Was Jesus a Narcissist?

When I was a young boy, those trying to discredit Jesus would claim there was no proof that he even existed other than the Bible, and it was merely a collection of myths and fables. No Jesus, no miracles, no Son of God, no commandments. That argument bit the dust as more and more archeology and historical evidence substantiated that he was born, taught and died in Judea.

Then the Anti-Christs postulated that Jesus supported their particular life style because he never personally said, "Thou shalt not be gay." He also said to, "Love everyone," so he was inclusive of everyone and didn't condemn wickedness as present-day Christians love to do. Since Jesus loved everyone, he must have accepted their lifestyles and beliefs.That hasn't gone over too well as so many of those who preceded and followed him were insistent that while we must love everyone, certain standards of behavior were required for us to be happy.

Now, the current rage is to claim that Jesus was a Narcissist.

Sam Vaknin, an Israeli, writer has lead the way in trying to humanize Jesus as a simple narcissistic teacher who destroyed the lives of all those he touched. The humor in this is that Mr. Vaknin is a diagnosed and admitted narcissist. He claims to be an expert on the subject. I guess it takes one to know one?

Ironically, Mr. Vaknin's own written papers declare that narcissists are not real personalities but a false self, therefore "The False Self replaces the narcissist's True Self and is intended to shield him from hurt and narcissistic injury by self-imputing omnipotence ... The narcissist pretends that his False Self is real and demands that others affirm this confabulation," (Vaknin S., The Dual Role of the Narcissist's False Self). Since he also claims to be a genius with an IQ of 180, it looks like the diagnosis is correct.

Mr Vaknin is certain that this unfortunate situation of self-delusion creates a condition that can never be cured because narcissists are not real people but a deluded false self they have created.

To put this into everyday English, he says he is a broken personality with the need to force everyone to his way of thinking and unfortunately, he can never be fixed, never become normal and never be sane.

Back to his vilification of Jesus.

Claiming that Jesus is narcissist begins with one very large assumption, that Jesus was a mortal man and not the Son of God. If this is true, then his actions and teachings are certainly the product of a narcissist and the disruption to the lives of his followers is unforgivable.

The point the author missed was that while he is attributing all these negative narcissistic characteristics to Jesus, he concedes that Jesus actually did perform miraculous acts of service for the people of his day. This assumption is made because Mr. Vaknin never questions the actions of Jesus, (healing the sick, giving sight to the blind, even raising people from the dead,) only his motives. He even chides Jesus for threatening to withhold healing from those who did not adore and worship him, a narcissistic trait. He never claims Jesus was a charleton, fooling the people into believing they were healed.

Does that mean that Mr. Vaknin actually believes that Jesus healed the lame, gave sight to the blind and raised people from the dead?

Does that also mean that Jesus actually did rise from the dead and appeared to over 500 people in the 40 days after his death?

Does that mean that Jesus really lives today in a celestial world, so elevated from our own that we can scarce comprehend it and someday we can live there too?

If Jesus, who is all knowing, omnipresent, and omnipotent, claims to be all knowing, omnipresent, and omnipotent, is that narcissism or integrity?

Reminds me of a quote by my son, Jeremy: Arrogance is when you think you're right based on assumptions, confidence is when you know you're right based on evidence.

So, a narcissist is one who thinks they are right based on their assumptions, as defined by Mr. Vaknin. If Jesus really healed afflictions and raised the dead, including himself, then he spoke with confidence because his real self was the Son of God.

Jesus was not a narcissist, he was the Son of God.