Student and teacher got in an argument yesterday, during class, over whether or not the historical Jesus of Nazareth could have said, "Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory which I had with you before the world was made." (John 17:5)
Student: "You do admit that, because you can't know what he said, he could have said this, no?"
Teacher: "All I'm saying is that a devout Jew of the 1st century could never have said such a thing."
Student: "But Jesus was more than an ordinary Jew."
Teacher: "No he wasn't."
Trouble is, they both have to be right. Jesus has to be more than an ordinary Jew of the 1st century; that's the central claim of Christianity after all. On the other hand, we have to be able to say that he was an ordinary person just like us; if he wasn't just like us we wouldn't be saved by his passage through death to life.
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Faithful, or even just thoughtful criticisms are always welcome. Uninformed rudeness to other posters or to the Lord and His Church is not.
I also reserve the right to reject comments promoting things like private revelations and fringe points of view, if it seems to me like they are being presented in a misleading way.
If you raise a disagreement with something I say but I do not respond, please do not feel slighted or insulted, or imagine that this automatically means I disagree or agree with you. It's just that I don't find the comment box to be a constructive medium for certain forms of debate.