SENECA Christian Religion Discussion

Post your answers on the following questions and comment on at least one of your classmates’ posts.

1.Why is the Resurrection of Jesus such a key to the understanding of Christianity, especially as a “world religion”? How do you understand a statement that the Resurrection is a “New Creation”?

2. What point is Jesus making about “who is my neighbour?” based on the parable of The Good Samaritan ( Luke 10:25-37). What do you find interesting or challenging in the commandments to love God and one’s neighbour?

3.What is the new moral teaching that Jesus bringing according to The Beatitudes (The Sermon on the Mount from Matt. 5:1-12). What do you find in this sermon intriguing, problematic or difficult to comprehend? Can we live today as Jesus has taught?

here is my classmate work

1. Christianity like other religions has spread throughout the world from east to west. It is the most practised and known religion in many countries. The resurrection of Jesus is a key to understanding Christianity, especially as a world religion due to the fact that when Jesus was resurrected from his tomb he spoke to his disciples and told them to spread the word of God, His teachings. After Jesus’ death, his followers hid in fear. as the text states, due to His followers hiding the religious movement would have eventually died out. Without his resurrection, his disciples may have never pursued to tell the whole world about the gospels. His resurrection gave his followers the belief that eternal life exists for those that believe in God, that there is life after death. It’s a ‘New Creation’ because after that important moment His disciples and followers had a new, deeper understanding and a new goal. They sought out to spread the word of God. Christians started to believe that there is life after death, that they can live with Jesus in Heaven.
2. I believe that Jesus was trying to convey that our neighbours are those that help us at times of need. Good people are there to help us no matter how big or small the problem is. In the parable of the Good Samaritan, A lawyer asked Jesus a question to where Jesus paints him a picture of a man who ran into robbers. Jesus explains that out of 3 people that passed by the man attacked by robbers, 1 came up to aid him and bring him to an inn. In the end, Jesus states “Which of these three do you think was the neighbour to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?’ He answered, ‘The one who showed him kindness”. What I mentioned earlier does not necessarily only apply when we are in need. Neighbours according to this parable could be those people who just show kindness. Strangers that we have no relations with that show us kindness can be considered our neighbours. The commandment to love one’s neighbour is a challenging commandment to obey. In this day and age, we know of individuals that are not always kind to those around them or individuals that just get on our nerves.
3. The moral teachings of the Beatitudes are that people are blessed during hard times because, in the end, they have Heaven. I find this sermon intriguing cause it’s not often where you take the hard times in your life and consider them as blessings. To humans, blessings are generally things that are good such as food, clothes, a roof over our heads. Hardships such as financial problems, emotional problems are often not counted as blessings. I don’t take my hardships and come to the conclusion that I feel blessed cause more likely I won’t. It’s interesting considering that when it comes to bad things in my life, I don’t have a positive outlook on things. In the sermon, Jesus tells his followers to feel blessed regardless of what happens in life whether it’s good or bad. In today’s society, I do not think it’s as easy to live life as how Jesus taught in that sermon. Today with the mounting problems everyone is facing and the current situation of the world lot of things do not seem to be blessings. It is easy to think about our blessings but often times hardships won’t be on that list of blessings.

and here some to help u

Christian scriptures are known as the Holy Bible because Christians believe these books hold the revelation of God that brings salvation to all believers, including eternal life.

The Holy Bible is a library of books that is divided into two parts: the Old Testament and the New Testament.

The Old Testament is made up of books from the Hebrew scriptures ( Tanakh) because Christians share historical narrative with Jews: Jesus and his followers were all Jews and the first Hebrew prophets, Abraham, Moses and others are considered to be real figures in ancient Israel and predecessors of Christianity.

It is important to underline, that even though Christians share with Jews the books of the Hebrew Bible, they read them and interpret in terms of the coming of Jesus and his teaching, and his life.

The New Testament consists of 27 books related to Jesus’s life and the teachings of his disciples.

Jesus himself didn’t write any books that we know of! All the writings of the New Testament were written by his followers.

