Hi,i've just come across an e-text on the website haydid.org which discusses jewish influences within the new testament. It is interesting that some sections of the text say that the new testament isn't entirely seperate to the old and is more of a continuation and also that Jesus was simply emphasisng the more moral parts of G-d's Law,to do with love etc. I hope there will be a discussion on this. I think this could be helpful for me since i am thinking of converting to Judaism from Roman Catholicism and i don't know if some of the new testament could be used as a reference or whether that would be blasphemous and disrespectful to the Torah etc? Although, i am only a few sections in...
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Jewish influences within the new testament
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NoahideHiker
Religious Headbanger
One could learn much by doing a red letter reading of the NT. Go through and read ONLY the words of Jesus. Then if you go read the other books you see where things started taking a turn.
It was only after I learned Torah that I came to realize that many of the revolutionary things Jesus taught were old hat straight from the Torah and Oral Law.
It was only after I learned Torah that I came to realize that many of the revolutionary things Jesus taught were old hat straight from the Torah and Oral Law.
jewscout
Religious Zionist
while some aspects of what jesus says may come from Torah, to say that it is a continuation of Torah is completely false, as much of the text, especially that of Paul, is in complete contradiction to the Torah.
If you are considering converting to Judaism i'd suggest more focus on Rashi, Rambam, Ramban, Ibn Ezra, etc. and less on Jesus.
If you are considering converting to Judaism i'd suggest more focus on Rashi, Rambam, Ramban, Ibn Ezra, etc. and less on Jesus.
KingNothing
Member
jewscout said:
I pretty much agree. I've always felt the detour from Judaism to Christianity went thru Paul and not Jesus. I think Jesus subscribed to the idea of the Jewish Messiah, not the Christian one. The Gospels were too influenced by both Paul and the end of the Jewish revolt to be considered a continuation of the old testament. I would recommend a historical study of Jesus apart from Christianity.
NoahideHiker
Religious Headbanger
jewscout said:
I agree 100%. Judaism is not an open ended covenant. The suggestion that a "new testament" 9according to christianity, not Jeremiah 31) was needed points to a flawed system or code. Torah is perfect and not lacking in anything.
Halcyon
Lord of the Badgers
I think most Jews just ignore the NT as an irrevelance.spirit said:
The NT itself is fairly useless as a study on the Jewish influences on Jesus. The Gospels were written by pagan converts (as is evident from their many slip-ups concerning Jewish culture and custom). And Paul was a Jewish convert whose letters are written to spread a new faith, not discuss his old one.
Christianity began as a Jewish sect, and perhaps if the Gospel of the Ebionites had survived we could have seem for ourselves the many crossovers between Judaism and emerging Christianity. The NT texts are pretty useless though.
NoahideHiker said:
I have recently loaned out a King James version of the Bible,unfortunately,our college library doesn't have much, i might try my local library. However,i'm not sure exactly how to use it. Are the red lettered areas from the original Hebrew texts which were omitted?
NoahideHiker
Religious Headbanger
spirit said:
In most English Christian bibles the words of Jesus are in red.
I am of the opinion that it is impossible to understand the history of either Christianity or Judaism in full without studying both; there are very few ancient texts to go on, they are simply copies or records from the oral/aural traditions, and the writings of early Christians must have influenced what came to be seen as Tanakh just as Jewish scholars influenced Christian, as Arabian scholars influenced both.
Looking at the history of the Septaguint, it was as important to consolidate the Greek languages into what developed as recognisible to us today.
I was trying to think earlier about which ancient texts survive, and there is very little that is complete before the fourth century. No original old Testament texts at all, nothing written down during the time of Jesus' teaching. Everything has touched many minds and several languages.
Often people feel their faith as the scriptures dropped from the sky as a complete missal from G_d, but the move from the ancient texts in Hebrew, Arabic and aramaic through Greek then Latin to the European languages we know as scripture today is a complex and ongoing process of social change influencing translation and interpretation.
It depends at which level you wish to study- I am not an adherent of apologetics so I like to see the complete picture even where it may not fit with the received notions of the religions. But then I also disregard aspects of my own religion which are patently over-interpreted or anti-scientific!
One thing about Judaism I love is that we are all people of G_d, no one faith need be upheld as 'the way'.
Looking at the history of the Septaguint, it was as important to consolidate the Greek languages into what developed as recognisible to us today.
I was trying to think earlier about which ancient texts survive, and there is very little that is complete before the fourth century. No original old Testament texts at all, nothing written down during the time of Jesus' teaching. Everything has touched many minds and several languages.
Often people feel their faith as the scriptures dropped from the sky as a complete missal from G_d, but the move from the ancient texts in Hebrew, Arabic and aramaic through Greek then Latin to the European languages we know as scripture today is a complex and ongoing process of social change influencing translation and interpretation.
