By him and through him all things were made. He was a man of sorrows acquainted with grief. He made the opossum, The platypus, have you ever watched an armadillo play? I haven’t watched the whole video, but I’m assuming the issue isn’t that Christ never actually laughed, but rather that he’s never shown in the scripture to have?
i really get tired of people removing/ignoring the humanity of Christ. i get equally tired of people downplaying/disrespecting the divinity of Christ. i do understand both though. it's hard for our human brains to really comprehend a being fully of two natures.
But does Chesterton’s point go so far as to say he “never laughed?” Was it a certain level of mirth he hid from us? His divine mirth, maybe? I find it very hard to believe he connected with people so deeply and had such good friendships and never once laughed.
"The tremendous figure which fills the Gospels towers in this respect, as in every other, above all the thinkers who ever thought themselves tall. His pathos was natural, almost casual. The Stoics, ancient and modern, were proud of concealing their tears. He never concealed His tears; He showed them plainly on His open face at any daily sight, such as the far sight of His native city. Yet He concealed something. Solemn supermen and imperial diplomatists are proud of restraining their anger. He never restrained His anger. He flung furniture down the front steps of the Temple, and asked men how they expected to escape the damnation of Hell. Yet He restrained something. I say it with reverence; there was in that shattering personality a thread that must be called shyness. There was something that He hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was something that He covered constantly by abrupt silence or impetuous isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it was His mirth." -GK Chesterton, Orthodoxy i dont fully understand why Christ would hide his mirth, to be honest. But it maybe has to do with his mission and our salvation, as everything regarding his incarnation does. Maybe his hapiness, God's laughter is something that only the saints in heaven could bear.
@IsaacEstrada12 AI summed it up nicely for me: G.K. Chesterton addressed the idea of Jesus never laughing in The Everlasting Man and other writings. He argued that while the Gospels do not record Jesus laughing, it is not because He lacked joy or humor, but because the sacred texts focus on His mission and sacrifice. Chesterton believed that Christ's silence on laughter is not a denial of humor but a reflection of His immense gravity in redeeming humanity. Chesterton also implied that the joy of Christ is so profound that it transcends casual laughter. In Orthodoxy, he famously remarked that there was a "hidden mirth" in Christ, writing: > "There was something that He hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was something that He covered constantly by abrupt silence or impetuous isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it was His mirth." Chesterton viewed Christ as the embodiment of ultimate joy and love, qualities deeper than mere outward expressions like laughter. His silence on laughter reflects the ineffable mystery of His divine mission, not a lack of humor or joy.
@@stevendouglas3781 im not sure of it myself. But, maybe his hapiness would revel to us, as sinners, our own sadness or misery. And who could then bear the hapiness of God?
He was fully God and fully Human. With that came the full range of human emotions. Children would not have enjoyed his company if he didn’t crack a smile or laugh or exhibited humor.
@@dohope4554 there is nothing wrong with “making fun of life”. Children “make fun of life” all the time. It’s called “play”. Drop the gnostic worldview of seeing our current human experience as something inferior to the ultimate reality. It’s demonic.
@@dohope4554 just to clarify, there’s a difference between making fun of something in a playful kind of way versus making fun of something in a mocking way.
@@dohope4554 and yet, if that’s true, then those gnostics are contradicting themselves because they don’t believe Christ was human. As for me, every time I witness something beautiful and I am deeply moved by that reality to the point of weeping or laughing or both, that is not evil. That is Holy. That is Human. How dare you think otherwise. Enough with your demonic human abstractions. Learn to embrace the humanity God has given you that Christ affirms eternally.
Yea, monks disdain a lot of these aspects of life. I heard some hearsay that Jesus never walked into a house with music playing. Which is ridiculous! Because I’m sure music was played in the temple.
@@Joefrenomics It's overzealotry for the Cross, born of a pharisaical sense of what holiness is. Granted and emphatically affirmed that there is a deep need for penance and mortification in this life, it does not therefore follow that one treat consolations, pleasures, comforts, and other good things as a curse. That's either putting on airs or, worse, a stubborn rejection of blessings as evil. True, they often are enticments away from the love of God and neighbor, but that only means that you're bad at receiving the good things of the Lord in the land of the living... means that you need to get good at it... that you need practice, say, listening to music for the sake of God rather than yourself.
Weird how some say Jesus never laughed when he wept. Emotions took over Jesus Lazarus died despite Jesus being God and knowing he'd resurrect him. The idea of Jesus living a human life and communing with people but never laughing is strange to me.
He would have been completely alien to them if he was literally incapable of laughter. Most people don't like to be around normal humans entirely capable of laughter but have no sense of humor. Those who don't know how to laugh are often maladjusted and not well rounded or grounded individuals. They have no full understanding or appreciation for the full scope of the human experience.
Emotions did not "take over" Jesus when he wept. That would be to imply He lost control. I think that is the meaning Jonathan is trying to say. I don't think crying when you see a group of people grieving is the same as laughing. Laughing is sort of an uncontrolled response. He probably smiled when finding something humorous.
@@nancyann1090or maybe… He laughed. Crying that is “completely controlled” is false, it is pretend and not the genuine outpouring of emotion as the weeping of The Lord is described. There is a limit of course, I doubt Christ would laugh so hard as to be incapacitated or laugh at inappropriate things, just as He did not drink so much as to become incapacitated or drink at inappropriate times. Perhaps The Father does not laugh, or “laughs” in a way that is unrelatable to us.
I don't understand why God went through the whole effort of being completely human just for man to philosophize about his nature centuries later with "no, he probably was *super* human: didn't cry as a baby--didn't laugh."
Could not agree more. That's why I think a lot of (note I didn't say all) theological divisions just reduced people to arrogant naval gazing the further you go from the earliest ecumenical councils. There are absolutely doctrinal lines in the sand that need to be drawn because we need to be able to define who we are and who we worship, but more high minded philosophers and theologians need to learn to be more comfortable with the phrase, "I don't know." Appreciate the fact that some things are simply beyond our finite knowledge and understanding, and extend more grace to other people where disagreements occur.
Well he did say that "even tax collectors will enter into the kingdom before the lawyers" as Matthew, a tax collector, is one of his disciples...that is complex sarcastic humor. Whether he laughed or not, I can imagine he said that with a wink and a smile or he is just being cruel to Matt.
@@calebbrunson7120 everything involving Peter always came across as funny to me. I can just imagine the stupid look on his face when Christ says “get behind me, Satan!” Jesus is always inverting the structure in a humorous way. Not sure why J Pageau is so hung up on this Christ never laughed thing
@Messianic-Gentile not sure if laughing is necessary. Some of the best comedians I know don't laugh at their jokes, they are not passified by their own humor...that said I also know comedians like Billy Connolly that can't tell a joke that doesn't "make himself laugh". I think the point Pageau is making is that Jesus was impassable as fully God, and laughter is often a spontaneous reaction to external stimulus..."making" the person laugh. So being humorous and laughing are not mutually inclusive things...People can laugh with no sense of humor and Jesus could have perfect humor and not laugh. For me, "Jesus Wept", choosing to experience loss and grief for a friend...is problematic. Any point i have heard regarding "Jesus never laughed and this is why..." seems undermined by "Jesus wept."
It's funny you say that because that line always stood out to me from the Sermon on the Mount as humorous. The other one was the camel through the eye of the needle analogy.
Weeping is also a loss of control. I see it as the inverse of laughter. Christ wept more than once. I don't think laughter is exclusively the result of surprise. I still laugh at comedy shows ive seen many times. I think laughter is a physical way to fully embrace the humor of something and enjoy it. It's also a way to share a joyful experience with others. In fact, sometimes I laugh joyfully when i hear really great news about people. Its a way of rejoicing. It would stretch the claim that He was fully man if He never laughed.
I agree with this, I would add that it seems to me the reason an emotional action, such as, weeping was integrated into the telling of the gospels and the life of Christ, was to reflect the seriousness of the message. There is a difference in meaning when someone is somber and serious, vs when someone is jovial and laughing. It a still affords Him equal space for His Humanity and His Divinity.
Agreed...the surprise argument to support Jesus not laughing would also have apply to weeping. I also think of God talking to Moses through the burning bush. Moses keeps trying to reject God choosing him and eventually God gets angry. God seemed to relate to Moses in the moment, but He couldn't have been surprised at how Moses was acting. I don't know for sure of course, but I can imagine weeping and laughter would be another way Jesus chose to relate to us in the moment.
I think laughter shows a gap between you and the fullness of something. You experience it either by surprise or considering it more deeply. Christ has no gaps and whatever is funny about a topic was already perfectly understood by the logos when He created it.
@@writerblocks9553 According to some Christians ironically yes. There was a whole group that tried to justify this belief by saying that he ate only ambrosia and honey.
Eh, it never mentions him trimming his nails, scratched an itch or got a sunburn. Is this to say these things didn't happen? Or merely didn't make it into the text?
He’s saying the Bible doesn’t tell us that he laughed, so we don’t have the answer to our question in the Bible. He isn’t saying that anything that isn’t in the Bible didn’t happen.
The reason people who hate the truth don't like comedy is because it very often reveals the truth. People will involuntarily give away what they really think through laughter. In a totalitarian state comics are usually the first to go.
@@JayBThomas I have no idea what it has to do with the topic of the video. The video mentions comedy but it seems like something a bot would do. Identify the element of comedy being discussed in the title and leave a comment relevant to comedy, but completely disconnected from the topic of the video. I understood the comment, I understood the video, but the video was not about political use or censorship of comedy. Whoever left it seems to have wanted to start an entirely different convo unrelated to the video.
@SandyCheeks1896 By observing that totalitarians do not like comedy, the commenter implies that religious people or institutions that don't like comedy are likely to be totalitarian. I agree. People and institutions that cannot abide humor and laughter are completely closed to others' points of view; they do not want new information. They blaspheme by assuming all-knowingness.
