HOLLY WRITES:

If I may be so bold, I am curious about Christianity with regards to your traditionalist views. Do you espouse Christianity because it is the moral and ethical framework that our culture’s traditions were based on, and because an embracing of it is most likely to bring traditionalism back? Or do you truly believe in the very specific details of the faith — i.e. that Jesus was actually, physically, born of a literal virgin, physically died and was resurrected, etc.?

Laura writes:

I appreciate your interest. No, I don’t embrace Christianity because it is the moral and ethical framework for Western civilization. There are people capable of adopting that position, of living with detached respect for Christianity. But if the Christian tradition had  falsehood or wishful thinking at its core, it would be best if it passed away, with perhaps some nostalgic adherence to its forms.

To deny that Jesus Christ is God became for me years ago like denying the existence of the Sun. Here was the greatest of intellectual revolutions. There was no leap of faith, but dawning recognition of what was before my eyes.  The fact that Christ consoles, that He is Author of all love and devotion, is secondary to the simple fact that He is.

I believe because it is reasonable to believe, and thus unreasonable to disbelieve. There are reasons to believe Jesus Christ was God made man, that He was physically born of a virgin, that He cured the sick and expelled demons, that He walked on water and multiplied loaves, that He prayed and fasted in the desert, that He suffered, that He died and came to life again after three days. There are reasons to believe heaven and hell exist, that what we do in this life has eternal consequences and that all salvation ultimately comes through Him. This is history not fable and the recorded events meet the conventional standards of reliable history. The fact that these events were unprecedented does not in itself prove that they did not occur.

It is possible to talk to atheists and liberal Christians who share remarkably similar beliefs about who Jesus was. Just as almost no one disputes that Jesus existed, almost no one disputes that He was wise, loving and profound. From this perspective, Christianity seems a glorified, institutionalized celebrity cult. But, as one honestly ponders the truth or falsehood of Christianity, one comes to a crossroads: Jesus was who He said He was or He was a Not-So-Great Guy. It is not possible to fashion Him as human mystic or saint.

Jesus said he was God. “I tell you the truth, you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.” (John 1:50-51)  If He wasn’t God, then, as C.S. Lewis argued, He was lying or insane or cynically manipulative, in which case all his ethical teachings are worthless because of their deceptions. How can a liar speak to the value of not lying? How can a hypocrite condemn hypocrisy? His claim to forgive sins is dangerous megalomania or truth. Jesus could not have been just a Great Guy. The historical record is reliable enough to reasonably prove that Jesus existed and that He said He was God. Mary, Joseph, Zacharias and John spoke of the facts of Mary’s virginity. Many saw Christ after He died. There is no record of any personal faults in Jesus, unlike every other prophet or visionary who ever lived.

Once we accept the truth of Christ’s words and actions and the purpose of the Incarnation, all the major problems of existence have satisfactory, if not exhaustive, answers. These answers constitute further proof of who Christ was. Here is the greatest story in history, too good to be true and yet true. As G.K.Chesterton said, “It met the mythological search for romance by being a story and the philosophical search for truth by being a true story.” Both as dream and history, the story has freed:

Long my imprisoned spirit lay,
Fast bound in sin and nature’s night.
Thine eye diffused a quickening ray,
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light.
My chains fell off, my heart was free,
I rose, went forth and followed thee.

This Charles Wesley hymn illustrates another reason to believe. So many have experienced this light and freedom. The evidence of Jesus Christ as the Son of God, the eternal and necessary source of being, is overwhelming.

 

                                                                                             — Comments —

Charles writes:

Laura wrote: 

The fact that Christ consoles, that He is Author of all love and devotion, is secondary to the simple fact that He is. 

This is very well said. I was thinking about this just yesterday as I was musing over what is the most important thing to believe about this man. There is no more important doctrine about The Lord than that He exists, and that He did exist before this world began. Everything about Him — His miracles, the resurrection, forgiveness, redemption –proceeds from this one thing: that He exists and possesses authority over all things. 

