text: I think it was fair to read Violet's definitive assertion as pertaining to the historical Jesus, whose self-identity is sheer speculation.
  
  As I understand it: The gospel writers, most conspicuously the author/s of John, associated Jesus with the sacrificial Passover lamb. But even before the gospels, the "Philippian Hymn," which is said to predate Paul, implicitly contrasts the disobedient Adam with Jesus the obedient son, "to the point of death, even death on a cross." The earliest Christians apparently believed the Crucifixion was God's will (otherwise "obedience" here makes no sense), a sentiment echoed in Gethsemane when Jesus says "not what I want but what you want." Why would God will the Messiah be crucified? Well, as Paul relates in another pre-Pauline formulation (1Cor 15:3-6), Christ died for our sins and was raised on the third day "according to the scriptures." (Personally I don't find this answer satisfactory.)
  
  Jesus's Eucharistic Words suggest self-sacrifice.