This exactly. Those without a sense of humor don't have a very full appreciation of the human experience. They're also frequently maladjusted and aren't very grounded or well rounded individuals. To laugh is to be human just as much as crying.
it can potentially become sanctity but ascetiscism for the sake of asceticism I agree it's not. There are some excesses in some Christian individual ascetics who in my opinion are Augustinian crypto manicheans (radical division and separation between creator and creature to the point of having the Catholic Church in the 1600s calling theologically orthodox mystics as Pantheists and even doubting female devotional literature from actual canonised female saints from previous centuries becuase a faction of radical clerics percevied them to be witches) or gnostics where they deny the world so much as to percieve it as evil, it betrays an escapism and in Western Christainity (in some instances in Eastern Christianity too) there are countless examples of radical escapism in Medieval literature. Many Medieval authors wanted heaven so much and judged the body as wordly and inherently evil or gross like for example the founder of the Norbertine order where 3 monks died becuase of the severity of discipline (Medival self flagellation which for me is pathological and heritical). There is also the risk of self denying as an unconscious mean to self aggrandise, someone denies himself for publicity or even to compete with other ascetics (a rare occurance but still).
Asceticism of some form is required for salvation. A mind who does not participate in asceticism does not have its nous oriented to God. As St Seraphim of Sarov says, “A Christian who does not fast is not a Christian.”
therefore 95% of humanity is screwed because they wont get the ticket to heaven (heaven is not the destination and without earth it’s completely sterile) Nietzsche was right in pointing the inherent nihilism of some versions of Christianity where you hope for a ticket and escape in an unrealised and abstract heaven, too much escapism. Some form of self control and sacrifice even if small is necessary and every religion advocates for that but too many Christian (not all traditions but still) have inherited Zoroastrian or Manichean metaphysics with the devil having more independent existence and power than in the Jewish tradition which can generate paranoias and scapegoating and paradoxically makes you more exposed to evil influences. The true Christian eschatology is closer to the Semitic understanding with new heaven and EARTH and a resurrection and not going to heaven and floating in it. Life after death it’s not as dogmatically defined in Orthodoxy and remans a mystery like the universal salvation of all creation which is still a mystery and while it cannot be dogmatically confirmed one can still hope and pray for such an outcome. The less Persian metaphysics the better and while self sacrifice is necessary I think balance is also important in avoiding extremes and radical contempt for the natural world which betrays crypto gnostic dualism and the possibility of self aggrandising in the process of extreme self denying and escape which something some ascetics correctly pointed out.
He at least had comedic intent when He talked about a plank coming out of a person’s eye. Sin causes foolishness, and foolishness is a kind of incongruity, which is a cause of laughter. Laughing at the foolishness of the wicked helps free our souls from their tyranny. This is not to say that we shouldn’t take sin seriously; it is merely to say that we should hold seriousness in tension with some levity at sinful absurdity. As the Psalms say, “The One enthroned in heaven laughs; the Lord scoffs at them. He rebukes them in his anger and terrifies them in his wrath.”
Or when he said, "You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God, in order to keep your tradition!" (Mk 7:9). A clear, although rare, example of Christ's sarcasm.
Shows like The Chosen and many others go out of their way to show the human nature of Jesus, whereas very few modern depictions of Christ emphasize his divinity and the implications of it. We couldn't even begin to represent how the God-Man would have acted in the most basic things: eye contact, body language, tone of voice, cadence, hand placement, etc. What would the perfect expression of all these little details truly look like in person?
It's true. Even the way Jonathan Roumie walks in The Chosen has me thinking "Surely God the Son almighty didn't walk like that." And how would perfection incarnate walk anyway.
I wondered about that too… how would meeting God in physical person be? Him looking at you knowing everything about you, non judgmental, all loving, caring, not fearful at all, wanting to give you everything, if you were willing to accept it, and then sacrifice for it yourself. And isn’t us not leaving everything worldly behind at that encounter the same as the rich young man turning around and leaving?
Great question. I also struggled with this. I believe Jonathan is overthinking it here. I attended a talk with Iain McGilchrist, who said that he believes laughter is one of the reasons to live. I agree with him. It can be twisted, of course, but it can also be a great expression of joy.
I can confidently say that I probably wouldn't still be alive if I wasn't blessed with a sense of humor and the capacity for laughter. The idea that Christ never laughed because humor can be corrupted fail ti recognize that literally every good thing meant for our blessing by God is a thing that can be corrupted, so that isn't really a valid argument.
I actually agree about Jesus being depicted as laughing far too much and it absolutely signifies that we dont understand Christ in the popular culture. People would take that as a sternness when that is not the case at all. I was thinking about the real righteous role of humor, and that is to tear down idols, and laughter is the expulsion of the tension that the idol brought. Thats why in humor, one of the core elements is this tension between silliness and seriousness. Its why the Joker is so corrupt as a character. "Why so serious?" Because he takes nothing seriously or as sacred. The Joker is actually one of the most truly satanic comic book villains, because he is the most antialigned with anything resembling order. This understanding of comedy also brings around God's sense of humor, constantly mercifully breaking down all the things that we take too seriously.
Excellent analysis. An interesting point I would add about the Joker is that for a guy that calls himself "the Joker," he often isn't very funny. You can't be funny if you have no connection whatsoever to the truth, which affirms your point about Joker being a satanic villain. It's also why he's such a "good" villain. The best and longest lasting fictional characters, heroes or villains, become iconic because something about them rings fundamentally true with reality.
The Joker is an agent of chaos. Chaos is the opposite or order. Batman brings order. You can't have one without the other. They are two sides of the same coin.
It's too funny that you also talked about the accidental, uncontrolled loss of air or spirit when laughing, farting, etc. before and then you sneeze during this video at 3:48 hahaha
He talked about it at the beginning of the video "Deconstructing the Fall of Adam and Eve - Jonathan Pageau" with Alex O'Connor by the way for anyone interested.
To marvel at something can just mean "to be impressed by" in the same way you can marvel at something beautiful. You're not surprised by it but it is still remarkable. I think that was the point.
@garrettkalinowski7618 i get your point, and you might be right to some extent, but I'm inclined to disagree. If you're already familiar with and already know how beautiful and impressive something is, you don't marvel and find the same amazement toward it that you did when you're first exposed to it. Anything that you continue to be amazed at has further depths of its goodness, truth, and beauty to be discovered and explored. That's why people who risk taking good and beautiful things for granted. They grow too familiar and don't find good and impressive things as good and impressive as they really are.
I’ve heard it said once as a criticism to people who are constantly overanalyzing what it means for Jesus to weep: “Just behold the Man weep!” I think the same principle would apply to Him having a good laugh every now and then.
I guarantee Yeshua laughed. He let the children hang out with him, teased women (called one a puppy), probably was teasing one when he observed she had had 8 husbands (rather than sternly judging her), etc. GOD HAS A SENSE OF HUMOR.
I'm not sure that I would interpret everything exactly as you have, but I do agree with your conclusion. God very clearly has a sense of humor, and those incapable of laughter are missing a healthy and important piece of the human experience. If Christ was fully human, he was capable of laughter just as much as he was capable of sorrow.
Mark 7:26-30 ESV [26] Now the woman was a Gentile, a Syrophoenician by birth. And she begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. [27] And he said to her, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” [28] But she answered him, “Yes, Lord; yet even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” [29] And he said to her, “For this statement you may go your way; the demon has left your daughter.” [30] And she went home and found the child lying in bed and the demon gone. This isn't teasing, it's a statement of fact relating to the Jewish people being above the gentiles under the old covenant.
He may have never laughed, but he said many funny things and surely amused those around him. He was funny in an absurd way, like when he asked people if they would give stones to a child who asks for bread. That's an absurd question, and a funny one, which catches you off guard and makes you pay attention to the message.
I always start with whether or not something is a per se good. Laughter is obviously a per se good, and regarding your Gervais example, I think it is pretty clear why; there is a catharsis in the revelation of an internal incongruity. We are reveling in the joy of understanding that something is actually absurd. Of course, this is also why one has to be careful with humor; humor can be deployed to demonstrate something as absurd that isn't.
You have to define good though because things that seem good to man are often evil. Pleasure etc. not inherently but in the way humans create idols and attachments to these things
Lots of laughter is actually bad for the soul. That doesn’t mean humor and laughter is bad though. Just as a glass of wine at a feast is not bad but drunkenness is
@@thecrow4597 no one‘s arguing that Jesus excessively laughed, though. He probably laughed as much as the average person. The only people who don’t laugh at all are the stoics and the bitter.
There is constructive humor where you use jokes like proverbs to show a contradiction or an unhealthy imbalance in the "serious" or normative pattern and there is also poisonous cynical humor that is used to well poison and annihilate the main pattern instead of correcting or balancing it (like a medic trying to cut off an entire arm because the patient has a small finger pain, no arm no finger pain and therefore no problem). Well there is also a third kind of humor which is North American 21th century stand up comedy which is neiglhter constructive nor destructive but just unfunny (I'm from Europe and I'm not fan of this genre). Let's not reduce millenia of decent humor in all civilisations including in the modern age to the recent degradation of all art forms including satire. The Medieval Goliardic poetry is funny but the reproduced music sounds very serious (probably the Carmina Burana).
@@thecrow4597 for everything there is a season. As it applies here. When when something is worth laughing over. Cry when something is worth crying over.
The amount of people that find this so hard shows that how much we are soaked in a culture of “fun” and entertainment. Christ was an extremely serious person. God is an extremely serious person. God kills people sometimes and executes His wrath on nations, He takes our own salvation and holiness far more seriously than we do. There are things in the world that bring us joy and Christ probably smiled and enjoyed himself and His friends, but He had a mission and He was eager to fulfil it. He still has a mission and we need to take our lives more seriously and not treat everything like a joke. People want relatable Jesus to the point where it strips Him of the status of the most dignified, Holy and in control of Himself person who ever walked the Earth. EDIT: Another thought I had was the way people think about Christ’s humanity is they bring it down to their level. They have sex and have sexual desire and are usually married so they find it uncomfortable that Jesus and St Paul say it is better to be celibate. They have many possessions even if it’s pretty humble so they find it uncomfortable when Jesus says “sell all you have and give it to the poor.” They laugh all the time so they find it hard to hear Jesus saying “Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh. “Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.” Christ is perfect, you are not, just because He didn’t do things you do which aren’t necessarily sins, like owning property, having holy sex, laughing appropriately doesn’t mean He wasn’t fully human.
