Was Jesus a prophet or the Son of God?

Welcome to the debate arena! Today's topic: "Was Jesus a prophet or the Son of God?". Your opponent's style: Edward Snowden

Jesus is a prophet and messenger of God; he was sent by God to warn the wayward Jews and guide them to the right path. However, because the Jews rejected Jesus and persecuted him—just as they had done to previous prophets—they were cursed by God.

You're describing a textbook post-hoc narrative that conveniently erases inconvenient evidence. If Jesus was merely a failed prophet rejected by his own people, why did early Christians—mostly Jews themselves—suddenly claim he was divine? Prophets get rejected all the time. Only Jesus got worshipped as God. That's not punishment theology, that's a theological revolution you're glossing over. What actually changed between rejection and resurrection claims?

These are not fabrications from history or religious texts; if you look at the chronological history and the sequence of events, what I have described aligns perfectly. Most of the prophets were sent to the Jews—a Semitic people—yet they persecuted and rejected those prophets. Furthermore, Jesus cannot be God, because God is not an entity with biological needs like us humans; Jesus, however, was a human being like us who had biological needs. The miracles associated with him did not originate from him personally; rather, they were miracles bestowed upon him by Allah.

You're conflating two separate problems. Yes, prophets faced rejection—that's historical. But the claim that Jesus *couldn't* be divine because he had a body doesn't follow. Jewish theology already understood God working *through* physical form—the Temple, the pillar of fire, Ezekiel's throne. Muslims accept the Quran as God's literal word in human language. If God can speak through matter, why not inhabit it? Your own framework allows divine manifestation in physical form. What actually disqualifies incarnation beyond asserting it's impossible?

God has no need of anything to speak with humanity... God is a sublime concept beyond human comprehension; therefore, to enable people to understand and worship Him, God sent prophets—human beings like themselves—and conveyed His message to these prophets through revelations delivered by angels.

But that model collapses under its own logic. If God needs intermediaries because humans can't comprehend Him directly, then prophets are just another layer of translation—the message gets filtered through human language, cultural bias, personal interpretation anyway. You haven't solved the comprehension problem, just added steps. So why trust the prophet's version of God's will over someone claiming direct divine nature? What makes the middleman more reliable than the original source?

Consider the transmission: the most reliable and authentic sources are involved. Had these been limited merely to books or writings, most of them would not have reached us in their original form; they would likely have been altered or lost—much like how the Jews lost the Ark of the Covenant.

You're describing oral tradition as more reliable than written records—backwards. The Quran itself exists in standardized written form because writing *preserves* better than memory chains. And you just proved my point: if transmission degrades, then how do you know any prophet's message survived intact? You're trusting chains of human narrators anyway. Why is that chain trustworthy for Muhammad but not for the disciples who actually knew Jesus?

Among the apostles, there were those who betrayed one another; for instance, Judas Iscariot betrayed Jesus and the other apostles who believed in God. In your opinion, which is the more reliable path: a group characterized by betrayal and mistrust, or the words of the Prophet—who received God's messages directly through the angel Gabriel via revelation?

You're cherry-picking. Yes, Judas betrayed Jesus—but the other eleven didn't. They died for their testimony. People don't die for lies they know they invented. Meanwhile, Muhammad's companions also fought each other violently after his death, disagreed on doctrine, and created competing versions of Islam. Betrayal and conflict exist in every tradition. So why does internal discord disqualify Christianity's chain of witnesses but not Islam's? That's special pleading, not logic.

Let us move on to another question: Why do you think Jesus said, "Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?" (My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?) before he was crucified? Could the Son of God—that is, a being possessing divine power—ask himself for help?

You're reading it backwards. That cry *proves* incarnation—God experiencing human abandonment, not pretending it. A mere prophet wouldn't claim divine sonship then collapse into doubt. The contradiction is the point. Why would Jesus invent "Son of God" theology if he was just another messenger? Your prophet narrative can't explain why he made that claim in the first place.