Christspiracy

FireDragon76 · Apr 26, 2024

There's an indie film that's out called Christspiracy, about the historical Jesus and his real motivations for cleansing the temple. It has some interviews with biblical scholars like James Tabor, who argues that Jesus cleansed the temple because he was opposed to the sacrifices there, and that Jesus himself (and John the Baptist) were most likely vegetarians.

This would be ironic as many Christians later went on to interpret Jesus death sacrificially, especially in the west where it was seen as appeasing God's anger against sin. It has only been some Orthodox and Mainline Protestant theologians that have questioned the ethics of the notion of seeing Jesus death as a blood sacrifice.

ViaCrucis · Jun 27, 2024

If we use the Gospels as our base source of information, I'm not sure how one can reach this position.

Jesus' rebuke of the corruption in the Temple seems somewhat straightforward. The underlying historical context is that the money-changers were literally robbing God's people, and as a consequence the Temple had been turned into a "den of thieves". The money-changers took regular Roman currency and converted it into acceptable Temple currency (Tyrian shekels). If it was honest, there probably wouldn't have been an issue, but it wasn't honest, the result was the Temple took in a lot of money that was, ostensibly unacceptable, exchanged it for acceptable money which ripped off Temple-goers, and they had to purchase animals at the Temple for sacrifice.

It's why the tables were over-turned and the animals forced out of the Temple. Jesus disrupted a scheme which used the Temple as a pretext for corruption and robbery.

-CryptoLutheran

FireDragon76 · Jun 27, 2024

ViaCrucis said:
If we use the Gospels as our base source of information, I'm not sure how one can reach this position.

Jesus' rebuke of the corruption in the Temple seems somewhat straightforward. The underlying historical context is that the money-changers were literally robbing God's people, and as a consequence the Temple had been turned into a "den of thieves". The money-changers took regular Roman currency and converted it into acceptable Temple currency (Tyrian shekels). If it was honest, there probably wouldn't have been an issue, but it wasn't honest, the result was the Temple took in a lot of money that was, ostensibly unacceptable, exchanged it for acceptable money which ripped off Temple-goers, and they had to purchase animals at the Temple for sacrifice.

ViaCrucis said:
It's why the tables were over-turned and the animals forced out of the Temple. Jesus disrupted a scheme which used the Temple as a pretext for corruption and robbery.

-CryptoLutheran

This is a plausible explanation to a certain extent (Jesus also condemned usury and financial exploitation), but doesn't seem to explain why there were Jewish groups at the time of Jesus that rejected animal sacrifices altogether, such as the Essenes. Also, certain passages in the Hebrew prophets seem to cast doubt on the desireability of sacrifices altogether (although since books like Isaiah went through the hands of multiple authors, it seems to equivocate at times).

ViaCrucis · Jun 27, 2024

FireDragon76 said:
This is a plausible explanation to a certain extent (Jesus also condemned usury and financial exploitation), but doesn't seem to explain why there were Jewish groups at the time of Jesus that rejected animal sacrifices altogether, such as the Essenes. Also, certain passages in the Hebrew prophets seem to cast doubt on the desireability of sacrifices altogether (although since books like Isaiah went through the hands of multiple authors, it seems to equivocate at times).

Depending on whether the Qumran Community was Essene or not (it's not entirely clear, though this is a favorable position among many); and depending on if the Essenes were even a single group, as ancient sources suggest they weren't (see Josephus, Wars, Book II, 8.13); the rejection of sacrifices may be related to the rejection of the priesthood. The Qumran Community clearly had an issue with the priesthood in Jerusalem, and probably was a result of some kind of earlier schism.

-CryptoLutheran

FireDragon76 · Jun 27, 2024

ViaCrucis said:
Depending on whether the Qumran Community was Essene or not (it's not entirely clear, though this is a favorable position among many); and depending on if the Essenes were even a single group, as ancient sources suggest they weren't (see Josephus, Wars, Book II, 8.13); the rejection of sacrifices may be related to the rejection of the priesthood. The Qumran Community clearly had an issue with the priesthood in Jerusalem, and probably was a result of some kind of earlier schism.

-CryptoLutheran

I think the issue is that there were multiple Judaisms, just as there were different early theologies in Christianity (Paul's Christology of exhaltation vs. the Johanine communty's Logos).

