If jesus was supposedly Jewish, why are the Jews responsibles for his death?
Posted on: August 8, 2007 - 3:11pm
If jesus was supposedly Jewish, why are the Jews responsibles for his death?
This has always confused me for the longest...?
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Easy. The Jewish leaders of the time didn't like how Jesus was upsetting the status quo. Jesus pissed them off so they had him snuffed.
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During Jesus's time, the Temple in Jerusalem was under the control of a group of priests who were Pharasees. The Pharasees were a minority sect of Judaism heavily influenced by ideas from Persia ("Pharasee" = "Persian" and they weren't at all in the mainstream of most Jews at the time.
But the Pharasees did control the temple, and they had made up a bunch of rules that basically forced people to pay a lot of money for absolution. You had to buy all kinds of different animals for sacrifice and pay fees to have them purified and all that, so they had a stranglehold and a monopoly on the business of forgiving sins. Ever wonder why there were money-changers in the temple yard? They were providing financial services for pilgrims who had come to buy absolution for sins.
When he came and basically said "you don't need to sacrifice animals for absolution anymore," Jesus threatened the livelihood of the Pharasee priesthood. So they had the Romans kill him. So it was a sectarian killing.
We don't have information for sure about what kind of Jew Jesus was (assuming that he was a real person). But many details in the gospels, like the fact that he was a "carpenter" (actually a migrant generic laborer) and the whole baptism thing suggest that he might have belonged to one of the progressive, apocalyptic sects like the Essenes. These guys believed that the end of the world was immanent, and that baptism--rather than animal sacrifice--was the path to absolution.
Paul of Tarsus, incidentally, was also a Pharasee before his big conversion experience. It accounts for his obsession with sin and absolution, which were really mostly Persian ideas.
"After Jesus was born, the Old Testament basically became a way for Bible publishers to keep their word count up." -Stephen Colbert
Short version - Jesus pissed 'em off. Long version - Textom gives an excellent synopsis.
Funny how politics and money seem to be at the center of so many things, eh?
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I thought that according to the Bible myth that Jesus was sent by his father to Earth so that he would be be killed and die for man's sins. If this was god's plan then isnt he responsible?
Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful. - Seneca
Since god is omnipotent then he most assuredly can pass the buck.
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As Robert Ingersoll pointed out, God told the Jews to execute anyone who tried to change the OT laws, and Jesus came down to change them - so they were only doing what he said. God/Jesus only reaped what he sowed.
Matt Shizzle has been banned from the Rational Response Squad website. This event shall provide an atmosphere more conducive to social growth. - Majority of the mod team
Excellent post Textom
Why thank you, Christos (and Wavefreak).
It was always a big issue for me growing up and reading the Gospels and trying to make sense out of what was going on. Read, as I was taught, that they're the story of Jesus coming to establish a new covenant with gentiles, the canonical Gospels make no sense at all (except maybe some parts of John). Read as the story of Jesus, the radical Jewish reformer trying to fix the problems with his own religion, it all falls into place.
"After Jesus was born, the Old Testament basically became a way for Bible publishers to keep their word count up." -Stephen Colbert