You speak as though taking life seriously and having a sense of humor are antithetical concepts. Don't forget the words of the wisest man who ever lived. There's a season for everything, including a time for laughter. Everything belongs in its proper place.
@ Solomon was the wisest man of his time. Even Solomon didn’t have the fullness of Wisdom that the Church has with the Revelation of Christ. That verse is talking about things of human life, not blessing all of those things as eternal virtues or goods. For me as a fallen man yes there is a time for laughter but for the perfect man, He only did what was for our salvation laughing at His creation wasn’t one of them according to the Fathers.
I've heard people even go as far to say our Lord never even smiled. What do you think of that? I understand St. John Chrysostom and St. Basil said that He never laughed but I've heard others extend the notion of Christ's serious demeanor even further.
@@ethanfung8814 I don’t know what it’s like to be Jesus I’m not sure. It doesn’t really bother me, He is the Creator of the Universe and it’s Judge, not some guru
When you see photos of Orthodox ascetics you see deep joy, peace, wisdom, and not uncommonly deep but reserved smiles. This is clearly how we know that Christ didn’t laugh. Joy and laughter in this sense are not the same while people often understandably associate joy with laughter.
“He who sits in the heavens laughs, the Lord has them in derision.” What would be the understanding of this? Psalm 2:4: “He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord has them in derision” Psalm 2:5: “Then he will speak to them in his wrath, and terrify them in his fury, saying, “I have set my king on Zion, my holy hill””
Yes this was the verse that came to mind for me? I would like some clarification circling this text? This is a question of wanting understanding not opposition!
All humor is rooted in suffering. It's one of the best defenses against pain and depression that the Lord has given us. Like the man said, "Shared pain is lessened, shared joy is increased; thus do we refute entropy."
@@garyhynesthat comedy shouldn’t be analyzed apart from the actual people doing it. Who are constantly being conditioned by the lowest common denominator in a crowd, and a culture of unscrupulous skid row types.
Would be kinda hard to laugh when you know the punchline but I think he did laugh, just that the gospel writers had bigger fish to fry in telling the story than to capture Jesus in every situation.
If you don't think it's possible to laugh when you already know the punchline, you must have never repeated a good joke/funny story or watched a comedy film or show more than once, because you absolutely can. This is definitely one of those topics where people who don't have much of a sense of humor aren't really the best people to speak with any level of authority on the subject.
@ There’s a difference between laughing as a result of novel experience and retelling a funny story or joke to experience the joke with others, there’s a distinction between the type of humor. This is the definitely one of those topics where people who don’t understand comedic nuance, structure, and how humor actually functions aren’t really the best people to speak with any level of authority on the subject.
The context is always important. Jokes of and the laughter that comes with the intent to tear us down and brings mockery to the horrible circumstances always seems to hit the hardest why may that be?
The numerous funny coincidences, impossibilities orchestrated in my own little personal life convinced me that God has a great sense of humour! I am sure Jesus appreciated jokes and teases (what good can come from Nazareth,after all??) and I hope to see his beautiful smile one day!
I read somewhere that the devil hates jokes. If that’s true then innocent, light-hearted laughter irritates the devil. I strongly believe Christ laughed in his life for innocent, light-hearted jokes or situations.
This is almost certainly true. It's why tyrants censor and persecute humor and comedians so enthusiastically. This is because you cannot be really funny unless what you're saying is dialed into the truth about reality on some fundamental level. If Satan is the father of lies, this is why evil, corrupt, and oppressive societies censor humor and persecute comedians. Sure, humor can be used for evil, but so can every other good thing given by God.
Genuine question: If Christ is an icon of the Father, And the Psalms depict God as laughing, Would it appropriate to see Christ laughing in a sort of controlled yet natural appropriate and natural (“response vs. reaction.”) Also, speaking of “willed passions,” by what mode is it willed; a conscious decision from moment to moment, or in his decision to become man and thus embraced man’s blameless passions. “What is not assumed is not redeemed.” Also, take into account that via the hypostatic union, he has two wills and two intellects, the Divine and human. Obviously the divine is unable to be surprised, as it knows all, but would it be possible and not impious to suggest that perhaps in his humanity he could be surprised? (Speculating, not making an apologetic statement.) Thanks. I do believe that He possessed a gravitas, yet not one opposed to tenderness. Somehow, in that mystical reality of His perfection, they coexist.
St Isaac says in the kingdom of God the language we will speak is silence we will communicate with love and words will not be necessary everything will be present a sense of deep fulfillment.
I read a Bible study once that focused on the humor used by Jesus and it explained how much of the original humor he used got lost in translation and especially in the massive differences between ancient/classical cultures and modern.
Two situations where I expect Christ at least smiled: 1. When he put forward a child to show apostles. 2. When he was asking disciples going to Emaus what appened in Jerusalem that moved them so much. And then disciples told Him that He ist the only person who don't know what happened (His cruicifixon).
Pondering this post. 🧐 Who am I to question Chrysotom and his teachings, so I will give this great consideration. But my thoughts go to examples in Proverbs.... About a Merry heart , laughter, joy and being delighted like a child . God certainly made man with a sense of humor, and all He has made is declared good . Like all things in our human disposition, there is a created , fallen and eventually a redeemed aspect to our lives and choices . We being joined to Christ, continually pursue the redeemed aspect of our humor , in tone, quaintly and subject matters being some . Though, Jesus in His Earthly ministry was on a mission, and being funny wasn't His purpose, I never saw this as evidence that He has something against humor in general. There is a time and place for everything . Wisdom and discernment come in handy in times like these . Glory to God in all things
Slipping out of his tunic to run away? Sure it can seem cartoonish. But if you’ve seen a flogging or a crucifixion or two, it’s no joke. I’ve seen people do just that, in harsh places in the world, so I never thought it was a joke.
I think Norm MacDonald said it best when he said something like "sometimes I just laugh and laugh, and I laugh so hysterically and uncontrollably that I cant stop laughing and it becomes like existential dread and I'll have a terrible panic attack." Life does seem like one big cosmic joke sometimes
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"There was some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it was His mirth.” - GK Chesterton, Orthodoxy
Every time some absurd positive synchronicity happens it cracks me up so good; “God works out all things for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.” And it’s actually crazy funny when the absurd turns into blessing somehow
I always imagine Jesus letting out a small chuckle in Luke 22: And the men that held Jesus mocked him, and beat him. And they blindfolded him, and asked him, saying: “If you are Christ, prophesy - who struck thee?” Lord have mercy.
It would be interesting to do a longer dialogue about this topic. Exploring Jesters and the purpose of this kind of entertainment in history. How it intertwines with comic relief today with a lens in Christianity. The idea that Christ didn’t laugh certainly has me thinking. Thank you for your thoughts, Jonathan!
The events in the Bible happened with dangerous, evil people and events that weren't a laughing matter. But Christ will laugh with me, God willing. We will both giggle with joy that I made it into His Kingdom. We will finally be together.
Christ never rides a camel in the scriptures either. The fact it is not contained in scripture should not lead us to believe it didn't happen. "And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written. Amen." John 21:25
Your best point seems to be “we are drowning in jokes.” We are indeed too attached to making light of things, and a school of stand up comedy is completely absurd. BUT, if we weren’t drowning in jokes, I think the Mirth of God would be easier to see. Laughter is bigger than jokes. When we are overwhelmed with joy to the point of laughter (or tears), SOMETIMES it seems like something more virtuous than “lack of self control” going on.
Just because the Bible doesn’t say Jesus laughed, doesn’t mean He didn’t. It’s weird to assume He didn’t laugh. The Bible also doesn’t talk about our Lord’s morning poop, but we know He did it. Laughter is human, and Jesus was human. Logic.
But that is not the argument. The comment about the Bible was part of a broader point about the meaning of laughter. I'm not saying I agree with the tradition, I probably don't, but that wasn't the argument.
@@issaavedra The title of the video implies Christ didn’t laugh, and the only way to derive that implication is from the Bible. You seem to be trying really hard to disagree with me, but to no avail. Chill.
@@ghostgate82 But the implication could be derive in others ways other than "it is not mentioned, therefore it didn't happen". For example, if from the Bible be know Christ is Divine and understood everything in creation, and we define laughter as "an involuntary reaction when we encounter something we don't understand", Christ couldn't laugh by definition. Again, I don't know if I agree with the proposition, I don't know what laughter is. What I do know, is that you initial "refutation" is a strawman.
Jesus certainly said funny things. I always think of the sermon on the mount where our Lord admonished us to worry about the "log" in our own eyes versus the "sawdust" in our brother's. That verse has always made me laugh a little inside because of the humorous imagery. And yet it sticks with me because of that.
hmmm, laughter is also an expression of joy or even intimacy, like playing with a baby. Laughter exists as something distinct from joking. Wouldn't weeping be a corollary expression of emotion to laughter; that we lose control of ourselves in a similar way to laughter? I don't find it a stretch at all that if Christ weeps, there surely would have been laughter with close friends.
Some things Jesus said are simultaneously heartbreaking and humorous. I think of John 10:32 especially: "I have shown you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you going to stone me?" (ESV) There are also moments with the disciples that are humorously absurd, like Peter's response to the Transfiguration (even though, yes he was terrified.) But with all this, we have to keep in mind that in terms of genre, we are talking about ancient biographies/Greco-Roman lives. Normal things subjects of such works do are less likely to make it into the accounts, rather, the accounts will emphasize important sayings, actions and so on. Add to the this the eyewitness dynamic - what's more important to pass on to/within an early Jesus community? That time Jesus raised your daughter from the dead, or that time He laughed at a joke?
This is almost impossible for westerners, probably just american and Canadians, to wrap their minds around. So many think its literally inhuman not to laugh. But if youve ever met like half of men in the third world youd find how common not smiling and laughing is.
Jesus makes a pun in scripture if I remember correctly. It's in the calling of Nathanael 'Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no deceit!' which is a pun based on his tribe.