In the Beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…………..John 1:1

Laura writes:

So much of the deadness of modern life stems from the shallow and undiscerning belief in an impersonal void. Not only is the void filled, but it is filled with the immense personality of God. The very ground we walk on has been sanctified by Divine Personality. There is no void. He was here and He walked among us. All of creation is draped and festooned with His glory.

Edie writes:

Your concise, intelligent answer to the question Holly asked about your belief in Christianity is excellent. You write in a such a manner that others cannot be put off by your arrogance nor by expressions of mystical “feelings.” To believe these truths you write of is the only belief system that fits the reality of life. Many of your “audience” now has something to peak their interest, including the writings of C.S. Lewis and G. K. Chesterton – which may also lead them to George MacDonald. Perhaps this is the first time any of them have ever heard a message of Christianity other than the popular media portrayal of idiots and destructive hypocrites.

Thank you for dedicating so much of your time to being one of the “reasonable” voices on the web and for challenging us all to see what is really happening in our culture.

Laura writes:

Thank you.

I often mentally retrace my steps back to the country of unbelief, where I lived for many years even though I was raised in a liberal Catholic home. I remember almost every day what it was like to live in the land of unbelief, not as a hardcore atheist but as a pantheist. Pantheism is the belief in an indwelling creative force, a gentler, seemingly benign form of un-belief. It’s the default position of humanity, as Lewis noted, morally superior to the modern sensibility because it appears less judgmental. Pantheists are judgmental, as environmentalists demonstrate; they just don’t accept traditional morality, which only makes sense if one accepts a God who cares enough about how we live to set standards. The pantheist  is naturally bipolar to some degree, veering between rapture and despair. A culture of pantheists is one of bliss and brutality.

Ilion writes:

“Jesus said he was God. …” 

Also, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words shall never pass away.” He was not quoting God as quoted in Scripture, he was claiming for himself something true only of God.

Ilion adds:

“… The very ground we walk on has been sanctified by Divine Personality. There is no void. He was here and He walked among us. All of creation is draped and festooned with His glory.” 

In a real and important way, the Incarnation can be understood as a “re-enactment” (I can’t yet think of a better word) of what Christ has always been doing … similar to the Sacrifice of Isaac being a presaging (or a “pre-enactment”) of the Passion. 

God is the “ground of all being” … it’s not merely that God created all that is created (and, according to the New Testament, by and for and through the Son); it’s not merely that nothing (that is created) would exist had not God created it; it’s not even that all that is created would cease to exist did God not uphold its existence; it’s that God is the existence of all that exists — the Son has always been giving his life for his Creation. In the Passion, the Son willingly delivered himself into the hands of his creatures (who then took, as they imagined, his life) … but, in fact, he has always been delivering himself into the hands of his Creation and willingly giving his life that it may live.

Gail Garrasi Aggen writes:

You hit it out of the park with your response to why you believe. You have expressed “the hope” we have so well! I am writing only as a fellow witness.

I personally have no problem with the miracles and unprecedented circumstances surrounding the life of Christ. Jesus said His believers would do the things He did on earth and even greater things, and I have witnessed many a miracle, myself. In fact, miracles just seem to be what happens where true belief exists and faith is walked out in the nitty gritty details of life. As one Anglican bishop said of answered prayer and seeing God’s hand, “These may be mere coincidences, but the more I pray, the more they seem to occur.”

Are we the most deluded, and therefore the most to be pitied for it? Even if that were true, I have had, so far, a wonderful, hope-filled existence by being such a believing rube! In fact, God through Jesus has not only given me life, but the gift of being amused by my own life. God is the divine comic, and since all comedies have happy endings, we can be confident and content with our beginning, the middle, and our end.

Jesus also tells us of a common sense way to discern whether He is the truth. He reminds us that a tree is known by its fruit. Fig trees produce figs, not brambles, good trees produce good fruit, and bad trees produce bad fruit. Where folks undergo a true conversion, they truly change, and the good fruit their lives produce testifies that God is real and really working through them and on their behalf.

