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 WAS JESUS A CHRISTIAN? In a very important sense, no. Jesus was Jewish, worshipped at the synagogue and the Temple, kept the Jewish religious law (on the whole), and there is no suggestion that he ever told his followers to split away from Judaism and join this new religion he'd just invented called Christianity. Everything we know about his teaching was directed towards a renewal of the Jewish faith, not at establishing a new world religion. But this is often how new churches start, because the old ones aren't always too keen on being "renewed". Protestantism was originally a movement to renew the Roman Catholic Church, and attempts to do the same to the Church of England have ended up as new churches too, such as the Methodists. The reformers either get kicked out, or they realize that the only way to have a renewed church is to leave the old church. This did not happen in Jesus's lifetime, though, so he lived and died in the Jewish faith. However, there is another angle to this question: did Jesus actually believe and teach all the things that became the beliefs of the Christian church? Jesus certainly never said explicitly many of the things in the creeds of the church: We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one Being with the Father. Through him all things were made. For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven... The church teaches these things both on the authority of the followers of Jesus who wrote the books of the New Testament, and as its own official interpretation of the surprising claims Jesus is reported to have made about himself. Such as: "The Father and I are one" (John 10:30) and "Before Abraham was, I am" (John 8:58). Is the church's interpretation of Jesus correct? That's the big question, and it's open for each person to decide. More questions about Jesus' teaching |
Picture: 19th-century Bible illustration. |
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