Atheist?
this post was submitted on 17 Oct 2024
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To me, that seems to exclude the Jesus part tho.
Adherence to a moral standard is secular, even if the source is a mythological text that is the foundation of a religion.
Keep in mind that the religious figure of Jesus predates Christianity.
The guy was a real scientifically proven to have existed person. Being interested in him and not religion is having a interest in history therefore being atheist.
We have no direct evidence of Christ's existence, there is no "scientific proof" of Christ's existence as a person. Instead what we have is historical evidence, i.e. people wrote about him, so he probably existed. It's the best evidence we have that Christ lived, and it's generally good enough in the discipline of history - but it's not the same standard of evidence as used in science.
You're right, but just to rephrase:
- The natural sciences aren't in the business of saying whether or not a given person existed.
- If you think of history as a social science, then there may be "scientific" methodologies that determine whether or not a given person existed, but that's not what's generally though of as "scientifically proven"
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Bro, he was Jesus from Nazareth not "Christ" and yes we do have documents and texts from that time naming him, these documents predate the Bible. Its not clear where his body actually is, however there is scientifically enough evidence of his existence that it can be called a fact, even the resurrection can be scientifically explained with sedatives that did exist naturally around the time and where used together with Vinegar, wich is named in the Bible as a pretty significant element of the crucifixion.
I don't see the point in policing whether he is referred to as Christ or Jesus from Nazareth - is there some meaningful distinction here?
Also documents are not scientific evidence. The documents are enough evidence to consider it a historical fact, but that's, again, not the same thing as a scientific fact, and it is not backed with any material or physical evidence. Not that we expect or demand such evidence, I'm only pointing this out because you claimed there is scientific proof where there is none.
Regardless, I would be curious to get your receipts on those documents referencing Christ that predate the gospels, I hadn't heard of that before!
Speculation about the resurrection being faked with sedatives is irrelevant to this discussion, but since you brought it up, why not entertain more likely alternatives: towards the end of the book of John, Mary saw the resurrected Christ in the tomb and was the first to see him, yet she did not recognize him:
“They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.” At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus.
He asked her, “Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?”
Thinking he was the gardener, she said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.”
If he took sedatives, why did he look like a different person such that she thought he was the gardener? Why not think the resurrected person was just falsely claiming to be Christ, since he didn't look like him anyway? Why resort to more elaborate explanations when we have more simple ones at hand?
There is also the issue about how Christ supposedly survived being eviscerated and tortured before being hung on the cross, even if he did have access to sedatives. It's just not likely he survived that, and the sedatives don't explain that away.
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Good question, but I guess it also goes down to what you think Jesus was. Do you think he was God Incarnate or had a divine nature? Do you think he was a prophet of God, but himself simply human? Or just a cool guy, but nothing divine? In the first case, you are a Christian, even if you don't identify with any of the well known versions of Christianity. After all, many different conceptions of Christianity have existed.
In the third case, I don't think there is or should be a term for it. After all, is there a word for someone who thinks Marcus Antoninus was a cool guy? If that's not something that constitutes an important part of who you are and how you think, why should you be called anything in regards to it? Maybe depending on just how much you like him, we might call you a Jesus fan. Jesus fanboy or fangirl at worst. But there needsn't be a specific word.
Now, the middle case, where you recognize Jesus as a prophet is an interesting one, because several religions would qualify, including Manichaeism, Islam and Druzism; and as far as I know there isn't a term that englobes them all without also including Judaism... If I were to invent a term for that, I might go with "jesuic" or "yeshuaic", by analogy with the word "abrahamic" that englobes those who recognize Abraham as a prophet.
Thanks! This gave me a lot to think about
Maybe like nonreligious christian? I feel like the word christian doesn't inherently imply actual religion even though it's usually used that way, the same way identifying as a satanist can mean many different things. I'm neither a theologist nor a linguist though so maybe everything I said is nonsense
I don't think that there's a specific term for picking a religious figure solely as a behaviour standard, with no regards to the beliefs. But you could describe yourself as "morally Christian", I guess?
Christ-like, I'm certain its a secular reference to exemplars of Christ-like behaviors and humanistic interests
I like this one too! Thank you
Usually when I hear people described as "Christ-like," it's used to demote how much power and influence that person has over others - for example, "Donald Trump is a Christ-like figure among the alt-right." Someone going around and calling themselves that would come across as strange at best.
In terms of religion, atheist. Adherence to a moral standard is secular and does not require a supreme being.
Follower? Fan? Enjoyer? lol
Disciple would fit
Such term would be useful. Christianity does not seem to follow this leftwing liberal immigrant.
Church of England? They are pretty vanilla and low key in my experience.