Apollo Sunrise

In Luke 10:25-37 (the parable of the Good Samaritan), Jesus says that if you love your neighbor as yourself, you will be saved. In this self-contained passage, Jesus does not mention faith or belief, in the trinity or otherwise. The example he uses of that love of neighbor is of the non-believing enemy, the Samaritan. In Matthew 25:31-46, Jesus describes the final judgment and says that if you show compassionate for those who are hungry, thirsty, naked, sick, in prison, strangers or all those he called “the least of these,” you will be saved. Period. Again, no mention of faith or belief, in the trinity or otherwise. I take him at his word on this.

There is much truth, ancient wisdom and also human failing in many of the ancient writings. These were the best efforts of pre-scientific minds around the world to explain a perplexing universe. These were intelligent human minds, often wise, but lacking in the full range of scientific knowledge that we have today (which will probably seem primitive to our descendants 2,000 years in the future if we don’t destroy ourselves before that). Many of them contain much wisdom, but also much violence, internal contradictions, factual errors, etc. We should learn from the wisdom of the ancients, but put it in perspective, balanced with the human errors.

I have to agree with Larry. I don't understand how killing an innocent human sacrifice makes other people's “sins” magically disappear. The doctrine of blood atonement through human sacrifice does also strike me as being primitive. I do think one could say, and perhaps Paul might have meant this on some level, though I don't get that sense from his writing, that Jesus did teach us how to cleanse the stain of sin (in the form of negative feelings towards others) by replacing it with universal compassionate love expressed actively through deeds, directed towards everyone — friends, enemies, the hated non-believing Samaritans, and “the least of these.” And because he gave us the “free gift” of that teaching, knowing that he risked his life to do so, he did, in fact, give his life to cleanse us from sin, but not in the human sacrifice way.

I am going through the process of evaluating my belief system. I like much of what is attributed to Jesus, but don't like many aspects of more traditional or “evangelical” Christianity, which I think departs from Jesus. This site was referred to me as a place where I could find various viewpoints about Christianity from more progressive and flexible perspectives. Eager to listen, learn and share.