jewish beliefs and christian beliefs

[Hawkins]

 

I would tend to disagree with much of what you wrote.

 

Around 130 ce, there was a revolt in Jerusalem, which resulted in the Jewish people being scattered out of Jerusalem. Many of the leading Pharisees gathered in Yavneh. Without the Temple, the Sadducees who were mainly Priests, lost influence. In Yavneh, a council was held to deal with the loss of the Temple and the scattering. To maintain a consolidated Judaism, they determined that the Oral law (Pharisaical belief), should be recorded, and the decisions of the judges which affected the practice of the Jewish community should also be recorded. The other issue is how to observe the Mosaic law (Judaism), while scattered with no Temple. Clearly, many Mosaic law could not be kept and others would not be kept exactly the same way. The Talmud historically records many of the practices during Jesus time, and approaches how to keep the law with the lack of a Temple and scattered.  

 

The Talmud is historical in many ways, is a study of the 'OT' and also carries forward many of the teachings and practices taught by the Pharisees. In the negative, it discusses each law in fine detail, explores varying interpretations, but attempts to 'put a fence around the law' so no one would accidently violate the law. There are discussions on how to treat others, etc.   

 

While there are differences between modern Judaism and Temple Judaism, simply because modern Judaism does not have the Temple, one of the losses is that modern Judaism has normalized a Judaism missing the Temple and the Priesthood. 

 

There is a tremendous amount of study of the OT in Judaism over the centuries. And the books written by the great teachers for the past 2100 years have been kept and still studied. The men who study, are sincerely seeking to understand the Tenack/OT, and viewed as given by God, so is handled with great respect. Knowledge and study are key hallmarks of Judaism. Jewish youth are taught Hebrew so that they have knowledge in the original language. The belief is that God dictated the 5 books of Moses (Torah) to Moses, so each letter was specifically given by God. The effort to preserve the original is important in Judaism. There are many higher levels of education in Judaism.   

 

 

This is a contradiction. They don't need to write it down if it's not facing the danger of losing it. They try to record it down most likely because they can no longer keep it if something isn't written down. 

 

So they were losing it because no one (the Pharisees) enforced it any more. Talmud is more of a rabbi stuff, for the purpose of teaching. The true oral law was formally held (and thus defined) by the Pharisees. The Jews were already losing the Pharisee stuff, they have to start the recording from what the rabbis have. It is like, you lost the formal materials and have to fabricate them from the training materials.

 

 

The elites from both the Pharisee and Sadducee camps should have be gone after AD 70 siege. Later revolts may not be led by the most influential Pharisees and Sadducees (or their successors) living in Jerusalem before the siege. That's actually why most documents (including Mishna) were written by rabbis instead of a Pharisee. If the Pharisees were still there after 70AD, they would have perceived the needs of writing the oral laws down themselves.

[Qnts2]

 

 

I would tend to disagree with much of what you wrote.

 

Around 130 ce, there was a revolt in Jerusalem, which resulted in the Jewish people being scattered out of Jerusalem. Many of the leading Pharisees gathered in Yavneh. Without the Temple, the Sadducees who were mainly Priests, lost influence. In Yavneh, a council was held to deal with the loss of the Temple and the scattering. To maintain a consolidated Judaism, they determined that the Oral law (Pharisaical belief), should be recorded, and the decisions of the judges which affected the practice of the Jewish community should also be recorded. The other issue is how to observe the Mosaic law (Judaism), while scattered with no Temple. Clearly, many Mosaic law could not be kept and others would not be kept exactly the same way. The Talmud historically records many of the practices during Jesus time, and approaches how to keep the law with the lack of a Temple and scattered.  

 

The Talmud is historical in many ways, is a study of the 'OT' and also carries forward many of the teachings and practices taught by the Pharisees. In the negative, it discusses each law in fine detail, explores varying interpretations, but attempts to 'put a fence around the law' so no one would accidently violate the law. There are discussions on how to treat others, etc.   

