Another bit of religious news that just popped out was the publication of a new book by Pope Benedict XVI titled “Jesus of Nazareth – Part II”. The main topic is the exoneration of Jews for Jesus’ death.
This is a very positive move on Benedict’s part and he really needs a few positives at this time because everything else going on with the Vatican
The subject of the culpability of Jews in the death of Jesus (God) is centuries old. I have mentioned repeatedly that Christians / Catholics are notoriously ignorant of their own religion especially the historical development of their religion. The ignorance can be blamed on the Church itself in most cases and the Jewish question is a prime example.
Thousands of Jews have been slaughtered throughout history for killing Jesus “Christ Killers”. Even though the slaughter was under the banner of punishing the Jews for what they have done, the reasons for instigating such pogroms were usually political and/or economic in nature as in stealing the property of the Jews once they were killed or limiting their political power or plainly unwilling to pay back the loans they accepted from the Jews.
The Church did not try to dissuade the killers and in some cases actually encouraged them. Only relatively recently, have Popes such as John Paul II and Benedict and some before them, tried to counter the belief that the Jews, as a whole, were responsible for Jesus’ death.
In my own circle, I found that the ignorance of today’s Catholics about Jesus and his Apostles is quite staggering. Many are surprised when I tell them Jesus was a Jew, born a Jew, lived as an observant Jew and died as a Jew; not as a Christian…doh? They are surprised when I tell them ALL the Apostles were Jews and remained Jews; no they did not start another religion.
After Jesus’ death, the Apostles and their group remained together in Jerusalem
The Apostles and their followers were called Jewish Christians and remained observant Jews till the end as part of the broader Jewish religious culture.
The Apostles and their descendents remained in Jerusalem until the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, after which they supposedly moved to Syria
Back to the Jews; many people are unaware that there were many and I mean many, Jesus like prophets screaming that the end is near; there were many during the time of Jesus and many after the crucifixion. The most famous was John the Baptist who is a real historic figure as is Jesus’ brother James but not Jesus who has one mention in an obscure sentence by Jewish historian Josephus and a problematic sentence at that and that is all in all the historic documents of the world that we have…strange don’t you think.
Anyway, the Jewish authorities were having all sorts of problems with these so called messiahs and tried to keep the peace as best they could. The Romans were all about keeping the peace and if one guy got a crowd stirred up too much; down he went.
Please remember that Jesus, at that time, was not elevated to God-hood or even messiah-hood; he was just a plain Jewish trouble maker that had to be dealt with. So to accuse the Jews (Jewish nation) of conspiring to kill CHRIST THE MESSIAH is more than absurd, it is conspiratorial on the part of later New Testament writers.
Those writers were pissed that the Jews were not buying into Jesus (their own man) as some kind of God or Messiah that was foretold in the Old Testament, that would bring victory and glory back to the Jewish nation, hell, Jesus was crucified, what kind of victory is that? What kind of mighty Messiah is that? Do you blame the Jews for laughing at the notion that a dead Jew was somehow their Messiah?
Many cite the phrase from the Gospel of Mathew, “His blood be on us and our children” as proving that a “collective” guilt was borne by all Jews as a curse.
Benedict tries to dispel that in his book which will come out March 10. The problem with Mathew is that he was one of the writers that was pissed at the Jews for not joining the non-Jewish Christians in accepting Jesus as the Messiah and he made his feeling known in his Gospel and for that thousands of Jews had to die through the ages and for that I guess we should be grateful to Benedict for trying to rectify that falsehood.
I have not read the book but applaud the attempt as I condemn the centuries of Church obfuscation as to the matter of the Jews and one of their own, Jesus; the end is near preacher who Paul used as a central figure in his new fangled religion called Christianity.
I am interested in how Benedict handles this issue and once I read the book, I will report…
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