Continuing my exploration of early Christianity, the hot topic in religious academia today, I may have been a little too eager to accept the reason for the split between Pauline Christianity and Jewish Christianity (Jesus and his Apostles) or maybe not.
The initial indication of why the two Christianities split pointed to the insistence by the Jewish Church that people wanting to join the Jesus or shall I say, the Jesus the Christ movement needed to first become Jewish in all aspects including circumcision; something Paul’s Gentiles just were not going to do.
This turns out to be maybe only partially true. After the death of Jesus, his followers were spreading throughout Israel (as instructed), trying to turn their fellow Jews into Jewish Christians by getting them to buy into Jesus being the Messiah and about to bring into being the new Kingdom – prepare!
The question of gentiles joining the movement did not come up at first because the Apostles were not addressing non-Jews. St. Paul, the non-Apostle, brought up the question of gentiles joining the movement to the Jerusalem Church; the group Paul considered as the official Jesus Apostle group.
A quick reminder that the word “Christianity” does not mean the Christianity of today but a belief that Jesus was the Messiah and about to come back – that’s all!
In listening to a lecture by James Tabor, professor of Christian Origins and Ancient Judaism at the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte, I was reminded that yes, the Jerusalem group insisted on the gentiles becoming Jewish but only at the beginning. Actually, some in the group never relented from that stance but were eventually overridden by James, the leader of the group according to the account in the New Testament Book of ACTS by Luke.
The justification in ACTS for allowing Gentiles to join the Christian movement without becoming Jews first was the NOAHIDE LAWS or sometimes called the SEVEN LAWS OF NOAH.
I first became aware of these laws when a friend pointed out to me that the U.S. Congress has officially recognized these laws as “…the bedrock of society from the dawn of civilization…”
I wondered how come I never heard of them. Well I guess there are many important facts about our world’s history that I am totally ignorant of and that happens to be one of them.
Anyway, these laws are found in the Jewish Talmud in the story about Noah. We all know the story and we agree that according to the story we are all Noah’s children or better yet, the children of Noah refers to all of mankind since all others were destroyed by God in the flood; only Noah, his family and the animals survived and repopulated the earth.
According to this story, God then gave Noah a list of seven moral imperatives which applied to all of mankind (the Jews later had their own set of laws from God). According to Judaism, non-Jews that abide by these moral precepts are held to be “Righteous Gentiles”, right with God and afforded salvation after death or at least a good place in the afterlife.
The laws basically forbid:
Idolatry
Murder
Theft
Adultery
Blasphemy
Cruelty to animals
The last one is a requirement to set up a form of government that will police adherents to keep the above laws.
The way ACTS 15 tells it, the Council in Jerusalem (James the Just) the leader of Jewish Christianity, issued a directive that if gentiles follow the Noahide Laws, they can join the Jewish Christian movement without having to become Jews and observing all Jewish laws.
We know that the purpose of ACTS was to give Paul legitimization to convert people to Christianity as a “true” apostle of Jesus even though he never met Jesus (just in his dreams). Luke had to connect Paul to Jesus through the Apostles or make Paul appear as an Apostle appointed by Jesus himself; the new, risen Jesus and not the old Jesus. Luke’s purpose is quite clear and therefore problematic from a historical standpoint; he probably made some things up to fit his end purpose.
Even though there was a documented way to accept Gentiles into the movement without having them become Jews (Apostolic Decree) I feel if it did happen it was under duress. Paul was bribing the Jerusalem Council with money, lots of money. Since Jesus told his followers to sell everything for the Kingdom is at hand, many were probably poor and in need; remember one name for the group was the Ebionites (the poor).
I think the split between the two Christianities still had something to do with being Jewish but also about the divinity of Jesus, etc.
This concentration on the “true” birth of Christianity is absolutely fascinating to me but it is hard to keep up with all the material being published on the subject; I will try.
The initial indication of why the two Christianities split pointed to the insistence by the Jewish Church that people wanting to join the Jesus or shall I say, the Jesus the Christ movement needed to first become Jewish in all aspects including circumcision; something Paul’s Gentiles just were not going to do.
This turns out to be maybe only partially true. After the death of Jesus, his followers were spreading throughout Israel (as instructed), trying to turn their fellow Jews into Jewish Christians by getting them to buy into Jesus being the Messiah and about to bring into being the new Kingdom – prepare!
The question of gentiles joining the movement did not come up at first because the Apostles were not addressing non-Jews. St. Paul, the non-Apostle, brought up the question of gentiles joining the movement to the Jerusalem Church; the group Paul considered as the official Jesus Apostle group.
A quick reminder that the word “Christianity” does not mean the Christianity of today but a belief that Jesus was the Messiah and about to come back – that’s all!
In listening to a lecture by James Tabor, professor of Christian Origins and Ancient Judaism at the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte, I was reminded that yes, the Jerusalem group insisted on the gentiles becoming Jewish but only at the beginning. Actually, some in the group never relented from that stance but were eventually overridden by James, the leader of the group according to the account in the New Testament Book of ACTS by Luke.
The justification in ACTS for allowing Gentiles to join the Christian movement without becoming Jews first was the NOAHIDE LAWS or sometimes called the SEVEN LAWS OF NOAH.
I first became aware of these laws when a friend pointed out to me that the U.S. Congress has officially recognized these laws as “…the bedrock of society from the dawn of civilization…”
I wondered how come I never heard of them. Well I guess there are many important facts about our world’s history that I am totally ignorant of and that happens to be one of them.
Anyway, these laws are found in the Jewish Talmud in the story about Noah. We all know the story and we agree that according to the story we are all Noah’s children or better yet, the children of Noah refers to all of mankind since all others were destroyed by God in the flood; only Noah, his family and the animals survived and repopulated the earth.
According to this story, God then gave Noah a list of seven moral imperatives which applied to all of mankind (the Jews later had their own set of laws from God). According to Judaism, non-Jews that abide by these moral precepts are held to be “Righteous Gentiles”, right with God and afforded salvation after death or at least a good place in the afterlife.
The laws basically forbid:
Idolatry
Murder
Theft
Adultery
Blasphemy
Cruelty to animals
The last one is a requirement to set up a form of government that will police adherents to keep the above laws.
The way ACTS 15 tells it, the Council in Jerusalem (James the Just) the leader of Jewish Christianity, issued a directive that if gentiles follow the Noahide Laws, they can join the Jewish Christian movement without having to become Jews and observing all Jewish laws.
We know that the purpose of ACTS was to give Paul legitimization to convert people to Christianity as a “true” apostle of Jesus even though he never met Jesus (just in his dreams). Luke had to connect Paul to Jesus through the Apostles or make Paul appear as an Apostle appointed by Jesus himself; the new, risen Jesus and not the old Jesus. Luke’s purpose is quite clear and therefore problematic from a historical standpoint; he probably made some things up to fit his end purpose.
Even though there was a documented way to accept Gentiles into the movement without having them become Jews (Apostolic Decree) I feel if it did happen it was under duress. Paul was bribing the Jerusalem Council with money, lots of money. Since Jesus told his followers to sell everything for the Kingdom is at hand, many were probably poor and in need; remember one name for the group was the Ebionites (the poor).
I think the split between the two Christianities still had something to do with being Jewish but also about the divinity of Jesus, etc.
This concentration on the “true” birth of Christianity is absolutely fascinating to me but it is hard to keep up with all the material being published on the subject; I will try.
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