1
This basically states that we should only interact with others in ways we would accept ourselves. To unpack that in my own words, It assumes that you and I both exist and that we are equal conscious beings, and we must treat eachother with the same respect that we would like for ourselves. This makes complete logical sense and is what I have concluded from all that I know so far about the Universe. If it is a universal conclusion on how beings should interact, then one would think others must have discovered this same truth besides just Jesus and myself.
Upon further research, I found that not only has this same conclusion been held as truth by at least 21 different world religions, but also philosophers have come upon this same conclusion. This website http://www.religioustolerance.org/reciproc.htm shows many of them. I also copied it onto the bottom of this blog since I don't want to take up room here...
What do we make of the fact that there are so many people with the same conclusion? While a person like myself believes in this ethic of mutual coexistance only after I have rediscovered it through rigorous tests of logic and reason, others have taken different paths to the same conclusion.
Does it really matter how someone comes to this belief? If the end result is living peacefully with one's fellow beings and the striving for shared happiness and love for all, then I don't think it matters how someone comes to the same conclusion.
What would Jesus say to the person who is living by the golden rule, but does not practice Christianity? I am sure he would have no problems with that person. And if there is a creator of the Universe? This seems to be the only conclusion of ethical behavior that we can rely on from what we know in this universe created or not. So whether you are athiest, diest, agnostic, buddhist, jewish, christian, muslim, of any race, gender, nationality, sexual orientation, height, weight, etc. this ethical ideal of mutual care and non harm toward one another is the only one that I can think of that is truly universal.
Oh, dang, that didn't paste well... But here is the list from that website.
Bahá'í World Faith:"Ascribe not to any soul that which thou wouldst not have ascribed to thee, and say not that which thou doest not." "Blessed is he who preferreth his brother before himself." Baha'u'llah
"And if thine eyes be turned towards justice, choose thou for thy neighbour that which thou choosest for thyself." Epistle to the Son of the Wolf
Brahmanism: "This is the sum of Dharma [duty]: Do naught unto others which would cause you pain if done to you". Mahabharata, 5:1517 "
Buddhism:
"...a state that is not pleasing or delightful to me, how could I inflict that upon another?" Samyutta NIkaya v. 353
Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful." Udana-Varga 5:18
Christianity:
"Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets." Matthew 7:12, King James Version.
"And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise." Luke 6:31, King James Version.
"...and don't do what you hate...", Gospel of Thomas 6. The Gospel of Thomas is one of about 40 gospels that were widely accepted among early Christians, but which never made it into the Christian Scriptures (New Testament).
Confucianism:
"Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you" Analects 15:23
"Tse-kung asked, 'Is there one word that can serve as a principle of conduct for life?' Confucius replied, 'It is the word 'shu' -- reciprocity. Do not impose on others what you yourself do not desire.'" Doctrine of the Mean 13.3
"Try your best to treat others as you would wish to be treated yourself, and you will find that this is the shortest way to benevolence." Mencius VII.A.4
Ancient Egyptian:
"Do for one who may do for you, that you may cause him thus to do." The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant, 109 - 110 Translated by R.B. Parkinson. The original dates to 1970 to 1640 BCE and may be the earliest version ever written. 3
Hinduism:
"One should not behave towards others in a way which is disagreeable to oneself." Mencius Vii.A.4
Humanism:
"(5) Humanists acknowledge human interdependence, the need for mutual respect and the kinship of all humanity."
"(11) Humanists affirm that individual and social problems can only be resolved by means of human reason, intelligent effort, critical thinking joined with compassion and a spirit of empathy for all living beings. " 4
"Don't do things you wouldn't want to have done to you, British Humanist Society. 3
Islam: "None of you [truly] believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself." Number 13 of Imam "Al-Nawawi's Forty Hadiths." 5
Jainism:
"Therefore, neither does he [a sage] cause violence to others nor does he make others do so." Acarangasutra 5.101-2.
"In happiness and suffering, in joy and grief, we should regard all creatures as we regard our own self." Lord Mahavira, 24th Tirthankara
"A man should wander about treating all creatures as he himself would be treated. "Sutrakritanga 1.11.33
Judaism:
"...thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.", Leviticus 19:18
"What is hateful to you, do not to your fellow man. This is the law: all the rest is commentary." Talmud, Shabbat 31a.
"And what you hate, do not do to any one." Tobit 4:15 6
Native American Spirituality:
"Respect for all life is the foundation." The Great Law of Peace.
"All things are our relatives; what we do to everything, we do to ourselves. All is really One." Black Elk
"Do not wrong or hate your neighbor. For it is not he who you wrong, but yourself." Pima proverb.
Roman Pagan Religion: "The law imprinted on the hearts of all men is to love the members of society as themselves."