Jesus actually told jokes. He was an accomplished stand up and, as the Second Person of the Trinity, he knew exactly what made people chuckle. The problem is that the gags lost a lot in translation from the Aramaic.
when you finally reach God's unfathomable doorstep and you meet his unseenable Eye of velocity there is nothing else to do but be turned into that ultimate LAUGHTER inthroughout God's pleated mansions bliss and stillness no laughter, no doorway 🐙🐳🐬🦉🦅💫🕊️
Unfortunately that movie is not typically regarded well in Orthodox Circles from what I have seen. I, for my part, believe it is an excellent film that should probably only be watched during penitential seasons such as the Thursday and Friday before Pascha.
0:42 everyone is saying “Just because it’s not in the scripture, doesn’t mean he didn’t laugh!” There’s a different between A: it’s not in the scripture, therefore it didn’t happen. And B: It’s not in the scripture, therefore we can’t know from scripture that it happened. Obviously Jonathan is not saying A. He’s just saying the scripture doesn’t tell us that he laughed, so scripture isn’t going to settle the question explicitly. Also, it’s possible that Jesus didn’t laugh during his earthly life, because of the gravity of his calling. But I could imagine him laughing in heaven or even after the resurrection.
saying christ has no unconscious processes, if he's fully man, and much of our brain function controls unconscious processes, seems odd. did christ breathe, blink, have a heartbeat, digest food, and grow from baby to adult? and how do we have this brain if christ didn't? are we more evolved than christ? i'd just admit he laughed.
Christ is known as 'the man of sorrows', and there is (perhaps) an important detail noted in the shortest verse in the bible, John 11:35. However, we only have what the authors of the bible considered worth writing. In my opinion, the idea of the blind leading the blind had to raise a smile or two, if not laughter- it's clearly ridiculous. Beyond that, it seems logical that humans would have the capacity to laugh because we are image bearers of our Creator.
One can control when one gives into laughter… in most cases I would say. I get the point about the nature of laughter but it can be taken too far. The idea that Christ didn’t partake of that basic human experience (which is really defining of humanity… do lower animals laugh? Do angels laugh), is pretty hard to believe.
Actually yes, animals of higher intelligence like primates, dolphins, dogs, and horses do exhibit the animal equivalent of laughter, particularly during play. It's an inherent part of being a biological animal, so to speak, meaning that it's a fundamental aspect of what it means to be fully human.
@ I would argue that what happens in other animals is really something like “proto-laughter”. I wouldn’t doubt it bears some relation to our own physiology of laughter, but that it’s in the same category I would doubt. Humor to me seems intrinsically related to our reason, the capacity to “step outside” the stream of experience and view it “from above”.
I am not sure I agree the young man running naked in Mark is a joke. I agree it is a reference to the Fall and shame/nakeness, which Noah's post-Flood drunkenness recapitulates, meaning that he is not the last Adam, but which Joseph's innocent nakedness running from Potiphar's house also recapitulates, but this time the man resists the forbidden fruit but is imprisoned for the woman's crime (thus, it is part of the cruciform picture of what the last Adam will look like)! What I think Mark is doing is setting up a quasi-self-insert/cypher feature to the text, which works like this: Previously, man betrayed God in a garden and was exposed, hiding his nakedness. The place of life and abundance became the place of death. Now, that happens again (in Gethsemane instead of Eden), but this time, mankind can be clothed by the death of God (notice the lone speaker, CLOTHED in white), a tomb becomes a womb, the place of death becomes the place of life. The young man shows both the depth of human loss and the height of human potential through Jesus's death and resurrection.
I think we need to ask the question whether Christ as a human felt divine emotions and or/emotions of the flesh. Divine emotions as in joy and rejoicing that comes through faith, or divine anger or mourning that drives repentance. I think the moment Christ flipped the table was an act of divine anger rather than human emotion. The moment he sat weeping before heading to the crucifixion was one of purely human emotion, fear. He rejoiced when he rose from the dead, an emotion only the divine knows. There may be something to him never being in his flesh when he laughed, but since the Bible spent so little time focusing on his emotional reactions to things we wouldn’t know he never laughed in that way. The best we can do is posit how Christ reacted by our own reactions if we read these stories with the Holy Spirit residing in us and don’t let our worldly thinking get in the way.
Interesting speculation, but stuff like this is definitely territory where more people need to have enough humility to say, "I don't know." While I certainly value doctrine and believe it to be necessary, many things we label as doctrine are, if truth be told and if everybody had more humility, are things we don't actually know and have no way of knowing with any degree of certainty on this side of eternity.
"You have loved righteousness [You have DELIGHTED in integrity, virtue, and uprightness in purpose, thought, and action] and You have hated lawlessness (injustice and iniquity). Therefore God, [even] Your God (Godhead), has anointed You with the oil of exultant JOY and GLADNESS above and beyond Your companions." - Hebrews 1:9 AMPC I'd venture to say Jesus laughed. 😂
As a Millennial, I think the problem with my generation is a complete inability to take anything seriously. Ten years ago I would have thought it was youthfulness, but now that I'm in my early 30's and realize my generation has not grown out of it I see it is endemic. It's a kind of post-modernism that is not self-aware - we are not a consciously degenerative generation like the Boomers and Xers were, but we are a compulsively degenerative one, which is possibly worse. I guess he's probably considered Gen X, but obviously views himself as more consciously Millennial, but just look at Elon Musk, who seemingly can't hold any positive view on anything without devolving into a smear of tired memes and irony. Your example about the joke in Scripture is pretty apt. I was reading the Canterbury Tales a few months ago and was struck by the potty humor in The Miller's Tale. I think you touch on something accurate that well-ordered jokes tend to be a comeuppance for disordered behavior. In the case of Scripture, it is the man not willing to stand by Christ that literally lays him bare. Today's comedy is built completely on dismantling any hierarchy, meaning, or sincerity.
Idk, maybe you're onto something, but I think what you might be mistaking as an inability to take anything seriously is little more than just a coping mechanism for the fact that Millenials (and a lot of Gen Z as well) are much too self serious as a consequence of the doom, gloom, and pressimism that we've been propagandized with for our entire lives.
So long as man is still facing damnation and this life continues there is nothing to laugh at. Christ was serious here on Earth because this life is deadly serious and only a lapse in how truly horrific we have fallen allows us to laugh. Christ knows the intensity of this life, he wasn’t going around cracking jokes.
Proof of the humor of the creator is clearly manifest in the existence of the platypus
LOL
But not Perry, right?
By him and through him all things were made. He was a man of sorrows acquainted with grief.
He made the opossum, The platypus, have you ever watched an armadillo play?
I haven’t watched the whole video, but I’m assuming the issue isn’t that Christ never actually laughed, but rather that he’s never shown in the scripture to have?
Dogma reference, nice
@@MeladonessableI knew I heard that somewhere😅
i really get tired of people removing/ignoring the humanity of Christ.
i get equally tired of people downplaying/disrespecting the divinity of Christ.
i do understand both though. it's hard for our human brains to really comprehend a being fully of two natures.
I'm tired of people speculating so much on Jesus beyond scripture. His humanity can be seen in scripture and His divinity.
Read again your comment and think if there is anything worth considering a change
It is not removing his humanity. Joy doesnt mean making jokes. Christ was joyful.
@@theangryslav9115 humans make jokes. Christ, a human, made jokes
@theangryslav9115 how can you say Jesus was not making jokes? Its not written in the Bible. Well there you are in sola scripture yourself lol
God created the fart.
And made it noisy, lol
Jesus farted and that offends people
Yes he was fully man, and fully God. He definitely passed gas and pooped in the desert.
He pooped, too! 💩
🤫 🤪
@@jamestaillon4781 everybody poops
This reminds me of G. K. Chesterton saying Christ's mirth was the only thing He hid from us, mercifully so.
But does Chesterton’s point go so far as to say he “never laughed?” Was it a certain level of mirth he hid from us? His divine mirth, maybe? I find it very hard to believe he connected with people so deeply and had such good friendships and never once laughed.
"The tremendous figure which fills the Gospels towers in this respect, as in every other, above all the thinkers who ever thought themselves tall. His pathos was natural, almost casual. The Stoics, ancient and modern, were proud of concealing their tears. He never concealed His tears; He showed them plainly on His open face at any daily sight, such as the far sight of His native city. Yet He concealed something. Solemn supermen and imperial diplomatists are proud of restraining their anger. He never restrained His anger. He flung furniture down the front steps of the Temple, and asked men how they expected to escape the damnation of Hell. Yet He restrained something. I say it with reverence; there was in that shattering personality a thread that must be called shyness. There was something that He hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was something that He covered constantly by abrupt silence or impetuous isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it was His mirth." -GK Chesterton, Orthodoxy
i dont fully understand why Christ would hide his mirth, to be honest. But it maybe has to do with his mission and our salvation, as everything regarding his incarnation does. Maybe his hapiness, God's laughter is something that only the saints in heaven could bear.
@IsaacEstrada12 AI summed it up nicely for me:
G.K. Chesterton addressed the idea of Jesus never laughing in The Everlasting Man and other writings. He argued that while the Gospels do not record Jesus laughing, it is not because He lacked joy or humor, but because the sacred texts focus on His mission and sacrifice. Chesterton believed that Christ's silence on laughter is not a denial of humor but a reflection of His immense gravity in redeeming humanity.
Chesterton also implied that the joy of Christ is so profound that it transcends casual laughter. In Orthodoxy, he famously remarked that there was a "hidden mirth" in Christ, writing:
> "There was something that He hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was something that He covered constantly by abrupt silence or impetuous isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it was His mirth."
Chesterton viewed Christ as the embodiment of ultimate joy and love, qualities deeper than mere outward expressions like laughter. His silence on laughter reflects the ineffable mystery of His divine mission, not a lack of humor or joy.
It is a mercy to hide mirth? Why?
@@stevendouglas3781 im not sure of it myself. But, maybe his hapiness would revel to us, as sinners, our own sadness or misery. And who could then bear the hapiness of God?
He was fully God and fully Human. With that came the full range of human emotions. Children would not have enjoyed his company if he didn’t crack a smile or laugh or exhibited humor.
Strongly agree.
@@dohope4554 your definition of human is gnostic
@@dohope4554 there is nothing wrong with “making fun of life”. Children “make fun of life” all the time. It’s called “play”. Drop the gnostic worldview of seeing our current human experience as something inferior to the ultimate reality. It’s demonic.
