#7 Jesus Christ! (No, but I'm his dad...)

Good friends often raise an eyebrow when I, a card-carrying atheist, show an interest in the life of Jesus Christ. It’s hard to explain, but my Christ complex must be something to do with it.

We do have a lot in common, JC and I: both sons of carpenters ; both better at spouting bullshit than banging nails ; both have a penchant for sporting dodgy beards ; both like a drink ; both borderline autistic.

So I’m a godless soul. Big deal. How does that preclude me from a belief and fascination in the past existence of a nutcase who thought he was the Messiah in a time when everyone believed in Messiahs? Back then, when someone as influential as John the Baptist piped up you were God’s rugrat, you damn well listened. What beggars belief more is somebody like David Icke. He purported to be Son of God in 1991 on The Wogan Show, a time and place in which almost nobody believed in God, let alone His sons. How come I’m allowed to believe that David Icke existed?

Jesus taught his followers to turn the other cheek. This means you can take the piss out of him mercilessly with nary a consequence. Forget hippies and the E generation. Jesus was doing the one-love shtick thousands of years before – pre-cannabis, pre-ecstasy, in a society which ruled that not wishing to skewer one’s closest friend with a rusty railing over a disputed sandal was tantamount to being gay. Having made the celebrity A list, he hung out with a tart – in full view of everyone – and didn’t give two shits.

Kum-bay-yah-ers are not the only ones left affected. His school of thought is sewn into the fabric of modern, liberal morality: the simple goals of tolerance, peaceful resolution, and love. Here and now, only Richard Littlejohn would not sign up to that.

Net research makes entertaining – if risible – reading. Wikipedia, as ever, is the model of studious inquiry and savvy, balanced thesis. Their article vindicates me: most proper historians reckon the Saviour stripped of all mythological claptrap was real. The mythological claptrap gets its fair share of column inches too.

However, put “Jesus Christ” into Google and, Wiki apart, you get a load of old balls.

Take whoisjesus-really.com. This site wants to answer some “tough questions” like “How can I be sure the Bible is really the word of God?”. It offers “facts” so that you can come to an “informed decision”. Intrigued, I read on.

A number of facts make it reasonable to believe the Bible is accurate and reliable. Jesus, the Son of God and the greatest spiritual authority of all time, attested to the accuracy of the Bible, even to the "smallest letter or stroke."(Matthew 5:18)

Did you get that? In summary, we know the Bible is accurate because it says so in the Bible.

I’m not sure how he managed to proof-read the bits written after his death.

Maybe a manuscript was Fed-Exed to Heaven.