Shinto:
"The heart of the person before you is a mirror. See there your own form"
"Be charitable to all beings, love is the representative of God." Ko-ji-ki Hachiman Kasuga
Sikhism:
Compassion-mercy and religion are the support of the entire world". Japji Sahib
"Don't create enmity with anyone as God is within everyone." Guru Arjan Devji 259
"No one is my enemy, none a stranger and everyone is my friend." Guru Arjan Dev : AG 1299
Sufism: "The basis of Sufism is consideration of the hearts and feelings of others. If you haven't the will to gladden someone's heart, then at least beware lest you hurt someone's heart, for on our path, no sin exists but this." Dr. Javad Nurbakhsh, Master of the Nimatullahi Sufi Order.
Taoism:
"Regard your neighbor's gain as your own gain, and your neighbor's loss as your own loss." T'ai Shang Kan Ying P'ien.
"The sage has no interest of his own, but takes the interests of the people as his own. He is kind to the kind; he is also kind to the unkind: for Virtue is kind. He is faithful to the faithful; he is also faithful to the unfaithful: for Virtue is faithful." Tao Teh Ching, Chapter 49
Unitarian: "We affirm and promote respect for the interdependent of all existence of which we are a part." Unitarian principles.
Wicca: "An it harm no one, do what thou wilt" (i.e. do what ever you will, as long as it harms nobody, including yourself). One's will is to be carefully thought out in advance of action. This is called the Wiccan Rede
Yoruba: (Nigeria): "One going to take a pointed stick to pinch a baby bird should first try it on himself to feel how it hurts."
Zoroastrianism:
"That nature alone is good which refrains from doing unto another whatsoever is not good for itself". Dadistan-i-dinik 94:5
"Whatever is disagreeable to yourself do not do unto others." Shayast-na-Shayast 13:29
Epictetus: "What you would avoid suffering yourself, seek not to impose on others." (circa 100 CE)
Kant: "Act as if the maxim of thy action were to become by thy will a universal law of nature."
Plato: "May I do to others as I would that they should do unto me." (Greece; 4th century BCE)
Socrates: "Do not do to others that which would anger you if others did it to you." (Greece; 5th century BCE)
Seneca: "Treat your inferiors as you would be treated by your superiors," Epistle 47:11 (Rome; 1st century CE)
Humanism: "...critical intelligence, infused by a sense of human caring, is the best method that humanity has for resolving problems. Reason should be balanced with compassion and empathy and the whole person fulfilled." Humanist Manifesto II; Ethics section.
Scientology: "20: Try to treat others as you would want them to treat you." This is one of the 21 moral precepts that form the moral code explained in L. Ron Hubbard's booklet "The Way to Happiness."
Wow. this was deep I liked it. shows the integration that people overlook in religion.
http://www.progressiveu.org/133506-job-security
Thanks! It is interesting that they share this thing in common, along with the fact that even without god or religion, people can have the same ethical standard of Jesus, Buddha, Ghandi, Martin Luther King Jr. Etc.
bravo! you pointed out something many people seem to forget. Religious congregations were organized to establish a code of values waaaaaaay back in the day. so thank you for your insight. *hugs*
You are right that religions were organized to establish codes of values. Unfortunately, religious based values, often come into conflict with other religious and non religious based values, and create confusion or conflict. This is because of the added rules that each belief system may hold which don't have anything to do with the basic idea of "do what ever you want as long as you harm no one." My question is, how do we get people to take the good, and leave the bad from their belief systems?
Isn't a religion just a belief system?
Even if it needs to be a religious group to be religious, isn't "do what ever you want as long as you harm no one" the basic wiccan tennant? When I see that phrase I think Wicca and Paganism. Both are religions.
I guess it sounds like wiccan phrasing, but it is also the same as the other beliefs (religious and non-religious) listed above basically. Would you prefer I describe it as "don't do anything that causes suffering?" It's the same thing. One doesn't need to ascribe a religion to this rule of reciprocity.
My point is that any belief system is a religion. It is frustrating that any belief or system of thought or theory can be easily thrown out because it is "religious."
There is plenty of truth in religions as mentioned in this blog. There is also truth without religions. They are both okay as long as someone tries to live a life that causes no suffering to others.
Very interesting, however you are missing the key to Jesus' message. And that is that he is the son of God. As the son of God he wants us to keep that golden rule. But if you would use the Bible as a reference from Jesus teachings you must also take into account his other teachings about himself. John 14:6-7 says, "Jesus answered, 'I am the Way the truth and the life. No one comes to the father except through me. If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well...'" And so we see the center of Christs message, That he is the son of God, who loved the world(John 3:16) , died, and rose again because of his love. And now he has called us to love each other in the same way he did. That we would die to ourselves and follow his example. You cannot take Christ as an example without taking in all his teachings. HE can only be three things: a liar, a lunatic, or who he said he was. And so we must accept, If we accept the other things he says, that he is also the sonof God, which would be the center of his "gospel" and probably what he would blog about. He would say something like, I am the son of God, I love you, so now you love others.