The temple priesthood, represented by the Sadduccees in the Gospels, had a different religious ethos, even reading different scriptures and having a different worldview.

I think the conflict is likely similar to between the brahmin priests and the sramanas in India, during approximately the same time period (axial age). Brahmins believed their sacrifices were necessary to ensure a good life in this world and the next, and the sramanas believed that only personal transformation could accomplish this, in many cases considering sacrifices to be superstition. This is similar to the later Jewish view of Maimonedes.

FireDragon76 · Jun 27, 2024

This article suggests Jesus wasn't merely against corruption in the temple, but the entire religious system of the temple, that allowed the violent and wicked to hide behind the sacrificial system. "Den of robbers" refers to a passage in Jeremiah that uses a Hebrew word that means "violent":

A Den of Robbers

Is a “den of robbers” a place where robbers go to steal, or a place where robbers go to hide? Perhaps one of the most famous actions attrib...

serene-musings.blogspot.com

N.T. Wright, in an interview, similarly states the real issue with cleansing isn't the financial transaction, but the entire temple system.

petergreenwell · Sep 11, 2024

Hey, I believe what was going on was an occupation of 2 groups of narcissists who just controlled the temple conversations and activities. They wouldn't allow actual debate, but had unspoken agreements in their behavior disorders on how to put on their dog and pony show everyday. You see this kind of thing at 12 Step Groups all the time. You can spot them, because they get angry. My guess Pharisees and Sadducees were just blown over when Jesus came in and could easily pierce through their nonsense. It must of shocked them ROFL.

Once you point out someone's behavior disorder in front of people it just destroys their credibility.

Imagine saying this at an AA meeting were there is a jerk narcissist? "Have you ever noticed that a jerk narcissist will purposely NOT laugh at someones joke if they are jealous of them?"

It completely cleans out the AA meeting. See how that works? That's how you clean a temple. IMHO.

christian-surfer · Dec 31, 2024

If Jesus was specifically trying to promote vegetarianism then there would be much more in the scriptures in regards to that. Vegetarianism is not wrong but it can be its own kind of religion and a form of radicalism in some ways. It’s kind on an idealistic thing in a world besought by greed, nuclear weapons, paganism etc. it can be perhaps an idealistic focus on the welfare of animals by animal lovers who perhaps love certain animals more than they love other people. Perhaps animals can seem more worthy of love to some people because animal life is simplistic and animals do not have enough higher intelligence. Humans have greater intelligence and a greater ability to be evil or neurotic but that’s not the end of the story

The Liturgist · 2025-05-04T00:35:25-0500

FireDragon76 said:
This would be ironic as many Christians later went on to interpret Jesus death sacrificially, especially in the west where it was seen as appeasing God's anger against sin.

That Christ our True God sacrificed Himself for our salvation is taught by all Christians in the East (whether Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, or members of the Assyrian Church of the East or the Ancient Church of the East, or members of the various sui juris Eastern Catholic churches like the Maronites of Lebanon).

The Liturgist · 2025-05-04T00:39:21-0500

FireDragon76 said:
There's an indie film that's out called Christspiracy, about the historical Jesus and his real motivations for cleansing the temple. It has some interviews with biblical scholars like James Tabor, who argues that Jesus cleansed the temple because he was opposed to the sacrifices there, and that Jesus himself (and John the Baptist) were most likely vegetarians.

I wouldn’t worry about this; its a fringe view propagated by people trying to distort Christianity for their own purposes, and it contradicts the Nicene Creed and the Christian Forums Statement of Faith. We have a record in the Holy Gospels of our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ, eating fish; in the case of St. John the Baptist, he is recorded as eating wild locusts, and since the four canonical Gospels are Gospel Truth, pun fully intended, we can thus exclude either of them as being vegetarians. Rather this falls under the concept of another gospel such as the Holy Apostle Paul warned us about in Galatians 1:8-9 (this forms part of a hymn in the Syriac Orthodox tradition called “I heard the Apostle Paul say…” which is rather beautiful.

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Christspiracy

FireDragon76

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ViaCrucis

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FireDragon76

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ViaCrucis

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FireDragon76

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FireDragon76

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A Den of Robbers

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petergreenwell

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christian-surfer

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The Liturgist

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The Liturgist

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