Seeing creation itself, and God’s hand in my own life and in the lives of real people I have personally known, also removes the problem of evolution, the parting of the Red Sea, the virgin birth, and all the rest. A God who witnesses to Himself through this incredible creation, and who can redeem the most desperate, failed lives through His son, Jesus Christ, would have no problem making all the physical universe in six days if that’s what He wanted to do, or however He wanted to, with evolution, adaptation, or whatever. I really don’t see what the big deal is about that. Are we still such children that we think we have it all figured out? That there isn’t any more to know than what is known at present? Are we like the head of the U.S. Patent Office, who in the 1860’s quit his position because he said that there was now nothing left to be invented?

Maybe a lot of folks are so disheartened that they cannot fathom a God who would be so loving and personally involved that He could create them and wish to give them eternal life through His Son. I would just challenge any of those people to suspend their disbelief for a couple of days and just go with it, and see if their lives do not dramatically change. I know their lives will change because I know that God will show up.

Now I confess that I do enjoy all the traditions, the ritual, the liturgical seasons, the traditionalist culture, the art and ethics of a civilization that was once Christ-infused, but these are truly just dividends on the stock which is ridiculously rising all the time, that is, that the Holy Trinity exists, and that in Him we live and move and have our being.

That is why you will find me plodding along, in spite of a misstep or two along each day’s way, as I feebly attempt to lift high and carry the banner of Christ along the dusty streets of life.

Laura writes:

Well said. Thank you.

Regarding your point about miracles, I recommend C.S. Lewis’ book Miracles for anyone interested in pursuing this subject, and I strongly agree with your point about humor. An appreciation of the absurd requires some recognition that the absurd is, well, absurd and not the whole story. Once existence itself is absurd, it just isn’t funny anymore. 

Conrad writes:

I first want to thank you for your invaluable work. I suspect you are helping more people than you will ever know, and I mean that. I found your site about a year ago and though I’ve never written in yet, I can’t imagine how much longer it would have taken me to get where I am without it. With the advantages of time and resources that college confers, I’ve spent a lot of time learning what I hope sane society and a good republic of letters (not to mention a good college!) would teach its students in the first place, but there is no substitute for what you do explaining and illuminating everyday life by tradition and providing a place for us to know that we’re not alone.

I’ve come down the road that Holly has, if I understand her rightly; I value Christendom and want to give Christianity a trial. I was raised, like I suspect many are, in a moral but essentially agnostic background that does not explain sin and virtue to my satisfaction. Maybe it doesn’t help that I read it in a class on Tolstoy, but the Sermon on the Mount has been a real dead end for me in taking Christ seriously. If we take it seriously, I can’t see how to reconcile it with my general understanding of good. What would you recommend to read for someone who wants to understand the Sermon? I think Lewis’ answer is a good one, but it wouldn’t be a total loss, I think, to lose Christ as a “great moral teacher” only—there’s still Aristotle, Boethius, Confucius, moralists in literature etc. that we can still take as moral teachers without divine inspiration. Without putting it harshly, the Sermon does make me think of a megalomaniac who’s dangerously wrong. It’ still not really imaginable to me how to believe in the whole metaphysical nine yards of Christianity, but I can’ t get there with the understanding (that I suspect isn’t very good) of the Sermon.

Laura writes:

Thank you for writing.

While many of the ethical lesons of Christ are not unique to him and can be found in other great thinkers, it would not be possible to simply replace Christ’s teachings with those of Aristotle or Confucius or other wise visionaries and philosophers. The parables and sayings of Christ are poetic utterances of unparalleled depth. Many of the morals are found elsewhere, but there is a numinous quality to Christ’s words that is unique. It’s like the difference between a pond and an ocean. Can you get the sense of what an ocean is from gazing at a pond or a lake? The depths, the breadth and the length, are not there.

Tolstoy’s non-fiction writings on Christ are not a good entry point to a basic understanding of Christianity. Tolstoy then viewed Christ as a social reformer.

Would you explain to me a little what you find objectionable in the Sermon on the Mount? Just so I can understand your view.

Conrad writes:

Of course. I’m not used to talking about religion at all so excuse me if I’m unclear or convoluted. Excuse me if these questions are simplistic.

17Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill.

18For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.

19Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

20For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.

Does Jesus mean the Mosaic law? If not, what law? As to righteousness, aren’t we short of achieving righteousness and thus need mercy or grace?

Laura writes:

Here you are quoting from Matthew. The Sermon on the Mount also appears in more abbreviated form in Luke.

Yes, he is referring to the Mosaic law and the teachings of the Pentateuch. Christ is not here as revolutionary to overturn the Hebrew laws and prophecies but to realize them. However, He wants the Jews (He is speaking to the Chosen People) to put aside the arid legalism of the scribes and Pharisees, to observe the laws in mind and heart and seek salvation through Him. He calls for a higher form of righteousness. As to mercy and grace, that is not His subject here. That is something He addresses elsewhere.  The fact that we may never perfectly acquire righteousness does not mean perfect righteousness does not exist.

Conrad continues:

28But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.

As a man I’m unsure of to what “looketh on a woman to lust” truly is. Is looking on beauty lust? Is this a way to warn us to commit adultery in our hearts as little as possible and to be contrite about it? That I can understand.

Laura writes:

He is talking about a married man lusting after a woman who is not his wife and he is more generally addressing the psychological realities of evil, a point amplified later in Matthew:

Do not ye understand that whatsoever entereth in at the mouth goeth  into the belly, and is cast out into the draught?
But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart and they defile the man.
For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies:
These are the things which defile a man but to eat with unwashen hands defileth not a man. (Matt: 17-20)

Sin begins in the inner man. We cannot indulge immoral desires without eventually indulging immoral actions. Now I think you are making a serious error in interpretation if you think that what Christ is saying is that we are banished from the kingdom of heaven if we cannot always meet these very exacting standards. We will be banished if we do not try to meet these standards. Augustine goes at length into some of the difficulties of controlling our impulses and exerting will over illicit desires. I recommend Chesterton’s chapter “The Riddles of the Gospel” in The Everlasting Man for more discussion of the extreme idealism presented in the Sermon on the Mount. This is, in part, the morality of another world. Where is the proof of our success or failure? In our hearts. God, and God alone, knows whether we have aspired. We are all subject to involuntary desires, the question is how much willing of these desires we indulge.

Remember what Christ says in this discourse on the legalism of the Pharisees. You must continually bear that in mind.

Conrad continues:

33Again, ye have heard that it hath been said by them of old time, Thou shalt not forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths:

34But I say unto you, Swear not at all; neither by heaven; for it is God’s throne:

I’ve always been suspicious of Quakerism but they seem to have a point. No society, even the best Christian societies, has given up oaths, but on the contrary taken oaths and promises to be extremely important. Are we sinning every time we ask “so help me God?”

Laura writes:

Possibly Christians have neglected this point, but it seems that taking an oath of honesty in the formal setting of a court is a good thing and that the casual taking of oaths is what Christ is really addressing. The Sermon on the Mount is not a legal code and I think you are mistaken if you approach it that way. It is an ethical discourse and a poetic evocation of conduct at its most beautiful. When an artist looks at a mountain with the idea of painting it, with a real spirit of love for what that mountain is, does he say to himself, “I can never capture the beauty of this immense summit! Therefore I will not even try?” No, if he truly loves the mountain, he tries. Unless he is a lunatic or the victim of some mad and mindless scrupulosity he does not kill himself if he cannot replicate what he sees. In his heart, he loves perfection.

So it is with the Sermon of the Mount. We are moved by the beauty of the ethical ideal. We want to attain it and everything hinges on our efforts. But we are not called to commit suicide if we do not attain it nor is the Sermon on the Mount a complete guide to living any more than a mountain is a complete picture of all of nature.  

Conrad writes:

43 “You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father must be perfect.”

I don’t want this to be overly long, so I’ll try to summarize: in essence, I fear that the liberation theology/late Tolstoy interpretation of the Sermon, or at the very least the Quaker interpretation, is correct. Is life as it’s been lived by average people over the last two millennia horrid and hellbound? At the same time taking the commands of the Sermon as analogy or myth seems fairly weak to me.

