In Mark 2, Jesus heals the paralytic man and forgives his sins. The scribes who were there called this blasphemy because only God has authority to forgive sin (see
Isaiah 43:25). This was a claim to be God. Luke records this claim also in
Luke 5:20.
In John 10, Jesus again claims to be one with the Father. The Jews question Him, and His answers again elicit an attempt to stone Him. Jesus asks them for which of His good works they want to kill Him. They answer, “It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you but for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself God.” And they attempted to arrest Him, but Jesus escaped.
In
Matthew 14:33 and
28:9, Jesus received worship, the kind of worship Jews only gave God. Greg explains in more detail in
this article.
Finally, Jesus’ claim to be God was the reason the Jews arrested Him and convinced Pilate to crucify Him. In John 19, Pilate tells the Jewish leaders that he finds no guilt worthy of the capital sentence. They answer Pilate, “We have a law, and according to that law He ought to die because He has made Himself the Son of God.” Jesus’ violation of blasphemy is recorded in
Luke 22:70–71 when He appeared before the Council after His arrest. They had the evidence they needed from Jesus’ own lips. Mark gives more detail of this in 14:62–64. When Jesus answered them, the high priest tore his clothes and declared this was blasphemy.
Jesus said very clearly that He was God.