It depends at which level you wish to study- I am not an adherent of apologetics so I like to see the complete picture even where it may not fit with the received notions of the religions. But then I also disregard aspects of my own religion which are patently over-interpreted or anti-scientific!
One thing about Judaism I love is that we are all people of G_d, no one faith need be upheld as 'the way'.
NoahideHiker
Religious Headbanger
TeePee said:
The NT had an effect on Tanach? The Tanach was around for how many thousands of years before the NT came along? The accuracy of the Torah is very easy to trace all the way back to the 13 original Torah scrolls Moses copied word for word.
There are [FONT=TREBUCHET, ARIAL, HELVETICA]304,805 letters in the Torah. Some 79,000 words. Out of all these words and letters how many are different or changed from the original? Only nine letters are different and of these nine they are found only in the [/FONT][FONT=TREBUCHET, ARIAL, HELVETICA]Yemenite scrolls which were out of the checking system for hundreds of years. And of these 9 differences none change the context of the text. They were simple spelling variances much like Color and colour.
Torah and Judaism are a separate religion from Christianity.
[/FONT]
NoahideHiker
Religious Headbanger
TeePee said:
The oldest known scrolls are nearly 1,000 years old. The simple fact that the original scriptures were never lost to the Jewish people completely helps to insure accuracy. Plus the fact that we aren't talking translations of translation of translations here as the christian scriptures have changed. Were talking painstaking copies of the original scriptures in their original language. Torah has had no need to evolve or change because it has remained a constant.
Torah is the arrow hitting the bullseye. The NT is a bullseye being painted around the arrow.
The New Testament in itself cannot be used as a referece. It is a mixture of Pagan ideas built upon a very weak Jewish basis.spirit said:
I think, however, you will find that there are similarities. Jesus' teachings were not revolutionary - although some of them may have been rather unorthodox, leading to his execution.
One example that I have always liked, because it appears to be completely stolen, is the famous,
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets." - Jesus, 6-33AD
And then, we see...
"That which is hateful to theyself, do not do to another. This is the whole law, the rest is commentary."" - Rabbi Hillel, 70BC-10AD
Although the New Testament may have slight hints of "Jewishness" in it here and there, the overall message is simply not Judaism.
1) Judaism rejects the Trinity, a central part of modern Christianity.
2) Judaism rejects the idea of the abolishment of the OT laws, which were called "eternal."
3) Judaism rejects the idea of someone else atoning for your sins through his death.
4) Judaism rejects the idea of a "Second Coming."
I could keep going on and on. In short, you will find hints of "Jewishness" in the New Testament, but in truth, it cannot be used to learn about Judaism.
Elessar
Well-Known Member
Actually, of those four, the first two are not to be found except in Christian tradition, not in the text of the "New Testament" (Messianic Writings, we prefer). 3 certainly is related to Jewish tradition, as Judaism is not alien to the idea that animals can be blood sacrificed to atone for sins, though such has not been done in Judaism since the Temple was destroyed. And, of course, 4, of course non-Messianic Judaism does not have the idea of a second coming, if the first coming has not occurred yet!
NoahideHiker
Religious Headbanger
Yes, the blood from certain animals can atone for sin, but, and I gotta big ol' but, the sacrifice of animals can only atone for certain sins. Unintentional sins. But animal sacrifice wasn't the only atoning sacrifice either and it wasn't even preferable to some of the others.
The law of sacrifice is very strict and exacting. The sacrifice had to be done in the Temple (jesus was killed outside the city), the blood had to be sprinkled onto the alter (Jesus' blood was outside the city), the sacrifice had to be done by a priest of the Temple (jesus was killed by the Romans), and of course there is the problem of there being no human sacrifices allowed in Torah.
A person can not atone for the sins of another.
Elessar
Well-Known Member
That, of course, I disagree with, but as it is one of the critical differences between Messianic and non-Messianic Judaism, I will not continue on to debate it here because this is not a debate forum.
Judaism has laws on how to write the Torah scroll in order for it to always remain the same.
A little example is the 2000 yrs of exile Jews were located in different parts of the world without having any connection to each other until the last +/- 100 yrs. but when you compare their Torah scrolls they are identical to the point.
Even if there is a little extra dot or a drop of ink on the any part of the scroll it is considered not "kosher". During the reading of the Torah to the Whole congregation on Shabbat mornings two people stand next to the reader ( with their own Torah books and follow him read and even pronounce the intonations correctly. if the reader commits a mistake they tell him and he starts from that point again.
all of this is specifically done to make sure it will always remain the same since the days of Moses.
And remember if it is discovered that a certain Torah scroll has any extra letters or marks on it it is not considered as you have read the Torah, so for Jews it is considered anything else but reading Torah.