Christian theology is split on this issue, and different sects are apt to believe different things. . .
First some history: When
Christianity was starting out long ago, the
gentiles recruited by the
evangelists were either former pagans or former Jews. As these early
Christians were grappling with the nature of
Jesus and the
divine, they looked to their old
faiths in order to get a handle on who he was.
For example, some early
Christians who were formerly of
Greek religion looked to
Asclepius.
Asclepius was a son of
Apollo who who went around healing men and performing
miracles. He was, however, not allowed to raise men from death, for such a thing was supposed to be beyond the province of
men. . .He was exhorted to resurrect a dead fellow, and, for doing this,
Asclepius was struck down by
Zeus. He was, however, then raised to
Mount Olympus and became of the
gods. "Oh," some early
Christians said. "
Asclepius was of man, performed
miracles for man, was struck down in his youth, and then adopted into
heaven.
Jesus is like
Asclepius!" And they came to the conclusion that
Jesus was some kind of superhuman man who was later raised to
heaven by
god. (as an interesting side note, many of the early
Christian temples were built upon former temples and centers of healing to
Asclepius)
Others early
Christians looked to other stories: for example,
Jews who became
Christians saw the story of
Elijah the Prophet in the
Old Testament, and drew a parallel there:
Elijah was a prophet of
God who was brought up to
heaven because he served
God well and true. "Oh," some other people said. "
Jesus was like
Elijah - he was a human who simply was incredibly
pious, served
God very well, and was then brought into
heaven."
So at any rate, a schism formed from all of these interpretations, and it lasts unto this day. Most
Christians believe nowadays that
Jesus was actually an incarnation of
God, but there is a split over how much like man or how much like
God this incarnation was: was he entirely
human, and did he
doubt,
weep, and
tremble as men? Was he
superhuman, and therefore was at some midpoint? Or we he godly, knew all of what was and what would be, and did not tremble a whit?
The argument for
Jesus being extremely human might go like this: mankind has
sinned. He has blackened his
soul, and he has blackened the
Earth. For
man to be
redeemed,
God must come in a profoundly human way and must suffer in a profoundly human way: He must
doubt as man,
weep as man, and, ultimately,
bleed as man. A man who is closer to
God than to
mankind would be unacceptable - it is men who have
sinned and therefore a man must take all of this suffering upon himself.
The argument for
Jesus being a "perfect" man is that it was a "perfect" man who got us into this mess, namely
Adam. Because a perfect man initiated this cycle of
sin, a perfect man is required to end it: Adam ate of the Tree of Life's apple; to atone, Jesus must be mounted upon a tree of thorns.
Yes, I agree. This is all fucked up.
Most conservative portrayals of
Jesus have him being "perfect." It's just safer that way. Newer (and inifinitely more interesting) portrayals can be found in several modern works, including the excellent
The Last Temptation of Christ and the minorly great
Jesus Christ Superstar.