The Lost Religion of Jesus

[GregorytheGood]

This is actually the title of an exceptional book that I think EVERY Christian should read.
In order to truly understand Jesus and what He taught, we must understand something of Judaism. Also, we must try to learn what interpretation Jesus and His followers had on Jewish Law and the Prophets. Jesus' favorite Prophet seems to have been Isaiah, which is interesting, because Isaiah is also the Prophet most revered by the Essenes (perhaps the most radical of the five major sects of Judaism).

Anyhow, Jesus is rightfully known as the Prince of Peace; the Benign One; the Harmless One; and the Teacher of Righteousness. I feel like modern-day christianity has lost much of, if not all of, Jesus' message.

 

[dvd_holc]

Isaiah was the most known prophet of Jews; not just one group. And yes, to understand Jesus you have to understand His settings, both theolgically and politically.

 

[dayhiker]

I am reading Phil Yancey's book the Jesus I never knew. Its really good and shows how the church misses a whole aspect of the teaching fo Jesus and how Jesus lived.

 

[Caduceus]

Jesus of Nazareth was a Jew! He lived and died in his ancestral faith.

Christianity [i.e. the Jesus movement] was originally a Jewish messianic sect, but unfortunately it defected and later on started worshipping Jesus instead of the Almighty.

I would strongly recommend reading, Geza Vermes' book, The Religion of Jesus the Jew, SCM Press,1993.

 

[vekarppe]

Christianity [i.e. the Jesus movement] was originally a Jewish messianic sect, but unfortunately it defected and later on started worshipping Jesus instead of the Almighty.

The early Christians worshiped Jesus as the Messiah, Son of God.

 

[Caduceus]

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[Caduceus]

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[Caduceus]

The earliest Jewish followers of Jesus revered him as the expected messiah and anticipated his imminent return to inaugurate the kingdom of God here on earth. They only worshipped, as did Jesus himself, the one immanent and transcendent God of Israel.

The term messiah is a Jewish royal designation meaning “anointed” as in Ancient Near Eastern coronation rituals. In earlier times Saul, David, and Solomon had each been so described. In later Judaic belief the concept was developed further, in speculative eschatological scenarios, to denote an individual invested by God with special powers and functions.

The word Christ [χριστος] is merely the Greek translation of the Hebrew mashiah [messiah]. It is a title not a proper name. The extent to which Jesus personally believed in himself as the messiah is somewhat uncertain. However, there is no doubt that he was tried and executed as one. Any alleged pretensions to “kingship” were deemed seditious by the Roman authorities in Judaea and summarily punished.

Claiming to be the son of God was nothing extraordinary in contemporary Judaism. All righteous Jews were believed to be God's sons. To Jews the term “son of God” was a metaphorical expression of their relationship with the creator.

However, in the wider Hellenistic/Roman world with its numerous anthropomorphic deities, both male and female, the significance and implication of such an expression would have been construed in a totally different fashion!

 

[Woltz]

The message of Jesus won't be followed because of our human nature, we still follow the law of the stronger. To be natural is to be egoist. A selfish person it's against nature. That's why there are laws, to prevent that our nature destroy ourselves.

 

[GregorytheGood]

Christianity was originally a sect of Judaism. A Radical Sect it was. It did go against the grain of society and it was seen as strange.

The tenets of Christianity are STILL STRANGE.

So, now the question is; are you a child of the Light or a child of the Darkness?

We are all Children of Light who worship the great Being, and who follow the Prince of Peace, Teacher of Righteousness' footsteps.

Peace,
Gregory

 

[Yin717]

Jesus is part of the trinity. Father, Son and Holy Spirit. How in the world are Christian's just worshipping Jesus? If anything they worship God more and belive Jesus is his Son who came down to Earth to forgive us of our sins.

 

[rootbeer88]

Claiming to be the son of God was nothing extraordinary in contemporary Judaism. All righteous Jews were believed to be God's sons. To Jews the term “son of God” was a metaphorical expression of their relationship with the creator.

Do you believe the first chapter of Luke is false?

 

[Teke]

This is actually the title of an exceptional book that I think EVERY Christian should read.
In order to truly understand Jesus and what He taught, we must understand something of Judaism. Also, we must try to learn what interpretation Jesus and His followers had on Jewish Law and the Prophets. Jesus' favorite Prophet seems to have been Isaiah, which is interesting, because Isaiah is also the Prophet most revered by the Essenes (perhaps the most radical of the five major sects of Judaism).

Anyhow, Jesus is rightfully known as the Prince of Peace; the Benign One; the Harmless One; and the Teacher of Righteousness. I feel like modern-day christianity has lost much of, if not all of, Jesus' message.

Judaism doesn't hold the fullness of truth, Christianity does. If you are lost and can't find the church, it doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. It just means that the Lord is hiding it from you for some reason.

It does not mean that "religion" (which is ordered worship) is lost to mankind, nor is Jesus teachings. To say such is to call the Lord a liar. I think we both know He would never lie to us. We, on the other hand, are imperfect and disillusioned by many things in the world.

