Mfonobong Inyang: The Hill That Jesus Chose To Die On

Oxford University Press named ragebait as its 2025 word of the year, but I reckon that context will give other words a run for their money this year, despite being barely four months into 2026. Context, a word that has seemingly been exploited by poor communicators recently, is actually such an important qualifier that it gives a more apposite presentation to the content itself.

The bible is not any different; without context, anyone can lift one verse and use it to support a silly agenda. Most of the people we refer to as fake preachers are not necessarily so. They are just lazy, ignorant or disingenuous in their appropriation of scriptures. This was so important that Paul drilled into his protégé the importance of “rightly dividing” or doing justice to the text. Being a skilled craftsman himself, he knew a thing or two about orthotomeo, which is the Greek word for precision in cutting. In fact, he explicitly stated in a letter to Timothy that those who put in the work to arrive at proper exegesis should not only be honoured but also rewarded materially. Paul treated this matter as an existential threat because the biggest weapon of religion is the misrepresentation of God. Even to this day, it’s one of the challenges our civilisation is facing. I wrote in a previous treatise how Paul himself was formerly a terrorist who believed that the killing of infidels was an act of service to God until his operations were intercepted.

The Old Testament was originally written largely in Hebrew and Aramaic, while the New Testament was written in Greek, not the English Language. This is why we study root words: to get the original meanings that may have been lost in translation. So when you see where the bible says that, “the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom”, the etymology of that fear is not being terrified but awe and reverence. Another popular one is when you see the face or hand of God in a sentence, it is an anthropomorphism, the attribution of human traits, emotions, intentions, or behaviours to non-human entities, such as animals, objects, or supernatural beings. God is a spirit and spirits don’t have physical bodies, so the use of face is really a metaphor for an encounter with God, just as the hand is a metaphor for the influence of God. Sometimes the Hebrew word mal’ak, which is often translated as angel, is used as a generic term to describe celestial beings, but depending on specific context, this could mean an evil spirit (as in the case of Saul), a messenger from God (as in the case of Samson) or the pre-incarnate Christ (as in the case of Joshua). I’m going somewhere with this, just dey with me.

The Prototype

From the beginning of recorded history, human beings have always sought to know God better. In a few instances, they have caught glimpses, and where they failed, religious rituals were used as fillers. Joseph saw God through the lens of stewardship and service, and throughout his lifetime, he exemplified those attributes, whether as a prisoner or prime minister. Moses was very consequential; God literally transported or time-travelled him to the beginning (genesis) of human civilisation and gave him a front row seat to document the origins of creation. Being raised in the palace of the hegemony of his day, coupled with his life’s mission to lead slaves into nationhood, shaped his worldview of God. Hence, his archetype is consistent with themes such as government, leadership, constitutional architecture and administrative excellence. Abraham saw God through the prisms of covenant, obedience and faith; this explains why he could believe and submit to God even at the expense of his son, Isaac. Joshua saw God leading his people into the Promised Land, hence his military posture, because those lands were contested territories and he had a mandate to possess them. David modelled the messianic reign; he did everything to protect the sovereignty of his homeland or kingdom, which often included protecting it from external aggression (i.e. the gates of hell will not prevail).

Whilst the bible is not a history book, it contains historically accurate events. A lot of what those guys did or said, especially in the Old Testament, was descriptive, not prescriptive. Translation: documentation doesn’t equal doctrine. If you don’t know this, you will get stuck in arguments such as whether getting a tattoo is a sin or not, without acknowledging the context of that statute. For example, many men are quick to point out that Solomon married 300 women and had 700 concubines as a validation for their randy behaviour. Let’s interrogate that a bit with a little backstory. Judah was Solomon’s great-grandfather, and he introduced sexual debauchery into the bloodline by sleeping with his own daughter-in-law, Tamar. Fast forward down the lineage to Jesse, who gets involved with a woman, not his wife and the relationship produces David. This is why Jesse didn’t present David before Samuel because he was a reminder of his indiscretions. David himself alluded to this in one of the Psalms: “in sin did my father and mother conceive me”. David’s adultery with Bathsheba is well-documented. In fact, his generals knew David was really about to die when he didn’t get a boner in the presence of a young lady. So by the time it gets to Solomon, he had the wealth to fund the signature temptations of his bloodline. So, using Solomon as a yardstick is not the flex some people think it is because “a greater than Solomon is here”.

