Rejection of Jesus
This article uses secondary sources that critically analyze them.(May 2016) ) |
There are a number of episodes in the
]New Testament
Hometown rejection
In the sixth chapter of the Gospel of Mark there is an account of a visit by Jesus to his hometown together with his followers. On the Sabbath, he enters a synagogue and begins to teach. The account says that many who heard him were “astounded”, and offended, and they asked him "is this not the carpenter, the son of Mary?" It adds that he could do no “deeds of power there” except to heal a few sick people. Amazed at the community's lack of belief in him, Jesus observes that "Prophets are not without honour, except in their hometown, and among their own kin, and in their own house." (Mark 6:1-6)
The account which is given in the Gospel of Matthew differs from this account by having those in the synagogue describe Jesus as the "son of the carpenter" and stating that he could not do many deeds of power (rather than none).[1] (Matthew 13:54-58)
The Gospel of Luke moves this story to the beginning of Jesus' preaching in Galilee; according to Lutheran commentator Mark Allan Powell, this was done in order to introduce what follows it.[2] In this version, Jesus is described as performing a public reading of scripture; he claims to be the fulfillment of a prophecy at Isaiah 61:1–2. (Luke 4:16-30)
In Matthew and Mark the crowd is also described as referring to Jesus as being the brother of James, Simon, Joseph, and Judas (in Mark they also mention, but do not name, Jesus's sisters) in a manner suggesting that the crowd regards them as just ordinary people, and criticising Jesus' quite different behaviour.
Luke adds that Jesus recounted stories about how, during the time of
The negative view of Jesus' family may be related to the conflict between
Rejection of the cornerstone
canonical gospels |
Portals: Christianity Bible |
Matthew 21:42, Acts 4:11 and Mark 12:10 speak of Jesus as the cornerstone which the builders (or "husbandmen") rejected. 1 Peter 2:7 discusses this rejection of Jesus. This references similar wording in Psalm 118:22: The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone.
Chorazin, Bethsaida, Capernaum, and Decapolis
According to the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, the Galilean cities of
Not welcomed in a Samaritan village
According to Luke 9:51–56, when Jesus entered a
Many disciples leave
John 6:60–6:66 records "many
Rejection as the Jewish messiah
Jesus is rejected in Judaism as a failed Jewish messiah claimant and a false prophet by all mainstream Jewish denominations. Judaism also considers the worship of any person a form of idolatry,[11][12] and rejects the claim that Jesus was divine. However, Messianic Jewish organisations, which are not considered Jewish by any mainstream Jewish denomination, like Jews for Jesus have made the case that he is the Messiah promised by the Torah and the Prophets.[13]
- Judaism affirms that Jesus did not fulfill the Isaiah 2:4), building the Third Temple (Ezekiel 37:26–28), and gathering all Jews back to the Land of Israel (Isaiah 43:5–6).[14]
- Judaism deems the worship of any person a form of idolatry, rejecting the claims that Jesus was divine, an intermediary to God, or part of a Trinity.[15][11][16][17]
- Jews believe the Messiah will be a direct (blood) descendant of King David through Solomon on his father's side and will be born naturally to a husband and wife (Jeremiah 23:5, 33:17; Ezekiel 34:23–24).
- "The point is this: that the whole Christology of the Church - the whole complex of doctrines about the Son of God who died on the Cross to save humanity from sin and death - is incompatible with Judaism, and indeed in discontinuity with the Hebraism that preceded it."[18]
- "Aside from its belief in Jesus as the Messiah, Christianity has altered many of the most fundamental concepts of Judaism." (Kaplan, Aryeh)[19]
- "...the doctrine of Christ was and will remain alien to Jewish religious thought."[20]
- "For two thousand years, Jews rejected the claim that Jesus fulfilled the messianic prophecies of the Hebrew Bible, as well as the dogmatic claims about him made by the church fathers - that he was born of a virgin, the son of God, part of a divine Trinity, and was resurrected after his death. ... For two thousand years, a central wish of Christianity was to be the object of desire by Jews, whose conversion would demonstrate their acceptance that Jesus has fulfilled their own biblical prophecies."[21]
- "No Jew accepts Jesus as the Messiah. When someone makes that faith commitment, they become Christian. It is not possible for someone to be both Christian and Jewish."[22]
On the Jewish side, the accounts of Jewish rejection of Jesus are prominently featured in the
On the Christian side, the accounts of Jewish rejection of Jesus are prominently featured in the New Testament, especially the Gospel of John. For example, in 7:1–9 Jesus moves around in Galilee but avoids Judea, because "the Jews/Judeans" were looking for a chance to kill him. In 10:20 many said ″he hath a devil, and is mad″. In 7:12–13 some said "he is a good man" whereas others said he deceives the people, but these were all "whispers", no one would speak publicly for "fear of the Jews/Judeans". Jewish rejection is also recorded in 7:45–52, 8:39–59, 10:22–42 and 12:36–43. 12:42 says many did believe, but they kept it private, for fear the Pharisees would exclude them from the Synagogue, see also Council of Jamnia.
