Did Jesus claim to be God?
After being satisfied that the New Testament is trustworthy, I decided to
take David to task on a different point. Nowhere, ever, did Christ claim
that He was the literal Son of God, let alone God Himself. Christ, being
the
Messiah for Muslims as well as Christians, was a holy man. How dare the
Christians ascribe such hubris to one of the greatest men of history,
especially when He never claimed divinity in the Gospels themselves!
This discussion took more time than the first. David's claim was that
Christ
did say that He was the Son of God, though He didn't run around
proclaiming
it from the rooftops, as this would have gotten Him killed immediately.
Here
is some of the evidence David offered.
In the Old Testament, Isaiah prophesied that a child would be born who
would
be called "Mighty God" (Isaiah 9:6). But this isn't the only Old Testament
support for the deity of Christ. Jesus's most common title for Himself was
"Son of Man," which referred back to a prophecy in the book of Daniel:
In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of
man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days
and
was led into his presence. He was given authority, glory and sovereign
power; all peoples, nations and men of every language worshiped him. His
dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his
kingdom
is one that will never be destroyed. (vv. 7:14-15, NIV)
According to the New Testament, Jesus was worshiped shortly after His
birth
(Matthew 2:11), during His ministry (Matthew 14:33; John 9:38), and after
His resurrection from the dead (Matthew 28:9, 28:17; Luke 24:52), yet He
never told his worshipers to stop what they were doing. Jesus claimed to
have existed before Abraham (who lived in the 18th century BC). When asked
whether He was the Son of God, He answered, "I am . . . And you will see
the
Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and coming on the
clouds of heaven" (Mark 14:62). Jesus also claimed to be the final Judge
of
all mankind (Matthew 25-31-32).
After actually reading parts of the New Testament itself instead of merely
reading Muslim books on the topic, I came to agree with David's claim:
both
the New Testament in general and Christ Himself claimed that Jesus is God.
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