gsa
Well-Known Member
This is an interesting thread. If I might make some observations:
1. To echo a point made earlier, whether or not Paul was situated within Judaism at that point in time, Rabbinic Judaism has developed quite a bit over the past two thousand years (and that doesn't even consider Karaism, which is distinct). Paul's criticisms are aimed at a very different kind of Judaism being practiced in an entirely different setting.
2. As someone who is post-Christian, I tend to agree with the Jewish critique of Christianity, namely that Jesus was either a failed messianic claimant or that the attempt to designate him a messianic claimant is not consistent with the mainstream of Jewish belief, either today or at the time that the early Christians were writing. I am not sure exactly what the historical Jesus was attempting to convey during his ministry, but it is clear that a messianic interpretation was embraced and developed by the post-execution survivors that became the earliest Christian community.
3. Even setting aside Jewish objections, I think that Paul's writings, as well as the message of the gospels themselves, are pretty damning in that they convey a clearly articulated belief in the imminent return of Jesus and judgment day. The fact that this return failed to materialize is enough to cast doubt on their interpretation of Jesus' life and the significance of his message.
4. I would agree that claiming Christianity "fulfilled" Judaism or was its logical progression is no different from claiming that Islam "corrected" Christianity's errors and was its logical progression, and so on. Christianity did evolve out of Judaism, but that says very little about its current relationship to the (evolving) tradition of Judaism; as Stephen Batchelor has said about the relationship between Buddhism and Hinduism, it resembles the relationship between Christianity and Judaism, which is to say that there are far more significant differences than similarities.
5. Addressing anti-Trinitarianism, pt. 1. Since I was never an "orthodox" Christian when it came to this "mystery" of the faith, I am not inclined to defend it against charges of polytheism or shirk, but I would say tha Trinitarians understand themselves to be monotheists and by and large most Jews and Muslims seem to accept them as such. For my part, I think Advaita Vedanta has a stronger claim on monotheism than trinitarianism, if only because the discerned doctrine of the Trinity requires three co-eternal persons, as opposed to infinite manifestations of a single entity.
6. Addressing anti-Trinitarianism, pt. 2. Although the religion of the Israelites evolved, I also think that it betrays henotheism in the Torah, not monotheism as we know it today, and this is a view widely held in academic circles. Of course that conflicts with later and contemporary Jewish beliefs and self-understanding, just as the accusation of polytheism conflicts with Christian modern beliefs and self-understanding. So I consider this charge of Christian polytheism to be throwing stones from glass houses, albeit understandable from Jews being told that their religion has been fulfilled by a questionable upstart preaching a god that appears to suffer from multiple personalities.
Mostly, there is very little discussion of actual Judaism in this thread, as opposed to its depiction in the biased and outdated early Christian writings.
1. To echo a point made earlier, whether or not Paul was situated within Judaism at that point in time, Rabbinic Judaism has developed quite a bit over the past two thousand years (and that doesn't even consider Karaism, which is distinct). Paul's criticisms are aimed at a very different kind of Judaism being practiced in an entirely different setting.
2. As someone who is post-Christian, I tend to agree with the Jewish critique of Christianity, namely that Jesus was either a failed messianic claimant or that the attempt to designate him a messianic claimant is not consistent with the mainstream of Jewish belief, either today or at the time that the early Christians were writing. I am not sure exactly what the historical Jesus was attempting to convey during his ministry, but it is clear that a messianic interpretation was embraced and developed by the post-execution survivors that became the earliest Christian community.
3. Even setting aside Jewish objections, I think that Paul's writings, as well as the message of the gospels themselves, are pretty damning in that they convey a clearly articulated belief in the imminent return of Jesus and judgment day. The fact that this return failed to materialize is enough to cast doubt on their interpretation of Jesus' life and the significance of his message.
4. I would agree that claiming Christianity "fulfilled" Judaism or was its logical progression is no different from claiming that Islam "corrected" Christianity's errors and was its logical progression, and so on. Christianity did evolve out of Judaism, but that says very little about its current relationship to the (evolving) tradition of Judaism; as Stephen Batchelor has said about the relationship between Buddhism and Hinduism, it resembles the relationship between Christianity and Judaism, which is to say that there are far more significant differences than similarities.
5. Addressing anti-Trinitarianism, pt. 1. Since I was never an "orthodox" Christian when it came to this "mystery" of the faith, I am not inclined to defend it against charges of polytheism or shirk, but I would say tha Trinitarians understand themselves to be monotheists and by and large most Jews and Muslims seem to accept them as such. For my part, I think Advaita Vedanta has a stronger claim on monotheism than trinitarianism, if only because the discerned doctrine of the Trinity requires three co-eternal persons, as opposed to infinite manifestations of a single entity.
6. Addressing anti-Trinitarianism, pt. 2. Although the religion of the Israelites evolved, I also think that it betrays henotheism in the Torah, not monotheism as we know it today, and this is a view widely held in academic circles. Of course that conflicts with later and contemporary Jewish beliefs and self-understanding, just as the accusation of polytheism conflicts with Christian modern beliefs and self-understanding. So I consider this charge of Christian polytheism to be throwing stones from glass houses, albeit understandable from Jews being told that their religion has been fulfilled by a questionable upstart preaching a god that appears to suffer from multiple personalities.
Mostly, there is very little discussion of actual Judaism in this thread, as opposed to its depiction in the biased and outdated early Christian writings.
