Bloody Sacrificial Salvation
(Top Posts - History - 012801)

... a primitive concept from primitive and
ancient cultures, with the one surviving icon
perpetuated to this day, in western culture,
in the form of a bloody christ sacrifice for
salvation, a sacrifice worth no more (in
fact, logic, or reason, whether it actually
occurred or not) than the blood sacrifices
of animals and humans from earlier primi-
tive and ancient cultures, from which the
concept was spawned ...

The following excerpt is from the notes to
The Jesus Puzzle, by Earl Doherty
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0968601405
http://pages.ca.inter.net/~oblio/home.htm

--- begin excerpt {clarifying definitions, not
part of original text, added} ---

For close to 2000 years, Christians have
accepted that Jesus' sacrificial death on
Calvary was a redeeming act which con-
ferred salvation on the believer.

Chapter 10 discussed the principle of para-
digmatic {an outstandingly clear or typical
example} relationships between divine figures
and their experiences in the heavenly realm,
and those of human counterparts on earth.

That homologic parallel {same relative posi-
tion, value, or structure} guaranteed, through
its pattern of "likeness", a beneficial effect on
the believer, usually to do with the afterlife.

But how did the sacrifice itself function? Why
was the shedding of Jesus' "blood" --whether
spiritual or material-- regarded as efficacious
{having the power to produce a desired effect}?
Why would it persuade or enable God to
confer forgiveness of sin and eternal salvation?

The surprising fact is that nowhere in all the
biblical writings is this question addressed.

No writer of the Old or New Testaments
makes an effort to explain it. Hebrews 9:22
states: "Under the law almost everything is
purified with blood, and without the shedding
of blood there is no forgiveness of sins" [RSV].

A few verses earlier, the author concludes
(through a somewhat deficient argument) that
to ratify a covenant with God, a death must
occur involving the shedding of blood. How-
ever, no explanation accompanies these state-
ments.

In Israelite religion, communion with God,
especially in the matter of intercession
{prayer, petition, or entreaty in favor of
another}, purification {act of freeing from
guilt, imperfection, defilement, moral blemish,
ceremonial blemish}, and propitiation {act
of gaining or regaining the favor or goodwill
of}, took place through the blood sacrifice
of animals, millions of them over the centur-
ies.

Other ancient cultures were not far behind.
The origins of this practice and the thinking
behind it are lost in beginnings far older than
recorded history.

Although there were other, less sanguinary
{bloodthirsty, murderous} gifts people
could offer to placate and intercede with
the gods, blood sacrifice was at the center
of the divine-human relationship.

At some early time, the sacrifice of animals
seems to have grown out of and supplanted
the sacrifice of humans.

The legend of Abraham and Isaac in which
God demands the sacrifice of Abraham's
son, then relents and instructs him to offer
the lamb instead, is regarded as a mythical
story symbolizing the changeover in the
dimly remembered past from human to
animal sacrifice.

That human sacrifice survived in at least
isolated cases in Israelite history is indicated
by the traditions recorded in Judges 11:30-40
and 2 Kings 16:3 and 21:6. Such practices
had their roots in those among the Canaan-
ites, from which the Israelite population is
now regarded as having been largely derived. ...

Biblical and other records show that during
the first half of the first millennium BCE, the
Phoenicians (related to the Canaanites) living
on the Mediterranean coast of Syria in cities
like Sidon and Tyre still occasionally sacri-
ficed children to their gods, and the Cartha-
ginians (of Phoenician stock) continued to
do so in Roman times.

It would not have occurred to the ancient
mind that there was anything reprehensible
about a god who required the blood sacri-
fice of animals to effect purification or
expiate {to put an end to} sin because it
would have been looked upon as part of
the natural workings of the universe, which
probably even the god had no power to
change.

This may be why neither the Old Testament
nor the New makes any attempt to explain
how the sacrifice of Jesus brought about
the expiation of sin. It may have been re-
garded as one of God's mysteries.

The practice of blood sacrifice, even of
animals, is a primitive concept which no
one in the 20th or 21st centuries would
regard with anything but aversion, yet the
principle itself still lies at the heart of the
Christian religion and is still vigorously
defended in that context.

The focus on Jesus' love and willingness
to make the ultimate sacrifice on behalf
of humanity does not solve the problem."

--- end excerpt ---