The Crucifixion Facade

1. Theology: What Was the Point of the Crucifixion?
   1. Judgment and Salvation: God's Ability to be Just
   2. Did Jesus Die Because of Original Sin?
   3. Did Jesus Die So God Would Know Suffering
   4. Did Jesus Die So People Would Know Jesus? What About People Who Lived Before the Time of Jesus and Never Knew Him?
   5. Public Relations
   6. If God Was a Rich Man Who Wanted to be Loved
2. Surviving a Crucifixion
3. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John Contradict Each Other
4. Historical Evidence for the Events of the Crucifixion
5. Conclusions

1. Theology: What Was the Point of the Crucifixion?

1.1. Judgment and Salvation: God's Ability to be Just

God is perfect, therefore is perfectly just and benevolent (good-natured). God's chosen actions are always the best chosen actions possible. God's plan of salvation in order to get people into Heaven is the best plan, and, is perfectly just. These sentiments are eternally true, for all time. So is it not odd that, in a particular year on planet Earth (after billions of years of existence), we think that God had to do something in order to improve the rate of salvation of Human beings? A perfect God can, and will, judge people in an adequate manner whether or not Jesus was crucified by the Romans.

God is all-powerful and just and therefore always judges people in the best way, according to the most fair criteria. God judges a person who lived in 100BCE in a perfect manner, because God is perfect. God also judges a person who lived after the crucifixion, in 100CE for example, also in a perfect manner. It seems odd to say that such a perfect God would have to sacrifice its son in between the lives of these two people, in order to implement his plan of salvation. This is one of the great problems with having mythology at the core of a religion: at the end of the day, there appears to be no rational reason behind some of the key concepts of that religion.

In other words, the point of the crucifixion was not to empower God or increase its ability to judge people and allow them into heaven.

1.2. Did Jesus Die Because of Original Sin?

"...the Church has always held and holds now, Christ underwent His passion and death freely, because of the sins of men and out of infinite love, in order that all may reach salvation"₁ This implies that the Catholic Church believes the crucifixion of Jesus occurred 'in order that all may reach salvation' and without the crucifixion such a thing would be impossible. Many non-Catholic Christians believe this, however the belief seems to call into question the ability of God to judge people fairly before the time of Jesus.

God makes the rules of the Universe. Adam and Eve sinned: We suffer for it. This is God's rule. He then creates a Son, lets it be murdered in a brutal way, so that we no longer suffer the Original Sin. It would have been much more logical if God simply never allowed us to inherit the sins of Adam and Eve. God makes the rules... then creates more suffering (of Jesus) in order to repeal one of his own rules? It is a contradiction, and a moral absurdity, and therefore can't be true of a perfect, moral or just God.

An analogy can be used to explain the fall of man and the salvation offered by God's plan for Jesus₂. Each successive part of the story is less moral than the version before it:

1. You have slipped, and are hanging from a mountain ledge. A man sees your predicament and pulls you to safety, away from the certain death that awaits you below.

The next version introduces the idea that you have to 'accept' Jesus as your saviour before God will save you:

2. You have slipped, and are hanging from a mountain ledge. A man sees your predicament and tells you he can save you, if you admit Him as your savior. When you do, He pulls you to safety, away from the certain death that awaits you below.

The next version introduces the idea that God created the system of original sin ('the fall') in the first place, and makes us subject to it:

3. You're on a mountain ledge, when the man pushes you off. You have no chance except to grab onto the ledge. He tells you he can save you, if you admit Him as your savior. When you do, He pulls you to safety, away from the certain death that awaits you below.

And the final story of Christian salvation introduces the idea of the crucifixion of Jesus to atone for our sins:

4. You're on a mountain ledge, when the man pushes you off. You have no chance except to grab onto the ledge. The man is holding baby Jesus in his arms. He tells you he can save you, if you admit Him as your savior. When you do, the man throws the child over the edge so he can then pull you to safety, away from the certain death that awaits you below.

There is no reason to throw the child over the cliff in order to save mankind. None at all... God can just save us, even if its son never existed. Some argue that it was necessary because of the laws of the Universe, that a sacrifice had to be made. However... who made the laws of the Universe? God! Jerome Luther, who provided the original inspiration for the analogy above, continues:

“They call God’s act the ultimate sacrifice. Indeed, he seems to have sacrificed his own morals. He killed his own son, in cold blood, when he could have done otherwise. He created us, sentenced us to hell, hung a weight of guilt about his son over our shoulders, and then told us he would save us if we bowed down before him.

Now all we have to do is take his hand. If we grasp his hand, we will be raised up high to live among the elite, to live in ecstasy until the end of time. If we refuse it, we will fall, and live a tortured existence beyond our worst imaginings.

There is only one sane answer, one obvious choice we must make: let go, and face the consequences.”

Jerome Luther₂

Submitting to such a monstrous scheme is to condone its immorality, to sacrifice our morals too, along with our dignity. We are granted knowledge between good and evil... and I know an evil scheme when I see one! If I am a selfish person, I would do anything to attain heaven... but if I am a moral person, I cannot accept God's scheme as portrayed by Christian beliefs. A more sensible alternative is to admit that there is no God at all.

“If God wanted to forgive our sins, why not just forgive them, without having himself tortured and executed in payment - thereby, incidentally, condemning remote future generations of Jews to pogroms and persecution as 'Christ-killers' [...].

Progressive ethicists today find it hard to defend any kind of retributive theory of punishment, let alone the scapegoat theory - executing an innocent to pay for the sins of the guilty. In any case (one can't help wondering), who was God trying to impress? Presumably himself - judge and jury as well as execution victim. To cap it all, Adam, the supposed perpetrator of the original sin, never existed in the first place: an awkward fact [...] which fundamentally undermines the premise of the whole tortuously nasty theory. Oh, but of course, the story of Adam and Eve was only ever symbolic, wasn't it? Symbolic? So, in order to impress himself, Jesus had himself tortured and executed, in vicarious punishment for a symbolic sin committed by a non-existent individual? As I said, barking mad, as well as viciously unpleasant.”

"The God Delusion" by Prof. Richard Dawkins (2006)₃

1.3. Did Jesus Die So God Would Know Suffering

It is said that the crucifixion allowed God to fully embrace us and suffer. However, as an omniscient being he can imagine any amount of suffering that we might endure, and more. He can know and understand our pain better than we can, Jesus could not have showed or experienced suffering that God couldn't already have known about. Before we existed God had the foresight to understand our emotions completely and understand our suffering completely. The crucifixion taught God nothing that it did not already know.

1.4. Did Jesus Die So People Would Know Jesus? What About People Who Lived Before the Time of Jesus and Never Knew Him?

Some Christians argue that the point of the crucifixion was that it led to 'everyone' knowing about Jesus. If the crucifixion did not occur, then no-one would know Jesus. Some believe that in order to be accepted by God into heaven, then, you have to have accepted Jesus and clearly this is only possible if you actually know anything about Jesus. Those who argue that the point of the Crucifixion was that we all know about him are following this line of argument.

Before the birth and death of Jesus, no-one knew of Jesus. This means that God, before that time, kept everyone in the dark. If knowing Jesus is better than not knowing of him, then God in effect punished everyone simply because they lived before the time of Jesus. This is of course an unacceptable conclusion: Christians will not accept it. Some argue that it is not a punishment that people did not know Jesus. If that was true, our assumption that it is better to know Jesus is wrong, and it is neither good nor bad to know Jesus.

A judge is judging 26 people. Each person is called one of the 26 letters of the alphabet. The Judge has infinite money and is free to give away money to anyone. If he wants he can give it to people who do not deserve it. If the Judge gives 23 of the people £1234 pounds (he hasn't converted to Euro yet, it must be a British judge) and gives the other three £999 pounds, then we all conclude that the Judge has punished those three people for some reason. If we find out that the reason is purely arbitrary, for example, he only gives £1234 to people whose name is a letter before 'X', then we conclude that an injustice has been done. No-one would deny that for some reason God has punished some of those people.

Therefore, if it is important to 'know' Jesus, then God is actually punishing people who do not happen to know about Jesus. God makes the rules of the Christian world: God has made the rule that there are benefits to knowing Jesus. But there is a clear argument that if God is good, it would not do this. This means that:

1. People before 0CE₄ did actually know Jesus.
2. People before 0CE were granted the benefits of knowing Jesus.
3. It doesn't matter if you know Jesus or not.

1) I have debated with Christians who have held that everyone knows Jesus but that some people reject him (although this seems impossible, let's grant it as a given for now). Therefore those before 0ce are in the same boat as everyone afterwards. This appears to then invalidate the crucifixion. It means the death of Christ was not necessary, if everyone before and after this happened can know Jesus. It implies that everyone can know Jesus even if the crucifixion did not happen. This means that the need to know Jesus is not a valid justification of the crucifixion. Additionally if you believe that people can know Jesus just through revelation from God, then it becomes apparent that Evangelical Christianity as a religion is pointless.

2) The other possibility was that people before 0ce were granted the benefits of knowing Jesus, because the crucifixion hadn't happened yet there was no chance for anyone to reject Jesus, and therefore reject the benefits that come with knowing Jesus. However if it is possible for God to grant the benefits of knowing Jesus to people, without them actually knowing Jesus, then He could very easily grant these benefits to all people for all time: This means that the crucifixion was not necessary in order for people to have the benefits of knowing Jesus.

3) It is clear then, that the benefits of knowing Jesus cannot be the point of the crucifixion. If there are benefits to knowing Jesus then God is immoral for punishing those before 0ce who did not know Jesus. Our conclusions are that the point of the crucifixion was not so that we would know Jesus or that there are no benefits to knowing Jesus.

1.5. Public Relations

At any time, God can re-create the body of Jesus, and do it all again. Just because a bundle of divinely inspired atoms was deanimated does not signify a great theological event, but more like a public relations one. The only actual purpose of the crucifixion must have been for the effects it had on us, rather than on God. It led to the foundation of the Christian Church (albeit with a lot of inference of the part of Paul). It therefore led to a lot of conversions and pro-God sentiment.

All the pretence, drama and zest of those writing about the crucifixion are merely acting out their own roles in the great drama act of the crucifixion - which in reality was a facade. God feels every piece of suffering that every person ever feels - the crucifixion of Jesus was nothing, a mere gesture.

This and other such emotional commentary about the crucifixion doesn't ring true when you consider that God did not need the crucifixion for any other reason than public relations. God can place Jesus on Earth at any time - God did not sacrifice or harm Jesus. Jesus is not gone, harmed and does not suffer as a result of His crucifixion. There is no suffering in heaven. Jesus suffered as a man, according to Christianity, yes, but this is nothing compared to how much suffering God can experience with his infinite knowledge and infinite empathy.

It is said that Jesus had to love us beyond measure to give Himself willingly to die for our sins. But... God can judge us and we can know God with or without Jesus. Jesus had to love us to commit suicide and sacrifice Himself? The emotion is not that great. Love is, for sure, stronger than hate. Yet out of hatred alone Human Beings kill themselves. Suicide bombers and self sacrificing terrorists commit suicide out of hate. Jesus' own sacrifice was no great feat of emotion. He became a martyr, for sure, but this required only as much courage as a terrorist suicide bomber, of which there are many amongst normal (non-Godly) humans. In that light, and in the light of the public relations revelation, the sacrifice by God does not seem so great, and the love of us by Jesus does not seem so worthy.

If Jesus loved us, why did he not survive and learn to write, then write His own Bible instead of other people writing it many years afterwards? It seems that if Jesus loved us that much, He would have wrote down a book Himself without the chance of any Human errors.

On the cross, it is written that Jesus said "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do". However something that Jesus knows full well is that God is omniscient. Jesus only has to think "forgive them" and God knows he thought it. He doesn't have to say it. Also, God also must know that "they know not what they do". Jesus doesn't need to give God a reminder! Jesus must have said those things for us, not for God, as God already knew it and Jesus knew that God knew. Jesus' words to God were actually public relations, for us to hear.

1.6. If God Was a Rich Man Who Wanted to be Loved

"There lived a very powerful and wealthy man, so rich he could buy the whole world if he wanted to. Now this very man happens to be a bachelor and wanted to get married. He falls in love with a very beautiful lady. He loved her so much he could die for her should it be needed. But unfortunately for him, he is not sure if the lady loves him back. With all his powers, the rich man can force the Lady to marry and live with him forever if he wants to. With all his riches the man can command the lady to do anything he wants her to just because he is stinky rich. Surprisingly enough, the rich man puts his riches aside and approaches the lady disguised as a poor man deeply in love with her."

This story is used to explain why God created evil. The theory is that God wants people to have free will, so it invents evil. People then can "choose" evil instead of God. But it makes no sense.

Free Will
For a start, God has free will and cannot choose evil. God is in heaven: There is no evil in heaven, no temptation, and everything is perfect and happy. If there is free will in heaven, then it makes no sense to say that evil is required for free will on Earth. The story fails to explain why God created evil.

To die for her
God cannot die. To pretend to die is moral blackmail. It is nonsensical that God "isn't sure" if she will love it back. God knows everything. God knows every choice that will be made; it exists outside of time and can see the future with perfect clarity, as if it was the past. To say that god "isn't sure" is the same as saying that God is not all-knowing or all-powerful. God created the "beautiful lady" and gave her all of her personality and characteristics. God knows perfectly well what choices she will make; and God created her mind knowing exactly and specifically what actions would result from it. If God didn't want her to love him "because he is stinky rich" then God simply would not have created her Human mind as the type that loves riches. It was God's choice to create people who fall in love with riches. It makes no sense to say that God created Humans with a predisposition to love riches, but also that God doesn't want to be loved for that reason. According to this tale, a good God would create people to fall in love with people for spiritual reasons, not material ones. If God didn't do this, then God is either not good, or there is no god.

The rich man puts his riches aside
"and approaches as a poor man deeply in love with her". God is in complete control and knows the results of every action. God knows exactly what subtle body language, words and nuances will make the lady love it. If God does these things, then the lady is made to love God. God is still in complete control. God's infinite knowledge amounts to a complete ability to psychologically manipulate people: If the lady loves God, for whatever reason, then God has forced her to by conspiring to create the lady with a destiny of love for itself. There is simply no way for anything in life to occur that is not created by God as the result of God's will and action. It makes no sense to say that God "tries" to make people love it: God can't "try" and fail, it can only ever try and succeed, as god is perfect and all-powerful.

The final point is about God "falling in love". An eternal God, beyond time, needs nothing at all. It doesn't have wants because it is a perfect being. It lacks nothing. It can never be improved, because it is already perfect. God knows every possible experience; it cannot "fall in love", as God is love. If love is good, then God would have created everything in a state of permanent love, with no evil or suffering. If free will was required, then God must kill itself and disappear forever. That would be the ultimate sacrifice in order to allow free will. A perfect God, if it wants free will, would kill itself for love. If God's love is meaningful, and yet God cannot choose evil, then it makes no sense to say that in order for Humankind's love to be good, it does need evil.

2. Surviving a Crucifixion

“Even if the story of Jesus' crucifixion is mostly truth, Jesus could have survived the crucifixion. Crucifixion was intended to be a slow torture, lasting for several days. Jesus, however, was crucified on the eve of the Sabbath, when Jesus would have known it was customary to remove the torture victims that evening. Jesus didn't spend several days on the cross; instead, he spent several hours.

The gospels contradict themselves on this matter. John says Jesus was crucified at noon, while Mark says it was the third hour, or 9:00 a.m. (Jn 19.14, Mk 15.25). In any event, Jesus spent from three to six hours hanging from a cross, torture that traditionally was survived for three to six days.”

Quoted from: home.talkcity.com/librarydr/eztoamuse/webdoc7.htm

3. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John Contradict Each Other

The accounts of Matthew, Mark and Luke contradict each other, even on the parts of Christian mythology which Christians consider to be the most important: The crucifixion and resurrection. They give different sets of final words, confusingly different accounts of the empty tomb (one of them including an earthquake), and wildly different accounts of the resurrection. They're all making it up!

• Jesus' last words, according to Matthew 27:46 and Mark 15:34, were to quote Psalm 22, 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?'. In Luke, his last words were completely different: 'Father, into your hands I commend my spirit' (Psalm 31). And the fourth gospel gives another different set of words: 'It is finished' (John 19:28-30). It seems that Jesus' disciples do not know his last words. These last words of Jesus are surely a very important message, and if you are willing simply to make them up, what confidence does it give us in the rest of the story as told by the same writers?

• Once Jesus has died, Mark tells us that Pilate is surprised when Jesus has died quickly on the cross (Mark 15:44). This contradicts the gospel of John, where Pilate himself gives the order that Jesus' legs are broken and he be stabbed with a spear in order to quicken his death.

• The empty tomb, according to the Gospel of Mark, was found by some women, who saw a young man in a white robe inside. But Luke says that, actually, what happened was two men in brilliant clothes suddenly appeared by their side (there is no 'man in a white robe' inside the cave). Matthew embellishes the story with an earthquake and has an angel with a face like lightening roll the stone away. Mark's sombre account looks starkly empty in comparison to the other gospels!

• When Jesus was resurrected after his death, like various other Roman pagan sun-gods, he appeared to various people. Mark's account contradicts Luke and Acts:

  “In Mark and Matthew, the resurrected Jesus appears to his other disciples in Galilee, where they have been specifically sent by divine decree. [But] Luke and the author of the Acts of the Apostles have the risen Jesus appearing in and around Jerusalem [and] not only did they not receive any divine commandment to go to Galilee, but were expressly forbidden to leave Jerusalem.”

  "Jesus Mysteries" by Freke & Gandy [Book Review] (1999)₆

4. Historical Evidence for the Events of the Crucifixion

“Lack of evidence from outside of scripture surrounds the most important tale of the New Testament - Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection. Christian literature is filled with claims that these events were foretold. But again we have nothing outside of the Gospels that rules out what is the more plausible account: the authors of the Gospels formulated the life and death of Jesus to conform to their conception of the Messiah of the Old Testament.

Many people say they believe because of the many eyewitnesses who said they saw Jesus walking after he was supposed to be dead. However, that testimony is only recorded in the Bible, second hand, and years after the fact. Eyewitness testimony recorded on the spot would still be open to question two thousand years after the fact. Eyewitness testimony recorded decades later is hardly extraordinary evidence. [...]

We might easily imagine that independent evidence could have been found. Matthew describes what happened at the death of Jesus: "And behold, the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom; and the earth shook, and the rocks were split; the tombs were opened and many of the bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many" (Matt. 27:51-54, Revised Standard Version). Again, we have no record of these phenomenal events outside scripture. If they really happened as described, Philo, Josephus, or one of the many historians of the time would likely have mentioned them. [...] In short, despite the long list of Jewish and pagan scholars writing at that time, there is no record of Jesus being tried by Pontius Pilate and executed - much less rising from the dead.”

"God, the Failed Hypothesis: How Science Shows That God Does Not Exist" by Prof. Victor J. Stenger (2007)₇

5. Conclusions

The crucifixion story of Jesus Christ is mythical, based on pagan religions, and makes no sense:

1. There is a complete absence of evidence for the events described - no authors mention the phenomenal events that supposedly occurred at the time of Jesus' resurrection, and, there are no records of Jesus being crucified in the first place. This is despite there being multiple historians of the time who kept extensive records of events in that era, especially of unusual events and the misdeeds of rulers. The only records we have are those written by Christians themselves, the Gospels. And within each of those gospels nearly all details of the crucifixion and resurrection are different. Very important details, such as Jesus' last words, are so different that it appears they are simply being made up by the authors. The earliest Christians did not know simple details such as where Jesus was buried.

2. Most the details of Jesus' death and rebirth are similar to the existing myths surrounding god-men in that era. The similarities to the Christs of other pagan religions are shockingly detailed, so much so that early Church fathers had to defend themselves against pagan critics who said that the stories of Jesus were simply pagan stories with new names.

3. The crucifixion makes no sense; God judged and accepted people into Heaven before the time when Jesus existed so it was not necessary for God's judgment, and anyhow, God is perfectly knowing and perfectly just, so it seems impossible that the crucifixion should somehow make God's system of salvation better than it was. It did not aid God's understanding of Human suffering, as God is omniscient (all-knowing). God knows the depths of Human suffering better than anyone alive.