@@dohope4554 just to clarify, there’s a difference between making fun of something in a playful kind of way versus making fun of something in a mocking way.
@@dohope4554 and yet, if that’s true, then those gnostics are contradicting themselves because they don’t believe Christ was human. As for me, every time I witness something beautiful and I am deeply moved by that reality to the point of weeping or laughing or both, that is not evil. That is Holy. That is Human. How dare you think otherwise. Enough with your demonic human abstractions. Learn to embrace the humanity God has given you that Christ affirms eternally.
The Gospels not following the Marvel Cinematic Universe formula doesn't mean Christ never laughed.
This.
Yea, monks disdain a lot of these aspects of life. I heard some hearsay that Jesus never walked into a house with music playing.
Which is ridiculous! Because I’m sure music was played in the temple.
@@Joefrenomics It's overzealotry for the Cross, born of a pharisaical sense of what holiness is. Granted and emphatically affirmed that there is a deep need for penance and mortification in this life, it does not therefore follow that one treat consolations, pleasures, comforts, and other good things as a curse. That's either putting on airs or, worse, a stubborn rejection of blessings as evil. True, they often are enticments away from the love of God and neighbor, but that only means that you're bad at receiving the good things of the Lord in the land of the living... means that you need to get good at it... that you need practice, say, listening to music for the sake of God rather than yourself.
“Erm, so that just happened…”
Weird how some say Jesus never laughed when he wept. Emotions took over Jesus Lazarus died despite Jesus being God and knowing he'd resurrect him.
The idea of Jesus living a human life and communing with people but never laughing is strange to me.
He would have been completely alien to them if he was literally incapable of laughter. Most people don't like to be around normal humans entirely capable of laughter but have no sense of humor. Those who don't know how to laugh are often maladjusted and not well rounded or grounded individuals. They have no full understanding or appreciation for the full scope of the human experience.
Emotions did not "take over" Jesus when he wept. That would be to imply He lost control. I think that is the meaning Jonathan is trying to say. I don't think crying when you see a group of people grieving is the same as laughing. Laughing is sort of an uncontrolled response. He probably smiled when finding something humorous.
@@nancyann1090or maybe… He laughed. Crying that is “completely controlled” is false, it is pretend and not the genuine outpouring of emotion as the weeping of The Lord is described. There is a limit of course, I doubt Christ would laugh so hard as to be incapacitated or laugh at inappropriate things, just as He did not drink so much as to become incapacitated or drink at inappropriate times.
Perhaps The Father does not laugh, or “laughs” in a way that is unrelatable to us.
I don't understand why God went through the whole effort of being completely human just for man to philosophize about his nature centuries later with "no, he probably was *super* human: didn't cry as a baby--didn't laugh."
😂😂 it’s dumb. None of us know what it is to be human. We have gnostic ideal version of it.
Could not agree more. That's why I think a lot of (note I didn't say all) theological divisions just reduced people to arrogant naval gazing the further you go from the earliest ecumenical councils. There are absolutely doctrinal lines in the sand that need to be drawn because we need to be able to define who we are and who we worship, but more high minded philosophers and theologians need to learn to be more comfortable with the phrase, "I don't know." Appreciate the fact that some things are simply beyond our finite knowledge and understanding, and extend more grace to other people where disagreements occur.
@@MattisWell.20 Gnosticism has nothing to do with it. Lol.
@@Tyler_W amen to that!
He was human but without the consequences of the fall
Well he did say that "even tax collectors will enter into the kingdom before the lawyers" as Matthew, a tax collector, is one of his disciples...that is complex sarcastic humor. Whether he laughed or not, I can imagine he said that with a wink and a smile or he is just being cruel to Matt.
oh yeah that is funny
Don’t forget the whole pulling a coin out of a fish’s mouth incident
@@calebbrunson7120 everything involving Peter always came across as funny to me. I can just imagine the stupid look on his face when Christ says “get behind me, Satan!” Jesus is always inverting the structure in a humorous way. Not sure why J Pageau is so hung up on this Christ never laughed thing
@Messianic-Gentile not sure if laughing is necessary. Some of the best comedians I know don't laugh at their jokes, they are not passified by their own humor...that said I also know comedians like Billy Connolly that can't tell a joke that doesn't "make himself laugh".
I think the point Pageau is making is that Jesus was impassable as fully God, and laughter is often a spontaneous reaction to external stimulus..."making" the person laugh. So being humorous and laughing are not mutually inclusive things...People can laugh with no sense of humor and Jesus could have perfect humor and not laugh. For me, "Jesus Wept", choosing to experience loss and grief for a friend...is problematic. Any point i have heard regarding "Jesus never laughed and this is why..." seems undermined by "Jesus wept."
It's funny you say that because that line always stood out to me from the Sermon on the Mount as humorous. The other one was the camel through the eye of the needle analogy.
Weeping is also a loss of control. I see it as the inverse of laughter. Christ wept more than once.
I don't think laughter is exclusively the result of surprise. I still laugh at comedy shows ive seen many times.
I think laughter is a physical way to fully embrace the humor of something and enjoy it. It's also a way to share a joyful experience with others. In fact, sometimes I laugh joyfully when i hear really great news about people. Its a way of rejoicing.
It would stretch the claim that He was fully man if He never laughed.
I agree completely.
I agree with this, I would add that it seems to me the reason an emotional action, such as, weeping was integrated into the telling of the gospels and the life of Christ, was to reflect the seriousness of the message. There is a difference in meaning when someone is somber and serious, vs when someone is jovial and laughing. It a still affords Him equal space for His Humanity and His Divinity.
Agreed...the surprise argument to support Jesus not laughing would also have apply to weeping. I also think of God talking to Moses through the burning bush. Moses keeps trying to reject God choosing him and eventually God gets angry. God seemed to relate to Moses in the moment, but He couldn't have been surprised at how Moses was acting. I don't know for sure of course, but I can imagine weeping and laughter would be another way Jesus chose to relate to us in the moment.
I think laughter shows a gap between you and the fullness of something. You experience it either by surprise or considering it more deeply. Christ has no gaps and whatever is funny about a topic was already perfectly understood by the logos when He created it.
Amen. To be fully human means He definitely did laugh.
The Bible never says he took a crap, does that mean he never pooped?
Gnostics be like:
@@writerblocks9553 According to some Christians ironically yes. There was a whole group that tried to justify this belief by saying that he ate only ambrosia and honey.
@@denniszaychik8625But he also ate fish with his apostles
Him and the bears
@@drfoust1294 and bread
Eh, it never mentions him trimming his nails, scratched an itch or got a sunburn. Is this to say these things didn't happen? Or merely didn't make it into the text?
He’s saying the Bible doesn’t tell us that he laughed, so we don’t have the answer to our question in the Bible. He isn’t saying that anything that isn’t in the Bible didn’t happen.
I'm sure he did laugh. But most likely it was laughter that comes from joy or seeing tender moments, like a child playing
also dont mention if Jesus poop or piss..
@@psyche8187 title: “Christ didn’t laugh”
@nerychristian You know more than Chrysostum and the tradition of the church?
The reason people who hate the truth don't like comedy is because it very often reveals the truth. People will involuntarily give away what they really think through laughter. In a totalitarian state comics are usually the first to go.
Is this a bot comment
@@SandyCheeks1896 no, just something interesting that you find with totalitarian state. Satirists are not very popular.
@@SandyCheeks1896 is this an ignorant person comment? I’ll just answer, yes yes it most certainly is
@@JayBThomas I have no idea what it has to do with the topic of the video. The video mentions comedy but it seems like something a bot would do. Identify the element of comedy being discussed in the title and leave a comment relevant to comedy, but completely disconnected from the topic of the video. I understood the comment, I understood the video, but the video was not about political use or censorship of comedy. Whoever left it seems to have wanted to start an entirely different convo unrelated to the video.
@SandyCheeks1896 By observing that totalitarians do not like comedy, the commenter implies that religious people or institutions that don't like comedy are likely to be totalitarian.
I agree. People and institutions that cannot abide humor and laughter are completely closed to others' points of view; they do not want new information. They blaspheme by assuming all-knowingness.
I’m not sure what I think about this topic, but I do know that priests / pastors could afford to tell at least 20000% fewer jokes.
Man thank you, you described 90% of the reason why I dread going to church. It feels like they’re treating me like someone who needs to be entertained
@@emilyawood Are you Orthodox?
Depends on the Priest or the pastor really.
Some take it to far. Some try to be funny. Some might throw a joke in once in awhile.
My priest tells a joke about 3 times a year and they’re usually very wholesome. He’s an 82 year old Saintly Eastern Catholic priest.
Very true problem within the church [any denomination]. This need to be addressed more.
An argument from silence.
?
This comment is evidence the western mind is broken
If He didn’t laugh, then He wasn’t human.
This exactly. Those without a sense of humor don't have a very full appreciation of the human experience. They're also frequently maladjusted and aren't very grounded or well rounded individuals. To laugh is to be human just as much as crying.
@@Tyler_WAbsence of laughter is not proof that one lacks a sense of humor.
This is not true. I know people who do not laugh and they are very human.
Asceticism is not sanctity.
It necessarily is. By definition
@@thecrow4597 no it's not
it can potentially become sanctity but ascetiscism for the sake of asceticism I agree it's not. There are some excesses in some Christian individual ascetics who in my opinion are Augustinian crypto manicheans (radical division and separation between creator and creature to the point of having the Catholic Church in the 1600s calling theologically orthodox mystics as Pantheists and even doubting female devotional literature from actual canonised female saints from previous centuries becuase a faction of radical clerics percevied them to be witches) or gnostics where they deny the world so much as to percieve it as evil, it betrays an escapism and in Western Christainity (in some instances in Eastern Christianity too) there are countless examples of radical escapism in Medieval literature. Many Medieval authors wanted heaven so much and judged the body as wordly and inherently evil or gross like for example the founder of the Norbertine order where 3 monks died becuase of the severity of discipline (Medival self flagellation which for me is pathological and heritical). There is also the risk of self denying as an unconscious mean to self aggrandise, someone denies himself for publicity or even to compete with other ascetics (a rare occurance but still).
