who killed Jesus?

[private_ryan]

first of all: I don't care at all. (on edit: but I'm curious)
second: I was told that the Jews gave him to the Romans but now the Jewish groups dispute that.

what do you know /think?

[short bus president]

1. Falwell/Robertson/etc. n/t

[trotsky]

2. I doubt the biblical Jesus ever existed.

Too many inconsistencies. One or more real historical persons probably served as a model for the character, and some of them were probably crucified. Just keep in mind that the only accounts we have were written by people with a vested interest in propagating the religion.

[amberdisc]

5. there are Roman non-Christian letters/histories which mention Jesus.

I don't doubt the historicity of Jesus of Nazareth.

[radwriter0555]

32. You want we should solve a 2000 YO murder? what for? the dude is LONG

gone and regardless of the fairy tales, he ain't comin' back.

[Cheswick2.0]

55. he loves you anyway

that's okay, he loves you anyway honey

[trotsky]

46. Sure there are

But they don't corroborate any of the fantastic gospel stories, they're just sort of a footnote mention. The passages in Josephus are generally agreed to be forgeries, and other writings only mention the sect of Christianity, not Jesus or any reasons why his followers started a religion.

For such a supposedly important historical figure, the evidence is remarkably scant.

[private_ryan]

10. I believe he existed

just never rose after being killed :)

[sujan]

13. so the muslims are right

Jesus was a muslim.

[sidwill]

3. I know

Certain individuals who happenned to be Jewish, betrayed Jesus to the Romans who crucified him. He rose from the dead after the third day and ascended into heaven, And he sat at the right hand of the father and he will return in glory to judge the living and the dead......so George W. Bush better watch his a--.

[44wax]

6. well put

[amberdisc]

4. Probably the Romans.

Historians of that part of the Roman Empire find the Christian claims unbelivable.
You could search for Notovitch. He was the Russian who found the Asian version of the trial of Jesus. Documents were indepebdently corroborated by an Indian also.
The gospels have probably been written in a way acceptable to Roman sentiment.

[roughsatori]

7. From a Christian Theological view: All of Us

Before anyone screams. I am not a Christian, and I am not preaching, but I do like the "all of us" answer from a philosophical view.

There is some interesting stuff if you google "Who crucified Jesus."
I am too tired to remember much that I have read in the past regarding this issue. I do know that some feel that as the Roman Empire became Christian it became important to emphasize the Sanhedrin's role over that of the Romans. To this day some Christian leaders love the other explanation (Google and you'll see): it was the Jews manipulating Rome to kill Jesus.

[FreeperSlayer]

8. It was...

...a soldier by the name of Georgus Bushus, a known sociopath that would giggle and then mock the pleas of the condemned, just before putting them to death.

[rabid_nerd]

9. who cares?

I'm more interested in who killed nicole simpson...

:silly:

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

18. well that SHOULD be obvious, duh

[On the Road]

11. The Roman Were the Only Ones Around Who Crucified People

The question is: what did the Jews have to do with it, if anything?

The reason Jesus was arrested was that he was perceived as a political threat. Bloody uprisings were common, often led by a charismatic leader like Judas the Galilean. Jesus' ministry appeared to be building up support for a mass revolt:

-Preaching to large crowds that the Kingdom of God has arrived
-Telling ambiguous and possibly suversive parables.
-Claiming to fulfill prophecy and apparently declaring the year of the Jubilee
("the good and acceptable year of the Lord")
-Having the correct lineage for a legitimate ruler ("son of David")
-Allowing himself to be led into Jerusalem decpicted as a king
-Cleansing the temple.

I believe Jesus was preparing to lead a revolt, which would have been nonviolent only in that he expected God to destroy the Romans if he "stepped out on faith".

Now, what did the Jews have to do with this? The upper classes and religious leaders who collaborated with the Romans were just as threatened by a popular revolt as any quisling would be. They were in it up to their eyeballs.

