Paul’s (ca. 5-67 C.E.) portrayal of Jesus as an exalted ruler may seem to challenge Jewish monotheism. Yet the idea of a human king ruling on God’s behalf is already found in the Bible. Reading Paul alongside Jewish traditions of divine kingship shows how his claims about Jesus remain consistent with exclusive allegiance to one God.
The products of a period in which Judaism was considered to have been superseded by Christianity and Jews were treated as inferiors, the Talmud and Toledot Yeshu literature developed a biting, farcical retelling of Jesus’ story, which, at the same time, reveals the Jewish struggle to explain his massive impact on world religion. Yet, medieval rabbis also responded to Jesus’ death in a serious way, noting that ultimately, things turned out for the best: Jesus always planned to be crucified, and Jesus asked God to forgive everyone involved.
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John all include accounts of women discovering Jesus’ tomb empty three days after his crucifixion that share a common structure, but vary considerably in their details. Christians reading the story at Easter experience vicariously the women’s fear and awe, just as Jews re-experience the Exodus through the Haggadah.
The nativity stories in Matthew and Luke are deeply rooted in Jewish Scripture and Second Temple Judaism. Nevertheless, over the centuries they have accumulated interpretations that portray Jews as cruel, greedy, impure, or spiritually blind. A closer look at familiar claims—from Mary’s supposed threat of being stoned to the caricature of shepherds as social outcasts—shows how antisemitism often enters the Christmas story not through the Gospels themselves, but through their interpretation.
Originally, Deuteronomy presented itself as the torah, and even after its incorporation into the Pentateuch, it retains a distinct identity, which is why the Septuagint translates mishneh torah (Deuteronomy 17:18) as deuteronomium, “Second Torah.” At the same time, with the canonization of the Pentateuch, the role of the “second Torah” was claimed by: Jubilees, some Dead Sea Scrolls, Philo, early Christians, and ultimately the rabbis, culminating in the composition of the Mishnah. A millennium later, Maimonides presented his Mishneh Torah as the (so-far) complete and final embodiment of that second revelation.
The precise origins of the practice of reading from the prophets in the synagogue are unknown, but early evidence can be seen in the story of Jesus visiting the synagogue in his hometown on Shabbat and reading from Isaiah (Luke 4:16–19). Yet the process of making prophetic scripture relevant to a contemporary audience began even earlier, as we see in the second-century B.C.E. book of Baruch.
In his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus challenges the talion law of “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,” instructing his followers to turn the other cheek. While this may be admirable as a personal practice, society requires a policy for protecting its people. Positioned between the extremes of total annihilation of the enemy and passive acceptance of aggression, the principle of talion law advocates for measured justice.
The gospels present Pontius Pilate, the Roman procurator, condemning Jesus to death, and his soldiers crucifying Jesus at the behest of the priests and the Jewish crowd. How, then, did the claim—found even in the Talmud—that the Jews physically crucified Jesus develop?
Nativity scenes are peaceful and idyllic. However, Matthew’s story of the magi bringing gifts to the newborn Jesus, set in the time of King Herod, foreshadows the gospel’s themes of political rivalry, violence, and the death of Jesus.
YHWH declares to the Davidic king, “You are my son; today I have begotten you” (Psalm 2:7). For the New Testament, this verse is a prooftext for Jesus’s divinity, but what did it mean in its original context, and how did Jewish interpreters understand it?
The historical John, יוחנן, was a thoroughly Jewish religious preacher, who had little if any relation to Jesus and his movement. Here is the story of how John and his central rite, baptism, became part of Christianity.
If an Israelite wishes to marry a woman taken captive in war, she becomes part of the Israelite community and is protected from future re-enslavement. Uncomfortable with the Torah’s permission of this marriage, the rabbis declare it to be a concession to man’s “evil impulse,” an idea reminiscent of Jesus’ assertion that the Torah allows divorce as a concession to humanity’s “hard heart.”
When the Temple was destroyed by the Romans in the summer of 70 C.E., the Jews lost their religious and political center. Practically speaking, this did not adversely affect Jesus’s followers, who continued to grow and flourish in this period. But what did they feel about the Temple’s destruction?
The biblical precept “you shall love your neighbor as yourself” has long been understood in Jewish and Christian circles as universal, a transcendent principle encompassing the whole Torah. However, in Leviticus, it is actually one of many action-oriented commandments focused on Israelite social cohesion.
The narratives of Jesus’ conception and birth as presented in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke echo Jewish history and cite Jewish prophecy. In that sense, the Christmas story can be said to have Jewish origins.
Paul, in the 1st century C.E., allegorizes the expulsion of Hagar to argue that his rivals should be expelled from the church. Nahmanides, in the 13th century, uses the same biblical story to explain why Jews of his day are persecuted. The assumption shared in both Judaism and Christianity: The Bible speaks to present-day circumstances.
Jesus is famously associated with the holiday of Passover. However, according to the Gospel of John, Jesus makes his debut and final visit at the temple on Sukkot, while the Book of Revelation uses Sukkot imagery to describe Jesus’ future appearance on earth. These repurposings of Sukkot and its rituals highlight Sukkot’s eschatological significance for Jews in Second Temple times (Zechariah 14).
One of the main themes in the Book of Esther is the death of Haman, the descendent of Agag, last king of Amalek, at the hands of Mordecai and Esther, Benjaminites from the family of King Saul. Is this just a coincidence?
An introduction to the Diatessaron, and its significance to biblical studies, particularly the Documentary Hypothesis.
“May the All-Merciful One reestablish the fallen sukkah of [King] David” הרחמן הוא יקים לנו את סוכת דוד הנופלת — from the Grace after Meals of Sukkot.
