Hello, friend, and welcome back to The Moral Vision of Jesus Christ, the most exhaustive Gospel study you'll ever read. If this is your first time here, please avail yourself of the Introduction, which can be found here.
Today, we approach the final entry to our five-part series, Sects of Judaism Existing in Palestine at or Immediately Prior to the Time of Jesus. You will recall that we've already covered The Pharisees, The Sadducees, The Essenes, and The Zealots. Our last sect of study is The Christians.
Were I the reader, I might ask: "but sir, Christianity and Judaism are two different things. What do you mean by calling Christianity a sect of Judaism?!"
Let's shed a little light on that, shall we?
Were I the reader, I might ask: "but sir, Christianity and Judaism are two different things. What do you mean by calling Christianity a sect of Judaism?!"
Let's shed a little light on that, shall we?
Sects of Judaism Existing in Palestine at or Immediately Prior to the Time of Jesus - A Shallow Survey
Number Five: The Christians
It has been about a month now that we've been studying the first-century sects of Judaism. As we embarked on this study, our purpose was to augment our understanding of the context of the philosophy of Jesus, which will begin emerging for us from Matthew very soon. I am hoping that we will have accomplished this task adequately by the end of today's study.
We've met four sects so far, and, in meeting them, we have deepened our understanding of the ancient world Jesus existed in. Things that unify the philosophies of all four of these sects are a belief in the written scriptures and laws of Judaism as represented by The Torah, and a belief that The Jews were God's "chosen people."
Due to critical interpretive discrepancies, all four of these groups were led to believe that their particular way of practicing Judaism was the only right way. These severe beliefs led to a rise in sectarian violence in the first-centuries BC and AD as Rome pushed its way into Palestine, upending everything it touched.
Due to critical interpretive discrepancies, all four of these groups were led to believe that their particular way of practicing Judaism was the only right way. These severe beliefs led to a rise in sectarian violence in the first-centuries BC and AD as Rome pushed its way into Palestine, upending everything it touched.
And so we come to the final sect in our study: The Christians.
Recall that one Flavius Josephus has informed our study of sectarianism more than any other ancient historian. Flavius Josephus was a Romano-Jewish historian who surrendered to, and eventually worked for, Rome. He is one of the greatest sources of data we currently have about the era of Jesus Christ.
What does Josephus say about Christianity? This, it turns out, is quite a loaded question.
If you ask certain scholars what Josephus said about Christians, you might hear them refer to Josephus' Antiquities of the Jews, Book 18, Chapter 3. The passage in question is as follows:
Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man; for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews and many of the Gentiles. He was [the] Christ. And when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day; as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him. And the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day.
Wow. Pretty glowing report, especially considering the fact that Josephus was not a proponent of the Jesus Movement.
Other scholars believe that Josephus' words were changed at some point between their writing and now. Many believe that a passage describing the death of Jesus did exist in Josephus manuscript for Antiquities, but that it would have read something more like the following:
At this time there appeared Jesus, a wise man. For he was a doer of startling deeds, a teacher of people who receive the truth with pleasure. And he gained a following among many Jews and among many of Gentile origin. And when Pilate, because of an accusation made by the leading men among us, condemned him to the cross, those who had loved him previously did not cease to do so. And up until this very day the tribe of Christians (named after him) had not died out.*
That sounds a little closer to the mark.
Josephus would have written these words around 93 or 94 AD, twenty-four years after he'd personally witnessed Rome's brutal sack of Jerusalem. Josephus mentions John the Baptist in another text, and "James the brother of Jesus" in yet another, but he says little to nothing about the Jesus Movement as it existed in the immediate wake of Christ's execution.
The best source of information we have on the group is The New Testament.
The Book of Acts shows the very first Christians living in Jerusalem among Jews, praying with Jews, and attending The Temple area everyday with their Jewish brothers and sisters. The New Testament sees the first members of the Jesus Movement observing a plethora of Jewish holidays, festivals, and feasts.
All that is to say that the first followers of the Jesus Movement considered themselves Jewish first, and this would have remained true for at least a generation. Most scholars look to 70 AD as the year when Christianity became Christianity, a thing separate and apart from Judaism. Alternatively, some scholars might point to the 90s AD as the moment Judaism and Christianity finally became distinct. At that time, Christians began lobbying Rome that they might be recognized as separate from Jews as far as it applied to the collection of the "Fiscus Judaicus," or "Jewish Tax."
As for the sect's beliefs about the afterlife, The Christians of The New Testament do not ever use the word "hell." The New Testament contains passing references to "Gehenna," and to "Hades," and to the "netherworld," ambiguous terms from the Hellenized Jewish world of its time. The first Christians were not concerned with getting into heaven or avoiding hell so much as they were concerned with the coming "Kingdom of Heaven." The coming Kingdom of Heaven refers back to the "world to come" that The Pharisees believed in, and can be seen as a prophesied worldly event of great upheaval, even to the point of being "world-ending." The Jesus Movement sect was an apocalyptic one in that it foresaw an immediate end to the world, as it currently existed, at the hands of the one true God.
