Are Jews still God's Chosen People?

[rosends]

It is not at all hard to define who killed Jesus. No legitimate Jewish court could have ordered such a thing, for all the well-established reasons I have given. Whereas Romans crucified people often, and Pontius Pilate is known to have been fond of crucifying people. And Romans killed anyone they thought might be a rabble-rouser, whereas Jewish law precludes such acts.

Jewish leaders (at least those not puppets of Rome) had no reason to kill Jesus for the simple reason that he wasn't important enough to merit notice by Jewish authorities during his lifetime. There were tons of popular movements, mini-sects, and itinerant preachers running around saying all sorts of heretical things in those days. Jesus was one among a large crowd. At that time, when it came to heresy, the Rabbis would have been concerned about gnostic dualism and Hellenic philosophy, not just one more guy who claimed to be the messiah.

The Romans killed Jesus because he probably annoyed them with unruly followers, or making public scenes. The Jews who were not Roman puppets could not have done so under Jewish law, and probably never heard of Jesus, much less spared enough thought about him to do him ill.

A good resource on this front is this text:
The Court-Martial of Jesus: A Christian Defends the Jews Against the Charge of Deicide: Weddig Fricke: 9780802110947: Amazon.com: Books

 

[Eliab ben Benjamin]

I
My memory of Jews and their problems goes as far back as WW2 , my maternal grand mother was a Jew and I made a point of visiting Belsen after the war whilst serving in the army. To see for myself.
At no time during my life have I ever heard a priest or member of the Anglican or other church blame the Jews for the death of Jesus. This is neither what we believe nor what we teach.
.

My mother was in Buchenwald at the end of WWII rescued by British Royal Marines, one of whom was my father ....
However not the issue i wish to comment on, it is the statement that Jews were are considered christ
killers by the church to this day, i witnessed this first hand on Passover eve some decades ago
(late 60s) ..
A friend and i attended erev Passover services at the Auckland Synagogue, and perhaps delayed our
departure a little too long saying our goodbyes, in that we arrived down at the harbour as the last ferry
was departing, we had no funds only our weekly ferry passes, so we walked back up town looking for shelter, as we came to the Cathedral we noticed it open by co-incidence for good Friday midnight mass, We stepped inside as the congregation was seating itself, very identifiable as we were wearing
yarmulke and prayer shawl ... the sermon was most defiantly explicit that the Jews killed their christos ... Astounding were the looks we received as the congregation filed out past us ...

However the Bishop was most kind after he enquired the reason for our attendance, he became
a perfect host, offering us tea and a room/cell to spend the night ... ... as a result we were
rested and early for morning service at the Shull a few doors up the street

Shalom .. Eliab

 

[Kenny]

My mother was in Buchenwald at the end of WWII rescued by British Royal Marines, one of whom was my father ....
However not the issue i wish to comment on, it is the statement that Jews were are considered christ
killers by the church to this day, i witnessed this first hand on Passover eve some decades ago
(late 60s) ..
A friend and i attended erev Passover services at the Auckland Synagogue, and perhaps delayed our
departure a little too long saying our goodbyes, in that we arrived down at the harbour as the last ferry
was departing, we had no funds only our weekly ferry passes, so we walked back up town looking for shelter, as we came to the Cathedral we noticed it open by co-incidence for good Friday midnight mass, We stepped inside as the congregation was seating itself, very identifiable as we were wearing
yarmulke and prayer shawl ... the sermon was most defiantly explicit that the Jews killed their christos ... Astounding were the looks we received as the congregation filed out past us ...

However the Bishop was most kind after he enquired the reason for our attendance, he became
a perfect host, offering us tea and a room/cell to spend the night ... ... as a result we were
rested and early for morning service at the Shull a few doors up the street

Shalom .. Eliab

I think the biggest problem is found when something wrong, such as what you mentioned, happens and then a wide brush is painted over everyone who remotely has a fragrance of the same.

It would be like me reading about Jeroboram and his worshipping the calf and then saying all Jews worship calves.

As a Christian who fellowships with multiple pastors of all denominations, there is not one who would ever suggest that the death of Christos was the fault of those of the Jewish faith. It is not Biblical in nature and it is very narrow minded.

I am not saying it doesn't happen. But I have found that those who do hold to those erroneous statements, are people who have a form of godliness but deny the power thereof. Blind people leading the blind who don't have the understanding of what love is and does and haven't the foggiest of what Jesus Christ represents.

