V. The "Goodness" of Jesus

Why should Jesus be so "good"? This question should have the very highest priority for those who call themselves Christians, and wish to be like him. And yet, the question is almost never asked. It always seems to be taken for granted that Jesus was good "because he was good." Let us try to give a more significant answer by using the psychoanalytic theory of personality. How does one rid himself of evil impulses? One method is projection. We have seen that Jesus continually used this mechanism. First he projected his evil onto Satan during an experience in the wilderness. Then he projected his evil onto the demons which were possessing the sick who came to see him. But this was not enough. Not only did he rid himself of evil in this way, but in his identification with the people who came to be healed, in his "compassion" upon them, it became imperative that he rid them of evil spirits also. This is a mutually reinforcing pattern: Jesus healed demoniacs because of his personal conflict and the demoniacs encouraged him to do so because of their own hopes. Jesus was the supremely good man, because he was a supreme master of projection. When someone smites you on the one cheek, project your hostility onto him and let him do it again! But why was Jesus the supreme master of projection? Why, more than any other man, did he have to project all his evil onto demons? The answer to this question lies in the nature of his relationship to God, the father-son relationship.

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