However great or otherwise as some of these guys were, none of them was the prototokos (the prototype, model or pattern) until Jesus, who was God in the flesh, entered the chat. Many people tried to make Moses the prototype; he was so powerful that even in death, his body was contested. Religious people adopted his pattern of going to the mountains for prayers, but Jesus came and said to the Samaritan woman that after his glorification. There won’t be any need for people to worship at any mountain. When Jesus came with a counter-submission of turning the other cheek, He wasn’t suggesting weakness, but the bigger picture was a direct repudiation of the Mosaic Law, which postulates the concept of “an eye for an eye.” Despite being a physical associate of Jesus for three years, Peter, with his religious mindset, still held on to Moses as his prototype. At the transfiguration, Moses showed up as a representative of the Law, and Elijah showed up as a representative of the prophets, but both of them were quickly dismissed, and when the disciples saw Jesus alone standing, God gave a direct instruction: “Listen to him!” Translation: Jesus is your reference point.

The Declassified Documents

The entire bible is about one person, Jesus. That may not be immediately apparent because a lot of stories, characters and events don’t seem to corroborate that claim. In the old canon, the knowledge of Jesus is classified or hidden in plain sight. There is a term in the intelligence community known as deep cover or deep shadow; it describes a long-term covert operation where an agent, amongst other things, uses aliases to navigate the mission field. Jesus is the logos or intelligence of God, but he couldn’t reveal himself until the time was right. Before Jesus came out to declare himself as the Bread of Life, he had been dropping bread crumbs right from the Garden of Eden. When God replaced the fig leaves that Adam and Eve used to cover themselves with the skin of an animal that had been killed, he cast a shadow on the sacrifice on Calvary that would happen many centuries later. Progressively, many people clocked this animal to be a lamb without blemish. By the time it got to Isaiah, he understood that this lamb was really a man who would willingly sacrifice himself. It was John who officially blew Jesus’ cover when he approached the Jordan River to be baptised by saying, “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”

This is critical because Jesus’ assessment of who the greatest disciple is has nothing to do with who can preach up a storm or perform the most jaw-dropping miracle, but who has the most revelation of him. John had no notable miracle attributed to him, but Jesus rated him above those who divided seas, raised the dead or even called down fire. I refer to the Pauline Epistles as the “declassified documents”; this is why I consider Paul as QB1. In a previous treatise, I shared that it was Paul who let us know that Jesus was the actual promised seed of Abraham, not Isaac. In addressing the covert ops of Jesus in the wilderness as Moses led the people into the Promised Land, Paul declassified a redacted truth to the Corinthians, “They drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them and the Rock was Christ.” He was so obsessed with the revelation of Jesus, hence you would hear him saying stuff like, “For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ”.

Unsurprisingly, “the abundance of revelations” that made him QB1 was also responsible for the most assaults on his life and ministry. So it’s not uncommon to hear some people say that Paul’s teachings are heretical because he supposedly preached a different gospel from that which Jesus taught; nothing could be further from the truth. Not only did Jesus handpick Paul himself, but he also told Ananias that Paul was his personal representative and special envoy – what bigger co-sign could a person get? Even demons that eventually attacked the sons of Sceva affirmed that Jesus and Paul were in sync. The Roman Empire, like others, had its signature tools for statecraft. Crucifixion: public death as punishment for dissidents or persons considered enemies of the state. The Coliseum: an arena for entertainment, social engineering and display of the imperial nature of Caesar’s power. Character assassination: no better example than this line from the epic Gladiator movie, Juba tells Maximus, “You have a great name. He (Commodus) must kill your name before he kills you”. So the propaganda against Paul isn’t a 21st-century phenomenon.

Blood: Liquid, Language, Legislation

One of the most famous bible verses is John 3:16, which reads in part – “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son”. It makes a veiled reference to an equally famous verse, Isaiah 9:6, which reads in part – “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given”. If you deconstruct those two verses, it points to the child arriving in a manger, which is why we celebrate Christmas. It also points to the son being given (sacrificed) on the cross, which is why we celebrate the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Again it was Paul that put us on game that the New Testament was not merely literature but liquid, not just books but blood: “For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator.” He also pointed out Jesus’ blood was currency: “work hard for sin your whole life and your pension is death but God’s gift is real life, eternal life”, legislation: “blotting out the handwriting of ordinances” and language (advocacy): “speaks better things”. Finally, for those who assume that Jesus did not really die because God was too powerful to let such happen, Paul writes that the death of Jesus on the Cross may appear as weakness to some people, but his resurrection was really the highest display of God’s power known yet. So yes, a lot was at stake, hence Jesus chose Golgotha as the hill to die on, literally.