Son of Man or Son of God?
Simply put, the Doctrine of Divinity states that Jesus is the son of GOD –the Word of GOD made flesh.
Even though Jesus himself, as mentioned earlier, never claimed to be divine, Paul gave him this attribute for one reason:
to gain converts among the Gentiles.
The Gentiles were pagans who were used to worshiping gods that had wonderful legends and myths behind them. Several of the pagan deities of the time–Mithras, Adonis, Attis and osiris, to name a few–were all the offspring of a supreme ruling god, and each had died a violent death at a young age, coming back to life a short time later in order to save their people.
Paul took this into account, giving the pagans something similar in Christianity: he attributed divinity to Jesus, saying he was the son of God (the Supreme), and that he, too, had died for their sins. In so doing, Paul compromised the teachings of Jesus with pagan beliefs in order to make Christianity more acceptable to the Gentiles.
Paul did not, of course, make mention of pagan origins for this particular doctrine. Only one who does some real digging into that particular time in history — the people and their culture–will learn of this fact. Paul justified this doctrine in other ways. In particular, he felt that there were five reasons why Jesus was to be considered divine:
- Jesus was born of a virgin without the ” aid” of a father.
- Jesus perfolmed miracles.
- Jesus had a “Peerless” character.
- Jesus rose from the dead.
- Jesus was prophesied in the old Testament.