Asceticism of some form is required for salvation. A mind who does not participate in asceticism does not have its nous oriented to God. As St Seraphim of Sarov says, “A Christian who does not fast is not a Christian.”
therefore 95% of humanity is screwed because they wont get the ticket to heaven (heaven is not the destination and without earth it’s completely sterile) Nietzsche was right in pointing the inherent nihilism of some versions of Christianity where you hope for a ticket and escape in an unrealised and abstract heaven, too much escapism. Some form of self control and sacrifice even if small is necessary and every religion advocates for that but too many Christian (not all traditions but still) have inherited Zoroastrian or Manichean metaphysics with the devil having more independent existence and power than in the Jewish tradition which can generate paranoias and scapegoating and paradoxically makes you more exposed to evil influences. The true Christian eschatology is closer to the Semitic understanding with new heaven and EARTH and a resurrection and not going to heaven and floating in it. Life after death it’s not as dogmatically defined in Orthodoxy and remans a mystery like the universal salvation of all creation which is still a mystery and while it cannot be dogmatically confirmed one can still hope and pray for such an outcome. The less Persian metaphysics the better and while self sacrifice is necessary I think balance is also important in avoiding extremes and radical contempt for the natural world which betrays crypto gnostic dualism and the possibility of self aggrandising in the process of extreme self denying and escape which something some ascetics correctly pointed out.
He at least had comedic intent when He talked about a plank coming out of a person’s eye.
Sin causes foolishness, and foolishness is a kind of incongruity, which is a cause of laughter. Laughing at the foolishness of the wicked helps free our souls from their tyranny.
This is not to say that we shouldn’t take sin seriously; it is merely to say that we should hold seriousness in tension with some levity at sinful absurdity.
As the Psalms say,
“The One enthroned in heaven laughs; the Lord scoffs at them.
He rebukes them in his anger
and terrifies them in his wrath.”
Or when he said, "You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God, in order to keep your tradition!" (Mk 7:9). A clear, although rare, example of Christ's sarcasm.
Shows like The Chosen and many others go out of their way to show the human nature of Jesus, whereas very few modern depictions of Christ emphasize his divinity and the implications of it.
We couldn't even begin to represent how the God-Man would have acted in the most basic things: eye contact, body language, tone of voice, cadence, hand placement, etc. What would the perfect expression of all these little details truly look like in person?
It's true. Even the way Jonathan Roumie walks in The Chosen has me thinking "Surely God the Son almighty didn't walk like that."
And how would perfection incarnate walk anyway.
For Evangelicals, Jesus has to be like a typical Mega Church pastor; He has to entertain his audience.
I wondered about that too… how would meeting God in physical person be? Him looking at you knowing everything about you, non judgmental, all loving, caring, not fearful at all, wanting to give you everything, if you were willing to accept it, and then sacrifice for it yourself. And isn’t us not leaving everything worldly behind at that encounter the same as the rich young man turning around and leaving?
Right, because we have no way of representing divinity sufficiently, movie makers focus on Jesus’ humanity, which is understandable
A stoic depiction of Christ would promote toxic masculinity . . . and that would be very concerning.
Great question. I also struggled with this. I believe Jonathan is overthinking it here.
I attended a talk with Iain McGilchrist, who said that he believes laughter is one of the reasons to live. I agree with him. It can be twisted, of course, but it can also be a great expression of joy.
I can confidently say that I probably wouldn't still be alive if I wasn't blessed with a sense of humor and the capacity for laughter. The idea that Christ never laughed because humor can be corrupted fail ti recognize that literally every good thing meant for our blessing by God is a thing that can be corrupted, so that isn't really a valid argument.
I actually agree about Jesus being depicted as laughing far too much and it absolutely signifies that we dont understand Christ in the popular culture. People would take that as a sternness when that is not the case at all.
I was thinking about the real righteous role of humor, and that is to tear down idols, and laughter is the expulsion of the tension that the idol brought.
Thats why in humor, one of the core elements is this tension between silliness and seriousness.
Its why the Joker is so corrupt as a character. "Why so serious?" Because he takes nothing seriously or as sacred. The Joker is actually one of the most truly satanic comic book villains, because he is the most antialigned with anything resembling order.
This understanding of comedy also brings around God's sense of humor, constantly mercifully breaking down all the things that we take too seriously.
Excellent analysis. An interesting point I would add about the Joker is that for a guy that calls himself "the Joker," he often isn't very funny. You can't be funny if you have no connection whatsoever to the truth, which affirms your point about Joker being a satanic villain. It's also why he's such a "good" villain. The best and longest lasting fictional characters, heroes or villains, become iconic because something about them rings fundamentally true with reality.
The Joker is an agent of chaos. Chaos is the opposite or order. Batman brings order. You can't have one without the other. They are two sides of the same coin.
It's too funny that you also talked about the accidental, uncontrolled loss of air or spirit when laughing, farting, etc. before and then you sneeze during this video at 3:48 hahaha
He talked about it at the beginning of the video "Deconstructing the Fall of Adam and Eve - Jonathan Pageau" with Alex O'Connor by the way for anyone interested.
Jesus had some great one liners and a dry sense of humor. Example PP ‘so you’re the king of the Jews huh?’ JC ‘ if you say so sure’
That's for sure. I laughed out loud to some of his responses to people. Very witty.
Jesus's dunks on the pharisees always make me laugh.
When Christ saw the Faith of the Roman Centurion it states he marveled and was amazed by it. I am curious if this counts as such a suprise
Nice. Great point.
To marvel at something can just mean "to be impressed by" in the same way you can marvel at something beautiful. You're not surprised by it but it is still remarkable. I think that was the point.
How is that even close to laughter?
@garrettkalinowski7618 i get your point, and you might be right to some extent, but I'm inclined to disagree. If you're already familiar with and already know how beautiful and impressive something is, you don't marvel and find the same amazement toward it that you did when you're first exposed to it. Anything that you continue to be amazed at has further depths of its goodness, truth, and beauty to be discovered and explored. That's why people who risk taking good and beautiful things for granted. They grow too familiar and don't find good and impressive things as good and impressive as they really are.
To everything there is a season. I don't believe Christ never laughed.
I’ve heard it said once as a criticism to people who are constantly overanalyzing what it means for Jesus to weep: “Just behold the Man weep!” I think the same principle would apply to Him having a good laugh every now and then.
I guarantee Yeshua laughed. He let the children hang out with him, teased women (called one a puppy), probably was teasing one when he observed she had had 8 husbands (rather than sternly judging her), etc. GOD HAS A SENSE OF HUMOR.
I'm not sure that I would interpret everything exactly as you have, but I do agree with your conclusion. God very clearly has a sense of humor, and those incapable of laughter are missing a healthy and important piece of the human experience. If Christ was fully human, he was capable of laughter just as much as he was capable of sorrow.
Mark 7:26-30 ESV
[26] Now the woman was a Gentile, a Syrophoenician by birth. And she begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. [27] And he said to her, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” [28] But she answered him, “Yes, Lord; yet even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” [29] And he said to her, “For this statement you may go your way; the demon has left your daughter.” [30] And she went home and found the child lying in bed and the demon gone.
This isn't teasing, it's a statement of fact relating to the Jewish people being above the gentiles under the old covenant.
This issue of Christ not laughing came to me during a breakdown. The only time God laughs to hold people in derision.
He may have never laughed, but he said many funny things and surely amused those around him. He was funny in an absurd way, like when he asked people if they would give stones to a child who asks for bread. That's an absurd question, and a funny one, which catches you off guard and makes you pay attention to the message.
I always start with whether or not something is a per se good. Laughter is obviously a per se good, and regarding your Gervais example, I think it is pretty clear why; there is a catharsis in the revelation of an internal incongruity. We are reveling in the joy of understanding that something is actually absurd. Of course, this is also why one has to be careful with humor; humor can be deployed to demonstrate something as absurd that isn't.
You have to define good though because things that seem good to man are often evil. Pleasure etc. not inherently but in the way humans create idols and attachments to these things
Lots of laughter is actually bad for the soul. That doesn’t mean humor and laughter is bad though. Just as a glass of wine at a feast is not bad but drunkenness is
@@thecrow4597 no one‘s arguing that Jesus excessively laughed, though. He probably laughed as much as the average person. The only people who don’t laugh at all are the stoics and the bitter.
There is constructive humor where you use jokes like proverbs to show a contradiction or an unhealthy imbalance in the "serious" or normative pattern and there is also poisonous cynical humor that is used to well poison and annihilate the main pattern instead of correcting or balancing it (like a medic trying to cut off an entire arm because the patient has a small finger pain, no arm no finger pain and therefore no problem). Well there is also a third kind of humor which is North American 21th century stand up comedy which is neiglhter constructive nor destructive but just unfunny (I'm from Europe and I'm not fan of this genre). Let's not reduce millenia of decent humor in all civilisations including in the modern age to the recent degradation of all art forms including satire. The Medieval Goliardic poetry is funny but the reproduced music sounds very serious (probably the Carmina Burana).
@@thecrow4597 for everything there is a season. As it applies here. When when something is worth laughing over. Cry when something is worth crying over.
I wasn't going to watch your video Mr. Pageau but you are a good man I promise to listen open minded to what possibly you say in God's name.
The amount of people that find this so hard shows that how much we are soaked in a culture of “fun” and entertainment.
Christ was an extremely serious person. God is an extremely serious person. God kills people sometimes and executes His wrath on nations, He takes our own salvation and holiness far more seriously than we do.
There are things in the world that bring us joy and Christ probably smiled and enjoyed himself and His friends, but He had a mission and He was eager to fulfil it. He still has a mission and we need to take our lives more seriously and not treat everything like a joke. People want relatable Jesus to the point where it strips Him of the status of the most dignified, Holy and in control of Himself person who ever walked the Earth.
EDIT: Another thought I had was the way people think about Christ’s humanity is they bring it down to their level.
They have sex and have sexual desire and are usually married so they find it uncomfortable that Jesus and St Paul say it is better to be celibate.
They have many possessions even if it’s pretty humble so they find it uncomfortable when Jesus says “sell all you have and give it to the poor.”