 

While there are differences between modern Judaism and Temple Judaism, simply because modern Judaism does not have the Temple, one of the losses is that modern Judaism has normalized a Judaism missing the Temple and the Priesthood. 

 

There is a tremendous amount of study of the OT in Judaism over the centuries. And the books written by the great teachers for the past 2100 years have been kept and still studied. The men who study, are sincerely seeking to understand the Tenack/OT, and viewed as given by God, so is handled with great respect. Knowledge and study are key hallmarks of Judaism. Jewish youth are taught Hebrew so that they have knowledge in the original language. The belief is that God dictated the 5 books of Moses (Torah) to Moses, so each letter was specifically given by God. The effort to preserve the original is important in Judaism. There are many higher levels of education in Judaism.   

 

 

This is a contradiction. They don't need to write it down if it's not facing the danger of losing it. They try to record it down most likely because they can no longer keep it if something isn't written down. 

 

So they were losing it because no one (the Pharisees) enforced it any more. Talmud is more of a rabbi stuff, for the purpose of teaching. The true oral law was formally held (and thus defined) by the Pharisees. The Jews were already losing the Pharisee stuff, they have to start the recording from what the rabbis have. It is like, you lost the formal materials and have to fabricate them from the training materials.

 

 

The elites from both the Pharisee and Sadducee camps should have be gone after AD 70 siege. Later revolts may not be led by the most influential Pharisees and Sadducees (or their successors) living in Jerusalem before the siege. That's actually why most documents (including Mishna) were written by rabbis instead of a Pharisee. If the Pharisees were still there after 70AD, they would have perceived the needs of writing the oral laws down themselves.

 

 

They wrote it down because the court decisions, and so called Oral law were passed down orally and by tradition by the Priesthood. With no more Temple, no serving Priesthood, and no central leaders, they were concerned that the scattering would cause the knoledge to be lost. There would be no group to transmit the knowledge verbally in training the young men who were going to be priests.  

 

Historically, it was the Pharisees who met in Yavneh after 70 ce, and 130 ce, so they continued on and wrote the Mishnah.  Yavneh was already a school of learning for Judaism, but became the center of education rather then Jerusalem. For an alternate name for Yavneh, look up Jamnia.  

 

We do have the line of important Pharisees recorded in the Talmud. There were two main schools of Pharisees. One faded but we have their writings. The other continued on. Gamaliel the elder, who is mentioned in the NT, had a son who was also in leadership and his son had a son, who continued in leadership. We also have Hillel who lived shortly before Jesus, and his son, and grandson, etc.

[Hawkins]

 

 

They wrote it down because the court decisions, and so called Oral law were passed down orally and by tradition by the Priesthood. With no more Temple, no serving Priesthood, and no central leaders, they were concerned that the scattering would cause the knoledge to be lost. There would be no group to transmit the knowledge verbally in training the young men who were going to be priests.  

 

Historically, it was the Pharisees who met in Yavneh after 70 ce, and 130 ce, so they continued on and wrote the Mishnah.  Yavneh was already a school of learning for Judaism, but became the center of education rather then Jerusalem. For an alternate name for Yavneh, look up Jamnia.  

 

We do have the line of important Pharisees recorded in the Talmud. There were two main schools of Pharisees. One faded but we have their writings. The other continued on. Gamaliel the elder, who is mentioned in the NT, had a son who was also in leadership and his son had a son, who continued in leadership. We also have Hillel who lived shortly before Jesus, and his son, and grandson, etc.

 

 

Wikipedia,

The Mishnah was redacted between 180 and 220 CE by Rabbi Yehudah haNasi when, according to the Talmud, the persecution of the Jews and the passage of time raised the possibility that the details of the oral traditions of the Pharisees from the Second Temple period (536 BCE – 70 CE) would be forgotten.

 

 

Wikipedia,

 It was also during this time that the high priesthood - the members of which often identified as Sadducees ...(a situation since 3 century BCE).