Laura writes:

Your point, if I am not mistaken, is that the extreme pacifism of Tolstoy and of Quakers is justified by the Sermon on the Mount and that the last two thousand years have been an abomination by the standards of Christ. But the Sermon on the Mount is not a speech to armies. These words are not addressed to whole nations. They are spoken to individuals and they concern the spirit of actions in daily life. Christ exhorts the individual to lay down his life for good, not for evil, and to turn the other cheek in the pursuit of good, in the pursuit of the kingdom of heaven, not in the pursuit of evil. 

Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. (Matt: 34)

Christianity is a martial faith, but not one of pure conquest. Christ healed the servant of a Roman centurion. He did not tell the centurion to lay down his arms forever. He did not say that all armies and weaponry should be abolished. Once you start reading the gospels, you find many paradoxes and riddles. Prophecy and exhortation, parable and poetry are blended together. The Church and Christians – legislators, politicians, citizens, theologians – work out these riddles in the context of their times. The New Testament is not a political manual nor does Christ ever defend suicide, which is what the refusal to confront aggression is. Christ’s followers must observe the Commandments. That is indisputable. They must love others as they love themselves,which requires applying the same exacting standards to others.  We have an elaborate Church tradition that defines sin and forgiveness in more detail and that wrestles with the ethical subtleties of Christ’s words.

Judge Christians – those who have openly endorsed the creed and tried to live by it – by their actions. They are generally not insane aggressors or suicidal pacifists.  Compare the warring traditions of Christian nations with those of other civilizations and I think you will find that, while they do not achieve perfection, they observe a level of morality in warfare and a willingness to defend the weak that are exceptional.

Consider what heights from which Christ is speaking. He speaks harsh words of rebuke. He demands perfection. Would you not expect as much? Reflect on the whole, not the part:

Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.
Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God

Vishal Mehra writes:

I would advise Conrad to read Paradoxes of Catholicism by Robert Hugh Benson. It is a slim volume, available for free on Web.

Hurricane Betsy writes:

Laura wrote: they observe a level of morality in warfare and a willingness to defend the weak that are exceptional.

Woot! Tell that to the people whose skin peeled off and fried to death in the bombings of Dresden, Hiroshima and Nagasaki. If you asked me – which you won’t, because I’m never as smart as you – what the definition of a psychopath is, I would say that it’s a member of the armed forces who drops bombs because his government told him to.

Laura writes:

Well, I don’t think I disregard your opinions.

The bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were necessary to prevent the massive casualties that would have resulted if the Pacific War continued. The firebombing of Dresden was brutal in its devastation too and arguably unnecessary. The general standard, however, is that killing civilians is wrong.

Ilion writes:

Gail wrote: “God is the divine comic, and since all comedies have happy endings, we can be confident and content with our beginning, the middle, and our end.”

 It’s said that all (or, “all good”) comedies end in a marriage. And, sure enough, the Bible ends in a marriage.

Jim B. writes:

I would recommend to Conrad this analysis of the Sermon on the Mount (or at least of the Beatitudes) by Peter Kreeft. He makes clear the paradoxes Christ was working with, particularly when approached from our modern consciousness.

Lawrence Auster writes:

It’s very important for people to say things like this, when the belief in “Christian culture” (without Christ) and “Christian values” (without Christ) has become more and more common.

However, on a side point, I don’t think it’s correct to say that Jesus “said He was God.” He said he was the son of God. He said he was one with God. He said he was with God from the beginning. But he never said, “I am God.” I think it misrepresents his message to put it that way. Also, it would have been most out of character for him to express himself that way, since his main emphasis was on God as his father, even as his “daddy” (abba), whom he always sought to please and do his will. Jesus presented himself as the perfect follower of God, whom men should imitate in following God.

Also, the Nicene Creed does not say that “Jesus Christ was God.” Yes, it describes him as “begotten of the Father before all worlds,” as “God of God,” “Very God of Very God,” “being of one substance with the Father.” But it never says simply, “Jesus Christ is God.” Jesus’ Godness is always expressed in relation to that of the Father:

I believe … in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, Very God of Very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father by whom all things were made; who for us men, and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary, and was made man, and was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate. He suffered and was buried, and the third day he rose again according to the Scriptures, and ascended into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of the Father. And he shall come again with glory to judge both the quick and the dead, whose kingdom shall have no end.

