Philosophy Discussion Forums

Every Christian knows that Jesus is the "Son of God." I have a personal interpretation of the phrase that is different from how the phrase is commonly understood. John 3:16 says, "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." It is my understanding that the phrase "only begotten" is the translation of the Greek word "monogenes." However, some bible scholars, rather than translate that phrase as "only begotten," would actually consider a more accurate translation to be something like "one-of-a-kind," "special," or "unique." This latter interpretation could be corroborated by the verse Hebrews 11:17-19. In this verse, Isaac is referred to as the "only begotten (monogenes)" son of Abraham, even though Isaac was not actually Abraham's only son; he also begat Ishmael, but Isaac was Abraham's "special" son.

Furthermore, there is a group of beings in the Bible who are referred to as the "sons of God." Some examples are Genesis 6:1-2 – Now it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born to them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they [were] beautiful; and they took wives for themselves of all whom they chose, or Job 1:6 – Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD . . . . My belief is that Jesus considers himself to be one of these "sons of God." This can be corroborated by John 10:34-36 – "Jesus answered them, "Is it not written in your law, 'I said, "You are gods" '? If He called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken), do you say of Him whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, 'You are blaspheming,' because I said, 'I am the Son of God'?" In the first verse, Jesus is referring to Psalms 82:6 – I said, "You [are] gods, And all of you [are] children of the Most High"; this verse is addressing the sons of God. So Jesus is saying that he himself is one of the "gods" or "children of the Most High" mentioned in Psalms.

So putting these two observations together, I come to the conclusion that Jesus is not just one of the sons of God but is a special, unique, one-of-a-kind member of the sons of God. This might disagree with the traditional interpretation of the phrase, but I think my interpretation is more biblically accurate.

Do you agree with my conclusion?

I think that Jesus could never really explain what he truly is. The people then and probably now would not have understood it, just like they would not have understood the Theory of Relativity.

The closest that Jesus could come to explain himself was to use the phrase "Son of Man" or "Son of God". This had some historical meaning to the simple people to whom he was speaking. This is the same as if you or I tried to descibe some supernatural human. We might use the term superman because it has some meaning to us, but it wouldn't be precisely what we were observing.
After all, what precisely is a Son of Man or Son Of God?

Mysterio448 wrote: ↑June 21st, 2018, 6:52 pm Every Christian knows that Jesus is the "Son of God."
Do you agree with my conclusion?

No.
Every Christian is wrong.

As a Rabbi, Jesu Ben Josef would have used the same phrase to describe himself that ANY other rabbi would have used.

It is only when the story reaches the ears of the Greeks that they take "Son of man; son of God" too literally. All he meant to say is that he was a preacher.

Mysterio448 wrote: ↑June 21st, 2018, 6:52 pm Some examples are Genesis 6:1-2 – Now it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born to them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they [were] beautiful; and they took wives for themselves of all whom they chose, or Job 1:6 – Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD . . . . My belief is that Jesus considers himself to be one of these "sons of God." This can be corroborated by John 10:34-36 – "Jesus answered them,

You are not comparing like for like.
On the one hand you have a book written in Hebrew, here quoted 2800 years later in English, compared with a book written in Greek around 1800 years ago from stories taken from events originally described in Aramaic.

I do not know exactly which English versions you have used, but they are also likely to have Latin as an intermediary language.

The passage of all this time has added the wishful interpretations of the translators, not to mention the Chinese Whispers of the oral tradition.

The New Testament explains this in two ways: (1) Jesus was adopted by God at the time of his baptism, or (2) Jesus was born by his virgin mother having been impregnated by God.
Paul and the Gospel of John say he was "God" (Logos)to begin with, but took on the appearance of a human (Paul) or "became flesh" (John).

Mysterio448 wrote: ↑June 21st, 2018, 6:52 pm Every Christian knows that Jesus is the "Son of God." I have a personal interpretation of the phrase that is different from how the phrase is commonly understood. John 3:16 says, "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." It is my understanding that the phrase "only begotten" is the translation of the Greek word "monogenes." However, some bible scholars, rather than translate that phrase as "only begotten," would actually consider a more accurate translation to be something like "one-of-a-kind," "special," or "unique." This latter interpretation could be corroborated by the verse Hebrews 11:17-19. In this verse, Isaac is referred to as the "only begotten (monogenes)" son of Abraham, even though Isaac was not actually Abraham's only son; he also begat Ishmael, but Isaac was Abraham's "special" son.

Furthermore, there is a group of beings in the Bible who are referred to as the "sons of God." Some examples are Genesis 6:1-2 – Now it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born to them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they [were] beautiful; and they took wives for themselves of all whom they chose, or Job 1:6 – Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD . . . . My belief is that Jesus considers himself to be one of these "sons of God." This can be corroborated by John 10:34-36 – "Jesus answered them, "Is it not written in your law, 'I said, "You are gods" '? If He called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken), do you say of Him whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, 'You are blaspheming,' because I said, 'I am the Son of God'?" In the first verse, Jesus is referring to Psalms 82:6 – I said, "You [are] gods, And all of you [are] children of the Most High"; this verse is addressing the sons of God. So Jesus is saying that he himself is one of the "gods" or "children of the Most High" mentioned in Psalms.

So putting these two observations together, I come to the conclusion that Jesus is not just one of the sons of God but is a special, unique, one-of-a-kind member of the sons of God. This might disagree with the traditional interpretation of the phrase, but I think my interpretation is more biblically accurate.

Do you agree with my conclusion?

The is nothing intrinsically wrong with your point, except that
there are multiple interpretations with detail that
has been lost or distorted by the ages and translations.

Personally I reckon Jesus was an extra-terrestrial and
most of his 'miracles' can be understood as advanced science.

There is every chance that he was physically immortal
and there is no theoretical reason to suggest he was not.

Is there really a massive difference between what I am saying,
and Biblical tradition?

In my opinion he did not exist he is merely a symbolic representation for something. Hands to this can be found and the age of when he started his ministry in the age of when he died in the fact that he's called the Christ which is representation for the Christos or sacred oil also his actual name not being jesus because that name did not exist 2000 years ago and his Hebrew name of yeshua which means salvation which the name salvation makes sense if it's not a person but a action or thing that happens . Furthermore if you were to take the entire Bible for its face value it's fallaciously contradicting and makes no sense for me fundamental standpoint if you view reality and existence in all its entirety and length of time these petty little scenarios me nothing in the grand scheme of things. And that's not even mentioning the failed promises and contradictions in the Bible