Early Jewish Christian communities had three defining characteristics:
1. They faithfully adhered to the Law of Moses;
2. They exalted James, the brother of Jesus, and denigrated Paul the Apostle; and
3. They all believed that Jesus was the natural son of Joseph and Mary and he was adopted by G-d as His Son at His baptism by John.
How do the beliefs of the first Jewish Christians compare with the mainline teachings in Christianity today? Modern churches say that the law has been nailed to the cross and is no longer binding. The religion of Paul has become Orthodoxy. Any movement that insists that the Law of Moses is still obligatory is declared heretical. Finally, the modern church insists on a virgin birth and some believe in the perpetual virginity of Mary! What would Jesus say about the modern church? What would James, the leader of the Jerusalem church until his death in 62AD say about "Christianity?"
Today in church, I noticed that most all songs glorify Jesus as G-d with little reference to YHWH. I wonder what Yeshua thinks about what is being done in His name. The Holocaust, the Inquisition, and the Crusades are all rooted in Antisemitism. That Antisemitism developed in part with the victory by Paul's theology that emphasized teachings about Jesus as opposed to the teachings of Jesus which were practiced by early Jewish Christians. The victor writes history and gets to decide who is the heretic. Do you realize that if you lived in Jerusalem in 35AD and believed what modern Christianity teaches today, e.g Virgin Birth, Trinity, abolition of the Law, worship on Sunday instead of the Sabbath, then you would be declared the heretic? Perhaps it is time to discover who the historical Jesus really was. Perhaps it is time to decide who you are going to follow.
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Open Air Theology
13 hours ago
6 comments:
Just a thought. Not all of the early church thought that Yeshua was the natural son of Mary and Joseph. If they did then there would be no account of the virgin birth in Matthew and Luke. Both were written during the period of the early church.
The question is, I think, are you a part of the students of Ribi Yehoshua and is there a logical way to narrow down the myriad of opinions on what would qualify as a student. Those that don't start from a 1st century Jewish opinion within the framework of Judaism, since that has clearly been proven by the likes of Oxford historian James Parks in, "The Conflict of the Church and the Synagogue," do not qualify. Did Ribi Yehoshua submit to any type of authority? Logic dictates that he must have submitted to the Torah as he understood it and also as a great many of the Jews of his time understood it for if he didn't he would have been labeled as an apostate and there is no record (not even in the Talmud) of his being labeled as an apostate. His teachers would also have known of his understanding since they would have granted him the right to teach and judge the people of Israel, hence the title Ribi. Jzeus is not in this equation because he is a fabrication using the historical man Ribi Yehoshua's life to propagate the age old lie of Z-us, Mithra, Horus et. al. worship. I hope you list www.netzarim.co.il as a reputable reference because it is here that most facts have been taken and later plagiarized. The virgin birth is talked about in the Talmud as a real possibility. They understood the possibility of a woman conceiving had a man previously lost seed in a mikveh. Not common but not unheard of.
Most scholars believe that Mark (which includes no reference to the virgin birth) was written in the 70's. Matthew was most likely written next in the 80's and Luke in the late 80's or early 90's. John was most likely written last, in the 90's. My comment is referring to a period before the destruction of the Temple in 70AD, all most likely before the first "official" gospel was recorded.
Eliyahu,
You wrote: "I hope you list www.netzarim.co.il as a reputable reference...." I do include that site as a reputable reference. Thanks for the comment. Of course, my point is not to argue the virgin birth, but to point out the tension between the practices of the early Jewish Christian church and "Christianity" today.
I agree with the tensions between practices of early believers and "Christianity" today. Point well made and understood with study. My point about the virgin birth is that you cannot make the claim that "all" the early beleivers did not beleive in a virgin birth. You can claim that it was one position and argue for or against it. The timeline for the Gospel writings is also not clear in that many have Matthew and Luke before Mark and well before the destruction of the Temple in 70.
Good point. However, the post was not about all believers, but the practices of early Jewish Christians. The whole idea of a "virgin birth" did not even become an issue until much later with the evolution of the Catholic Church which made an issue of Yeshua's virgin birth. The idea of virgin birth was not uncommon among several pagan religions. Specifically, the birth of Mithra is very close to the verses in Luke and Matthew. The point is that it was not an issue to the Jewish Christians.
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