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You forgot my favorite parable, The Cleansing of the Temple:
And when he had made a scourge of small cords, he drove them all out of the temple, and the sheep, and the oxen; and poured out the changers' money, and overthrew the tables; And said unto them that sold doves, Take these things hence; make not my Father's house a house of merchandise. John 2:15-16
Jesus whipping money lenders will always make me chuckle.
Right here folks. Jesus hates capitalists. Be like Jesus.
Glad to know table flipping is timeless.
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Money changers. Not money lenders.
It wasn't about money changers, it was about the people selling animal sacrifices. The money changers just enabled them.
This is more explicitly laid out in Mark where it prohibits carrying anything through the temple.
That gets conveniently left out in Matthew where he copies from it as there's a bit of a theological paradox if it's Jesus's death that makes animal sacrifices pointless and he's telling people to stop killing animals to cleanse their sins while still alive.
The concept of racism didn't exist in 1st Century Judea. That being said, the parable of the Good Samaritan relies on bigotry.
Despite being superficially a complement, "Good Samaritan" is supposed to be ironic. Samaritan "goodness" must be unexpected for the story to work.
Imagine a parable of "the generous Jew" or "the industrious black man", and you'll get the idea.
Mitchel and Webb did a great sketch on this:
The story makes sense (in context) because of animosity between Jews and Samaritans, going back many years. A modern equivalent might be a Trump supporter helping out a democrat, or a Russian helping a Ukrainian.
John 4:9 gives a good illustrates this situation. In that story, a Samaritan woman is surprised that Jesus would talk to her when he is a Jew. It also illustrates that Jesus very much went against the culture of the day in his relations with Samaritans.
So, Jesus' wasn't making a statement about whether Samaritans were good or bad - he was explaining that being someone's neighbour is about how you treat them, not who you are. A modern parallel might be the famous 'today you, tomorrow me' story on reddit.
The story makes sense (in context) because of animosity between Jews and Samaritans, going back many years.
The story relies on prejudice, that's my point. Jesus didn't say "Seminarians were as good as Jews", he said "Jews are worse than Seminarians".
There are dozens of examples from the Bible where prejudice and bigotry are explicit. Hell, the whole concept of a "chosen people" implies that some people are better than others. Jesus ordered Saul to genocide the Amalekites. And if you notice, Jesus punished Saul for not killing every single last one, which implies that genocide isn't just permissible, but a moral duty.
( I know that these stories are from the OT and you're probably annoyed that I said Jesus instead of God, but according to the sign out on route 519, Jesus is God. Y'all still believe that, right? )
He said being a Jew or Samaritan doesn't make you good or bad. Neither does your position (Levites and Pharisees were very powerful and respected). Your actions are a reflection of who you are.
The concept of racism didn't exist in 1st Century Judea
The concept is as old as mankind. Details (replace 'race' with 'guy from next tribe', same concept) or it's name maybe not.
That's what I dont get. White Nationalists hate the Jewish but worship Jesus, who is also Jewish?
They love their made up Jesus.
Their made up jesus loves Guns, Racism, Money, and hates brown people and kindness.
Which is fitting for people who have never bothered to read the bible outside of some mistranslated quotes their greedy, money grubbing and hate mongering preachers repeat ad nauseam.
I still think of this if they were to meet the "real" Jeebus
Also remember that today's Bible was retold by a game of telephone before being written down. It was then written in a tongue the average person on the street could not read, this was so that they could not translate it themselves and were at the mercy of a preacher to tell them what it said. It was illegal to translate and/or distribute a copy of the texts.
This is all to say that had any of it been real, it is more than likely to have been reshaped over the years, before white nationalists have now added their own spin.
I sometimes wonder if any of it was a game of telephone. If you take out all the parts that are borrowed from Greco-Roman and traditional Jewish writings you are left with so little. Enough that it could have been made up by the authors. We don't have direct evidence of the oral tradition or even someone remotely natural hinting it existed.
Everyone reimagines the story in their own image. Whatever you want him to be be is what he is. That's the great thing about fiction. Why Vampires glitter now.
I once saw a cartoon with a church with a sign "No homeless people allowed inside" and Jesus stands before the sign and doesn't enter
We make god in our own image
We love toga parties, beards, and smiting.
Don't forget that Jesus has such a bad temper that he cursed a fig tree so it would never bare fruit again.