I was more interested in the truth in Christs message rather than the superstition and magical parts of the bible story. Because each religion can add magical happenings and threats of the gods to make followers do stuff, truth gets lost in a fog of dogma and scare tactics. Without the fog of dogma, the Golden rule holds truth by itself.
Jesus claimed to be God. He allowed himself to be crucified because the priests understood he was claiming to be God. Those two things are history that can be validated.
Either Jesus was lying and He is not God but a liar and he does not speak truth or He was crazy and possibly schizophrenic and thought He was God making His view on life completely without merit or He was God and it's not "magical happenings"
Nothing holds true without the existence of truth. Without a foundation nothing can be true. Without the perfect judge (God) there is no such thing as good or evil, only what you like or what I like or don't like.
Read my blog "Meaning of Life III" to understand how one doesn't need a "higher judge" to understand good vs. bad action. It's just logical that if you exist and I exist, that we shouldn't treat eachother with harm since it causes suffering. That can be concluded regardless of one's belief system as shown in the point of this blog with all the different philosophers, religions, etc. who came upon the same conclusion god, gods or no-gods.
churches often insist that it's crucial to subscribe to the name of jesus, that you must know jesus's name, even islanders that have no idea need to be told because otherwise it's definitely dire for them.
well jesus christ wasn't even jesus's name. jesus and christ are abberations on the greek and roman words for messiah. his real name was more like joseph or joshua.
it also bothers me that the main appeal churches use is that if you don't proclaim it you will go to hell. well that means your motivation is that you want to avoid something unpleasant, and not neccesarily in a strive for something higher.
the idea we can have of jesus is good and love and that is right. i think that religions can apply to each other, and the good in them mostly is common.
and in any case i'm pretty sure judgement on others should be avoided.
Religions often use threats to get their followers to follow the rule of reciprocity, but others follow the rule because they are just ethical people that truly care about their world and fellow humans.
I'm sorry that all you ever hear is the threats of Christians. I hate that. It really makes me angry. I'm truly sorry about that. But, I am a Christian, and don't want the world to feel condemnation but love. An I try to strive for something higher that dogmatism and judgementalism.
And yes the Golden rule by itself is a wonderful idea, But you cannot accept only that part of Christs message. If you look at his words and teachings, you will see that he called himself the Son of God. Which once again leaves you with only three options as to who he was.
A Liar: he was trying to trick the world into thinking he was the Son of God and has caused the deaths of thousands because of it.
A Lunatic: He really believed it, but was insane, and thus no teachings of his can be taken as true
Or he was the Son of God: In essence he was who he said he was. THere is no other alternatives, and thus we cannot look at him and say he was a good teacher. If he meant to teach us it must have all been an act of deciet.
Jesus would definatley have blogged the Golden rule, but if you look at his teachings, he would have given us the ultimate example of the golden rule, and that being his sacrifice.
I also would say judgement should be avoided.
I don't know if I believe those are the only three options actually. It is quite possible that Jesus was a very wise and selfless teacher, like a Gandhi or Socrates, and the supernatural story around him was created by his deciples to make it into a religion.
But if you look at his teachings, for instance in the gospels, you see that he claimed to be the son of God. He cannot be a good teacher and lie about something as big as that.
Concerning the disciples, had they made it up, I doubt they would have gone to the grave they ways they did. 11 of the twelve were executed, and the 12th was exiled to an island to die. I doubt many people would die for a known hoax. (although it has happened, but never with the impact that Christ's death has had.) Especially in some of the ways they were killed. None of them recanted, and so there must be something special about what they believed.
Also if the Discioples made it up, I would think that the Bible would contradict itself, but it doesn't. I would think that Paul, who was not a disciple yet wrote most of the New Testament, would write about something different than the diety of Christ, or that his writings would contracict those of the disciples. But they don't.
I'm just saying that not many sane people would die for a hoax. And Jesus was obviously feeding the people that he was the sun of God, and he died for it. There has got to be something more than "love your neighbor." People don't go to a cross because they just wanted to love their neighbor. There has got to be something more to his message.
Uh oh... Your inspiring me to write a new blog!! :-) Check out the one called "The Evil of Christianity"
for some reason i can't picture jesus typing.
Amazing commentary. I wholeheartedly agree that all religious practices aside, it comes down to simply "Love God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind; and love your neighbor as yourself."
Have you by any chance read Ramakrishna's "Many Paths to the Same Summit"?
peace,
ashley
Thanks, I would definately have to disagree though. It has nothing to do with god really, but everything to do with loving your fellow beings in this universe. God is just a little something extra on the side for those who like it.
If we had more people who thought about others as they thought of themselves this would be a better world. People would want to help each other instead of only thinking about themselves. It would be the balance in heirarchy.
I've said it once, and I'll say it again: Christianity is a fantastic philosophy. It just has awful representation.
"I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."
- Mohandas Gandhi