Note that this does not apply to the lower and middle classes. By all accounts, they loved Jesus. Blaming "the Jews" for Jesus' death is like blaming the French people for the atrocities of the Nazi occupation.

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

19. Well, obviously the chief priests and rabbis did not want

a religion that challanged their position as the only font of knowledge, and all the power and riches that these positions entailled, so in a sense, to say "The Jews" is correct, since the leaders of the religion at the time would be merely acting in self-interest
I sincerely doubt the average slave/serf/pesant/small merchant of the time was actively religious one way or the other, Judiasm had become stagnant. One of these people who heard Jesus (which I believe was a composite in the Bible) all of a sudden began giving tithes to a new church...
Well, that had to be stopped. There was no way for them to fit into this new ministry and keep their positions.

[roguevalley]

12. The Romans. By the by, no where in the Roman world

was there ever prisoners freed during a festival
by the Romans. It was believed, the alleviate the
burden of the church in Rome, to blame the Jews.

[nuxvomica]

17. Are you sure?

Wasn't it common practice to release prisoners and slaves during Saturnalia? Or is that a myth?

[dorktv]

42. Regardless of whether or not they freed people during holidays

or feast days, it IS in the nature of humans to make what is bad seem good for political/religious gain. So saying that Pontius Pilate wanted to free Jesus would be better then saying "The Romans killed Jesus, he was given no chance to live." This way the state would be less likely to want to destroy your church.

[Iris]

14. metaphroically speaking,

we all did.

[orangecoloredapple]

15. A jealous husband?

I have no idea.

[DrFunkenstein]

16. This Was A Password in PCU...

For the frat modelled on Skull & Bones.

[Fenris]

22. The Reaganites!

"Who killed Jesus?"

"The Jews! Now, open up, sucko!"

[Nevernose]

20. Santa Claus killed Christ

At least according to Kinky Friedman.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

21. Or was he killed?

I've heard theories that suggest that Jesus didn't die, but was in fact removed from the cross and sealed in the tomb while still alive...making "resurrection" possible.

[Scimmio]

26. no, he was definitely murdered...

How else can it be explained? The weather conditions that day were clear. Visibility was clear enough for him to see Nazereth. Air temps were not below freezing temperature. Jesus' pilot did not report any icing conditions on the wings.

...oh wait, what thread was this again?

[ulysses]

33. SNARF

:D

[mistertrickster]

23. Where are you going with this, Private?

This seems like one of those threads intended to foment conflict . . . It was a long, long time ago.

Let it go, dude.

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

25. well, considering that he has not responded to any post

humorous or historical, well thought out or silly... I guess he don't care.

Hijack it!

[private_ryan]

27. let it go?

I did. I said I can care less but it's in the news with this Mel Gibson movie. You don't have to comment if you don't want to...

[BarbariansAtTheGate]

24. Maybe....

Pilate. He's the guy.

[ForrestGump]

37. Is he the exercise dude that's so trendy now?

Doing pretty well for his age....

I always found him a bit pontius, though.

[sasquatch]

28. The collective evil of man did

Everyone that had power including Jewish clerks and Roman Emporers killed Christ. The people that didn't hold power were brainwashed into believing that he was evil. I hold the evil of man that lives in us all and we are in a constant battle to defeat responsible for the death of the prince of peace.

[AlienGirl]

29. Was Jesus a suicide?

If you were to accept as initial conditions that:

-"God" is defined as immortal, all-knowing, and all-powerful, capable of knowing what humans will do (and stopping it if he so chooses)

-Jesus is part of God

-God intended Jesus to die so that humanity could be redeemed,

then it seems Jesus was a willing victim, in other words a suicide, and the humans he used in his death were simply doing his will.

Of course, if Jesus is God and God is immortal, then he suffered no actual harm by "dying," as he simply shed his meat-body and went back to the spiritual realms for a while. (Okay, the pain involved in dying may constitute harm--but then again, he could've stopped it if he wanted to.)