The reason? It didn't have any figs because it was the wrong season, and he had a temper tantrum. 🤡
Add too the left "Hates figs" and on the right "Hates (slur)"
Try that in a small town woke brown Jesus.
I legit almost got into a fist fight at work for telling someone Jesus died a Jewish person...
don't do it its never worth it
Roundheads (who later settled Massachusetts as Puritans) believed that Jesus would return to the center of the world (aka London, obs) speaking English to establish the New Jerusalem.
This Anglo-Jesus idea then got brought here.
He was also Socialist by definition.
But TBF the whole white jesus concept came from Christianity's spread from Rome and Northern Europe, not from Republicans in the USA.
If he believed in his own teachings, he wasn’t Jewish.
Really interesting topic actually but most early 'Christians' didn't really think of themselves as converts but rather just Jews who understood Jesus to represent the 'completion' of Jewish script and prophecy.
Best example is Paul who most definitely continues to view himself as a Jew.
Anyone interested should check out a book like 'Did Jesus Exist?' by Bart Erhman or a Marginal Jew (huge read). There's a better book by him on the topic but blanking on the title
I've been binging Ehrman's podcast and videos and really appreciate how thoughtful and intellectually honest he is and his skill at explaining things for the layperson.
You can also tell from his choice of words that he is careful to separate fact from his own opinion. When someone asks him a question, I've heard him many times start an answer off by saying what other scholars believe, and then he explains why he disagrees, but he always is open to being wrong.
In a YouTube video I listened to just this morning, someone asked him a question (when did they start capitalizing the pronouns He and Him in the Bible translations?) and he just honestly said he didn't know, then he asked the audience if anybody knew.
He's very good. Only interacted with his books, but they share a similar vibe with him being very clear about where he deviates from the mainstream and why.
He was culturally Jewish at the very least.
Ah, a pharisee in 2024. Nice.
Only argument I have with this is that he was definitely christian, the dude strongly believed in himself, I mean you don't go around saying you're the son of God willy nilly
The historical Jesus was not a child refugee. He was from Nazareth, period. The stories of the family traveling to Bethlehem are not in the oldest gospel (Mark) and almost certainly got added in to explain why the messiah was not from Bethlehem when prophecy said he would be, the same home town as King David.
Here's the thing, though: Jesus is no more than a stolen symbol to these types. It's just like saying, "I am a good person," there is no validation, certification, or standards for it. Anyone can claim they are Christian, anyone can claim they follow Jesus, They just picked up a name tag off the street and wear it. That's it. It's really down to a simplified "I am good, they are bad." So using logic, reason, and even proof in the bible is pointless. There's zero consequences to claiming you're doing what you want, even despicable acts, "because it's the Christian thing to do." Look at the Crusades. The papacy. It's not a new thing. It's the same old bullshit.
Even pedophiles can quote scripture.
If the various churches cared ANYTHING about their tenants, they'd have a vetting process. They'd check on their flock's behavior. They'd work on making the world a better place through helping others. They'd kick out any member of their group who violated their rules. But most of them don't, or if they do, it's a social moray fueled by their own hatred and ignorance. They just want the numbers, they just want the POWER, and it's no more valid than a gang of thugs or the Mafia.
And I see memes like this, and it's preaching to the choir. We KNOW they don't follow anything jesus said, claim that they do, and in the end of the day they are the same hypocrites that wear red hats to make America "Great" again. It's not adding anything to the narrative but creating a snobbish divide. "Well, look how smart we are to point out the obvious using technicalities that do nothing but insult them. Ha ha, they so dumb." Mentally, these people are children. You see toddlers interact? There's all kinds of wisdom into human culture right there. Only toddlers can't hide it yet. There's hitting, crying, illogical bullshit. But we, as adults, teach them to behave and are supposed to set an example. But they learn the hypocrisy from us, too, whether we know it or not.
So, you know, memes like this also do the same thing to these people who think Jesus is a white dude that they can wear on a tee short while calling the homeless discussing illegals or whatever. They hate us because we look down on THEM. We have to treat these people like children, and not "dismissively like stupid kids," but like, "Hey, buddy. I see you're having trouble processing your hate and fear. Let's go over here and calm down for a second." Or something. Raise 'em right.
Don't forget to contrast charitable versus selfish AF. Also humble versus self-important.