 

Priesthood is basically in the hands of the Sadducees. High court is composed of both Sadducees and Pharisees together with others. However, since the Sadducees don't recognize the oral law, most likely the oral law isn't there. The oral law thus becomes the Pharisees' requirements for the Jews in general to follow under the help of rabbis who are responsible for general Jew education.

 

Temples (under the control of Sadducees) may have nothing to do with the oral law. Nor is the high court. Oral law thus is most likely enforced by Pharisees with the help of the rabbis in the form of general Jew education (in mainly the Jerusalem area).

 

 

In a nutshell, Talmud is an attempt to record down the contents of the oral law (authenticated by Pharisees before 70AD). Talmud is not responsible for recording down concepts developed from or outside the Oral law, such as the point of view of after life and the definition of sheol. It is more like a set of moral code you need to follow, instead of recording a school of thoughts about a specific sect. This is natural because the oral law isn't something developed by the Pharisees (they possibly added some rules though), it is originated from Moses. it is about oral LAW (even when rabbi commentaries and Pharisees may be recorded there) not concepts of souls or hell or such. At the same time this won't prevent the development of soul (afterlife) and hell concepts (such as that recorded in the book of Enoch) among a specific sect at a specific time, that is, the Pharisees at Jesus time.

[Qnts2]

 

 

 

They wrote it down because the court decisions, and so called Oral law were passed down orally and by tradition by the Priesthood. With no more Temple, no serving Priesthood, and no central leaders, they were concerned that the scattering would cause the knoledge to be lost. There would be no group to transmit the knowledge verbally in training the young men who were going to be priests.  

 

Historically, it was the Pharisees who met in Yavneh after 70 ce, and 130 ce, so they continued on and wrote the Mishnah.  Yavneh was already a school of learning for Judaism, but became the center of education rather then Jerusalem. For an alternate name for Yavneh, look up Jamnia.  

 

We do have the line of important Pharisees recorded in the Talmud. There were two main schools of Pharisees. One faded but we have their writings. The other continued on. Gamaliel the elder, who is mentioned in the NT, had a son who was also in leadership and his son had a son, who continued in leadership. We also have Hillel who lived shortly before Jesus, and his son, and grandson, etc.

 

 

Wikipedia,

The Mishnah was redacted between 180 and 220 CE by Rabbi Yehudah haNasi when, according to the Talmud, the persecution of the Jews and the passage of time raised the possibility that the details of the oral traditions of the Pharisees from the Second Temple period (536 BCE – 70 CE) would be forgotten.

 

 

Wikipedia,

 It was also during this time that the high priesthood - the members of which often identified as Sadducees ...(a situation since 3 century BCE).

 

Priesthood is basically in the hands of the Sadducees. High court is composed of both Sadducees and Pharisees together with others. However, since the Sadducees don't recognize the oral law, most likely the oral law isn't there. The oral law thus becomes the Pharisees' requirements for the Jews in general to follow under the help of rabbis who are responsible for general Jew education.

 

Temples (under the control of Sadducees) may have nothing to do with the oral law. Nor is the high court. Oral law thus is most likely enforced by Pharisees with the help of the rabbis in the form of general Jew education (in mainly the Jerusalem area).

 

 

In a nutshell, Talmud is an attempt to record down the contents of the oral law (authenticated by Pharisees before 70AD). Talmud is not responsible for recording down concepts developed from or outside the Oral law, such as the point of view of after life and the definition of sheol.

 

 

Well, I hope that answers your question.

 

'The Mishnah was redacted between 180 and 220 CE by Rabbi Yehudah haNasi when, according to the Talmud, the persecution of the Jews and the passage of time raised the possibility that the details of the oral traditions of the Pharisees from the Second Temple period (536 BCE – 70 CE) would be forgotten.'

 

The Talmud contains the views of the Pharisees. (The Talmud contains the Mishnah and the Gemarah).

 

Now according to Pharisaical belief, the Oral law was passed down from Moses: 'Pirkei Avot 1 1 Moses received the Oral law from Sinai and gave it over to Joshua. Joshua gave it over to the Elders, the Elders to the Prophets, and the Prophets gave it over to the Men of the Great Assembly.'

