Hi @wotsup - this is my long answer - and, sorry no evil spirits in this:
I can only go back into my treasure trove of experiences:
Having been brought up religious, in a fairly black-n-white religion (R.C.) I have puzzled about religion a fair deal - not always, I was a conceited atheist at one stage - but lately since a person has come into my life who has extreme views which are frightening - except I am not easily frightened - I am taking a close look at religion and the role it plays in people's lives.
For me, having recently (14.1.21) lost a much loved, gifted and generally wondrous daughter, too - just before really fulfilling all her talents and having submitted to great pain - it would be much easier now, if I had a belief in the afterlife. - I could think that she and my deceased husband, might have had a joyous reunion in that invisible realm of souls. But I cannot.
This is what I think about the historical Jesus:he was a wonderful human being, he had a genuine belief in God, he was charismatic, and he had genuine spiritual experiences which are beyond us - after more than 2000 years have passed, to understand - and he suffered the most cruel death the Roman Empire could bestow. His death was the death of a worthless criminal, an outcast from society, a non-Roman (Roman citizens could not be crucified, that cruel punishment was reserved for slaves and foreigners)
His life, his story - was re-told by his disciples, his fans, his mates, his evangelists, each one an individual personality with a different understanding but full of love for this one human being whom they loved and mourned and who was courageous enough to:
do away with the dusty, greedy, grasping and institutionalised version of religion he saw enacted by his 'religious leaders'
he was brave enough to talk about a Gracious God who forgives and does not punish
brave enough to accept a repentant prostitute, and give her love and acceptance, when all around him 'established religious types' wanted punishment
....and miracle of miracles! - he brought the message of the 'Innate Grace of God and his Forgiveness' to millions of oppressed people in the Roman Empire, that miracle eventually finishing one of the cruellest empires and making it's instrument of torture into the symbol of Christianity.
Of course, humans couldn't quite get away from long habits of the past of making offerings of flesh to their Gods, so Jesus was elevated and transmogrified into another offering of God - but in this case a deal was struck - He died for our sins, so that we could become squeaky-clean in the eyes of the Old God, the Cruel God, everyone had known for 5 000 years or longer, the God requiring blood sacrifices.
Jesus wouldn't have had much time to pore over books, he was a man of deeds and miracles.
He would be amazed at the multiplicity of religions spawned by his one act of being born and walking the earth preaching of love.
Preaching of the Love of a God who is full of Grace and Forgiveness and not the old-testament God of sacrifices (to him) and of punishment for every little misdemeanour of his naughty children.
I just take away the message of Grace in Christianity - and that is enough for me. Go well Taurisk