Tucker

[pretzel4gore]

30. you can do what jesus did.....

but imagine having freepers spitting on you, torturing you and finally hanging you naked to die from the murderous stress. All you have to do is identify yourself with the overthrow of the established order, while successfully galvanizing the people to follow you because almost everybody alive knows we're lost in somekinda mystery; most importantly remember:
you couldn't uses any force
you couldn't even hate your enemies-
even your most dedicated follower would be tormented by fear, most would run away many would anxiously turn on you (to save their skins)
you'd be identified as a rabble rouser; the authorities would be forced to execute yawl :-(

It seems Jesus has been christianity's greatest enemy....the minute the church opted for brute power it became an extention of the bigger world.
I'm native 'indian' and understand that christianity was fundamental to the way history unfolded...
all that bloodshed and suffering may not have been necessary(?)
(no one has ever tried to redo the history story with true christianty the impetus instead of gluttony greed and exploitation)
it would be too goddam embarrassing...


The Atlantic Monthly | March 2002

1491

Before it became the New World, the Western Hemisphere was vastly more populous and sophisticated than has been thought—an altogether more salubrious place to live at the time than, say, Europe. New evidence of both the extent of the population and its agricultural advancement leads to a remarkable conjecture: the Amazon rain forest may be largely a human artifact

BY CHARLES C. MANN

.....

he plane took off in weather that was surprisingly cool for north-central Bolivia and flew east, toward the Brazilian border. In a few minutes the roads and houses disappeared, and the only evidence of human settlement was the cattle scattered over the savannah like jimmies on ice cream. Then they, too, disappeared. By that time the archaeologists had their cameras out and were clicking away in delight.

Below us was the Beni, a Bolivian province about the size of Illinois and Indiana put together, and nearly as flat. For almost half the year rain and snowmelt from the mountains to the south and west cover the land with an irregular, slowly moving skin of water that eventually ends up in the province's northern rivers, which are sub-subtributaries of the Amazon. The rest of the year the water dries up and the bright-green vastness turns into something that resembles a desert. This peculiar, remote, watery plain was what had drawn the researchers' attention, and not just because it was one of the few places on earth inhabited by people who might never have seen Westerners with cameras.

From Atlantic Unbound:

Interviews: "The Pristine Myth" (March 7, 2002)
Charles C. Mann talks about the thriving and sophisticated Indian landscape of the pre-Columbus Americas Clark Erickson and William Balée, the archaeologists, sat up front. Erickson is based at the University of Pennsylvania; he works in concert with a Bolivian archaeologist, whose seat in the plane I usurped that day. Balée is at Tulane University, in New Orleans. He is actually an anthropologist, but as native peoples have vanished, the distinction between anthropologists and archaeologists has blurred. The two men differ in build, temperament, and scholarly proclivity, but they pressed their faces to the windows with identical enthusiasm.

Dappled across the grasslands below was an archipelago of forest islands, many of them startlingly round and hundreds of acres across. Each island rose ten or thirty or sixty feet above the floodplain, allowing trees to grow that would otherwise never survive the water. The forests were linked by raised berms, as straight as a rifle shot and up to three miles long. It is Erickson's belief that this entire landscape—30,000 square miles of forest mounds surrounded by raised fields and linked by causeways—was constructed by a complex, populous society more than 2,000 years ago. Balée, newer to the Beni, leaned toward this view but was not yet ready to commit himself.

Erickson and Balée belong to a cohort of scholars that has radically challenged conventional notions of what the Western Hemisphere was like before Columbus. When I went to high school, in the 1970s, I was taught that Indians came to the Americas across the Bering Strait about 12,000 years ago, that they lived for the most part in small, isolated groups, and that they had so little impact on their environment that even after millennia of habitation it remained mostly wilderness. My son picked up the same ideas at his schools. One way to summarize the views of people like Erickson and Balée would be to say that in their opinion this picture of Indian life is wrong in almost every aspect. Indians were here far longer than previously thought, these researchers believe, and in much greater numbers. And they were so successful at imposing their will on the landscape that in 1492 Columbus set foot in a hemisphere thoroughly dominated by humankind.

