The Doric columns of the floodlit 5th century BC Parthenon on the Acropolis appear behind strings of Christmas street lights in Athens, on December 9. [AP]
Jesus was not the Messiah that the Jewish priesthood and the people of Israel had been expecting. He was not the outstanding leader who would unite the diaspora of the chosen people and usher in the messianic era of world peace, re-establishing the Kingdom of David.
The powerful and self-satisfied view of the Pharisees, as recorded by John the Evangelist, was that “a prophet does not arise out of Galilee.” Moreover, 11 of Jesus’ 12 disciples were Galileans except for the Judaean Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him.
The birth of the God-man is mentioned by two Evangelists, Matthew and Luke, because the writers of the New Testament simply record the messianic mission that the Father assigned to His Son and do not compile a scholastic biography.
Besides, it was the Evangelical Prophet Isaiah who, around the end of 730 BC, informed the House of David about the coming of the Messiah on Earth, who would be born of a Virgin. “And we saw Him, but He had no form or beauty… and the Lord has laid on Him our sins.” And His name will be “Emmanuel.”
Emerging from the labyrinth of biblical descriptions, the coming of Jesus into the world coincides with a major secular change. The transformation of the Roman State or res publica into an empire, when in 27 BC the Senate awarded Octavius the title of Augustus. And this meant the coexistence of different nations within a single administration.
Agnostics have characterized Jesus as a social reformer or even a revolutionary. That has no relation to the prevailing reality at that time. “My kingdom is not of this world,” Jesus replied when questioned by Pontius Pilate, the Roman official who presided over His trial and declared Jesus’ innocence three times.
He denounced the scribes and Pharisees in His sermons. The phrase “destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up again,” which referred to His three-day burial and resurrection, scandalized the priesthood. Indeed, Solomon’s Second Temple was destroyed in AD 70 by the Romans in retaliation for the Jewish revolt. But already in AD 30, the Apostle Peter had been proclaimed the first bishop of Rome. And for 2,000 years, a church based on the preaching of the Messiah – despite the various doctrinal differences – has remained alive.
Nowadays, the issue of artificial intelligence as a product of human creativity also concerns theologians. The question that arises is whether AI constitutes a challenge or annihilation of the position of man in the context of divine creation, or whether, on the contrary, it constitutes yet another expression of the divine plan that will allow man to play a role in the process of the new divine creation. This column certainly does not aspire to answer this major theological question. And therefore, we simply say, “Merry Christmas!”