B' Shalom

 

[BilliardsBall]

All,

I have not lost the irony that Jesus and the leaders of His day fought over what was scripture, what was tradition, and what was the will of G_d. I know the Sanhedrin policies. This is not the first time I've heard the argument that "we know they never met on Shabbat because they said so". We have examples in our own day of Presidents and parliaments and etc. contravening their own rules of order for Midnight laws, pardons, illegal wars, police actions, etc. The leaders of Jesus's day were angry--again, His custom was to preach, particularly at Pesach, Festival of Lights, etc. and they were waiting for Him, and he told Herod "Tell the fox three days from now I will be in town", etc.

You cannot wins points with born again Christians and Jews by telling them that tradition defeats the Tanakh and gospels. Nor with statements like "there's no such thing as an emergency trial in Jewish law". Right, except for the times Moishe convened bodies to meet and made decisions for cases that were new, as when daughters wanted to split the inheritance with no sons present!

If I can make a little point here, I was thinking of Barbara Streisand's Yentl yesterday. All this poor little shtetl girl wants to do is learn with the boys. And she does and does and does and does--and they talk about nothing but Talmud for two hours in the film as if there is no Tanakh. The Tanakh says it is the word of G_d thousands of times within, as does the NT. The Bible, gentlemen, the Bible!

 

[BilliardsBall]

I think the biggest problem is found when something wrong, such as what you mentioned, happens and then a wide brush is painted over everyone who remotely has a fragrance of the same.

It would be like me reading about Jeroboram and his worshipping the calf and then saying all Jews worship calves.

As a Christian who fellowships with multiple pastors of all denominations, there is not one who would ever suggest that the death of Christos was the fault of those of the Jewish faith. It is not Biblical in nature and it is very narrow minded.

I am not saying it doesn't happen. But I have found that those who do hold to those erroneous statements, are people who have a form of godliness but deny the power thereof. Blind people leading the blind who don't have the understanding of what love is and does and haven't the foggiest of what Jesus Christ represents.

B' Shalom

Amen, I would not be caught dead worshipping in a "church" that resists the clear NT idea that G_d slew Messiah by way of atonement. He specifically told Pilate that the Romans would have no power to crucify Him without that fact... and the Romans, not the Jewish people, killed the Messiah.

 

[Kenny]

Amen, I would not be caught dead worshipping in a "church" that resists the clear NT idea that G_d slew Messiah by way of atonement. He specifically told Pilate that the Romans would have no power to crucify Him without that fact... and the Romans, not the Jewish people, killed the Messiah.

THAT, is the proper understanding. To boil it down to my personal application... it was I that crucified him with my own personal sins. He remains, my Messiah!

 

[rosends]

All,

I have not lost the irony that Jesus and the leaders of His day fought over what was scripture, what was tradition, and what was the will of G_d. I know the Sanhedrin policies. This is not the first time I've heard the argument that "we know they never met on Shabbat because they said so". We have examples in our own day of Presidents and parliaments and etc. contravening their own rules of order for Midnight laws, pardons, illegal wars, police actions, etc. The leaders of Jesus's day were angry--again, His custom was to preach, particularly at Pesach, Festival of Lights, etc. and they were waiting for Him, and he told Herod "Tell the fox three days from now I will be in town", etc.

You cannot wins points with born again Christians and Jews by telling them that tradition defeats the Tanakh and gospels. Nor with statements like "there's no such thing as an emergency trial in Jewish law". Right, except for the times Moishe convened bodies to meet and made decisions for cases that were new, as when daughters wanted to split the inheritance with no sons present!

If I can make a little point here, I was thinking of Barbara Streisand's Yentl yesterday. All this poor little shtetl girl wants to do is learn with the boys. And she does and does and does and does--and they talk about nothing but Talmud for two hours in the film as if there is no Tanakh. The Tanakh says it is the word of G_d thousands of times within, as does the NT. The Bible, gentlemen, the Bible!

So does the Koran. You agree that it is the word of God? What about the book of Mormon? Or the words of the prophet Rael?

And when Moshe met with the daughters of Tzelofchad, there was no emergency meeting.

 

[BilliardsBall]

So does the Koran. You agree that it is the word of God? What about the book of Mormon? Or the words of the prophet Rael?