Given the charged relations between white societies and native peoples, inquiry into Indian culture and history is inevitably contentious. But the recent scholarship is especially controversial. To begin with, some researchers—many but not all from an older generation—deride the new theories as fantasies arising from an almost willful misinterpretation of data and a perverse kind of political correctness. "I have seen no evidence that large numbers of people ever lived in the Beni," says Betty J. Meggers, of the Smithsonian Institution. "Claiming otherwise is just wishful thinking." Similar criticisms apply to many of the new scholarly claims about Indians, according to Dean R. Snow, an anthropologist at Pennsylvania State University. The problem is that "you can make the meager evidence from the ethnohistorical record tell you anything you want," he says. "It's really easy to kid yourself."

More important are the implications of the new theories for today's ecological battles. Much of the environmental movement is animated, consciously or not, by what William Denevan, a geographer at the University of Wisconsin, calls, polemically, "the pristine myth"—the belief that the Americas in 1491 were an almost unmarked, even Edenic land, "untrammeled by man," in the words of the Wilderness Act of 1964, one of the nation's first and most important environmental laws. As the University of Wisconsin historian William Cronon has written, restoring this long-ago, putatively natural state is, in the view of environmentalists, a task that society is morally bound to undertake. Yet if the new view is correct and the work of humankind was pervasive, where does that leave efforts to restore nature?

The Beni is a case in point. In addition to building up the Beni mounds for houses and gardens, Erickson says, the Indians trapped fish in the seasonally flooded grassland. Indeed, he says, they fashioned dense zigzagging networks of earthen fish weirs between the causeways. To keep the habitat clear of unwanted trees and undergrowth, they regularly set huge areas on fire. Over the centuries the burning created an intricate ecosystem of fire-adapted plant species dependent on native pyrophilia. The current inhabitants of the Beni still burn, although now it is to maintain the savannah for cattle. When we flew over the area, the dry season had just begun, but mile-long lines of flame were already on the march. In the charred areas behind the fires were the blackened spikes of trees—many of them, one assumes, of the varieties that activists fight to save in other parts of Amazonia.

After we landed, I asked Balée, Should we let people keep burning the Beni? Or should we let the trees invade and create a verdant tropical forest in the grasslands, even if one had not existed here for millennia?

Balée laughed. "You're trying to trap me, aren't you?" he said.
snip>
much more...

[soothsayer]

31. God killed Jesus

It was part of the plan. So no matter who actually pulled the trigger, as it were, is irrelevant---actually, it IS relevant as they were fulfilling God's plan, no?

I always thought Judas, who was a fave of Jesus' I think, was asked by Jesus to 'betray' him. I think Judas didn't want to, and was troubled by having done so, but I do think Jesus might have asked him to do that. Somebody had to, otherwise no crucifixion, and thus no benefit for mankind.

[nuxvomica]

34. I see a chilling parallel between that logic and 9/11

This idea of doing something self-destructive for the greater good is probably not unlike the sentiments of the neocons if we accept the MIHOP theory of 9/11. The big difference, of course, is that Christ accepted his fate willingly, while the 3000+ had no choice. Except, of course, Barbara Olsen, who's probably not even dead.
:tinfoilhat::tinfoilhat::tinfoilhat:

[Nikia]

35. I've always had a problem with Judas

I know that I am not suppose to feel bad for him since he was the betrayer, but there had to be a betrayer. Jesus spoke about his death having to happen and having to be betrayed. The 12 apostles were his closest followers who he picked. Was he destined to be the betrayer? I suppose that he had a choice in all of this but if he was the type to betray, it would have been better for him not to have gotten involved with Jesus, but yet he was chosen for that position. I guess that I just wonder if this is a parable for all Christians. Think of all the Freepers who think that they are close to Him but are actually betraying him everyday.

