Jesus

I saw a clip on the internets recently with two intellectual blowhards having an argument about government and religion. One guy was some leading proponent of atheism, and the other was an iron-faced douchebag who I won’t name. Let’s just call him William Of House Reilly. At one point in their argument, William argued that Christianity was not a religion at all, but was in fact a philosophy. After thinking about it for a while, I started to believe it. Christianity is a philosophy. At first that just seems like crazy talk. Take a look at the world in which we live: the churches, the laws, the religious doctrine. It all points to a conclusion that yes, Christianity is indeed a religion. Of course it is. There is an organized church split into approximately 40,000 different denominations, all with their own peculiar ideas and rules and definitions of what it means to be a Christian, and their own very specific understanding of the Christian Holy Bible.  This group believes this, while the other group believes that. One group says that you should do this, but the other group says that no, you should do something else instead. It can be very confusing.

Should you dance, or shouldn’t you? Should you speak in some unintelligible language, or should you just speak whichever tongue you understand? Should you pray in a loud and boisterous voice, or should you pray in a low whisper? Should women be allowed to speak in church, or keep quiet until they are in the house? Should you drink wine or grape juice for Communion? Should you even have Communion? Should you ask for tithes and offerings, or should you leave it up to each individual to decide if they want to give? Is every single word of the Bible a fact, or is some of it just a story written to make a point? How many commandments are there, truly? Lots of contradictions, lots of questions, lots of confusion. And each sect of Christianity can point to their very own favorite verses of the Bible to defend their beliefs and explain why they are right and others are wrong. Each church has its own set of laws and bylaws and rules and regulations which must be followed to the letter, otherwise the church itself would rip at the seams, and no longer be the peaceful, loving, caring organization it is today. After all, rules are important aren’t they? Isn’t that what Jesus taught? To follow the rules?

Seems to me that for pretty much every Bible verse you can find to support your reason for believing a certain thing, you can almost certainly find another verse somewhere else that completely contradicts it. It also seems to me that if you are going to pick and choose certain laws and rules to follow simply because they are written somewhere in the Bible, then you should follow all of them. How can you take one verse from the book of Deuteronomy and use it in your church laws, but ignore the others? How can you take Paul’s advice on one aspect of worship and church behavior, and still choose to ignore him in other matters? It’s contradictory. But this is not the purpose of my writing. I will leave that to you, the reader, to do as you will.

What I wish to argue here is that at its heart, cut through all the rules and laws and church nonsense, Christianity is indeed a philosophy. Or it would be if the church wasn’t around. Jesus was a teacher, not a preacher. He was a poor traveler, not a rich church leader. And at the heart of everything that he said and did, he had a philosophy. Love God and love your neighbor. That’s it.

The words of Jesus: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. The second most important is similar: Love your neighbor as much as you love yourself. All the other commandments and all the demands of the prophets stem from these two laws and are fulfilled if you obey them. Keep only these and you will find that you are obeying all the others.” – Matthew 22: 37-40

Jesus was a simple man who loved everyone and wanted everyone to love one another. That doesn’t sound too much like the church that exists today. It also doesn’t really sound like “an organized system of beliefs, ceremonies, and rules used to worship a god.” To me, it sounds more like “a set of ideas about how to do something or how to live.” Love God. Seek His forgiveness. Love one another. Forgive one another and seek the forgiveness of others. This, in a nutshell, is how you follow the teachings of Jesus Christ. Not by setting up laws and regulations designed to exclude certain people and punish certain people for not following some law that was randomly selected from the book of Leviticus. In this, I believe, we can say that Christianity – true Christianity – the belief and following of the teachings of Christ, is a philosophy. I don’t subscribe to religion. I don’t consider myself religious. I consider myself a follower and (trying to be) a practitioner of Christ’s teachings. His philosophy.

I don’t follow the teachings of Abraham. Or Moses. Or David. Or King Solomon. Christianity isn’t named for them – it’s named for Christ. I don’t think that Christ intended for his followers to be divided and fighting one another over laws. He didn’t lay down a set of laws to be followed – he provided a philosophy. Love God, love one another. Fighting others because they don’t believe what you believe isn’t Christ like at all.  Ostracizing people for living a certain way isn’t Christ like. Saying that someone is wrong because they don’t worship in the same very specific manner you worship isn’t Christ like.  We are to trust in God, not in man. Follow his teachings, his guidance, his advice. If we aren’t careful we allow our religion to get in the way of a true relationship and understanding of Christ. I haven’t quoted any other Bible scriptures because that’s not what this is about. Feel free to go and read for yourself. The one bit of scripture that I referenced says it all. It sums up what Christ was about.  Any teachings you receive from any man – any man, should be cross referenced and checked to see if it is in accordance to what Christ said and did. He is the leader of the church, the religion, the philosophy, whatever you wish to call it. I believe in God. I believe in Christ, and I believe in his teachings. I love God, I love others. I ask God’s forgiveness and I forgive others. It’s not easy. But it’s the best way to live life.