Zacharias P Thundy

Jesus' Killing Zacharias P Thundy

Interestingly, Jesus appeared to be only an ordinary Jew in the eyes of the people of Palestine; but, according to the New Testament and Christian tradition, the divine Jesus gives up the happiness of heaven, exactly like Buddha leaving the happiness of the Tushita heaven, descends to earth to share the miseries of us humans to save us, allows himself to be killed by laying down his life for his people and the rest of us, and then returns to heaven to prepare a way for us to be happy with him. What is intriguing about Jesus is that he has a timeless existence without beginning and end while he also had a life in time like us. That is why Christians view Jesus as divine and human, which double-existence, according to St. Paul, is "to the Jews a stumbling block, and to the Greeks foolishness" (1 Cor. 1:23). Paul is right: even for believers Jesus is an intriguing mystery. While the Matthew, Mark, and Luke say that Jesus died on the cross, the Fourth Gospel questions that claim. This Jesus's killing and death are the subject of this little book. The question remains: Did Jesus really die? This question is really relevant because Christian creeds are in conflict. The Nicene Creed, the only ecumenical "catholic" creed recited by most Christians--by the way we are ll catholics not just the so-called "Roman" Catholics-- says that ""He suffered, and the third day he rose again, and ascended into heaven." This creed deliberately refuses to say, like the Fourth Gospel, that Jesus died, whereas the Apostles' Creed unhesitatingly says that Jesus died. Did Jesus die or not? That is the problem raised and addressed in this book.