[ForrestGump]

38. I love his grand finale song, though

Judas was cool.

[Cheswick2.0]

54. Most fun after a crucifixion

"Every time I look at you
I don't understand
Why you let the things you did
Get so out of hand
You'd have managed better
If you'd had it planned
Now why'd you choose such a backward time
And such a strange land?

If you'd come today
You could have reached the whole nation
Israel in 4 BC had no mass communication"

[Ivory_Tower]

43. Oddly enough, in Catholic grade school

One of my teachers (a nun) told us that Judas was a sympathetic character, that he thought he was doing Jesus a favor by helping fulfill the prophesies, and enabling Jesus to prove that he was indeed God.

I always thought it was interesting to hear that from a nun, considering that for years before that we had been told that Judas was in hell for betraying Jesus.

I think they just liked to keep us kids confused. :)

[trotsky]

47. Great point.

Christians who "blame" the Jews for killing Jesus should be thanking them instead! If Jesus hadn't died, none of Christianity could have come about. No forgiveness of sins, etc. Why blame Jews for the very act that made your religion possible?

[sam sarrha]

36. He faked his death and split to the south of France with Mary Magnaline.

they ditched the cranky old right wingers like paul and found a found a better land, with milk and honies.

[MaverickX]

39. I'm a Christian and I think..

The Israeli religious elite had him killed. It wasn't the fault of every Jew, just some of their nutty leaders.

[Kellanved]

41. Nope

Israelites would have stoned him to death - he was crucified however. Only the Romans were allowed to do that.

[Cheswick2.0]

56. doh!

Yes, but he was turned over and betrayed by the Jewish political leaders who wanted him dead because of the threat to their status quo.

Who killed Jesus, greedy people, a corrupt judicial system and politicians. Some of them happened to be jewish and some happened to be roman.

[MaverickX]

57. that's because the Sanhedrin didn't want blood on their hands...

The Romans could've cared less about Jesus. I hate to say it but it doesn't matter. We shouldn't blame anyone for killing him, he could've stopped it himself.

[Gato Moteado]

40. freepers did.

nt

[sasquatch]

44. I agree with that logic

n/t

[jmm]

45. I've always thought that the story about Jews killing Jesus was a lie

spread by early Christians. Many of Jesus's early followers tried to convert Jews but didn't have much success. Also around this time many Jews were active in trying to recruit new people to their religion. So some early Christians were upset at and in competition with Jews. Rome was very powerful at this time so if the Christians blamed Romans for Jesus's death, that might make people even more hesitant to convert and draw more negative attention to themselves. So who then do they blame for his death? The Jews become a great scapegoat. Even if the people who turned him over to the Romans were Jewish it's a stretch of the imagination to blame the Jews for something the Romans did.

[FloridaJudy]

48. Who killed Jesus? It's a no brainer

The Romans killed him.

He was executed for treason, not heresy. If the Jews had been responsible, he would have been stoned, *not* crucified - read the Old Testament. The Jews may have been harsh (although less brutal than their neighbors), but they weren't sadists. Nailing someone up to die of slow suffocation was a "civilized" refinement.

The Jews probably didn't protest too much, not because they hated Jesus, but because they were scared shitless of making waves; they were a conquered and oppressed people. It was less than fifty years later that the Romans snuffed out the last remnants of Jewish resistance and dispersed the pitiful survivors.

Actually, if anyone deserves condemnation it was the disciples. Every single one of those dudes fled town when things got ugly. The only followers who stuck around were female.

And these are the people who think I'm sinful because I was born without a penis? What's wrong with this picture?