As a final illustration of the idea that Jesus is not thought of simply as “God,” when orthodox Christians pray (here I am not referring to evangelicals, but to Catholics, Anglicans, and Orthodox), they never pray to Jesus. Their prayers are always to the Father, “in Jesus’ name.”

On another side point, I think capitalizing pronouns in relation to Jesus is intrusive and unnecessary. One ends up with awkward things like this:

Jesus was who He said He was or He was a Not-So-Great Guy. It is not possible to fashion Him as human mystic or saint.

In my opinion, we do not add an iota to Jesus’ stature by capitalizing pronouns referring to him. But we do clog up our written language with what looks like excessive display of piety.

In fact, I don’t even capitalize the pronoun in relation to God. I follow the King James Bible, which refers to God as “he.” Notice also that the Nicene Creed, quoted above, does not capitalize the pronoun “he” in relation to Jesus.

Laura writes:

Yes, I should not have said, “Jesus said he was God.” He never expressed it that way. In the effort to emphasize His divinity, as opposed to the widespread claim or assumption that Jesus was a prophet, I simply abbreviated the thought. The distinction is important.

[Nevertheless, in speaking of Himself as Son of God, He was essentially claiming He was God. See Charles’ explanation below.]

 The idea that Jesus was the “Son” of God is a difficult concept for the initiate. (I don’t know whether Holly stands in this position.) Christ isn’t the totality of God;  He is one aspect of God. But, at the same time, He is not a son in the human sense either. We cannot get closer to the truth than this figurative language. The Trinity is the most difficult aspect of Christian theology, at least to me, far more difficult than grasping the idea of supernatural intervention in the natural world. The Persons of the Trinity are like the different dimensions of a cube, distinct aspects of one entity.

I will consider what you say about the convention of capitalizing the pronoun. The fact that it isn’t capitalized in the Creed is a good point. Is it excessive piety? I”ll think about that. When the pronoun appears once, it is not noticeable. But when it appears repeatedly, it is. The convention in the Catholic Church is to bow one’s head when one says Jesus, but if one repeatedly says the name it becomes intrusive to bow and does seem like a form of showing off. Thus the convention (at least among the pious) becomes to bow some of the time. Perhaps the pronoun should only be capitalized in prayers.

Ilion writes:

Mr. Auster writes: “However, on a side point, I don’t think it’s correct to say that Jesus “said He was God.” He said he was the son of God.” 

Laura writes: “Yes, I should not have said, “Jesus said he was God.” He never expressed it that way. In the effort to emphasize His divinity, as opposed to the widespread claim or assumption that Jesus was a prophet, I simply abbreviated the thought. The distinction is important.” 

While the Christ is not recorded to have said the precise words, “I am God,” that is what he claimed about himself, continuously — and it was well-understood at the time that he was claiming to be God: that’s what the incident (and similar) culminating in John 8:57-59 is about. 

Consider again my reference to Matthew 24:35, Mark 13:32, Luke 21:33 — “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.” He did not say “G_d’s word(s) will never pass away,” he said “my words will never pass away.” That is an outlandish statement. 

Consider his terminology to refer to the divinity: “The Father.” He did not use a circumlocution such as “the Ineffable One,” nor a descriptor like “the Creator,” nor did he typically use a Hebrew or Aramaic word equivalent to the English word ‘God.’ He mostly used a term of relationship, “the Father.” 

Then, consider his terminology to refer to himself in relation to the divinity: “the Son.” A son is like his father, a son is a reflection of his father; AND, a son is not a creation of his father (rather, he is “begotten”): in the thought of the time, all a man’s descendants, to the end of time, are “contained within” him. [And, thus, in that way of thinking, to curse or bless a man’s son was to curse of bless the man himself — that’s why the drunken Noah cursed Canaan, rather than Ham, so as not to curse himself and all his descendants, but only the descendants of his son Ham.]