They laugh all the time so they find it hard to hear Jesus saying “Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh. “Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.”
Christ is perfect, you are not, just because He didn’t do things you do which aren’t necessarily sins, like owning property, having holy sex, laughing appropriately doesn’t mean He wasn’t fully human.
You speak as though taking life seriously and having a sense of humor are antithetical concepts. Don't forget the words of the wisest man who ever lived. There's a season for everything, including a time for laughter. Everything belongs in its proper place.
@ Solomon was the wisest man of his time. Even Solomon didn’t have the fullness of Wisdom that the Church has with the Revelation of Christ.
That verse is talking about things of human life, not blessing all of those things as eternal virtues or goods. For me as a fallen man yes there is a time for laughter but for the perfect man, He only did what was for our salvation laughing at His creation wasn’t one of them according to the Fathers.
I've heard people even go as far to say our Lord never even smiled. What do you think of that? I understand St. John Chrysostom and St. Basil said that He never laughed but I've heard others extend the notion of Christ's serious demeanor even further.
@@ethanfung8814 I don’t know what it’s like to be Jesus I’m not sure. It doesn’t really bother me, He is the Creator of the Universe and it’s Judge, not some guru
You mentioned Mark running away naked, but the funniest part of the New Testament is the 7 sons of sceva story from acts; 😂😂
When you see photos of Orthodox ascetics you see deep joy, peace, wisdom, and not uncommonly deep but reserved smiles. This is clearly how we know that Christ didn’t laugh. Joy and laughter in this sense are not the same while people often understandably associate joy with laughter.
“He who sits in the heavens laughs, the Lord has them in derision.” What would be the understanding of this?
Psalm 2:4: “He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord has them in derision”
Psalm 2:5: “Then he will speak to them in his wrath, and terrify them in his fury, saying, “I have set my king on Zion, my holy hill””
Yes this was the verse that came to mind for me? I would like some clarification circling this text? This is a question of wanting understanding not opposition!
Well, that's also applicable to God the Father, Who is spirit. He cannot laugh physically.
All humor is rooted in suffering. It's one of the best defenses against pain and depression that the Lord has given us. Like the man said, "Shared pain is lessened, shared joy is increased; thus do we refute entropy."
The problem with stand-up comedy is the stand-up comics.
I have a hard head and didn't get that
The problem is also stand-up comedy itself and even humour as it is perceived in our times. Too much of it everywhere, everyday.
What does this even mean?
@@garyhynesthat comedy shouldn’t be analyzed apart from the actual people doing it. Who are constantly being conditioned by the lowest common denominator in a crowd, and a culture of unscrupulous skid row types.
Just like with anything, there are good and bad comics. Comedy is a spectrum that plays onto different levels of awareness. Comedy is subjective.
Would be kinda hard to laugh when you know the punchline but I think he did laugh, just that the gospel writers had bigger fish to fry in telling the story than to capture Jesus in every situation.
If you don't think it's possible to laugh when you already know the punchline, you must have never repeated a good joke/funny story or watched a comedy film or show more than once, because you absolutely can. This is definitely one of those topics where people who don't have much of a sense of humor aren't really the best people to speak with any level of authority on the subject.
@ There’s a difference between laughing as a result of novel experience and retelling a funny story or joke to experience the joke with others, there’s a distinction between the type of humor. This is the definitely one of those topics where people who don’t understand comedic nuance, structure, and how humor actually functions aren’t really the best people to speak with any level of authority on the subject.
The context is always important. Jokes of and the laughter that comes with the intent to tear us down and brings mockery to the horrible circumstances always seems to hit the hardest why may that be?
There is laughter of unconfined joy
The numerous funny coincidences, impossibilities orchestrated in my own little personal life convinced me that God has a great sense of humour! I am sure Jesus appreciated jokes and teases (what good can come from Nazareth,after all??) and I hope to see his beautiful smile one day!
I read somewhere that the devil hates jokes. If that’s true then innocent, light-hearted laughter irritates the devil.
I strongly believe Christ laughed in his life for innocent, light-hearted jokes or situations.
This is almost certainly true. It's why tyrants censor and persecute humor and comedians so enthusiastically. This is because you cannot be really funny unless what you're saying is dialed into the truth about reality on some fundamental level. If Satan is the father of lies, this is why evil, corrupt, and oppressive societies censor humor and persecute comedians. Sure, humor can be used for evil, but so can every other good thing given by God.
Psalm 2:7
The one who is enthroned in heaven laughs;
the LORD mocks their plans.
Genuine question:
If Christ is an icon of the Father,
And the Psalms depict God as laughing,
Would it appropriate to see Christ laughing in a sort of controlled yet natural appropriate and natural (“response vs. reaction.”)
Also, speaking of “willed passions,” by what mode is it willed; a conscious decision from moment to moment, or in his decision to become man and thus embraced man’s blameless passions. “What is not assumed is not redeemed.”
Also, take into account that via the hypostatic union, he has two wills and two intellects, the Divine and human. Obviously the divine is unable to be surprised, as it knows all, but would it be possible and not impious to suggest that perhaps in his humanity he could be surprised? (Speculating, not making an apologetic statement.)
Thanks. I do believe that He possessed a gravitas, yet not one opposed to tenderness. Somehow, in that mystical reality of His perfection, they coexist.
* Christ’s laughter serving as an icon of God’s metaphorical laughter, insofar as the description and concept is of God laughing is a sort of image
St Isaac says in the kingdom of God the language we will speak is silence we will communicate with love and words will not be necessary everything will be present a sense of deep fulfillment.
I read a Bible study once that focused on the humor used by Jesus and it explained how much of the original humor he used got lost in translation and especially in the massive differences between ancient/classical cultures and modern.
Two situations where I expect Christ at least smiled:
1. When he put forward a child to show apostles.
2. When he was asking disciples going to Emaus what appened in Jerusalem that moved them so much. And then disciples told Him that He ist the only person who don't know what happened (His cruicifixon).
3. When he told his disciples to be wary of the leaven of the Pharisees, and they thought he was literally talking about bread
“The One enthroned in heaven laughs; the Lord scoffs at them.”
Psalms 2:4 NIV
Also, your comments section is refreshing.
Pondering this post. 🧐
Who am I to question Chrysotom and his teachings, so I will give this great consideration. But my thoughts go to examples in Proverbs.... About a Merry heart , laughter, joy and being delighted like a child . God certainly made man with a sense of humor, and all He has made is declared good .
Like all things in our human disposition, there is a
created , fallen and eventually a redeemed aspect to our lives and choices . We being joined to Christ, continually pursue the redeemed aspect of our humor , in tone, quaintly and subject matters being some .
Though, Jesus in His Earthly ministry was on a mission, and being funny wasn't His purpose, I never saw this as evidence that He has something against humor in general. There is a time and place for everything . Wisdom and discernment come in handy in times like these . Glory to God in all things
One of the best takes on this subject.
Christ laughed even on the way to the cross. The bible tells us to be joyful, I’m sure Christ embodied that!
Slipping out of his tunic to run away? Sure it can seem cartoonish. But if you’ve seen a flogging or a crucifixion or two, it’s no joke. I’ve seen people do just that, in harsh places in the world, so I never thought it was a joke.
That was definitely not meant to be humorous. That was more of a comment on how desperate and terrified out of his mind he was.
“Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep” Luke 6:25
I think Norm MacDonald said it best when he said something like "sometimes I just laugh and laugh, and I laugh so hysterically and uncontrollably that I cant stop laughing and it becomes like existential dread and I'll have a terrible panic attack." Life does seem like one big cosmic joke sometimes
Enters 💓 : " ... Oh, Dear... Oh, Boy, ... Oh, JonaThanJonah, ... Oh, Grace, ... Oh, Mercy, ... Nothing could bring Us closer to Truth than Our gratitude to 💓 ... And ... Still ... Nothing could bring Us closer to 💓 than the most vicious ingratitude towards ... Us ... Oh, My ... " 💓💓💓 Ya 💓💓💓
"There was some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it was His mirth.” - GK Chesterton, Orthodoxy
I'd love to hear Jonathon's critique of The Chosen.
What about him crying? Which is something like what laughing is
Every time some absurd positive synchronicity happens it cracks me up so good; “God works out all things for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.” And it’s actually crazy funny when the absurd turns into blessing somehow
I agree, jokes and laughing are fine but it’s become so regular now that no one is ever serious about anything. Everything’s always a joke
So, Christ never laughed... involuntarily
I always imagine Jesus letting out a small chuckle in Luke 22:
And the men that held Jesus mocked him, and beat him. And they blindfolded him, and asked him, saying: “If you are Christ, prophesy - who struck thee?”
Lord have mercy.
Zorane, where are you from brother?
It would be interesting to do a longer dialogue about this topic. Exploring Jesters and the purpose of this kind of entertainment in history. How it intertwines with comic relief today with a lens in Christianity. The idea that Christ didn’t laugh certainly has me thinking. Thank you for your thoughts, Jonathan!
The events in the Bible happened with dangerous, evil people and events that weren't a laughing matter.
But Christ will laugh with me, God willing. We will both giggle with joy that I made it into His Kingdom. We will finally be together.
He loves it when we laugh
Christ never rides a camel in the scriptures either. The fact it is not contained in scripture should not lead us to believe it didn't happen. "And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written. Amen." John 21:25
Your best point seems to be “we are drowning in jokes.” We are indeed too attached to making light of things, and a school of stand up comedy is completely absurd. BUT, if we weren’t drowning in jokes, I think the Mirth of God would be easier to see. Laughter is bigger than jokes. When we are overwhelmed with joy to the point of laughter (or tears), SOMETIMES it seems like something more virtuous than “lack of self control” going on.
Christ is the moment of comedy at all times
Just because the Bible doesn’t say Jesus laughed, doesn’t mean He didn’t. It’s weird to assume He didn’t laugh.
The Bible also doesn’t talk about our Lord’s morning poop, but we know He did it. Laughter is human, and Jesus was human.
Logic.
But that is not the argument. The comment about the Bible was part of a broader point about the meaning of laughter. I'm not saying I agree with the tradition, I probably don't, but that wasn't the argument.
