January 2006: Page 1, 2, 3

Submitters Perspective

Page 2

The Human Jesus and Christian Deism

Cont’d from page 1

… In his parable of the “talents” (Matthew 25:14-30), Jesus taught that we show our love to God by how we use the life that God has entrusted to us. In his parable of the “good Samaritan” (Luke 10:30-37), Jesus taught that we fail to love others when we cause human suffering or when we do not try to relieve human suffering when we can do so.

...Unfortunately, soon after Jesus’ lifetime, a man named Paul of Tarsus began proclaiming a very different message. Paul never claimed to have seen or heard Jesus during Jesus’ lifetime, but claimed that Jesus had appeared later to Paul in some kind of vision after the death of Jesus. Paul began preaching that Jesus “was in the form of God, . . . . but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death of the cross” (Philippians 2:6-7).

Paul viewed the crucifixion of Jesus as a sacrifice to God to atone for the sins of humankind. Paul wrote, “But God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ (Jesus) died for us. Since therefore we are now justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved from the wrath of God” (Romans 5:8-9). According to Jesus, we are forgiven by God if we repent of our sins and we are

willing to forgive others who sin against us, but Paul taught that Jesus had to die as a human sacrifice to obtain God’s forgiveness and save us “from the wrath of God.” Paul’s teaching, or “gospel,” was very different from Jesus’ gospel.

Paul claimed that his “gospel” was revealed directly to Paul by Jesus after the death of Jesus. Paul wrote, “For I would have you know, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not man’s gospel. For I did not receive it from man, nor was I taught it, but it came through a revelation of Jesus Christ” (Galatians 1:11-12).

It is clear that Paul replaced Jesus’ natural religion with a so-called “revealed” religion. In all of his letters found in the New Testament, Paul never quotes the teachings of Jesus. Jesus’ gospel calling for people to repent of their failures to love, and to forgive each other, was replaced with Paul’s “gospel” of blood sacrifice to appease an angry God. A series of church councils in the fourth century compounded the errors of Paul by making Jesus equal to God and institutionalizing Paul’s “substitutionary theory” of atonement.

Brother John

[Ed.’s note: This article is based on excerpts from the original article which is much longer. The original article and other related articles of the author can be accessed at http://www.onr.com/user/bejo/index.htm]

A Voice from Ukraine

Good day! I am writing you from Lviv, Ukraine. I am very thankful for receiving from you "QURAN." After reading such topics from your web-page on Jesus and corruption of Bible, firstly I was disappointed, but after thinking about that I get acknowledgement: There is not any contradiction between point of view on Jesus and his message and that what I found in 'QURAN". Jesus always referred to himself an expression "Son of man." Also I know about history of creating a critical Greek text of New Testament /Nestle-Aland/ from pieces of sentences from different sources of different time frames.

I am writing that because I found no contradiction between real message of Bible and The last Revelation of G-d. Thank you for your help to find the complete truth of Quran alone without referring to man's tradition. I have not yet decided to become a submitter, I have to evaluate how will my life is to be changed. I recently get to know that in my city there is a small organization of traditionalist Muslims. Thank you. I found in public library several books on history of Islamic religion. Good bye.

Igor

BIBLE VERSES

Solomon’s Proverbs

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not unto your own understanding. In all your ways, acknowledge Him, and He will direct your path. Proverbs 3:5-6

He who guards his lips guards his soul. Proverbs 13:3

He who conceals his sins does not prosper, but whoever confesses and renounces them finds mercy. Proverbs 28:13