I do not believe Jesus is G-d, nor am I a Christian. I do not even believe Jesus was or is a savior. I do not believe in the Trinity. I do not believe Jesus was the Messiah or the Christ. If you are a Christian, please put those negative sentiments toward my belief aside. I have read the New Testament. I am not ignorant of it. Casting aside my own opinion of Jesus, as a whole, I will focus on Jesus’ good aspects in this essay.
To Jesus’ credit, like all those who love knowledge, philosophers, Jesus was not a materialist. Thus, I will use the teachings of Jesus to drive my message home. Jesus would be shouting to his many of his modern followers every Christmas, “You liars! You hypocrites! You are in danger of the fires of Hell!”
Who was Jesus?
My view of Jesus is very negative, but I am not beyond using positive things he said to drive home a message. Let’s consider the identity of Jesus. Jesus was a homeless person (Matthew 8:20). The prophet Mohammed concurs and believes Jesus to have been the least materialistic prophet. I have no doubt that Jesus was very clever, such that he was probably homeless by choice, probably because having a home would have given him a locus, and that would have hindered his ability to preach his message. Jesus was most likely homeless because he felt he needed mobility. Jesus thought his message was more important than materialism. By choice, Jesus would not be someone who would even had a place to put a present. Jesus would have preferred repentance to presents. There is no evidence of Jesus accepting birthday presents. He would have no use for them, as he was not a materialist. If you are his follower consider this: The New Testament calls us to be imitators of Jesus the Christ (Ephesians 5:1). In fact, as evidence of this I suggest that Jesus deemed a homeless beggar whose sores had been licked by dogs to be a sign of his kingdom (Luke 16). He never praises riches. The evidence all suggests that Jesus outright rejected materialism.
Turning Jesus’ birthday into a day of presents, and making Christmas into a season of materialism, is blasphemy of his message. To such things, there was who asked, “How many times should I forgive my brother?” Jesus’ reply seems close to infinite forgiveness, but it is not. Indeed, the forgiveness of Jesus is limited to 70 times 7, or 77 times (Matthew 18). Such limited forgiveness suggests that by the time someone had reached middle age and was still participating in the blasphemy of the birth of Jesus, that if you meet Jesus on the day of judgment, he would say “Away from me evil doer.” In Jesus philosophy, your place would be hell if you are a slave to the materialism of Christmas, going into debt just to buy more presents.
Though Christmas is an invented holiday, and all attempts to determine the date of Jesus’ birth are mere speculation. The best evidence shows Jesus was born in 4 CE during the summer. I am not one who believes Jesus was very concerned about the date of his birth. Celebrating Christmas would probably be just fine by Jesus. I am not one who believes completely doing away with Christmas, despite its lack of historical accuracy is unimportant in this case. To radically change anything except the materialism of Christmas is really unnecessary and inconsequential. The inaccurate yearly celebration of the birth of Jesus should be considered an outright harmless event. However, do not call yourself a Christian if you celebrate Christmas materialistically, then Jesus would not allow you in his kingdom.
Note: The inspiration for this blog is Bill McKibben's book Hundred Dollar Holiday: The Case for A More Joyful Christmas.
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