@ “Laughter” has no meaning without context.
@@ghostgate82 I don't even know what are you discussing. I'm saying that the argument wasn't "it is not in the Bible, so it didn't happen".
@@issaavedra The title of the video implies Christ didn’t laugh, and the only way to derive that implication is from the Bible.
You seem to be trying really hard to disagree with me, but to no avail.
Chill.
@@ghostgate82 But the implication could be derive in others ways other than "it is not mentioned, therefore it didn't happen". For example, if from the Bible be know Christ is Divine and understood everything in creation, and we define laughter as "an involuntary reaction when we encounter something we don't understand", Christ couldn't laugh by definition.
Again, I don't know if I agree with the proposition, I don't know what laughter is. What I do know, is that you initial "refutation" is a strawman.
Jesus certainly said funny things. I always think of the sermon on the mount where our Lord admonished us to worry about the "log" in our own eyes versus the "sawdust" in our brother's. That verse has always made me laugh a little inside because of the humorous imagery. And yet it sticks with me because of that.
hmmm, laughter is also an expression of joy or even intimacy, like playing with a baby. Laughter exists as something distinct from joking. Wouldn't weeping be a corollary expression of emotion to laughter; that we lose control of ourselves in a similar way to laughter? I don't find it a stretch at all that if Christ weeps, there surely would have been laughter with close friends.
You're onto something here. My previous comment was deleted of course but we are awash in too much comedy and a lack of earnestness.
Some things Jesus said are simultaneously heartbreaking and humorous. I think of John 10:32 especially: "I have shown you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you going to stone me?" (ESV) There are also moments with the disciples that are humorously absurd, like Peter's response to the Transfiguration (even though, yes he was terrified.) But with all this, we have to keep in mind that in terms of genre, we are talking about ancient biographies/Greco-Roman lives. Normal things subjects of such works do are less likely to make it into the accounts, rather, the accounts will emphasize important sayings, actions and so on. Add to the this the eyewitness dynamic - what's more important to pass on to/within an early Jesus community? That time Jesus raised your daughter from the dead, or that time He laughed at a joke?
0:44 except when he gets angry at the fig tree and curses it.
The story of Daniel and Bel and the Dragon is really funny.
Could Jesus have been so popular at parties without expressing a sense of humor? He must’ve had a fun and enjoyable aspect to him.
This is almost impossible for westerners, probably just american and Canadians, to wrap their minds around.
So many think its literally inhuman not to laugh.
But if youve ever met like half of men in the third world youd find how common not smiling and laughing is.
Jesus makes a pun in scripture if I remember correctly. It's in the calling of Nathanael 'Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no deceit!' which is a pun based on his tribe.
Jesus actually told jokes. He was an accomplished stand up and, as the Second Person of the Trinity, he knew exactly what made people chuckle. The problem is that the gags lost a lot in translation from the Aramaic.
To laugh or not laugh muhahahah😂
Remember when the apostles said "Can anything good come out of Bethlehem?" There was good natured ribbing too, even of Gods Son.
Those things matter very little.
when you finally reach God's unfathomable doorstep and you meet his unseenable Eye of velocity there is nothing else to do
but be turned into that ultimate LAUGHTER
inthroughout God's pleated mansions
bliss and stillness
no laughter, no doorway
🐙🐳🐬🦉🦅💫🕊️
I'll become a subscriber the minute we get a chosen analysis
I've yet to hear many opinions from orthodox Christians on Mel Gibson's 'The passion of the christ'. Jesus is playful with Mary in one scene.
Unfortunately that movie is not typically regarded well in Orthodox Circles from what I have seen. I, for my part, believe it is an excellent film that should probably only be watched during penitential seasons such as the Thursday and Friday before Pascha.
0:42 everyone is saying “Just because it’s not in the scripture, doesn’t mean he didn’t laugh!” There’s a different between
A: it’s not in the scripture, therefore it didn’t happen.
And B: It’s not in the scripture, therefore we can’t know from scripture that it happened.
Obviously Jonathan is not saying A. He’s just saying the scripture doesn’t tell us that he laughed, so scripture isn’t going to settle the question explicitly.
Also, it’s possible that Jesus didn’t laugh during his earthly life, because of the gravity of his calling. But I could imagine him laughing in heaven or even after the resurrection.
saying christ has no unconscious processes, if he's fully man, and much of our brain function controls unconscious processes, seems odd. did christ breathe, blink, have a heartbeat, digest food, and grow from baby to adult? and how do we have this brain if christ didn't? are we more evolved than christ? i'd just admit he laughed.
Christ is known as 'the man of sorrows', and there is (perhaps) an important detail noted in the shortest verse in the bible, John 11:35. However, we only have what the authors of the bible considered worth writing. In my opinion, the idea of the blind leading the blind had to raise a smile or two, if not laughter- it's clearly ridiculous. Beyond that, it seems logical that humans would have the capacity to laugh because we are image bearers of our Creator.
One can control when one gives into laughter… in most cases I would say. I get the point about the nature of laughter but it can be taken too far. The idea that Christ didn’t partake of that basic human experience (which is really defining of humanity… do lower animals laugh? Do angels laugh), is pretty hard to believe.
Actually yes, animals of higher intelligence like primates, dolphins, dogs, and horses do exhibit the animal equivalent of laughter, particularly during play. It's an inherent part of being a biological animal, so to speak, meaning that it's a fundamental aspect of what it means to be fully human.
@ I would argue that what happens in other animals is really something like “proto-laughter”. I wouldn’t doubt it bears some relation to our own physiology of laughter, but that it’s in the same category I would doubt. Humor to me seems intrinsically related to our reason, the capacity to “step outside” the stream of experience and view it “from above”.
I am not sure I agree the young man running naked in Mark is a joke. I agree it is a reference to the Fall and shame/nakeness, which Noah's post-Flood drunkenness recapitulates, meaning that he is not the last Adam, but which Joseph's innocent nakedness running from Potiphar's house also recapitulates, but this time the man resists the forbidden fruit but is imprisoned for the woman's crime (thus, it is part of the cruciform picture of what the last Adam will look like)! What I think Mark is doing is setting up a quasi-self-insert/cypher feature to the text, which works like this: Previously, man betrayed God in a garden and was exposed, hiding his nakedness. The place of life and abundance became the place of death. Now, that happens again (in Gethsemane instead of Eden), but this time, mankind can be clothed by the death of God (notice the lone speaker, CLOTHED in white), a tomb becomes a womb, the place of death becomes the place of life. The young man shows both the depth of human loss and the height of human potential through Jesus's death and resurrection.
I think we need to ask the question whether Christ as a human felt divine emotions and or/emotions of the flesh. Divine emotions as in joy and rejoicing that comes through faith, or divine anger or mourning that drives repentance. I think the moment Christ flipped the table was an act of divine anger rather than human emotion. The moment he sat weeping before heading to the crucifixion was one of purely human emotion, fear. He rejoiced when he rose from the dead, an emotion only the divine knows. There may be something to him never being in his flesh when he laughed, but since the Bible spent so little time focusing on his emotional reactions to things we wouldn’t know he never laughed in that way. The best we can do is posit how Christ reacted by our own reactions if we read these stories with the Holy Spirit residing in us and don’t let our worldly thinking get in the way.
Interesting speculation, but stuff like this is definitely territory where more people need to have enough humility to say, "I don't know." While I certainly value doctrine and believe it to be necessary, many things we label as doctrine are, if truth be told and if everybody had more humility, are things we don't actually know and have no way of knowing with any degree of certainty on this side of eternity.
"You have loved righteousness [You have DELIGHTED in integrity, virtue, and uprightness in purpose, thought, and action] and You have hated lawlessness (injustice and iniquity). Therefore God, [even] Your God (Godhead), has anointed You with the oil of exultant JOY and GLADNESS above and beyond Your companions." - Hebrews 1:9 AMPC
I'd venture to say Jesus laughed. 😂
As a Millennial, I think the problem with my generation is a complete inability to take anything seriously. Ten years ago I would have thought it was youthfulness, but now that I'm in my early 30's and realize my generation has not grown out of it I see it is endemic. It's a kind of post-modernism that is not self-aware - we are not a consciously degenerative generation like the Boomers and Xers were, but we are a compulsively degenerative one, which is possibly worse. I guess he's probably considered Gen X, but obviously views himself as more consciously Millennial, but just look at Elon Musk, who seemingly can't hold any positive view on anything without devolving into a smear of tired memes and irony.
Your example about the joke in Scripture is pretty apt. I was reading the Canterbury Tales a few months ago and was struck by the potty humor in The Miller's Tale. I think you touch on something accurate that well-ordered jokes tend to be a comeuppance for disordered behavior. In the case of Scripture, it is the man not willing to stand by Christ that literally lays him bare. Today's comedy is built completely on dismantling any hierarchy, meaning, or sincerity.
Idk, maybe you're onto something, but I think what you might be mistaking as an inability to take anything seriously is little more than just a coping mechanism for the fact that Millenials (and a lot of Gen Z as well) are much too self serious as a consequence of the doom, gloom, and pressimism that we've been propagandized with for our entire lives.
Best one in the bible is a phallic joke by Jesus, John 7:22-23. Godlike sense of humour.
Christ is waiting to laugh when we are with him in eternal paradise. Until then He has work to do.
Scriptural citation to both claims?
@ thanks for the offer, I’m good.
@@stevendouglas3781 right, because you're making things up.
@bradleyheissmann4538 I guess I’ll just have to live with Bradley Heissmann’s disappointment.
Surely God laughed at this chain of comments.
Even babies laugh. There are definitely some "funny" parts of the gospels, like Jesus' responses to pharisees or his disciples ignorance.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Jesus laughed, many times. As far as Him being surprised, He was surprised at certain people’s faith.
If a misterious hooded figure offers you an ancient forbbiden lost book, be sure not to lick your fingers.
It's ok if you criticize The Chosen, Jonathan. Go for it !
So long as man is still facing damnation and this life continues there is nothing to laugh at. Christ was serious here on Earth because this life is deadly serious and only a lapse in how truly horrific we have fallen allows us to laugh. Christ knows the intensity of this life, he wasn’t going around cracking jokes.