And when Moshe met with the daughters of Tzelofchad, there was no emergency meeting.

You are Jewish and you ask me if the Koran is the Word of God? I must misunderstand your question.

 

[rosends]

You are Jewish and you ask me if the Koran is the Word of God? I must misunderstand your question.

When you lecture Jews about the talmud NOT being the word of God, but insist, "The Tanakh says it is the word of G_d thousands of times within, as does the NT. The Bible, gentlemen, the Bible!" it seems reasonable to ask you about another text that makes the same claim. If the prophecies of Rael claim to be the word of God in the same way that the gospels do, why do you embrace one and not the other as "the Bible"?

 

[roger1440]

Since Jewish law forbids this kind of torture-- crucifixion, leg breaking, etc.-- this indicates all the more how illegitimate and un-Jewish such treatment would be, making it all the more an unlikely account.

The “leg breaking” was not meant to be a form of torture. It was meant to quicken death. In order to breathe our chest must expand so our lungs can be filled with air. It’s extremely difficult to breathe while crucified. The condemned would have to push down on his feet to arch his back in order to allow the chest to expand. If the legs are broken, it is impossible to expand the chest. The victim would then suffocate. Sundown was quickly approaching. Jesus’s death would have to occur before sunset.

“22 “And if a man has committed a crime punishable by death and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, 23 his body shall not remain all night on the tree, but you shall bury him the same day, for a hanged man is cursed by God. You shall not defile your land that the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance.” (Deuteronomy 21:22-23)

The “leg breaking” episode is there to make a point,

“These things happened so that the scripture would be fulfilled: "Not one of his bones will be broken,"” (John 19:36)

 

[Flankerl]

When you lecture Jews about the talmud NOT being the word of God, but insist, "The Tanakh says it is the word of G_d thousands of times within, as does the NT. The Bible, gentlemen, the Bible!" it seems reasonable to ask you about another text that makes the same claim. If the prophecies of Rael claim to be the word of God in the same way that the gospels do, why do you embrace one and not the other as "the Bible"?

That's not okay. You can't do unto Christians what they regularly do unto us.

As you see it just confuses at least this one.

 

[Levite]

The “leg breaking” was not meant to be a form of torture. It was meant to quicken death. In order to breathe our chest must expand so our lungs can be filled with air. It’s extremely difficult to breathe while crucified. The condemned would have to push down on his feet to arch his back in order to allow the chest to expand. If the legs are broken, it is impossible to expand the chest. The victim would then suffocate. Sundown was quickly approaching. Jesus’s death would have to occur before sunset.

“22 “And if a man has committed a crime punishable by death and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, 23 his body shall not remain all night on the tree, but you shall bury him the same day, for a hanged man is cursed by God. You shall not defile your land that the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance.” (Deuteronomy 21:22-23)

The “leg breaking” episode is there to make a point,

“These things happened so that the scripture would be fulfilled: "Not one of his bones will be broken,"” (John 19:36)

I understand what the point was. However, it is still not permitted. It would cause too much needless pain, and not hasten death enough to make it permissible.

Furthermore, the passage from Deuteronomy you quoted is not relevant. It refers to the practice of displaying the bodies of the executed as a deterrent to further crime. The displayed body was already dead when hung for display. It could not refer to a still-living person, because killing someone in such a fashion is not permitted under Jewish law. The idea in the verses is not that the man whose body is hung is accursed (bad translation), but that the man is humiliated. And while it is permitted to execute the guilty, it is not permitted to do so with undue public humiliation-- yet another reason that crucifixion is not permitted to us.

 

[metis]

And think we all can agree that crucifixion was a Roman form of punishment and not a Jewish one, right? And I think we can all agree that Jesus must have been perceived by the Romans to have broken one of more of their laws in order for the Romans to have executed Jesus, right?

 

[roger1440]

This is not, in fact, the case.

