Greetings, friends, and welcome back to The Moral Vision of Jesus Christ.
I had a day off the other day, which means I have time to bring you another installment of this study in quicker succession than normal. This elates me. I wish I had more time to work on this than I do, but I promise to occupy my free time with this as much as possible.
Last time, we went forward in time from the Gospels (just slightly) to the Book of Acts, where we witnessed the "Birth of the Church." We talked about the way the first Christians lived, and discussed the cultural and ethnic diversity of that first community. Then we followed the "Herod vs Baby Jesus" narrative down a little further in Matthew.
I know my rhetorical approach here thus far has been relatively scatter-gun, and I am sensitive to the needs of some readers for more focus. So, today, I'm going to introduce a multi-part series within The Moral Vision. Let's call this: Sects of Judaism Existing in Palestine at or Immediately Prior to the Time of Jesus - A Shallow Survey. This will provide a temporary sense of increased focus, and will last a few weeks at least.
As I have promised from the beginning, we will be working hard to understand the historical context for Jesus' Galilean Ministry. I currently argue that the biggest edifice within the realm of Christ's historical context is the Second Temple. That is to say that the most important thing we can learn about Jesus, in order to understand his teaching, is the nature of his Jewishness.
So, let's not waste any more time. Here we go.
Sects of Judaism Existing in Palestine at or Immediately Prior to the Time of Jesus - A Shallow Survey
Number One: The Pharisees
For a long time, I thought of Judaism as a monolith. Growing up outside of an ecosystem of thought, it is hard to recognize the variation and diversity represented within that ecosystem. Because of this myopia, things we aren't immediately concerned with tend to coalesce and become monolithic in the mind.
For Christians, I think, there is a tendency to think of ancient Judaism only as it existed in the Biblical Era, hundreds of years before Christ. For our interests here at The Moral Vision, we want to know as much about the Judaism(s) that existed in the year 4 BC as we do about the Judaism of Moses' time. Jesus' relays his teachings primarily to Jews, and explains his morality in part by constantly referencing known Jewish teachings and customs. If we don't have a thorough historical understanding of the references, how can we really get his meaning? Simply put, the answer is that we absolutely cannot.
Any veteran of the Gospels will recognize the first sect in our shallow survey immediately. "The Pharisees" appear prominently and frequently in the Gospels as some of Jesus' primary philosophical sparring opponents. He encounters The Pharisees and another group, "The Sadducees," over and over again, and he debates various points with them over and over again. The two come up so frequently that, again, I think the tendency for many Christians is to begin to think of the two groups as more singular than they are. However, The Pharisees had a unique tradition that it behooves us to understand.
We should think of The Pharisees as a popular separatist movement existing concurrently with several other exclusive movements in Jewish thought. The Pharisees arose out of traditions that began at the time of the Babylonian exile, when the First Temple had just been destroyed. The Pharisees exist in contrast to the elite priestly sect, eventually called The Sadducees, who derived their power from their direct management of the ongoings at the Temple.
During the Babylonian exile, when there was no Temple from which the elite could derive authority, their power waned. For many Jews, oral traditions and small religious services put on by scribes and sages in homes or synagogues became more important than the whims of an elite priestly class.
In 540 BC, on his way toward the history books, Persian leader Cyrus the Great eventually freed the Jews from Babylon (thus the "Great" in his name,) and they were allowed to return to Israel to build another Temple. While Cyrus allowed their return to Jerusalem, and allowed the construction of a Second Temple (the one Herod would eventually add on to,) the Jews were not allowed to re-establish their own monarchy. The elite priestly group that were empowered at that time in Cyrus' Jerusalem were seen by some as lackeys beholden to external nations, because their power could now be seen as being derived from Persia.
The Pharisees differed from the priests in many ways, but the biggest difference was that The Pharisees believed in the aforementioned "oral traditions," while the priests believed only in the Torah. Without a Jewish monarchy, these competing ideas were allowed to grow in opposition to one another, and religious homogeneity slipped away.
The priests favored much stricter readings, generally, of the scriptures. For example, where the scripture recommends "an eye for an eye," The Pharisees saw a prescription for indemnity, while the priests saw a prescription for literally scooping someone's eye out as punishment.
The Pharisaic tradition is the tradition that evolved into what we call "Rabbinic Judaism," or modern, mainstream Judaism.
The Pharisees were likely not concerned about a "hell" to be avoided in the afterlife, but, rather, were concerned about their acceptance into the "world to come," commonly understood as a time here on Earth when things would be ideal for those who had followed God's laws. Many Pharisees likely believed that, at God's institution of the "world to come," good law abiding Jews would be resurrected from the dead to share in God's bounty on Earth. Thus heaven, for The Pharisees, would have been a secure, independent Jewish monarchy instituted by God himself over a prosperous Jewish people in the area of Jerusalem.
As it turns out, there was significant ambiguity about the concept of the afterlife within Pharisaic thought. That ambiguity has lasted up until the present day, but we can say for sure that the "Doctrine of Hell" was not something that was fleshed out and accepted by the Pharisees at the time of Jesus.
So, here are the points I'd like you to remember about The Pharisees at this time:
a) They believed in an Oral Tradition that was supplemental to the Torah. That Oral Tradition eventually became what we call the Mishnah.
b) They are the sect of Judaism that evolved into what we know of today as mainstream Rabbinic Judaism.
c) By and large, they didn't technically believe in Heaven and Hell, but many of them did likely believe in a coming resurrection of the faithful dead into a glorious "world to come."
d) They were growing in popularity among the common people in Jerusalem at the time of Christ's Galilean Ministry.
As I admitted, this is shallow. Given the vast amount of time we have before us, I am certain that we will revisit The Pharisees as a topic of discussion over and over again, but this should suffice as introduction, for now.
Next time: The Sadducees.
Now let's get back to our Gospel.
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Matthew 2:10 through Matthew 2:12
10 They were overjoyed at seeing the star,
11 and on entering the house they saw the child with Mary his mother. They prostrated themselves and did him homage. Then they opened their treasures and offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.
12 And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed for their country by another way.
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Recall that Herod has sent the magi in his employ out to find Baby Jesus, under the lie that he wishes to "do him homage." They follow their guiding star to the house where Jesus is with his mother, and they prostrate themselves before him, give him gifts, and generally do him homage.
We know that Herod is up to no good, since we already learned that he is "troubled" by the word of Christ's birth. Here, the magi learn that Herod is up to no good through a dream, and they make the choice to abandon their mission for Herod.
There is plenty going on here in these verses, but little of it is anything but apparent, so I'll just leave you with two quick things that come to mind with this reading.
First, I'd like the reader to take note of how much data God seems to transmit to people via dreams throughout the Gospel. I will try to be diligent about studying dreams in the context of the Gospels at some point in the future. I think we might derive meaning by studying which data are relayed via dreams versus which data are relayed by other means.
Second, I'd call attention to this particular action of "prostration" by the magi. It is of a personal note, and probably not relevant, but I prefer to pray in a prostrate position, with my belly and forehead or lips touching the ground, the way these magi are said to have greeted Jesus. It is the most humbling position in which to put the body, to my mind, and seems to aid in focused prayer. I'd love to know if anyone else out there ever finds occasion to prostrate themselves.
Alas, now your brain is reeling, like: "why would the guy who says he doesn't believe in supernatural phenomena of any kind spend any amount of time praying?"
This question will be answered in full at a later date. For now: my prayers to y'all, whoever you are. I hope to see you next time.
Love.
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