You post exemplifies such confusion in stating that Judaism can help a Christian.

 

[thersites]

If claiming to be the son of God were such a commonplace thing in first century Judaism, why did the Jews try to stone Jesus for doing it, and why did they say that by claiming to be the son of God he was making himselg God's equal?

C'mon, now, deal with the documents.

 

[Protos]

Jews were held to be God's sons, this is attested by Paul in Galatians, but in the context of the Gospels, the Son of God was a title specifically for the Messiah. This is attested in Qumran and shows it is not a Greek concept.

 

[Protos]

Of course the Jewish concept “son of God” was not Greek and I never in fact stated that it was. An attempt was being made to demonstrate the different interpretations that such a term would have conveyed within the wider socio/religious context of the polytheistic Hellenistic/Roman world. It should be recognized that the NT gospels were not written for Jews, but for Greek speaking gentile Christian communities outside of the geographical area we now refer to as Palestine (the Eastern Mediterranean littoral).

That's speculative. Most consider Matthew from Antioch or Syria, so to say the least you're not arguing from facts. But yes, the other three were certainly written to Gentile communities. However, the material in the Synoptic Tradition is ultimately Palestinian. As Bultmann pointed out, the material was not changed in its basis in the story from its Palestinian origin, since apparently the Hellenistic Christians had no interest in stories about Jesus, apart from miracles (which he argues are the only thing that was Hellenized, apart from some "cultic" aspects like the Last Supper). So, Son of God remains entirely Jewish.

It is a fact that Jesus is often called son of God in the New Testament. It is equally a fact that even non Christian readers of the gospels, influenced by later ecclesiastical dogma, are liable to identify as a matter of course the title “son of God with concomitant notions of divinity. Both within Christianity and outside, it is accepted as an article of faith or else summarily rejected.

Where Paul uses Son of God, he doesn't use it in the same way as the Gospels. So this is clearly not so, that the Gospels employ the Greek usage. (and again keeping in mind the above).

The assumption is made that when the NT writers apply this term to Jesus himself, they are acknowledging him as equal to God. In other words, the tendency, conscious or otherwise, is to insert into these early Christian writings (and indeed beyond them) and to impose upon a religious tradition, originally sprung from unequivocal monotheistic Judaism, that most un-Jewish doctrine of the Council of Nicaea (325 CE) “Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God … God of God … being of one substance with the Father.”

I don't think Qumran is 325 my friend, where the term is clearly exclusively divine and applied to the Messiah. I'll find the references if you want.

 

[Steve Petersen]

Judaism doesn't hold the fullness of truth, Christianity does. If you are lost and can't find the church, it doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. It just means that the Lord is hiding it from you for some reason.

It does not mean that "religion" (which is ordered worship) is lost to mankind, nor is Jesus teachings. To say such is to call the Lord a liar. I think we both know He would never lie to us. We, on the other hand, are imperfect and disillusioned by many things in the world.

You post exemplifies such confusion in stating that Judaism can help a Christian.

Jesus didn't live in a vacuum. He lived in the real world of Second Temple Judaism. Understanding that context will illuminate the NT and MAY upset some doctrines based on verses taken outside that context.

 

[Protos]

Jesus didn't live in a vacuum. He lived in the real world of Second Temple Judaism. Understanding that context will illuminate the NT and MAY upset some doctrines based on verses taken outside that context.

That's true insofar as terms and phrases, but highly unlikely that any doctrine will be upset since Jesus' understanding of the purpose of man and the nature of the Jewish religion was markedly different from that of his contemporaries, and this can be seen whether one puts it in a Jewish context or not (e.g. Mark 12:35-37 and parallels, and especially the disputes about work on the Sabbath).

The Jewish context, although true in the sense that it would illuminate the meaning of the Gospels (at the very least in some cases) more fully, has nevertheless been exaggerated to such an extent that in some cases it has become ridiculous. For example, Bultmann (History of the Synoptic Tradition), believed that when Jesus said: "Whoever does not follow me/ Whoever does not follow me to the cross/in my way/etc" he meant actually following Jesus around just like the students of the contemporary Rabbis did. The very absurdity of expecting everone to physically follow him to crucifixion should be enough to point out that Jesus did not intend it that way and was different from his contemporaries due to his highly metaphorical way of thinking (if anything he probably used the literal meaning of his contemporaries and turned it around into metaphoric), which is actually further supported by the fact that his audience (including his disciples) took many of the things he said literally (e.g. John 6, the Jewish crowd confuses the Eucharist with actually having to eat Jesus' body, the parable of the Pharisees' yeast (Mark 8:14-21, that the disciples confuse with physically rejecting bread from them, and so on).

 

[Steve Petersen]

I have heard that 'Son of God' was a term that could be applied to rightful Davidic heirs to his throne. This supposedly was based on Psalm 2:7.

 

[bahumbas]

Sounds like an excellent book.