Thursday, February 7, 2008

Jesus' humanity part 2

One thing is certain: Jesus, while on earth was not omniscient. Our brains, although incredibly powerful tools, are still finite in capacity. From the world's creation, there is infinite amount of knowledge to be had, however irrelevant most of it seems (from knowing how many stars are in the universe to what each subatomic particle in that universe has done since the beginning of time.) Keeping this in mind, we mesh this idea with one other: Jesus knew he was the Son of God, and had inside information about God. I attribute this to gradual recall of being God-gradual recall since it is hardly likely that Jesus as a baby could have spoken out about how he was the Son of God nor could a baby have the language to even have these thoughts, and the fact that when his brain did develop speech, he did speak out. If this gradual recall is accurate, then God must have put memories (or knowledge) inside of the physical brain with the intention of serving Jesus while limited in the physical realm. Here's the question of the day: Which memories did God choose, and why did he choose them? I see two options. God selected the memories that God guessed would come in handy, OR God knew what information Jesus would need throughout his human experience and put that inside his head. If the answer is the first option, no new revelations are exposed, for we all expect God to make rather wise guesses, and get them right. But what is unspoken in the first option is that God did not know what was to happen, and just made an educated guess. The second option is more direct in this issue. It states that God knew exactly what circumstances would arise, and what questions would be asked, and thus the appropriate knowledge to answer these scenarios.
What all this leads to is that God may very well have foreknowledge of what is to happen. If this is the case, God knows each and every time I'm going to sin, and he did not take precautions to prevent this. This implies that God remains passive as I decide to live for him or without him. The fact that God knows the future and sees us sinning is demonstrated in the prediction of Peter's denials (which makes you wonder about the eventual recall- is it strictly of God's memories of the past, or God's memories of the future as well? Think about Jesus' statements on the end times as you dwell on this idea). So here is the paradox: We believe our God to be omniscient, omnipotent, and perfectly benevolent. In other words, our God knows we are about to sin, can change those circumstances easily, and loves us enough to do this. And yet we sin. Here's the solution. As I've heard it said in the South, "I ain't your momma," so God, a bit more eloquently I'm sure, says to us that we are responsible for ourselves, for there is no free choice without the actual possibility of you choosing. Jesus clears this point up in the Lord's Prayer by modeling, "lead me not into temptation, but deliver us from evil." God knows what's coming, and loves us enough to do something about it, if we only ask.

3 comments:

Elizabeth Giger said...

It seems you are making the assumption that Jesus while on earth was not omniscient. If you are logically going to work through this, you should work through large points like that as well, without assuming and taking leaps with your logic. I don't necessarily disagree, I'd just be interested in seeing how you worked that out.

Unknown said...

Well, the fact that Jesus was human indicates he was not omniscient. This is because everything that Jesus knew was stored in his brain. That's a pretty straightforward assumption. Now while the brain is extremely vast, and no one has yet to approach its full capacity, the brain is still finite. Which even though Jesus could know TONS of stuff, he could never fulfill the definition of omniscient since there is infinite amount of knowledge out there.

Unknown said...

Deity becoming human poses so many questions. It had never happened before in history and hasn't happened since. On top of that, the people who were around Jesus when he was on earth didn't seem interested in knowing about the limitations that humanity put on him. So, to know concretely what Jesus was capable of knowing is impossible. We can only speculate about it. So then, let's speculate! I like the 2 options you put out, and here's another. Jesus had a "lifeline." Say God gave him some knowledge of his Deity when Christ was made human. God didn't have to give Christ full knowledge of who he was and what he was sent here to do from birth(if you could imagine what an ordeal that would be for an adolescent, then you'll know why I say that). If Christ was unsure of himself, he had a direct connection with God who could give him trustworthy knowledge. Christ also had a mother who would assure him of his Deity. That said, I don't think that God could give him memories. And the Bible doesn't talk about the physical Christ recalling the beginnings of the earth or creation of man, but it does say that Christ knows about the end times.
However, self awareness is only part of omniscience. Speaking in human terms, Christ seems like an intelligent guy. He had the mental facilities to work out the physical world and make changes to it that no one else has been able to. He seemed to have super-human intelligence when it came to religious matters. He knew (or could logic through) more than the religious leaders of his day. He stumped them with questions- was that because God gave him the exact knowledge that he needed for that encounter, or was Christ a studious, intelligent and driven individual who was in constant contact with God?
I believe that God had a set purpose for Christ's being, and knew enough about what would happen on earth that his plans would be fulfilled. However, there is free will. Without free will our love for God means little. So, that free will allows for variations in outcomes and new situations that might not have been expected. I don't know that God could have known that Christ would need a certain tid-bit of info at a certain time, and then given Christ the knowledge for use in that moment. I think that God gave Christ intelligence, a clear mind and a pathway to him whenever Christ wanted it. Omniscience wasn't part of Christ's mission on earth, so it wasn't necessary to his earthly body. BUT, if God had wanted Christ to have omniscience, I don't doubt God's ability to have given it to him.