CHRIST, DIVINITY OF

The following observation is attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte: “I marvel that whereas the ambitious dreams of myself, Caesar, Alexander, should have vanished into thin air, a Judean peasant, Jesus, should be able to stretch His hands across the destinies of men and nations.

“I know men; and I tell you that Jesus Christ is no mere man. Between him and every other person in the world there is no possible term of comparison. Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne, and I myself have found empires; but upon what do these creations of our genius depend? Upon force. Jesus alone founded his empire upon love; and to this very day millions would die for Him.”124

“He went about saying to people, ‘I forgive your sins.’ Now it is quite natural for a man to forgive something you do to him. Thus if somebody cheats me out of five pounds it is quite possible and reasonable for me to say, ‘Well, I forgive him, we will say no more about it.’ What on earth would you say if somebody had done you out of five pounds and I said, ‘That is all right, I forgive him’?” (C. S. Lewis, God in the Dock [Grand Rapids: Wm. Eerdmans, 1970], Hooper, Walter, ed., p. 157).125

“A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said wouldn’t be a great moral teacher. He’d either be a lunatic—on the level with a man who says he’s a poached egg—or else he’d be the devil of hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse” (C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity [New York: The Macmillan Co., 1952], pp. 40–41).126

“A Savior not quite God is like a bridge broken at the further end” (Bishop Moule).127