According to Jeremy Cohen,
[e]ven before the Gospels appeared, the apostle Paul (or, more probably, one of his disciples) portrayed the Jews as Christ's killers
their Jewishness, as murderers of God and his messiah. That condemnation, however, was soon to come."[25]
Emil Fackenheim wrote in 1987:
"... Except in relations with Christians, the Christ of Christianity is not a Jewish issue. There simply can be no dialogue worthy of the name unless Christians accept—nay, treasure—the fact that Jews through the two millennia of Christianity have had an agenda of their own. There can be no Jewish-Christian dialogue worthy of the name unless one Christian activity is abandoned, missions to the Jews. It must be abandoned, moreover, not as a temporary strategy but in principle, as a bimillennial theological mistake. The cost of that mistake in Christian love and Jewish blood one hesitates to contemplate."[26]
Commentary from the Church Fathers
Jerome: "After the parables which the Lord spake to the people, and which the Apostles only understand, He goes over into His own country that He may teach there also."[27]
Saint Remigius: "He taught in their synagogues where great numbers were met, because it was for the salvation of the multitude that He came from heaven upon earth. It follows; So that they marvelled, and said, Whence hath this man this wisdom, and these many mighty works? His wisdom is referred to His doctrine, His mighty works to His miracles."[27]
Jerome: "Wonderful folly of the Nazarenes! They wonder whence Wisdom itself has wisdom, whence Power has mighty works! But the source of their error is at hand, because they regard Him as the Son of a carpenter; as they say, Is not this the carpenter’s son?"[27]
Pseudo-Augustine: " For the Father of Christ is that Divine Workman who made all these works of nature, who set forth Noah’s ark, who ordained the tabernacle of Moses, and instituted the Ark of the covenant; that Workman who polishes the stubborn mind, and cuts down the proud thoughts."[27]
Hilary of Poitiers: "And this was the carpenter’s son who subdues iron by means of fire, who tries the virtue of this world in the judgment, and forms the rude mass to every work of human need; the figure of our bodies, for example, to the divers ministrations of the limbs, and all the actions of life eternal."[27]
Jerome: "And when they are mistaken in His Father, no wonder if they are also mistaken in His brethren. Whence it is added, Is not his mother Mary, and his brethren, James, and Joseph, and Simon, and Judas? And his sisters, are they not all with us?"[27]
Jerome: " Those who are here called the Lord’s brethren, are the sons of a Mary, His Mother’s sister; she is the mother of this James and Joseph, that is to say, Mary the wife of Cleophas, and this is the Mary who is called the mother of James the Less."[27]
Hilary of Poitiers: "Thus the Lord is held in no honour by His own; and though the wisdom of His teaching, and the power of His working raised their admiration, yet do they not believe that He did these things in the name of the Lord, and they cast His father’s trade in His teeth. Amid all the wonderful works which He did, they were moved with the contemplation of His Body, and hence they ask, Whence hath this man these things? And thus they were offended in him."[27]
Jerome: "This error of the Jews is our salvation, and the condemnation of the heretics, for they perceived Jesus Christ to be man so far as to think Him the son of a carpenter."[27]
Saint Remigius: "He calls Himself a Prophet, as Moses also declares, when he says, A Prophet shall God raise up unto you of your brethren. (Deut. 18:18.) And it should be known, that not Christ only, who is the Head of all the Prophets, but Jeremiah, Daniel, and the other lesser Prophets, had more honour and regard among strangers than among their own citizens."[27]
Jerome: "For it is almost natural for citizens to be jealous towards one another; for they do not look to the present works of the man, but remember the frailties of his childhood; as if they themselves had not passed through the very same stages of age to their maturity."[27]
Hilary of Poitiers: "Further, He makes this answer, that a Prophet is without honour in his own country, because it was in Judæa that He was to be condemned to the sentence of the cross; and forasmuch as the power of God is for the faithful alone, He here abstained from works of divine power because of their unbelief; whence it follows, And he did not there many mighty works because of their unbelief."[27]
Jerome: "Not that because they did not believe He could not do His mighty works; but that He might not by doing them be condemning His fellow-citizens in their unbelief."[27]
Jerome: "Or we may understand it otherwise, that Jesus is despised in His own house and country, signifies in the Jewish people; and therefore He did among them few miracles, that they might not be altogether without excuse; but among the Gentiles He does daily greater miracles by His Apostles, not so much in healing their bodies, as in saving their souls."[27]
See also
- Anti-Christian sentiment
- Blood curse
- But to bring a sword
- Criticism of Jesus
- Jesus in the Talmud
- Life of Jesus in the New Testament
- Mental health of Jesus
- Mount Precipice
- Olivet discourse
- Physician, heal thyself
References
- ISBN 978-0-8294-3104-9.
- ^ Mark Allan Powell, What are They Saying about Luke? (Paulist Press, 1989), page 19.
- ^ The Complete Gospels, Robert J. Miller editor, 1992, page 126, translation note to Luke 4:29: "Nazareth is not built on or near a cliff face. Luke generally seems poorly informed about Palestinian geography. Aspects of his geography may therefore be fictive."
- ^ https://jesustrail.com/hike-the-jesus-trail/points-of-interest/mount-precipice Archived 2018-05-26 at the Wayback Machine[bare URL]
- ^ Wilson, A. N., Jesus: A Life, 1992. New York: Norton & Co., page 86.
- ^ Butz, Jeffrey. The brother of Jesus and the lost teachings of Christianity. 2005. Rochester, Vermont: Inner Traditions.
- ^ Crosson, John Dominic. “Mark and the relatives of Jesus”. Novum Testamentum, 15, 1973
- ^ Mack, Burton. A myth of innocence: Mark and Christian origins. 1988. Philadelphia: Fortress
- ^ Painter, John. Just James: The brother of Jesus in history and tradition. 1999. Minneapolis: Fortress Press
- ISBN 0-944344-30-5, page 140, translation note to Luke 9:53: "Samaritans would not offer hospitality to those travelling to the temple in Jerusalem, which the Samaritans regarded as an illegitimate rival to their own temple on Mount Gerizim (see John 4:20)."
- ^
- ISBN 978-0615348391.
- ISBN 0-87068-675-5.
- ^ Simmons, Rabbi Shraga, "Why Jews Don't Believe in Jesus". Accessed February 2, 2020.
- ^ "The fact that we always refer to God as 'He' is also not meant to imply that the concept of sex or gender applies to God." Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan, The Aryeh Kaplan Reader, Mesorah Publications (1983), p. 144
- ^ Singer, Tovia (28 April 2014). "Monotheism". Retrieved February 2, 2020.
- ISBN 978-0-9771937-0-7.
- ISBN 1-57181-974-6
- ISBN 0-89906-866-9
- ISBN 0-8091-3960-X
- ISBN 1-57075-573-6. p.149
- ^ Why don't Jews accept Jesus as the Messiah? Archived 2010-12-01 at the Wayback Machine by Rabbi Barry Dov Lerner
- ^ Ber. iv. 3; see Grätz, "Gesch." 3d ed., iv. 30 et seq..
- I Thessalonians2:14-15)
- ISBN 0-19-517841-6
- ISBN 0-671-46243-1.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s "Catena aurea: commentary on the four Gospels, collected out of the works of the Fathers: Volume 6, St. John. Oxford: Parker, 1874. Thomas Aquinas". 1874. This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.