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C.S. Lewis said, "...I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him, "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God." That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic - on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg - or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.
Yes, many authors wish to try and destroy God, though thier writings, but in the end, what S LEWIS though or would like to make us accepts means nothing. The truth to who Christ was and still is, is found in the only writing that really matters, the Bible,
C.S. Lewis said, "...I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him, "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God." That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic - on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg - or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.
A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic - on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg - or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.
Well, the choices aren't quite so limited as you imply. For one thing, you can notice that Jesus didn't write any books, and apparently didn't encourage any of his immediate associates to do it either. Why do you suppose that is? It certainly wasn't because he didn't know how to write. My own opinion is that the reason he didn't was that, growing up in the book-worshiping culture of his place and time, he realized all too well how the written words attributed to great teachers get distorted and turned into a weapon to enforce orthodoxy and subservience to the religious hierarchy that grows up in their wake.
The truth is, we don't really know what Jesus said or claimed to be. We know what some people who wrote many years after his disappearance say that he said.
If I believed (as I suspect you do) that God inspired every word these writers wrote, and that it wasn't possible for them to be mistaken, or to remember incorrectly, or to write in the service of an agenda that they came up with later, then of course your argument would carry more weight, but I don't believe that.
So yes, I can believe that he was a great human teacher who was neither more nor less Divine in origin than you or me.
I have tried to explain this to many people and they reply similar to ordinaryguy implying things like that the Bible isn't consistent with what Jesus actually said so you can't make that deduction. But it all does boil down to either you believe he is the son of God 0R his words (according to the Bible's accuracy) IF N0T true mean Jesus' claims make him a liar or lunatic if his claims aren't true.
Like if I ran around claiming to be a monkey I would be a lunatic or a liar unless I actually was a monkey.
What other choices would there possibly be???
Well, the choices aren't quite so limited as you imply.
They are if you got your information about Jesus from the Bible. CS Lewis, to which the OP refers was obviously referring to what Jesus said in the Bible. In fact, the Bible says that Jesus was accused of claiming to be God and was sentenced to death for claiming to be God.
So where do you get the other option?
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For one thing, you can notice that Jesus didn't write any books,
That is beside the point. Especially because Jesus established a Church which He gave authority to teach all that He taught.
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and apparently didn't encourage any of his immediate associates to do it either. Why do you suppose that is?
Because He gave them authority to write or not as they wished.
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It certainly wasn't because he didn't know how to write. My own opinion is that the reason he didn't was that, growing up in the book-worshiping culture of his place and time, he realized all too well how the written words attributed to great teachers get distorted and turned into a weapon to enforce orthodoxy and subservience to the religious hierarchy that grows up in their wake.
My opinion is that Jesus knew they would eventually write.
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The truth is, we don't really know what Jesus said or claimed to be. We know what some people who wrote many years after his disappearance say that he said.
You might not. But we believe we know exactly what Jesus taught. It has been brought to us by Scripture and Tradition.
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If I believed (as I suspect you do) that God inspired every word these writers wrote, and that it wasn't possible for them to be mistaken, or to remember incorrectly, or to write in the service of an agenda that they came up with later, then of course your argument would carry more weight, but I don't believe that.
As is your right.
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So yes, I can believe that he was a great human teacher who was neither more nor less Divine in origin than you or me.
But you can't claim to get that belief from anything He said in the Canonical Gospels or from the Church.
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