outhouse
Atheistically
There was oppressed people correct?
And Antipas was a rich Hellenist in power running Galilee, oppressing the Aramaic speaking people of Nazareth?
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Did Jesus preach with intent to start a new religion?
- Thread starter jeager106
- Start date
There was oppressed people correct?
And Antipas was a rich Hellenist in power running Galilee, oppressing the Aramaic speaking people of Nazareth?
Vishvavajra
Active Member
Yes, Sepphoris was an important cultural center and a jewel in the crown of the Herodian conquest of the region, but there's no evidence that the Jews living there didn't speak Aramaic just like everybody else.
And the existence of wealth disparities is not itself evidence of ethnic strife. Wealth disparity was a fact of life in antiquity, just as it typically is today. The people took that sort of thing for granted. And Sepphoris was designed specifically to be a showpiece by Herod, who poured a lot of resources into it.
outhouse
Atheistically
Were Hellenistic Jews, cultural oppressed Israelites? or free people of which many were Roman citizens?
He was a Roman citizen. He was a free wealthy Hellenist.
Not an oppressed Israelite/
Now your getting somewhere.
All Jews of this period need to have an short explanation of what type of Judaism they followed. Otherwise the term is useless in this multicultural and multi faceted belief pattern.
Aramaic Galilean Jew is more descriptive then just Jew. Cultural Judaism would state one s an Israelite, which in this period not all Jews were.
Real Jew equaling a cultural Jew, speaks volumes over a Hellenistic Jew who was a Roman citizen oppressing cultural jews.
outhouse
Atheistically
I will agree the socioeconomics of Galilee is heavily debated, and I agree with your statement.
BUT it is not up for debate that Jews were being oppressed by Antipas, and the burden of cost for these cities were placed on the peasants class.
Vishvavajra
Active Member
How many Romans do you think there were in Judea exactly? What few there were would have gotten by with their knowledge of Greek, as would any Greeks living in the region, since Greek was a lingua franca of the Mediterranean generally. But there's no indication of a mass migration of Romans to Judea or of the Aramaic language's becoming endangered. This idea that a bunch of Greek-speakers moved in and started oppressing people for speaking Aramaic seems to be based on assumptions from modern examples of colonialism, not on any actual evidence.
Who said anybody was oppressed for their ethnic identity in any kind of systematic manner? First of all, Antipas was a Jew, chosen as client king and ethnarch precisely because he was a member of the ethnicity in question, while also being friendly to Rome. That's how Romans preferred to rule foreign peoples when they could. Now, you can say that he was bleeding the poorer classes dry while enriching himself and his friends, but that's not an ethnic division, just business as usual. Same goes for Pilate's governorship.
As for Pilate, there's no indication that he meant to oppress anybody for ethnic reasons either, but he did demonstrate a rather typical Roman refusal to understand Jewish cultural taboos, so he caused a lot of problems without really meaning to. He just couldn't comprehend why those Jews kept making a fuss over seemingly normal things (for a Roman). There was never any intent to forcefully replace Judean culture and language with Greco-Roman culture, in any case. That's just not how the Roman empire operated. Pilate was replaced precisely because people higher up than him realized that a more nuanced approach was called for.
And it's worth noting that opposition to Pilate's transgression of religious taboos was undertaken by Jews of all social classes and nationalities. In fact our main source and critic of Pilate is Philo, a Greek-speaking Jew from Alexandria. It's not as if Jews of a more Hellenic bent were OK with it. The one thing you'll notice from the primary sources is that Jews of the time were Jews first and foremost and any other things second. Josephus juggles three hats: Jew, Hellenist, and Roman. And Jew is still the most important by far.
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outhouse
Atheistically
Were the Romans Hellenist who oppressed Israelites?
Had Hellenism permeated the cultures there for hundreds of years?
outhouse
Atheistically
No he wasn't. You need sources.
He was sympathetic to the religion as many Hellenist were adopting monotheism.
But he was a Hellenist through and through who followed the Greco Roman cultures religions
outhouse
Atheistically
Were cultural Jews oppressed by Romans?