 

The Men of the Great Assembly would be the great assembly after Babylonian captivity. The so called Oral law was kept orally by the Great Sanhedrin, which was headed by the Priest. During Jesus time, the Priesthood came into question and was considered corrupted. The High Priest became more of a political position/financial position..... These of course were the Sadducees. The Sanhedrin had both Sadducees and Pharisees. But, problems grew so the Great Sanhedrin was actually led by two men. Of the list of the Nasi (one of the leaders), some were Pharisees. Included in the list are those from the House of Hillel, which was a school of the Pharisees. There were a couple who were from the House of Shammai, another Pharisaical school.

 

Yavneh was primarily Pharisees who set up a court of judges (bet din) to authorize their decisions. The Great Sanhedrin only met for a short time after the move of the heads of Judaism to Yavneh.     

[Hawkins]

Well, I hope that answers your question.

 

'The Mishnah was redacted between 180 and 220 CE by Rabbi Yehudah haNasi when, according to the Talmud, the persecution of the Jews and the passage of time raised the possibility that the details of the oral traditions of the Pharisees from the Second Temple period (536 BCE – 70 CE) would be forgotten.'

 

The Talmud contains the views of the Pharisees. (The Talmud contains the Mishnah and the Gemarah).

 

Now according to Pharisaical belief, the Oral law was passed down from Moses: 'Pirkei Avot 1 1 Moses received the Oral law from Sinai and gave it over to Joshua. Joshua gave it over to the Elders, the Elders to the Prophets, and the Prophets gave it over to the Men of the Great Assembly.'

 

The Men of the Great Assembly would be the great assembly after Babylonian captivity. The so called Oral law was kept orally by the Great Sanhedrin, which was headed by the Priest. During Jesus time, the Priesthood came into question and was considered corrupted. The High Priest became more of a political position/financial position..... These of course were the Sadducees. The Sanhedrin had both Sadducees and Pharisees. But, problems grew so the Great Sanhedrin was actually led by two men. Of the list of the Nasi (one of the leaders), some were Pharisees. Included in the list are those from the House of Hillel, which was a school of the Pharisees. There were a couple who were from the House of Shammai, another Pharisaical school.

 

Yavneh was primarily Pharisees who set up a court of judges (bet din) to authorize their decisions. The Great Sanhedrin only met for a short time after the move of the heads of Judaism to Yavneh.     

 

 

You are not answering my question. You are fighting against wikipedia.

 

wikipedia,

The Sadducees rejected the Oral Law as proposed by the Pharisees. Rather, they saw the Torah as the sole source of divine authority.^[11] The written law, in its depiction of the priesthood, corroborated the power and enforced the hegemony of the Sadducees in Judean society.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadducees

 

It only makes sense that the high court (composed of both Sadducees and Pharisees) keeps only the Torah, not the oral law. It also only makes sense that the Pharisees keep the oral law orally. You can't keep something ORAL in a great assembly of both Sadducees and Pharisees with the Sadducees rejecting it.

[Qnts2]

 

Well, I hope that answers your question.

 

'The Mishnah was redacted between 180 and 220 CE by Rabbi Yehudah haNasi when, according to the Talmud, the persecution of the Jews and the passage of time raised the possibility that the details of the oral traditions of the Pharisees from the Second Temple period (536 BCE – 70 CE) would be forgotten.'

 

The Talmud contains the views of the Pharisees. (The Talmud contains the Mishnah and the Gemarah).

 

Now according to Pharisaical belief, the Oral law was passed down from Moses: 'Pirkei Avot 1 1 Moses received the Oral law from Sinai and gave it over to Joshua. Joshua gave it over to the Elders, the Elders to the Prophets, and the Prophets gave it over to the Men of the Great Assembly.'

 

The Men of the Great Assembly would be the great assembly after Babylonian captivity. The so called Oral law was kept orally by the Great Sanhedrin, which was headed by the Priest. During Jesus time, the Priesthood came into question and was considered corrupted. The High Priest became more of a political position/financial position..... These of course were the Sadducees. The Sanhedrin had both Sadducees and Pharisees. But, problems grew so the Great Sanhedrin was actually led by two men. Of the list of the Nasi (one of the leaders), some were Pharisees. Included in the list are those from the House of Hillel, which was a school of the Pharisees. There were a couple who were from the House of Shammai, another Pharisaical school.

 

Yavneh was primarily Pharisees who set up a court of judges (bet din) to authorize their decisions. The Great Sanhedrin only met for a short time after the move of the heads of Judaism to Yavneh.     

 

 

You are not answering my question. You are fighting against wikipedia.

 

wikipedia,

The Sadducees rejected the Oral Law as proposed by the Pharisees. Rather, they saw the Torah as the sole source of divine authority.^[11] The written law, in its depiction of the priesthood, corroborated the power and enforced the hegemony of the Sadducees in Judean society.

 

 

The Sadducees and Pharisees were opposing view points. I see wiki as a gloss of the history. During Jesus time, we know the Sadducees did not believe in the resurrection while the Pharisees did so their differing views extended beyond just the oral law. The Pharisees had set up synagogues outside of Jerusalem and offered classes in Torah to the Jewish people. The Sadducees were more elitist and did not interact with the people so the Pharisees had the favor of the Jewish people.  

 

The explanation of the Oral law was based on the idea that the Torah gave the law but did not explain how to actually keep the law. Such as the Torah said to circumcize but did not explain how. According to the belief in the Oral law/Torah, God explained how to keep the law in more detail to Moses, which was received by Moses orally and passed on orally. So, the Oral law is a further explanation of how do keep the written law.

 

In the Mosaic law, Moses set up additional judges. In the law it says that any questions or conflicts were to be taken to the judges and the decision of the judges was to be obeyed. So, you have the Great Sanhedrin, and also more local judges. If a question or conflict went beyond the basics, it was to be taken to the Great Sanhedrin. What that meant was that the Oral law was incorporated into the decisions of the judges, and I think some of it came from already established decisions of the judges. While the Sadducees opposed the idea of the Oral law, the process established by scripture of the systems of courts and their authority, made some of the Oral law binding biblically. 

 

So we have two issues.

 

Matthew 23:1 Then Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples, ² saying: “The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat. ³ Therefore whatever they tell you to observe,^[a]that observe and do, but do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do.

 

Moses seat would be the seat of the judges, in the Mosaic law. Jesus was confiming the Mosaic law and saying, you have to obey or observe what they say because they are judges according to the Mosaic law.

 

At the same time, Jesus opposed some of the decisions of the Pharisees. The Pharisees wanted the Jewish people to obey the Mosaic law, and in teaching in the synagogues would expand the law so that people would not accidently break the law. This is called the fence around the law. Some of the fences went so far as to actually break the law, or caused heavy burdens. Jesus was opposing some of the judges decisions as unbiblical. Just to say it, other times Jesus upheld the judges decisions, and taught it himself. (I say that because I have read some of the writings from Judaism and know of the stand of some Pharisees who lived before Jesus, and know at times Jesus quoted or paraphrased some decisions.)      

[another_poster]

 

So traditional Jewish belief is that life begins with the first breath. This is referred to in genesis, job, ezekial & psalms. So why do christians use the OT to say no that is wrong. What specifically is it that causes christians to say the jewish view is clearly a misunderstanding?

 

The question is how "traditional"? How traditional after they lost contact with God since AD 70?

 

 

Modern rabbinic teaching is based on Talmud which was only formed (in written form) in 200 ~ 500 CE. And modern Messianic concept is based on Maimonides' idea while he's born in 1135 CE.

 

So there is a gap between the Jewish views in Jesus time and today's Jewish views. Even in Jesus time, the Jewish views of those in Jerusalem may be different from those living outside the Jerusalem area (especially between the Grecian Jews and Hebraic Jews). 

