Ah barquemet....you will never agree with me and I certainly will never agree with you- you approach this from the mind of a Protestant fundamentalist and I from a traditionalist.
Whether we agree is irrelevent. What do the scriptures say?Protestant fundamentalist? Hardly. More like a Berean who searches the scriptures to see if it is so.
You assume man has no authority to interpret the scriptures or make practical rulings, and I think we do in certain cases.
Once again, what do the scriptures say? God laughs at mans opinion. Our ways are not His ways, it is written.
You assume the Rabbis are bad guys, I assume they are good guys.
What did Jesus say?
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[FONT="]Matthew 15[/FONT]
[FONT="]1[/FONT][FONT="] Then came to Jesus scribes and Pharisees, who were from Jerusalem, saying, [/FONT]
[FONT="]2[/FONT][FONT="] Why do your disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? for they wash not their hands when they eat bread. [/FONT]
[FONT="]3[/FONT][FONT="] But he answered and said unto them, Why do you also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition? [/FONT]
[FONT="]4[/FONT][FONT="] For God commanded, saying, Honor your father and mother: and, He that curses father or mother, let him die the death. [/FONT]
[FONT="]5[/FONT][FONT="] But you say, Whosoever shall say to his father or his mother, It is a gift devoted to God, whatsoever you might have received from me; [/FONT]
[FONT="]6[/FONT][FONT="] And honors not his father or his mother, he shall be free. Thus have you made the commandment of God void by your tradition. [/FONT]
[FONT="]7[/FONT][FONT="] You hypocrites, well did Isaiah prophesy of you, saying, [/FONT]
[FONT="]8[/FONT][FONT="] These people draw near unto me with their mouth, and honor me with their lips; but their heart is far from me. [/FONT]
[FONT="]9[/FONT][FONT="] But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.[/FONT]
[FONT="] [/FONT]
[FONT="] [/FONT]
Matthew 23
13 But woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for you neither go in yourselves, neither allow you them that are entering to go in.
14 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you devour widows' houses, and for a pretense make long prayer: therefore you shall receive the greater condemnation.
15 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you travel on sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, you make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves.
16 Woe unto you, you blind guides, who say, Whosoever shall swear by the temple, it is nothing; but whosoever shall swear by the gold of the temple, he is bound!
17 You fools and blind: for which is greater, the gold, or the temple that sanctifies the gold?
18 And, Whosoever shall swear by the altar, it is nothing; but whosoever swears by the gift that is upon it, he is bound.
19 You fools and blind: for which is greater, the gift, or the altar that sanctifies the gift?
20 Whoever therefore shall swear by the altar, swears by it, and by all things thereon.
21 And whoever shall swear by the temple, swears by it, and by him who dwells therein.
22 And he that shall swear by heaven, swears by the throne of God, and by him who sits thereon.
23 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, justice, mercy, and faith: these ought you to have done, and not to leave the other undone.
24 You blind guides, who strain out a gnat, and swallow a camel.
25 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess.
26 You blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also.
27 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you are like unto whitewashed sepulchers, which indeed appear beautiful outwardly but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness.
28 Even so you also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.
29 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you build the tombs of the prophets, and adorn the sepulchers of the righteous,
30 And say, If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.
31 Therefore you are witnesses unto yourselves, that you are the children of them who killed the prophets.
32 Fill you up then the measure of your fathers.
33 You serpents, you generation of vipers, how can you escape the judgment of hell?
The words of the rabbis even today mock and blaspheme Jesus and His finished work. You can go with your feelings on the subject. I will go with the Words of the Master.
You assume Jewish doctrine is frozen in the Tanakh (and I would guess Christian tradition frozen in the NT), I believe there is a clear development of religion in the Tanakh and beyond.
If you're looking for a picture of a tallit from the first century, you're asking the wrong question. It's like asking for a picture of a hamburger to prove they ate cows. You need only ask "did they have tzitzit in the first century" and there's your answer.
Tzit tzit and tallits are two separate items which *could* be combined (as they later were), but you have no proof that this occurred in the first century, therefore it is merely your own conjecture.
As for your gematria leap of conjecture- that's woeful. Perhaps you should consult proper sources before you disparage another's religious practices.
I will stick with consulting the Bible. False accusations do nothing to prove your assertions.