Jesus the Jew

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Judaism, as the Jewish religion came to be known in the 1st century ce, was based on ancient Israelite religion, shorn of many of its Canaanite characteristics but with the addition of important features from Babylonia and Persia. The Jews differed from other people in the ancient world because they believed that there was only one God. Like other people, they worshipped their God with animal sacrifices offered at a temple, but, unlike others, they had only one temple, which was in Jerusalem. The sanctuary of the Jewish temple had two rooms, as did many of the other temples in the ancient world, but the second room of the Jewish temple was empty. There was no idol representing the God of Israel. The Jews also believed that they had been specially chosen by the one God of the universe to serve him and obey his laws. Although set apart from other people, they believed God called on them to be a “light to the Gentiles” and lead them to accept the God of Israel as the only God. Later in the century this miracle took on a new meaning - a meaning that would resonate down the centuries. The Gospel writers saw that the miracles could speak directly to the Christians suffering persecution in Rome. Like that boat in peril, the Christians in Rome might well have feared that their Church was in danger of sinking. And like Jesus asleep on the boat, they might have worried that Jesus had forgotten them. But the message of the evangelists was this: if they had faith in Jesus, he would not abandon them; he could calm the storm on the Sea of Galilee or in Rome. The Resurrection It is this difference between being a Jew ethnically and religiously that lies behind Paul’s statement in Romans 2:28-29: “For he is not a real Jew who is one outwardly, nor is true circumcision something external and physical. He is a Jew who is one inwardly, and real circumcision is a matter of the heart, spiritual and not literal.” The Gospels contain records of over 35 miracles and of these the majority were healings of the lame, the deaf and the blind, exorcism of those possessed by demons. Quigley, Megan (2015). Modernist Fiction and Vagueness: Philosophy, Form, and Language. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-316-19566-6.

If we want to keep Jews Jews, we don’t tell lies about Christianity, and we don’t hide information – we educate ourselves … and we have to see what that means for us and for Jews who have Christian partners.” Modern Jewish scholarship of the New Testament is concerned with how Christ’s teachings are nurtured by Judaism and stem from it. According to one expert in the field, this can serve to further understanding between the two religions Remove the slippery metaphor of personal salvation and the blasphemy of his being the Son of God - with neither of which concept Jesus himself had the slightest bit to do - and there is nothing that he is reported to have said or performed that would have raised the ire of his fellow Jews sufficiently for them to chant for his death. In so far as we can separate his actual words from later theological interpretations of them - the historical Jesus from the person Christians writing after the event needed him to be - the voice we hear is that of an unequivocally Jewish healer and teacher. The American literary critic Harold Bloom has praised the Gospel of St Mark - the earliest of all the gospels - for rendering a Jesus who sounds, in his "unanswerably rhetorical questions, and fiercely playful outbursts that edge upon a frightening fury", very much like Yahweh, the Jewish God. Jokes about family resemblance apart, this is to be accounted for by Jesus's being steeped in the Torah and the instructions of the God whose gift to the Jews it was. "Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets," Jesus says in Matthew. "I am not come to destroy but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled." The voice is all sinew and austere temper, reminiscent, in its queer mix of candour, menace and self-importance, not only of the Jewish God but of earlier Jewish prophets too.

Avoid perpetuating anti-Judaism

Andreopoulos, A. (2005). Metamorphosis: The Transfiguration in Byzantine Theology and Iconography. St. Vladimir's Seminary Press. ISBN 978-0-88141-295-6. Crowley, Aleister (March 1909). "The Temple of Solomon the King". The Equinox. London: Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent. 1 (1): 160. Jesus' miracle of the walking on water would have reminded the disciples of Joshua. Like Joshua, Jesus was crossing waters. Ahead of Joshua was the Ark of the Covenant with the Ten Commandments carried by twelve priests. That scene was inverted and echoed on the Sea of Galilee; ahead of Jesus was a different kind of ark - the wooden boat, carrying the twelve disciples. But the biggest similarity between the two was in their names: Jesus is the Latin for the Hebrew name Joshua. Passover and Easter both commemorate liberation — one in terms of escaping the bondage of slavery, the other in the form of resurrection from the dead and freedom from sin. Some earlier biblical scholars believed that what the Gospels describe as Jesus’s Last Supper was in fact his celebration of the Passover seder, but most scholars now disagree. They are books with a message, an announcement. They are, for want of a better word, propaganda for the cause of early Christianity. This is why they are called Gospels - a word derived from the old Anglo-Saxon word God spell, from the Greek evangelion: 'good news'. John's Gospel provides a clear example of how the Gospel writers, or evangelists, were thinking about their task.

The initialism INRI represents the Latin inscription IESVS NAZARENVS REX IVDÆORVM ( Iesus Nazarenus, Rex Iudaeorum), which in English translates to "Jesus the Nazarene, King of the Jews" ( John 19:19). [16] John 19:20 states that this was written in three languages – Hebrew, [a] Latin and Greek – and was put on the cross of Jesus. The Greek version of the initialism reads ΙΝΒΙ, representing Ἰησοῦς ὁ Ναζωραῖος ὁ βασιλεύς τῶν Ἰουδαίων ( Iēsoûs ho Nazōraîos ho basileús tôn Ioudaíōn). [17] Senior, Donald (1985). The Passion of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew. Vol.1. M. Glazier. ISBN 0-89453-460-2. In isopsephy, the Greek term ( βασιλεὺς τῶν Ἰουδαίων) receives a value of 3343 whose digits seem to correspond to a suggested date for the crucifixion of Jesus, (33, April, 3rd day). For example, in Gospel stories describing the life of Jesus, people with lepra are purified when Jesus heals them.And a superscription also was written over Him in letters of Greek, and Latin, and Hebrew, THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS. Only some of the extant early Greek manuscripts of Luke’s Gospel include the reference to the languages in verse 23:38. [21] [22] This variance may be a result of later copyists adding to Luke to harmonize that Gospel with the text of John 19:20. [23] The New International Version (NIV) translation and 43 of the 63 translations of Luke 23:38 assembled by BibleGateway.com omit any reference to the languages. [24] New Testament scholars have spent an impressive amount of energy on the study of the historical Jesus and much of it in the last few decades has revolved around his Jewishness. And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was, JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEWS. This title then read many of the Jews: for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city: and it was written in Hebrew, and Greek, and Latin.