Work in Progress:

Jesus Mortal

jesusstatue

Judaism

The story of Jesus has really messed up the common understanding of Judaism, especially first-century Judaism. From the Christian perspective, first-century Judaism was legalistic, heartless, and maybe even oppressive, with hypocritical leaders. In fact, Judaism included several distinct traditions with different answers to fundamental religious questions, and Jesus’ teaching fit well enough under the big tent of Judaism.

The other feature of Christianity that obscures 1st-century Judaism is the Old Testament. The five books of Moses are pretty ferocious. Yahweh, for example, sends plagues to the Egyptians as a sort of genocidal terrorism that just doesn’t taste that good to the civilized palate. And the law is harsh, with death sentences handed out left and right. The Torah is so contrary to Christianity that a whole swath of unorthodox early Christians read those same scriptures as an account of the evil god Yahweh, from whom Christ was saving us. So Christians look at these books and think that that’s what 1st-century Judaism was like. Not much like Jesus.

In fact, however, Judaism had softened and matured in the centuries since the first stories about Yahweh were written. Some hard times with the Assyrians and Babylonians produced a religion with more sympathy, the prophets cried out for justice for the downtrodden, and by the time Jesus came along Judaism was so humane that Jesus’ much-ballyhooed moral teaching was largely in line with Jewish tradition.

That said, it was at the initiative of the Jewish leaders of Jerusalem that Jesus was killed. It was a political move. Jesus’ ministry and movement were acceptable along with other minority movements, such as the Essenes. Politically, however, they figured it was better to have one prophet killed than to risk Jesus stirring the people and provoking the Romans to action. Better one man die than all Israel perish, as the beloved disciple reported.

The chief priests having Jesus killed is pretty harsh. By modern standards, that’s unjust religious persecution of the clearest sort. That said, if the security of 1st-century Jerusalem were partly up to me, and someone asked me whether Jesus was too dangerous to let live, I might go along with those who say that it’s better to do the horrible thing and sacrifice this man before he brings down the uneasy peace with the Romans. As it happened, the Jews were able to hang onto Jerusalem another generation, possibly because they’d been shrewd and calculating enough have Jesus put down.

 

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contents

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table of contents you're already looking at it

introduction for the inquisitive reader

biographical overview who he was and wasn't

 

afterlife not Jesus' concern

animal sacrifice bloodless religion

apocalypse did Jesus preach hellfire?

baptism sin wash for Jesus and others

beatitudes Jesus' words and others' words

beloved disciple witness for the un-gospel

bible scripture old and new

bishop the unjesus

body focus on the physical

Buddha Jesus' close kin

charity key Christian virtue and legacy of Jesus

The Da Vinci Code secret (and false) messages

divorce women's status

dreams convenient literary device

Elijah Jewish prophet with his own second coming

equality ancient source of modern egalitarianism

exorcist Jesus and demons

failure reinterpreting Jesus as a failure

faith from trust to blind belief

father Jesus on titles of honor

Francis of Assisi the most Christlike Christian

Gandhi the 20th century's most Christly holy man

Galilee Jesus' inauspicious homeland

gentiles Jesus' inadvertent audience

god how Jesus became god

golden rule key to Jesus' success

gospels competing accounts

heaven from sky to spiritual home

hell revenge fantasy

humanism Jesus' legacy

inerrant Christian treatment of scripture

Thomas Jefferson ethics of Jesus

Jewish guilt Christian libel

John's gospel the un-gospel

John the baptist, see John the washer

John the washer Jesus' apocalyptic mentor

Judaism libeled religion of Jesus

kingdom of god what Jesus promised

Lao Tzu poet of the cosmic way

logos jesus as the word of god

C. S. Lewis famous, flawed trilemma

little drummer boy Luke beats Matthew

logos Jesus as the divine word

LORD Yahweh transitioning to the one god of all

Luke's gospel the all-around best gospel

Mark's gospel the gospel that lost its point

Mary of Magdala women, visions, and sex

massacre of the innocents bloodshed starts early

Matthew's gospel best gospel for church reading

Mormon, see Joseph Smith

Moses Jewish lawgiver

Muhammad a prophet who got it right

mystery Orpheus and transubstantiation

oppression origin of Jesus' compassion

The Passion of the Christ Luke as buzzkill

Paul revealer of the revealer

private and public public Jesus and secret Christ

relativism the secret power of the golden rule

sacrifice Jesus' death and Christian sacrament

Albert Schweitzer Jesus as a failure

sheol dark pit of death

show Jesus' deeds as put-ons

slavery abolished by Jesus' efforts

Joseph Smith flesh-and-blood Jesus

Socrates secular Jesus

son of god on close terms with the man upstairs

soul, see body

synoptics three gospels that agree

temple center of Jewish religion

trinity unifying and divisive doctrinre

vision, see dreams

Yahweh, see LORD

Zoroaster Persian dualistic holy man