In part 1, we saw that Messiah, King of the Jews was arrested and captured, treated as a common criminal, tried and falsely convicted of sedition, sentenced to death by a very cruel execution — crucifixion — and left for dead. But being saved by loyal friends, the King of the Jews was hidden and nursed back to health until he was well enough to escape to a land far away from his persecutors.
But you may say, “But Jesus freely gave his life, died and was resurrected after 3 days and afterwards ascended into Heaven and his ascension as even witnessed by 500 people, according to the Bible!”
The Bible is a book that is full of stories and “prophesies” that are impossible to be true:
- “the virgin birth” (mistranslation),
- “coming out of Egypt” (out of context),
- “the slaughter of the innocents” (out of context, forgery),
- “the Nazarene” (no such prophecy exists),
- “the lost years of Jesus” (missing information),
- “the false doctrine of the Trinity” (interpolation),
- “the forgery of the story of Jesus’ baptism” (forgery),
are only a few forgeries and false prophecies listed here. If you dig a little you will find much more.
There are so many discrepancies and inconsistencies in the Bible, to name a few:
- Was Jesus’ birth in the time of King Herod or ten years after Herod’s death?
- Was Jesus born in Bethlehem or Nazareth?
- Did the angel appear to Joseph after Mary becomes pregnant with Jesus or did the angel appear to Mary before she becomes pregnant?
- Was Jesus born in a house or a stable? Is Jesus birth visited by the Magi or by shepherds?
- Did Jesus and family flee to Egypt after his birth or did they travel to Jerusalem to the temple?
- Is all Jerusalem afraid of Jesus or is he warmly welcomed there and recognized as the Messiah?
- Do Mary and Joseph go to Nazareth to avoid the tetrarch of Judea or did they return to Nazareth because it is their home?
These discrepancies are impossible to reconcile no matter how you arrange the narratives. When you put these two stories of Jesus’ birth and childhood together you see that there are parts that directly contradict one another — they are real contradictions not just apparent ones — that’s what makes it impossible. The Bible is NOT inerrant — not even close!
How about Jesus’ Genealogy?
- The genealogies of Jesus in both Matthew and Luke are completely different — they can’t both be of Jesus. (forgery)
- One of them is about 30% longer than the other, even though they both begin with Adam and end with Jesus. That means either one or both have been either modified or forged. (forgery)
- The Messiah has to be a direct blood descendant of King David through his son Solomon (not Nathan). The royal lineage of kings in Matthew begins with David’s son Solomon, the genealogy in Luke begins with Nathan. (misinterpretation and forgery)
- Christian apologists claim that the lineage in Luke is different because it is the lineage of Mary, however Mary was a Levite and the genealogy in Luke is of the tribe of Judah. (misinterpretation)
These are not exhaustive lists of all the inconsistencies, contradictions, forgeries, fabrications, interpolations, and texts that were purposely left out while copying. More exhaustive studies have been done, but the ones on this site seem to be sufficient to make the main point. There are some lists that exist online are much longer.
The point of this whole article is that according to the Old Testament prophecies, the Messiah King of the Jews was very clearly defined as a real Earthly king, with a literal government and a throne, a great human leader who was anointed in ceremony as was King Saul and King David (thus the title Christ or Anointed one).
He never had a throne; he was never a ruler in a government over Israel; he never had a military to fight against the Romans (at least from what we read in the Gospels); he had no training to be a king; he had no authority as a king or officials under him. To sum it up, he had no traits or behaviors or abilities that could be recognized as a king.
Jesus, who was believed to be the Messiah King of the Jews, never literally was any of these things, never did actually fulfill the prophecies of delivering Israel from their enemies that they might live in peace and safety — obviously.
On the contrary, in his day, Jesus was captured, tortured and executed. Thousands of Jews who put their faith in him as their king, were massacred and scattered throughout the world in one of the most horrific tribulations of their history.
And why would Jesus have not died as the authors of the Gospels wrote?
Simply because Paul makes it a condition for salvation in Romans 10:9 that one must believe in his or her heart that God raised Jesus from the dead.
There was a need to make the story stick very strongly, since raising the dead and ascending into heaven, even in that day, would be a very hard story to swallow. If there weren’t anything to strongly convince people to believe — and fear of Hell is a very strong weapon against unbelievers — there would be the chance the story wouldn’t be accepted and the new Pauline Church would have failed.
To cover up for such a horrendous catastrophe and failure to fulfill prophesy: the authors may have had to have invented Jesus being raised victoriously from the dead; Jesus was a king with a kingdom “not of this world”; and only those who accept Jesus as their savior and king of Heaven (not on Earth, obviously), in their after-lives are allowed into Jesus’ kingdom.
If they believed in their hearts that God actually raised Jesus from the dead, they would be saved — from an imaginary Hell. This is a different type of salvation than what God promised them in prophesy; not a salvation as in being saved from one’s enemies who hate them and oppress them, but a type of salvation from eternal torture of an angry God, who punishes all who refuse to believe in the Resurrection story (according to the authors). Believers are granted free entrance into the kingdom of Heaven that they receive after death (or at the Rapture) for eternity: IF they believed in their hearts that God actually raised Jesus from the dead.
What the authors had to have invented was a type of salvation granted as a free gift of God through atonement by accepting Jesus’ bloody sacrificial execution on the cross. And all their followers had to do was believe in their hearts that God raised Jesus from the dead — no righteousness, no good works required, no following the law — nothing. People could live any way they wanted and if they only believed in their hearts that God actually raised Jesus from the dead, they would enter for free into the Kingdom of Heaven for eternity. A genius invention!
Either Jesus was God come in the flesh — the second person of a triune godhead, who gave his life in exchange of the sins of the world, or he was just a man like you or me who went around teaching the truth and was executed for sedition and might have believed he was Messiah, or even King of the Jews.
Either entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven is a free gift obtained through just believing this story only or it is the result of being literally born again for the purpose of purging and perfection to become righteous, doing the will of God and keeping his commandants and doing good works. It can’t be both. What is the real Truth?
But we trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel… and beside all this, to day is the third day since these things were done. (Lk 24:21)
Next: More Articles 2 | Executed for Insurrection Part 1