As for the sect's beliefs about the afterlife, The Christians of The New Testament do not ever use the word "hell." The New Testament contains passing references to "Gehenna," and to "Hades," and to the "netherworld," ambiguous terms from the Hellenized Jewish world of its time. The first Christians were not concerned with getting into heaven or avoiding hell so much as they were concerned with the coming "Kingdom of Heaven." The coming Kingdom of Heaven refers back to the "world to come" that The Pharisees believed in, and can be seen as a prophesied worldly event of great upheaval, even to the point of being "world-ending." The Jesus Movement sect was an apocalyptic one in that it foresaw an immediate end to the world, as it currently existed, at the hands of the one true God.
Since the first Christians anticipated an immediate coming of the Kingdom of Heaven, they did not find occasion to write down much or perhaps anything about what Jesus had said or done. It was a full twenty years after Jesus' death that we see the first Christian documentation. The first-written book of The Gospel wasn't penned until ten years later still, in 61 AD. That said, as any Christian will tell you, the Jewish holy scriptures remained forever integral to Christians. We can say that, as a sect of Judaism, the Jesus Movement believed in the same written tradition as the other Jewish sects of the period, but embraced a new oral tradition unlike that of The Pharisees.
There is much more that could be said, but, in the interest of time, we will draw this to a close. Before we go over the "must-remembers," please note that there are several other sects of Judaism that existed contemporaneously with Jesus that we will study in the future, outside of the five we've mentioned here. This study was designed to lay down a shallow contextual framework upon which we can build an understanding of the philosophy of Jesus. We will meet more of these peoples, and revisit the ones we've just met, again and again throughout the coming years.
Here are your "must-remembers:"
a) The Jesus Movement believed in the written Jewish scriptures, as well as a brand new apocalyptic oral tradition.
b) They eventually broke away from Judaism, becoming Christianity and spreading rapidly across the world.
c) The Jesus Movement didn't seem to be afraid of a "Hell," exactly. They did speak of a "netherworld," in Greek terms. They frequently referred to "Hades," the underworld of ancient Greek mythology. The ambiguously phrased "Kingdom of Heaven" is what they awaited and aspired to.
d) The Jesus Movement was a popular movement that, at very first, enjoyed favor mostly among the common and marginalized people. (It is worth noting that Christianity quickly attracted more upper-class adherents as it spread toward Europe.)
Next time: something completely different.
Now, let's get back to our Gospel.
There is much more that could be said, but, in the interest of time, we will draw this to a close. Before we go over the "must-remembers," please note that there are several other sects of Judaism that existed contemporaneously with Jesus that we will study in the future, outside of the five we've mentioned here. This study was designed to lay down a shallow contextual framework upon which we can build an understanding of the philosophy of Jesus. We will meet more of these peoples, and revisit the ones we've just met, again and again throughout the coming years.
Here are your "must-remembers:"
a) The Jesus Movement believed in the written Jewish scriptures, as well as a brand new apocalyptic oral tradition.
b) They eventually broke away from Judaism, becoming Christianity and spreading rapidly across the world.
c) The Jesus Movement didn't seem to be afraid of a "Hell," exactly. They did speak of a "netherworld," in Greek terms. They frequently referred to "Hades," the underworld of ancient Greek mythology. The ambiguously phrased "Kingdom of Heaven" is what they awaited and aspired to.
d) The Jesus Movement was a popular movement that, at very first, enjoyed favor mostly among the common and marginalized people. (It is worth noting that Christianity quickly attracted more upper-class adherents as it spread toward Europe.)
Next time: something completely different.
Now, let's get back to our Gospel.
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Matthew 2:22 through Matthew 2:23
22 But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling over Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go back there. And because he had been warned in a dream, he departed for the region of Galilee.
23 He went and dwelt in a town called Nazareth, so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be fulfilled, “He shall be called a Nazorean.”
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It's not that we should be learning to distrust Matthew...
It's just that we need to keep the name "Shoehorn Matthew" in the forefront of our minds when reading this Gospel.
As the narrative at hand works to get Jesus out of Egypt and into The Galilee on all the right terms, we see yet more angelic dreaming. Joseph, Mary, and Baby Joshua finally settle in the town of Nazareth.
Matthew says that they settle in Nazareth so that Jesus will be fulfilling the words of the prophets, who had supposedly said that a messiah would be coming and that he would be called a "Nazorean."
The problem here is that the prophets never mentioned Nazareth. Of this verse, notation in The New American Bible says the following:
The town of Nazareth is not mentioned in the Old Testament, and no such prophecy can be found there.
The notation goes on to try to connect the Matthew text to words that are phonetically similar to "Nazareth" in The Old Testament. It admits that the similarities are "remote."
These verses have nothing to do with how we will eventually interpret the moral vision of Jesus. We will retire of them here.
Next time, we begin Chapter 3, and meet one of my favorite Gospel personas: John the Baptist. I'm very excited for that. Until then, I bid you happy studies.
Love.
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* This rendition comes to us second hand, originally from John Meier's A Marginal Jew, I believe. Please correct me if you know better.
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To read what's next, click here.
To read what came prior to this, click here.
These verses have nothing to do with how we will eventually interpret the moral vision of Jesus. We will retire of them here.
Next time, we begin Chapter 3, and meet one of my favorite Gospel personas: John the Baptist. I'm very excited for that. Until then, I bid you happy studies.
Love.
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* This rendition comes to us second hand, originally from John Meier's A Marginal Jew, I believe. Please correct me if you know better.
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To read what's next, click here.
To read what came prior to this, click here.