A son is not a creation of his father; a son stands in a special relationship to his father (and his father to him) — one is not a ‘father’ unless one has begotten a son or daughter (**) — and, in the thought of the time, a son (or daughter) exists “within” his/her father even before being conceived or born. [So, in referring to YHWH as “the Father,” and himself as “the Son,” the Christ is saying, “YHWH is ‘the Father’ because I am ‘the Son’” — that is an outlandish statement. 

I can certainly understand (and sympathize with) Jewish rulers in their determination to put him put him to death for blasphemy; for, if he was merely a man, than he was guilt of the grossest blasphemy: all his statements about the relationship between himself and ‘the Father’ lead to: “I and the Father are One” and “If you have seen the Son, you have seen that Father.” 

Mr. Auster writes: “As a final illustration of the idea that Jesus is not thought of simply as “God,” when orthodox Christians pray (here I am not referring to evangelicals, but to Catholics, Anglicans, and Orthodox), they never pray to Jesus. Their prayers are always to the Father, “in Jesus’ name.”” 

Gee, what an original idea. 

Actually, we address our prayer sometimes to the Father and sometimes to the Son … which can lead to the odd situation of addressing one’s prayer to Jesus “in Jesus’ name” (for, we almost always end a prayer with that phrase). Also, evangelicals’ public prayers tend to be extemporaneous; believe me, I am not touting that fact, for they tend to be rambling and disorganized. 

But, we don’t pray to saints. 

Mr. Auster writes: “On another side point, I think capitalizing pronouns in relation to Jesus is intrusive and unnecessary. …”

 Mr Auster and I agree on something, at least. As near as I can tell, capitalizing the pronoun to refer to God (in any the Persons) is a reflection of Victorian-era pietism.

Laura writes:

Yes, it is not true orthodox Christians do not pray to Jesus. I had not noticed that point. The Kyrie of the Catholic Mass, for instance, includes prayers to Jesus. The Litany of the Most Sacred Heart includes prayers to Jesus, including the phrase “Christ, graciously hear us.” The Fatima prayer is commonly said during recitation of the Rosary: O Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of hell. Lead all souls to heaven, especially those most in need of your mercy.

Gail Gerrasi Aggen writes:

I think I should just apologize for having used capital letters when referring to Almighty God, and therefore must also apologize in advance, as I am about to do it again. Though truly I am a ham and perpetual show-off, referring to Him in capitals was never something I would use to draw attention to myself. Honestly and truly, I just feel compelled to do this, as it is the very least I can do to honor Him. Of course it is your editorial prerogative to change those caps back to lower case if you see fit, but I really want to try to explain that for me, using capital letters is a form of praise, in perhaps the same vein as the Jews, who would not even write out the name of God, out of deep reverence and a sense of how precious He is.

I can appreciate that it looks goofy and maybe smarmy and a throwback to those silly Victorians whom we all know suffered oxygen deprivation as a result of wearing their corsets too tight, but for me, to refer to the author and finisher of my salvation as “him” would be like presenting a cherished niece with a beautiful wedding gift wrapped in old newspaper. Or bringing my daughter for her first Holy Communion dressed in a swimsuit cover-up from the clearance rack at Walmart.

I know all about King James (he’s dead), and I do my scripture reading almost exclusively from the Textus Receptus (please don’t tell the pope), so its just a personal quirk of mine that capitalizing these pronouns is a small gesture I want to make to show my love and reverence for Him.

Signing off for now, from the depths of the lower class, I remain your (perhaps most) plebian friend.

Laura writes:

This is an interesting question.

It is not true that capitalizing the pronoun for Christ or God is simply a Victorian affectation.  C.S.Lewis capitalized. And so did Antonin Sertillanges, one of my favorite twentieth century authors. 

Ilion writes:

Laura write: Yes, it is not true orthodox Christians do not pray to Jesus. …

 Ahem! :-) I certainly consider my (extremely) low-church self to be an orthodox Christian.

Laura writes:

My reference to orthodox Christians was to those who uphold the belief in Christ’s divinity.

Charles writes: