I always thought that the idea of Jesus being divine negated a lot of other teachings of the church, namely the idea that god has granted his children free-will. I fear that the Jews who urged for Jesus' crucifixion were pushed into it without their making any sort of choice. God intended for himself to be killed, thus overriding the essential freedom of choice god has apparently given humans (I've said it before, god-given free will is an absolute misnomer).
-What was the origin of Pontius Pilate's wife's forbidding dream? Did god send that? Why would he do so, when it was his plan to have Jews* kill him? If God didn't send this prophetic dream, who did? Is there another divine player here? According to Jesus, there is not.
(*- a secondary effect, condemn the innocent Jews to exile and genocide. A bit of a thoughtless decision for a timeless master who already knew about the ensuing Holocaust)
-Jesus, being god, knew that his death would simply return him to his place as eternal master of everything; I must say, that certainly makes his sacrifice seem negligible, doesn't it? I would have no fear of pain or death (though yes, some anxiety sure) if I knew that, literally, paradise awaited me. Thanks Jesus, you have made your crucifixion as meaningful as the brief pain of an anaesthetist's needle before dental work.
-Jesus forgave us our innate sinfulness. Jesus, you are god, you made us- this sinfulness is your design, You MUST have intended it because You can make no mistakes- if You can, You are not God. So You made us sinful and weak and then punished us for eternity. Whats worse, You then want us to worship You because You forgave us for a mistake that You made! You Evil Fucker! :D
-Much of the passion is preordained, in keeping with God's timelessness and disregard for free-will. God knew that Peter would deny him, 3 times. He didn't say "You might do this" to Peter- he said it unequivocally. Again, it seems god is manipulating us into actions we would not otherwise necessarily undertake to fulfil an aim known only to god, and with a sort of spiraling logic that is meaningful only to god and confusing to us.
I don't believe even for a second that Jesus was the son of god. His sacrifice is meaningless if that is the case, because there was no risk or danger involved at all, no loss and no sacrifice. Christians talk about Jesus' death, but the whole point is that he did not die at all, and yet we are told he did die- for our sins. Seeing as he did not die, according to the New Testament, and that one cannot be forgiven for sins they have not comitted, Jesus, you have achieved nothing.
If Jesus was a human, I admire anyone who is willing to die, painfully and slowly, for their beliefs. Sadly, this is not what christians say and so I agree, that Jesus being Son of God is almost void of meaning.
