Your ideas would hold water if the Jewish messiah was an animal or human and not an immortal God that cannot die.
That and the fact that the Jewish messiah was to be an angel who was to return and lead the Jews out of bondage.
I think we're talking at cross-purposes again. I'm not Christian, gnostic or otherwise - honestly when it gets down to it we probably agree on a lot of core details when it comes to supernatural/literal readings of myths being unnecessary. I'm not going to go so far as to claim Jesus claimed it, because whether or not he did is irrelevant to the value of a belief in my eyes. (Ditto, 'Jesus as the Jewish Messiah' is definitely a dubious reading).
My stance is more that making a claim based on a specific reading of something that seems open to interpretation feels unhelpful.
Okay, this is something I could be wrong about, my knowledge of offering/sacrifice traditions doesn't extend as far as Judaism, but my understanding of comparable ideas in other cultures is that the act of killing something isn't where the offering comes into play - rather it's the losing something.
Which definitely gets dubious depending on Christian interpretation, the resurrection delaying the actual loss of the-man-Jesus. But the broad strokes, that the death of Christ is preventing the physical appearance and interactions with him as a teacher/a loss to those that loved him, that fills the same role.
As a man, yes.
Not a supernatural fiction.
Jesus can never physically appear as there is likely no miracle working Jesus.
If there is, as scriptures say, there can be many.
Regards
DL
You're assuming Jesus has a set form.
Gnostics are supposed to believe that Jesus (even before the whole death/resurrection thing) was a supernatural being, because the physical is evil.
But while Christian tradition treats this as heresy ("Jesus was both fully divine and fully human" is their official teaching), after the resurrection is another matter.
1. Jesus is described as phasing through a locked door.
2. But he's not a ghost, as his wounds can be touched, and he is even described as able to eat.
3. He's also described as not having a form that is not fixed, but able to change as necessity demands.
The Christian church makes the mistake of the teaching that once he returned to the father, he just sat around and allowed evil to continue, but never you worry. One day he's gonna come again, and save all the worthy (which will probably not be you or I since none of us are worthy from the content of the letters that Jesus's own followers claimed) and damn all the unworthy (which is everyone based on the same letters)
In what way is that the actions of a Savior?It's not, and any logical view of Revelation makes this fiction fall apart rather quickly. If none of us are worthy, either:
1. None of us are worthy, and all are damned.
2. Only those who encounter Christianity and correctly identify it as the only road to salvation, and furthermore know to ask for grace instead of believing themselves hopeless are saved. This btw rules out entire countries where Christianity is not well-known or followed by the majority.
3. Or all of us must be saved.
If all of us are saved, and Jesus is
not going to return to send us into a lake of fire, then him sitting on his hands and just letting evil continue is not really what is happening. The Bible says that Jesus's real name means "God With Us."
But Jesus doesn't sit on his throne like Orcus, refusing to come visit.
God can only be with us, if Jesus hides among the population, speaking through the Body of Christ (his followers, mostly). But there is also a sense that Jesus is directly living within the population, and I believe I have encountered something like that.
I'm reminded of a little known film called Man of Iron (1935). Basically, the plot goes that a man who is effective at leading the lower level workers is offered a raise, and all sorts of perks from the company at an iron mill. He loses touch with his roots, and there's a big strike, and then he comes to his senses. The boss wants him to be leader still by the end of the movie, but now he does so in the factory, ignoring his title.
This is how Jesus rules the world. Not from a throne, from the "factory floor." And he explicitly says this is how things happen. So this idea of Jesus returning to the father, and having a hand-off ruling style for the next 2000 years is unbiblical. Just as unbiblical as the idea that it is Satan that rules the Earth. No, God is in charge as Isaiah 45 tells us, not only of good but also of evil. He uses both of these to create harmony. Wicked people pretend to be in charge, they lord over others, but they have no true power. The tighter the hold they keep, the more they are overthrown, because the more obvious they become. Just as Adolf Hitler's actual rule was unseated within years, once everyone figured out the truth.