 

At that time, there were under 300k Jews living in Jerusalem while there could be 2~3 million in the whole Palestine area. Rabbis at that time were deeply influenced by the 6000 Pharisees (they disappeared after 70 AD). They both were mainly living in Jerusalem. 

 

And in 70 AD siege around 1 million Jews were killed (I believe this included most adult men living in Jerusalem). The teachings (and concepts) once driven and enforced by the Pharisees might have come to an end.

 

 

The second question is, how large is the research base in studying the OT? And is such a research put under God's will?

 

After AD 70, it seems Christians are the ones who seriously studied the contents of OT. Search the word "Hebrew" in chritianbook.com you will notice that there thousands of Hebrew translations and tools as a result of Christian effort in studying the Hebrew documents. On the other hand, the elites of the Jews (Pharisees, Sadducees, even rabbis etc.) died out in siege of AD 70. Jews were scattered since then. Judaism is more of a hearsay since then. Only the Christian research is in large scale under God's supervision. That's why we have tons of Bible translations, (KJV, NIV and etc.) and commentaries.

 

Ok so lets assume what you have said here is right. It still leads to the question then how do we know the current view is right? If records have been lost and/or destroyed then we can not say the current view is correct. Interesting thing is that very prominent christians including J I Packer & Billy Graham have endorsed the view that life begins with the first breath which was before the 1970's which is when the view that one must believe life begins at conception is the only valid christian view. Why did this view suddenly change in the 1970's? What happened that made people suddenly go from you can believe life begins at conception or first breath to you must believe life begins at conception or you are condemned to hell?

[another_poster]

I'd just like to point out, although I'm changing the subject here is that there is another reason that abortion is wrong (by that I mean abortion for the sake of it).

Technically, it is a blood sacrifice.

 

Could you expand on this a bit more. I agree blood sacrifices are wrong but I do not see how it is a blood sacrifice. Interesting view that I can't say I have heard before.

[Ezra]

 

Ok so I have a question. Without doubt there are a number of Jewish beliefs that are accepted in christianity as being correct.

 

First of all, you need to differtiate between "Jewish beliefs" (Judaism) and Old Testament Truth (the Word of God). They are not identical since the first is "the traditions of men" and the second is "the Word of God", and Christ already told us that they were worlds apart.

 

This comes from OT and jewish understanding of it. So how do we decide that the Jewish belief is wrong if there is not really anything in the NT to justify declaring them as being wrong?

 

The OT is as much Scripture as the NT.  However, the Lord Jesus Christ has already given us the spiritual meaning of OT teachings.  At the same time, all Scripture is profitable to all Christians, so the OT must be read in the light of the NT.

 

Certainly if a NT passage explains their understanding is wrong then by all means that is good but why do we then say the Jews had no idea about the OT which is after all holy scriptures for Jews and that we understand better?

 

What the Jews did was (1) misunderstand the purpose of the Law, (2) refuse to accept Christ as their King and Savior and be saved, (3) refuse to accept the teachings of Christ and (4) created their own rabbinic traditions which nullified the spirit and the letter of the Law. Had they all believed on the Lord Jesus Christ and been saved, there would be no "Judaism" (which is a rejection of Christ).

 

 

[another_poster]

 

 

First of all, you need to differtiate between "Jewish beliefs" (Judaism) and Old Testament Truth (the Word of God). They are not identical since the first is "the traditions of men" and the second is "the Word of God", and Christ already told us that they were worlds apart.

 

 

 

 

 

Yes but how do we decide which is truth? When we read the bible we interpret it. It is not always clear what is meant. Sometimes reading it literally causes a contradiction with other parts of the bible. So that leaves one in the position that either the bible contradicts itself and can not be the word of God OR our understanding must be wrong. I take this latter view. Once again the question of when life begins is an excellent example. When there are several passages all indicating life begins with first breath how then do we accept that life begins at conception? Especially considering the main justification for that view is from Psalms.