Relevant quote from St. Basil:
"Who is the covetous man? One for whom plenty is not enough. Who is the defrauder? One who takes away what belongs to everyone. And are not you covetous, are you not a defrauder, when you keep for private use what you were given for distribution? When some one strips a man of his clothes we call him a thief. And one who might clothe the naked and does not—should not he be given the same name?
The bread in your hoard belongs to the hungry; the cloak in your wardrobe belongs to the naked; the shoes you let rot belong to the barefoot; the money in your vaults belongs to the destitute. All you might help and do not—to all these you are doing wrong"
"Then He will also say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry, and you gave Me nothing to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me nothing to drink; I was a stranger, and you did not invite Me in; naked, and you did not clothe Me; sick, and in prison, and you did not visit Me.’
Then they themselves also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not take care of You?’ Then He will answer them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.’ These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”
I have always loved how simply Jesus spells it out.
As a kid, I always felt it was so implausible that the Jews would kill Jesus. Yes he claims to be God, which is a no-no, but how can a message of peace and love be so divisive? As an adult, I’ve come to realize that it’s divisive to people who are angry and filled with hate, to people who hate peace and love. The Pharisees of 30CE are the exact same as most Christians today. If you walked in to some Trump country Baptist church today and flipped over the collection plates and told everyone there they were going to hell because the want to deport immigrants instead of help them, you’d be shot for sure.
you’d be shot for sure
Do you think it’s a coincidence that MLK was only shot once he started speaking out against the rich and unifying the lower class (of all races)? I’m not saying there was a conspiracy (though I wouldn’t rule it out) or that MLK was the second coming or a prophet, but it’s pretty clear he started making the ruling class nervous once he started talking about class war.
It’s always a good time to remind people that MLK’s family proved in civil court that the government killed MLK (either through intent or negligence) to enough of a degree that the judge was convinced and awarded them restitution on the charges. And the only reason that the case didn’t go to a criminal court was because every judge who read the case refused it.
There absolutely was a conspiracy! Never forget the FBI murdered Fred Hampton and Mark Clark. Never forget what the FBI did to the Black Panthers and the American Indian Movement.
Everyone needs to know about COINTELPRO
I don’t think it was the message of love that did it, more the implied message of “Jews are no longer the only people with the right to heaven and god - everyone is”
The Jewish people who saw the value/truth of this message became Christians. The ones who didn’t like the idea of not being The Chosen Folk anymore were the ones who called him a heretic
Where I’ve come in regards to the Pharisees is that they were willing to make violent concessions for the sake of a tenuous status quo. Passover was often a flash point of rebellious activity in Jerusalem (which is why Pilate is there in the first place; to keep Jewish people suppressed and to put down any riots or revolutions from would-be messiahs). Violence was not infrequent at the time. And every time there was violence, Rome would take away more freedoms from Jews.
So the Pharisees are put in a position to see Jesus as a potential catalyst for Roman violence. So they figure that if they help hand over another would-be messiah then they can have a quiet Passover. But this mentality winds up being a sort of Leopards-eating-faces situation because Rome destroys Jerusalem a few years later anyway (due to a would-be messiah—just one that the Pharisees thought might be the real deal this time).
Yeah but he also said to love each other, and people quickly realized that he was wrong.
Just gonna say for those uninitiated, if memory serves right this little comic is from Chick Tracts. Which are fucking wild basically if you can think of an Evangelical bigotry or conspiracy theory they are all fucken in. As for how a bunch of them became memes my money is on The Bible Reloaded, though I think they were already memes before then.
You know, I’m something of a leftist myself.
That’s not Jesus, that’s Willem Dafriend.
There are no moral billionaires. Rich men do not enter the Kingdom of Heaven. There are no billionaires in Paradise. In the end, every last one of them burns.
Unfortunately they’re doing their best to burn the rest of us in this life.
“It is harder for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven than it is to pass a camel through the eye of a needle.”
It’s amazing to me what logical acrobatics people will go to in order to avoid the simple plain meaning of this passage. The truth is Jesus was a poor person who hung out with other poor people and social rejects of all kinds. He was canonically born in a barn…for Christ’s sake! To me, the message of Christ is quite unambiguous. Rich people go to Hell, same as murderers, rapists, etc. Being rich is a mortal sin. If you hoard enough wealth for a thousand lifetimes, sorry, you’re going to the Pit. There’s no way you can obtain that wealth except through the mass exploitation of the work of others. If you’re a billionaire, and if there is a Hell, you’re going there.
In the end, every last one of them burns.
If there was a just god, they would all burn. But if there was a just god, they wouldn’t get to be billionaires in the first place. Billionaires aren’t worried about hell or the afterlife because most of them know deep down that there will be no repercussions for their unethical behavior.
This line of logic never made sense to me. You could just as easily argue that, as god, the only way to prevent billionaires or people hoarding wealth/resources would be to get rid of free will, and that in a way is also immoral.
He has ended folks free will several times, because folks be sinnin’. The bible contends that was just, so there’s plenty of options to stop people from hording wealth.
But my contention is that he doesn’t exist, and if he does, he is the most immoral being.
And this line of logic never made sense to me. If God can’t prevent billionaires from hoarding wealth without getting rid of free will, then that means that God is not all powerful. Furthermore, if God can’t prevent billionaires from hoarding wealth, then that insinuates that there will be billionaires hoarding wealth in heaven, or there will be no free will in heaven.
Truth.
Also, the predominant image of fire in the Bible is that of purification (not punishment). So the idea is that billionaires (or other such sinners) will not be simply burned away, but will be confronted with what their wealth hoarding has caused. They will have to endure the pain of being rid of their sinfulness in order come out on the other side. So there are no billionaires in Paradise in the sense that every person who is a billionaire in this life will one day be ridden of their wealth in order to enter said Paradise.
This is precisely the image Jesus uses when He speaks of the “eye of the needle.” Tradition holds that this phrase is in reference to a small gate that required a camel (or other pack animal) laden with goods to be unencumbered in order to pass through. The rich must let go of their wealth in order to enter God’s kingdom in the same way because that wealth is like dross to them.
Tradition holds that this phrase is in reference to a small gate
It’s a fake tradition.
This is precisely the image Jesus uses when He speaks of the “eye of the needle.” Tradition holds that this phrase is in reference to a small gate that required a camel (or other pack animal) laden with goods to be unencumbered in order to pass through.
There has never existed in all of history a gate in Jerusalem called the “eye of the needle.” This interpretation was made up by some rich prick in the 11th century and repeated by other rich pricks through to the modern day in order to avoid the uncomfortable truth that Jesus said in no uncertain terms that they weren’t getting into heaven.
We were taught no one ever escapes hell. It’s eternal. No one is purified and comes out the other side ready for heaven.
Good way to keep the ignorant peasants quiet, calm, and obedient.
Exactly, the Bible had reincarnation in it before churches and priests got involved. You can still find a few snippets, like some people asking if Jesus was the reincarnation of Elijah.
Telling people that all is forgiven on death and the point is to just do your best doesn’t collect tithes.