[CSI Willows]

49. Cause I'm a Jew...

...I believe it was the Romans, or a mix of the two groups.
My enemy in my old school told me I killed Jesus. Stuck up you-know-what.

[Liberator_Rev]

50. "Liberals Like Christ" has a whole web page on this very topic:

According to the Gospels, it was neither the Jews nor the Romans
AS SUCH. See the several pages we devote to this important question at

http://www.LiberalsLikeChrist.Org/about/whokilledChrist.html .

We promote Christ's answers to the "Christian Coalition" & "Religious Right".

[TrogL]

51. Jesus killed Jesus

His death was fortold. This made everything else inevitable.

[Keithpotkin]

52. I did.

Holler.

[leftofthedial]

53. no one

[Kamika]

58. jewish groups did give him to the romans..

But it was the romans that killed him.


To say it was jews that killed him is pretty ignorant.. you can argue that the jewish priesthood was indirectly responsible but not more.

None should claim jews did it , but jewish groups shouldnt say they had nothin to do with it either.

All in all it was humans that killed him he died FOR everyone romans AND jews


(and the millions of others)

[JVS]

59. It doesn't really matter

The omnipotent, omniscient god let it happen.

[salin]

60. Not who, but what

Fear.

Fear from some of the Jewish leaders that the crowds and followers of Jesus might lead to calling so much attention from the Romans - that they would swoop in and take care of all of the Jews.

Fear from some of the Roman leaders that this charasmatic individual could draw so much adulation and whip up such support in various locations - and perhaps fear of not knowing how to control what might happen.

Fear from people - of the unknown - thus immobilized or feeling powerless to stop the momentum at the end.

Could probably place other players in - but misses the point (and in my read almost tragic inevitability) of the level of fear that was driving the actions that led to the end.

Just my opinion, though.

[Character Assassin]

61. Both the Romans and the Jewish Priesthood of the time

It's far to simplistic and PC, from what little documentation available, simply to say 'It was the Romans' and leave it at that. The case can be made that the priesthood and its supporters were actually rather enthusiastic about having him removed from the picture. To whit:

Matt 27:22-25
22 "What shall I do, then, with Jesus who is called Christ?" Pilate asked. They all answered, "Crucify him!"
23 "Why? What crime has he committed?" asked Pilate. But they shouted all the louder, "Crucify him!"
24 When Pilate saw that he was getting nowhere, but that instead an uproar was starting, he took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd. "I am innocent of this man's blood," he said. "It is your responsibility!"
25 All the people answered, "Let his blood be on us and on our children!"

Luke 23:13-25
13 Pilate called together the chief priests, the rulers and the people,
14 and said to them, "You brought me this man as one who was inciting the people to rebellion. I have examined him in your presence and have found no basis for your charges against him.
15 Neither has Herod, for he sent him back to us; as you can see, he has done nothing to deserve death.
16 Therefore, I will punish him and then release him."
17(Now he must needs release unto them at the feast one prisoner.)
18 With one voice they cried out, "Away with this man! Release Barabbas to us!"
19(Barabbas had been thrown into prison for an insurrection in the city, and for murder.)
20 Wanting to release Jesus, Pilate appealed to them again.
21 But they kept shouting, "Crucify him! Crucify him!"
22 For the third time he spoke to them: "Why? What crime has this man committed? I have found in him no grounds for the death penalty. Therefore I will have him punished and then release him."
23 But with loud shouts they insistently demanded that he be crucified, and their shouts prevailed.
24 So Pilate decided to grant their demand.
25 He released the man who had been thrown into prison for insurrection and murder, the one they asked for, and surrendered Jesus to their will.

It seems rather clear that the mob gathered by the priests prevailed upon the Pilate to have Jesus to be crucified. Seems to me that the he was quite reluctant to do so, as he could see an offense that would justify death. In Luke he is said to plead with the Mob 3 times before relenting.

There seems to be complicity on the part of both parties.