Roman Rule (63BCE-313CE) | Jewish Virtual Library
Ten years after Herod's death (4 BCE), Judea came under direct Roman administration. Growing anger against increased Roman suppression of Jewish life resulted in sporadic violence which esclated into a full-scale revolt in 66 CE.
outhouse
Atheistically
Jews looked at him as a traitor. He was a Hellenistic Jew who fought with cultural Jews, but his own story leaves much to be desired there for him being the only survivor.
outhouse
Atheistically
I cannot follow you here.
Judaism was multi cultural.
There was no orthodox Judaism.
And since Jews oppressed other Jews for the Romans, the title of Jew is to vague to be of any use. It means more then anything monotheistic and that is about it.
Proselytes were swore off pagan deities in Hellenistic circles were considered Jewish. The term means little with a descriptive element.
Vishvavajra
Active Member
It meant a lot to them, clearly. Who are we to say that Jewish identity didn't mean anything when there were people willing to lay down their lives for it. Sometimes literally lying down in the face of death, such as the nonviolent demonstration that occurred when the Roman standards were brought into Jerusalem bearing graven images. We also have accounts of Jewish embassies being sent to Caligula and Nero, such as when Caligula was insisting that a statue of himself be placed in the temple. Jews from around the Mediterranean sent tithes to the temple to fund the cult there, they maintained their dietary laws etc., they met in synagogues, and they studied their scriptures. The Jews in Alexandria had their own ethnic leadership and rights within the city. Jews across the Mediterranean were shocked when Greeks in Syria turned on their Jewish neighbors and killed them. There were at least three or four major sects, but they still recognized each other as Jews and saw an attack on one group of Jews to be threatening to them too. Judaism developed as a strong ethnic identity during the Exilic period, so diversity in the Roman period wasn't about to erase that; they knew how to live in diaspora and still be Jews.
And in what precise way were some Jews oppressing other Jews for the Romans? Why would the Romans want the Jews to be oppressed in the first place? For the most part the Romans were pretty good about accommodating the local culture, which is why guys like Pilate stick out so much. It's not at all clear that the population of Judea had a problem with the Romans prior to the Jewish Revolt of 66, and even then it was probably a minority of the population who flocked to the Zealot banner. Nor is it clear that the Zealots were really a reaction to Roman oppression. Josephus equates it to a glorified tax revolt in order to make them look like hypocrites for claiming religious justification (which Josephus vehemently denies, basically calling them blasphemers), but I think it can only really be explained, as Suetonius and others do, in terms of their own particular brand of millennialism. They were basically the ISIL of their time, thinking that with God's help they would throw off the yoke of the Romans and so pave the way for the Messiah and the End of Days. Even if you factor in the civil strive back in Rome, there's no way they could have expected to win without supernatural aid.
Doug Shaver
Member
I took a brief look. There is a difference between searching for the historicity of Jesus and searching for the historical Jesus. Those people are searching for the latter, because they think they have already found the former.
psychoslice
Veteran Member
The church that Jesus talked about was the people who believed in his words, it was not an organization or a building, he would be rolling in his grave today if he could see what came out of his teachings.
truthofscripture
Active Member
He did prophecy that it would happen.
psychoslice
Veteran Member
Again, the church, or true church are the people, no matter where they are, of course it can be a building, but that organization can never be the Church.
Matt: 5:17
"Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.New Living Translation
"Don't misunderstand why I have come. I did not come to abolish the law of Moses or the writings of the prophets. No, I came to accomplish their purpose.
You might want to rephrase what you said about Jesus coming to "end the law". Perhaps to fulfill them?
Otherwise you seem spot on correct.
Great response. But what is the "true" church? (people?)
It's been written there are between 40,000 and 44,000 Christian denominations.
At least one of those must be following the truth as best as possible.
Which one(s)?
psychoslice
Veteran Member
The problem is that you are looking for truth in an organization, truth is not found there, its only found within you, the religions are like a carrot on a stick, keep following the carrot and you will never experience the truth. Na, what's u Doc' lol.
No I'm looking for the truth in a book
The truth is there. One must get past the mistranslations and deception of Christendom to find it but it's there for any to see.
Problem is many do not want to see the Truth.