“Celebrating the Life and Achievements of Christ and Muhammad”
St. Patrick’s Cathedral Hall,
The Life and Achievements of Jesus Christ
Professor Neil Ormerod
Personal testimony
Let me begin by saying what an honour and privilege
it is to have an opportunity to speak about the life and achievements of Jesus
of Nazareth, the one the early Church called the Christ or messiah, and whom
Christian tradition proclaimed as Son of God.
No other relationship is as important to me as my relationship to Jesus;
because to me as a believing Christian my relationship to Jesus IS my
relationship to God. I seek to make my
life one of Christian discipleship, following in Jesus’ footsteps, setting his teachings
as my greatest wisdom, his life as my surest guide and greatest inspiration.
His life and the significance it holds are endlessly fascinating to me. My fervent hope is that when I die, Jesus
will count me among his friends, frail and imperfect though I am.
I say this because I want to be clear that I speak tonight as a
believer, not as a disinterested observer of the history of Christianity. I mean no offense to our Moslem brothers and
sisters this evening and I hope and expect that they too will be speaking as
committed believers of Islam.
Historical information
about Jesus
When we ask about the life of Jesus Christians immediately turn to the
Gospels in the New Testament. Though
these remain our most reliable source of historical information about Jesus,
the age has long since passed where we could read them as a straight diary
account of his life. The Gospels are
proclamation; they bear witness to the faith of the first generation of
believers; they shape their story to the needs of their audience. Consequently
as a theologian I find it increasingly difficult to use the Gospels as a strict
historical source. Nonetheless scholars
have laboured, using various methods, to extract
whatever may be historically reliable from these sources.
Some examples suffice. We do not
know exactly when Jesus was born – estimates vary; we do not know how long his
public ministry lasted – the classical “three years” is taken from John’s
Gospel while the events in Mark’s could easily have occurred in just one year;
we do not know exactly the year of Jesus’ death – the Gospels of Matthew, Mark
and Luke present a different time frame to that of John. It seems strange in this day and age where
precise records are kept on every little detail, how little we know about such
basic matters in relation to Jesus.
We know much about the message and teaching of Jesus, however. We know the central theme of his teaching was
the
One thing we do know about with some certainly is the manner of Jesus’
death. Though the exact date is
uncertain we do know that Jesus was crucified by Roman authorities. This is
attested not just in the Gospels, but also in the non-Christian source of the
writings of the Jewish historian Josephus.
It was such a horrendous form of death that it took Christians centuries
before they could portray it in visual forms.
There is also no reason to doubt the indictment placed on the top of the
cross, spoken of in the Gospels, that read “Jesus of
Nazareth, King of the Jews”, hence the inscription INRI found on most
crucifixes. The charge against Jesus had
political overtones, claims to political power which were judged contrary to
the interests and power of the Roman authorities. In the language of our contemporary world, we
could say that Jesus was executed for sedition, an attempt to undermine or
overthrow the political order of the day, or at least that’s what they thought
at the time.
We also know that despite his ignominious death as a political agitator,
that this death did not bring an end to his story. As Luke tells us:
Two whole days have gone by [since
his death] and some women from our group have astounded us: they went to the tomb in the early morning,
and when they could not find the body they came back to tell us they had seen a
vision of angels who declared he was alive.
Some of our friends went to the tomb and found everything exactly as the
women had reported, but of him they saw nothing. (Luke 24:21-24)
Something indeed had happened to Jesus, something mysterious and
unprecedented. According to his followers he was alive again, the same but
different, with them but likely to “vanish from their sight”. They proclaimed a risen Jesus, a message they
carried to the ends of the earth.
Achievements of Jesus
What then can we say about the achievements of Jesus in the light of his
life? If we take the standards of the
world at the time, then we would have to say that Jesus achieved very little. His brief ministry came to a tragic end. He left a body of teaching which was handed
down by his followers; he cured a few people; he gathered a few people around him. Outside his own circle he barely rates a
mention in the historical records of the day. Apart from Christian sources
there are only three or four reliable mentions of him, his life and death. But this would be to miss the point.
As Scripture scholar James Dunn states:
As inescapable starting point for
any quest for Jesus should be the historical fact that Jesus made a lasting
impact on his disciples. It can be
regarded as one of the most secure of historical [facts] that Jesus made a deep
impression during his ministry … His mission changed their lives. They became disciples. They gave up their jobs. They left their families. They committed themselves to him, to follow
him … The
impact of his mission turned their lives in a completely new direction; [and]
it lasted.
This impact was not lessened by his death; indeed it seems to have been
intensified by it. The New Testament
itself bears witness to the intensity of the impact of his life, death and
resurrection. It is a veritable
explosion of adoration, of love, of personal commitment. No language is strong enough to express their
devotion to him – he is Son of God, son of David, the Lord, the messiah, the
power and wisdom of God, the lamb of God, the son of man coming to judge human
history. Their relationship to him is
intense and personal. Paul, who never met Jesus during his ministry can say,
“He loved me and died for me”.
There is a very real sense then in which the major achievement of Jesus
is what he leaves behind to carry on his mission. From its historically insignificant origins
it emerged out of its Jewish roots to become a major religious movement in the
Greco-Roman world and beyond; for better or worse it became the official
religion of the very empire that executed Jesus. It has spread his message throughout the
world, in such a way that every believer can say, “I am an achievement of
Jesus. His life and power is at work in
me”.
Of course that history has not all been sweetness and light. It has had its darker moments and
episodes. As believers we need look no
further than to teachings of Jesus to judge our own failure to live out the
message he proclaimed. Jesus’ first message in the Gospels is one of repentance
and the history of his movement is no little evidence for the continual need
for repentance, conversion and calling on the mercy and forgiveness of God.
What Christians
believe about Jesus
I have spoken about the personal sense of devotion that Christians
direct towards Jesus. It is evident in
the books of the New Testament; in the lives of Christians throughout the ages;
and in the lives of Christians today. It
is this very devotion which is the cause of so many problems for others of Abrahamic faith.
Such devotion is only due to God, the one creator of heaven and
earth. To the monotheism of both Judaism
and Islam the devotion of Christians to the person of Jesus can only appear as
blasphemy. To Christians it is the basis
of their faith. It leads us in the long
run to rewrite our understanding of God, as Father, Son and Spirit. But this would take us to far a field for this
evening.
Conclusion
Let me conclude by thanking Bishop Manning for the invitation to speak
to you tonight, and to you for your patience and attention in listening to me.