The first four books of the New Testament, known as the Gospels (Good news) were:

• written about forty to sixty years after Jesus’s death;
• written to evoke faith “these things are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name” ( John 20:31);
• given the names of Jesus followers, Matthew and John, and of the apostle Paul’s companions, Mark and Luke; the real authors of the gospel are unknown;
• written in Greek and Aramaic, the everyday language that Jesus spoke, then copied and translated in many different ways over the centuries;
• offer the combined picture of Jesus as seen through the eyes of the early Christian community.

The Acts of the Apostles follow the Gospels. The next 20 books are the Letters from Christianity’s early leaders affirming the beliefs.

The earliest writings in the New Testament are seven Letters written by a Jew named Paul. Paul never knew Jesus during his lifetime, but he tells readers that he encountered him through divine revelation.

Therefore, Christian church was born out of experiences of disciples after Jesus’s death.

Some Christians, particularly in the West, refer to the Bible as the “Word of God.” Other Christians, particularly in the East, believe that Jesus alone is the Word of God, and see the New Testament as an authoritative book, inspired by God but written by men.

As a result of these differing views, many Christians disagree to varying degrees about how accurate the Bible is and how it should be interpreted.

What Jesus Did? According to the Gospels:

• Preached and lived by radical ethics: lived and ate with people Jewish society at that time considered ritually unclean, such as prostitutes, the sick ( blind, lepers) and tax collectors.
• In contrast to the prevailing patriarchal Jewish society he respected women as equal to men before God, welcomed women as his disciples.
• Preached radically new morals: do not take revenge, love your enemy. Jesus’s revolutionary messages that a Samaritan (a person from Samaria, not a Jew) acted in a more neighbourly way than did Jewish priests (elites) was rather a radical idea to Jewish society.

• Delivered the teaching in the form of short aphorisms, allegorical stories – parables; both format and content of the teaching were new to Jewish society.

What do we know about him historically?

Historians claim some undisputed facts of Jesus’ life and career:

• Jesus was a Jew who was born approximately 2000 years ago (around 4BC), he grew up and lived in Galilee, a region that is now in northern Israel, but in Jesus’s days was a part of the Roman Empire.
• In his early thirties he traveled throughout the areas of Galilee teaching and healing which lasted between one and three years. In time he provoked the hostility of some of his own compatriots and the suspicion of Roman authorities. Under Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of Judaea from 26-36 CE. The Romans executed him by crucifixion.
• The oldest surviving literature that mentions him is letters written by another Jew, Paul. Paul never knew Jesus during his life and gives, therefore, almost no information about his life and teaching. Instead, Paul emphasizes that Jesus is the promised Jewish Messiah ( the term Messiah literally means the anointed one, “Christ” in Greek).
• Jesus never wrote anything, so historians rely upon what his followers said about him and his teaching.
• He is not the founder of the religion in the sense that Prince Siddhartha (the Buddha) is the founder of Buddhism or Muhammad is the founder of Islam: Christianity begins after Jesus’s death.

What do followers of Christianity believe about him?

Adherents of Christianity believe that:

• Jesus Christ is the founder of Christianity in the sense that his words, his actions and his manner of death remain central to Christian identity.
• His resurrection from the dead has given birth to the new religious movement, Christianity.
• He is the fulfilment of all the prophecies in the Hebrew bible (The Old Testament)
• It is in Jesus that God entered human existence. This doctrine is called incarnation (“becoming flesh”). To use a Hindu terms, Jesus is an avatar of the deity – he is a realisation of God in human form.
• Jesus, the Son of God has participated in human suffering – which means that suffering is not alien to God’s self.
• The Resurrection is seen as a New Creation – New Covenant with humanity.
• Jesus is God incarnate, God in flesh, equally God and human, the Messiah (Christ).
• According to Christian narrative, Jesus partakes in creation, revelation, the saving and judging of humans ( the Second Coming).
• “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven”. “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted”. “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled”. “Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy”. “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God”.“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God”. “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven”.“Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account”. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.(Matthew 5:1-12)What is the new moral teaching that Jesus bringing according to The Beatitudes? What do you find in this sermon intriguing, problematic or difficult to comprehend?