A week ago, I posted a comment on the Pope’s recent assertion that only a few Jews of Jesus time were guilty of deicide. My main argument was that the Pope, in the tradition of his predecessors, avoided the real issue … blaming Rome for its brutality toward the Jews.1700 years after the Council Nicea, the Pope remains Pontifex Maximus, chief Priest and apologist for the Roman Empire.
This AM, I came across this essay that took my case to a another level. I am not sure he has all his facts correct, but …
from the Humanist: The Real Christians
This just in: the Jews aren’t to blame for killing Jesus after all. Whew! I bet they’re relieved.
A new book by Pope Benedict XVI, just in time for Lent, does a “scientific” analysis of the Gospels and concludes that despite the pretty plain meaning of verses like “Then answered all the people, and said, ‘His blood be on us, and on our children,’” it was actually just a few politicians who were to blame. He wanders pretty far, though, when he claims that “read in the light of faith … these words are not a curse, but rather redemption, salvation.” In other words, “in the light of faith,” words mean whatever the Pope wants them to mean, and not what they really mean.
At bottom, of course, the Pope is right: it is absurd to blame “the Jews” as a whole, much less their descendants, for any particular death. What’s interesting is why this blame arose in the first place.
As best we can piece together from 1st and 2nd century writings, there probably was a fellow named Jesus, who came to lead a somewhat puritanical sect within Judaism that is sometimes called the “Essenes.” John the Baptist was a leader of this group before he was killed. After Jesus was killed too, his brother James took over, but he was killed as well, to be followed by Jesus’ great-nephew Simeon, who was also killed – this was not a desirable job. Sometimes known as “Jewish Christians,” sometimes known as “Ebionites” (meaning the “poor ones”), this little sect lasted for hundreds of years. In fact, when Muhammad married his first wife in the 7th century, the ceremony was performed by an Ebionite.
Ebionites did not believe Jesus was divine in any way, but believed that he was the prophet promised by Moses in Deuteronomy. They followed the 613 commandments of Jewish law rigorously, adding other rules such as vegetarianism, teetotaling, baptism in place of temple sacrifice, and refusal to take oaths. Our knowledge of Ebionite practices is the best guide we have to what Jesus actually preached.
The religion of Jesus would have ultimately faded as quietly as the religion of Mani had it not been for an odd duck named Paul. Paul began his career as a muscle-man for the Jewish high priests, the richest politicians in Roman Palestine, who did not like their authority being challenged by the Essenes or any other upstart sects. He persecuted them, and was responsible for at least one murder (and probably many more); at some point he switched sides, though, and sought to join them. The Ebionites claimed this was because the high priest declined to give Paul his daughter in marriage, but this might be just sour grapes. Anyway, James and the rest of the Ebionite leadership in Jerusalem had no use for their “reformed” persecutor, and at one point even tried to kill him. Now hated by both sides, Paul did the smart thing – he hit the road.
There were substantial Jewish communities all over the eastern Mediterranean, who were denied the opportunity to be fully Jews because they were so far away from the official temple. According to the official Jewish God experts, only sacrifices performed there (proceeds from which went into their own pockets) really counted with God. Moreover, there was another large group of near-Jews, sometimes called the “God-fearers,” who liked the idea of an ethical monotheism but who couldn’t quite bring themselves around to the whole Jewish law – circumcision, in particular, was a real stumbling block. So when Paul came waltzing into town, proclaiming “Good news, straight from Jerusalem! No more circumcision! You can even eat shrimp!”, he started raking in money and converts.
When word trickled back to Jerusalem about the lies Paul was spreading, the Ebionite leadership went ballistic. To think that a fellow who had never actually seen or spoken to Jesus should be profiting by such a perversion of his teaching was more than they could bear. They even went so far as to send out “truth squads” to the cities Paul had visited, correcting the misimpressions he had left. The epistle of John even appears to refer to Paul as the anti-Christ. After many years Paul returned to Jerusalem for a showdown, but it did not pan out. In fact, a riot erupted, in which Paul would very likely have been killed, but for the intervention of Roman troops. He was then shipped off to Rome for a trial, but the Acts of the Apostles ends before he got there (if he ever did).
This occurred in the 50s AD. Paul’s little colonies would probably have faded away, but for the great Jewish rebellion of 70-74 AD. This uprising was incomprehensible to most of the Roman world – why would anyone want to rebel against such a peaceful, prosperous, tolerant Empire? The fact that it dragged on so long and cost so much Roman treasure and blood only made things worse. Suddenly, being Jewish became very unfashionable; just as suddenly, the ability of Paul’s followers to say “Oh, we’re not Jews – the Jews actually hate us” became a precious commodity.
So valuable, in fact, that all sorts of anti-Jewish propaganda began working its way into the Gospels, which were written after the Jewish rebellion, and edited extensively before attaining the form they have today. Not only were Jews blamed for killing Jesus, but they were depicted as being ignorant louts who could not understand what he was saying. Mark has them calling Jesus a blasphemer and plotting to kill him from the get-go; he is especially vitriolic about Jesus’ family, who were then leading the Ebionites. He has family members say of Jesus that “He is out of his mind,” while having Jesus in turn disown his mother and brothers; when told they are waiting for him outside, he replies that his real mother and brothers are his followers, not his kin. Later, Mark has Jesus whine about being “without honor … among his own kin, and in his own house.”
Mark has little use for the Jewish apostles outside the family, either. He shows them terrified by a windstorm, failing to understand the miracle of the loaves “because their heart was hardened,” failing to understand parables, confusing Jesus with John the Baptist and Elijah, unable to perform a routine exorcism, disputing among themselves who should be the greatest and seeking preferential treatment, being mean to women and children, and utterly falling apart at Jesus’ hour of need in Gethsemane: “And they all forsook him, and fled. “ In the earliest known versions of Mark, Jesus does not even bother appearing to his disciples after his resurrection, but only appears to the women at the tomb.
It all smacks of a disinformation campaign to discredit Jesus’ initial band of Jewish followers, with the coup de grâce canard that “the Jews” killed Jesus. At the same time, the New Testament sucks up to the Roman victors; it is a Roman centurion who exclaims that “Truly this man was the Son of God!”, and it is Paul himself who tells his Roman readers that “the powers that be are ordained of God.”
The Pope is certainly correct that it was the Roman governor, not the Jews, who executed a troublemaker for calling himself a king. While he’s at it, though, how about giving us a “scientific” analysis of why the religion invented by Paul, who never saw or heard Jesus, is a more accurate rendition of “Christianity” than the religion practiced by those who did?