First of all, there are only four methods of execution permissible under Jewish law, and crucifixion is not among them.
Second of all, it is incredibly difficult to get a death sentence out of a legitimate Sanhedrin: the burden of proof is vast, far far beyond the burden of proof in any modern nation.
Third of all, at that time, the legitimate Sanhedrin was not executing people, for various reasons, among them being the requirement imposed on us to turn over those sentenced to death to the Romans for execution, who would certainly use methods not permitted to us.
Fourth, the Christian scriptures present an account of a sanhedrin being called by the High Priest, Yosef bar Kayafa (or bar Kufai, Hellenized to Caiaphas): not only did the High Priest have no authority to convene a sanhedrin, but bar Kayafa was part of the corrupted Sadducee element in the priesthood, meaning he had even less authority to convene a sanhedrin. Any "court" he convened would have been completely illegitimate under Jewish law.

Finally, no legitimate Sanhedrin would have wasted its time on Jesus. There were hundreds of guys running around ancient Israel claiming to be the messiah. It would have been an endless parade of trials, and a bloodbath, if they had actually tried and executed them all. There was nothing special about Jesus.

There is no way to know for certain if the Jewish authorities had a hand in Jesus’s crucifixion. If Jesus did pose a potential threat to peace in Jerusalem during Passover then the Jewish authorities would have had motive. Granted, the Jewish authorities did not have the authority to do this, that and the other thing, but we do not live in a perfect world. I am from New Jersey. New Jersey is not known for only Bruce Springsteen, Frank Sinatra and The Sopranos. It is also known for corrupt politics. Point is, corrupt politics happen all the time, not only in my neck of the woods. As you know, it doesn’t take much to start a fire. It’s best to extinguish it before it gets out of hand. Just ask Mrs. O'Leary’s cow.

“You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish." (John 11:50)

Josephus did write about a riot that broke out on or near the Temple grounds. Some Roman soldier exposes his rear end and the Jews didn’t think kindly of that gesture. After the riot, thousands of Jews were dead. This riot happened around 20 or 30 years after Jesus’s death.

The O'Leary Legend | The Great Chicago Fire & The Web of Memory

 

[roger1440]

And think we all can agree that crucifixion was a Roman form of punishment and not a Jewish one, right? And I think we can all agree that Jesus must have been perceived by the Romans to have broken one of more of their laws in order for the Romans to have executed Jesus, right?

All I know, someone wanted him silenced, and it certainly wasn’t the welcome wagon, LOL.

 

[muhammad_isa]

And think we all can agree that crucifixion was a Roman form of punishment and not a Jewish one, right? And I think we can all agree that Jesus must have been perceived by the Romans to have broken one of more of their laws in order for the Romans to have executed Jesus, right?

3. Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man; for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews and many of the Gentiles. He was [the] Christ. And when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day; as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him. And the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day.
The_Antiquities_of_the_Jews

 

[roger1440]

I understand what the point was. However, it is still not permitted. It would cause too much needless pain, and not hasten death enough to make it permissible.

Furthermore, the passage from Deuteronomy you quoted is not relevant. It refers to the practice of displaying the bodies of the executed as a deterrent to further crime. The displayed body was already dead when hung for display. It could not refer to a still-living person, because killing someone in such a fashion is not permitted under Jewish law. The idea in the verses is not that the man whose body is hung is accursed (bad translation), but that the man is humiliated. And while it is permitted to execute the guilty, it is not permitted to do so with undue public humiliation-- yet another reason that crucifixion is not permitted to us.

If Jesus's dead body was on the cross for the entire night, would that have been permissible under Jewish Law?

 

[metis]

All I know, someone wanted him silenced, and it certainly wasn’t the welcome wagon, LOL.

Especially during Passover because of the crowds, I have not much doubt that Jewish leaders would have been concerned about Jesus, especially because of the incident at the Temple whereas he made a whip and overturned tables. They may have well sent up red flags for the Roman authorities that Jesus was not to be trusted, and maybe the Jewish leaders may have given the Romans a heads-up.

The Romans couldn't care less about Jewish Law, but they certainly cared about keeping the order and collecting taxes, so with the Temple incident on their minds and Jesus' procession into Jerusalem, they may have had enough and, if nothing else, may have wanted to send a loud and clear message about what can be expected if we screw around with them.

All this is hard to say because it relies on what is recorded, and what is recorded often is very subjective.

 

[roger1440]

3. Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man; for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews and many of the Gentiles. He was [the] Christ. And when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day; as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him. And the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day.
The_Antiquities_of_the_Jews

That's a fake. Josephus won't have written so favorable about Jesus.

 

[metis]

That's a fake. Josephus won't have written so favorable about Jesus.

Thank you for posting this reality.