Some people assume that Jesus made the world better, and that things were improved by the life, death, resurrection of Jesus.
They assume especially that Christian societies are better than not-Christian societies - so that the conversion of more people, the Roman Empire, and many nations, to the Christian religion; led to an improvement within those societies - and consequently (probably) the world.
Other people (apparently especially in Medieval times) regarded the time of Jesus Christ as the source of once for all revelation, and an unique spiritual impulse; so that the further away in time the world went from the ascension of Jesus, the more the world declined - the worse the world became...
Until eventually the world would become so evil that this would lead to the end times, and the second coming, judgment day etc.
It seems that there is no objective way of resolving such questions, because there are no agreed criteria for quantifying and summating the goodness of the world; such that we could measure and compare whether the world at one time is overall better or worse than another.
When goodness was equated with obedience to a particular church, then it seemed possible to measure - in the sense that the size and power of that church, and the devoutness of its members, was in principle quantifiable.
But such an equation now seems untrue. It is recognized that churches may be wealthy and populous while becoming increasingly corrupted; and that devout people who obey their churches rules, may well be un-Christian, or anti-Christian in their motivation.
More deeply; there is the matter of whether the work of Jesus Christ - what he did, how he changed the cosmos - had anything directly to do with the spiritual state of large numbers of people in the world...
We could ask whether the work of Jesus is not about The World as such, and only very partially about material and measurable things; but is instead primarily about spiritual matters, and the post-mortal fate of persons.
If Jesus's work is primarily individual, spiritual, and about resurrection; then any effect on the world at large will be secondary to the implications-of, and a long and complicated way downstream-from, various individuals choices to follow Jesus.
Perhaps the proper question is to ask whether Jesus's work was - in its essence - of this world, or Not of this world?
2 comments:
What's the yardstick? It seems the world, which means people, has become better in some way and worse in others. But, as you say, Jesus did not come to make the world a better place but to show us the way to the next world.
@William - That's how I see it too, but it is interesting that there have been very sure opinions in *both* directions - getting better or worse.
I am sure that the West (and all who subscribe to its values) is worse than ever before, because of unprecedented systemic and increasing *value-inversion* - but that isn't what most people mean by better or worse.
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