Jewish Christian

This article deals with the historical concept. For the modern-day religious movement see Messianic Judaism.

Jewish Christians, also Hebrew Christians or Judeo-Christians, were the original members of the Jewish movement that later became Christianity. In the earliest stage the community was made up of all those Jews who accepted Jesus as a venerable person or even the Messiah. As Christianity grew and evolved, Jewish Christians became only one strand of the early Christian community, characterised by combining the confession of Jesus as Christ with continued adherence to Jewish practices such as Sabbath observance, observance of the Jewish calendar, observance of Jewish laws and customs, circumcision, and synagogue attendance, and by a direct genetic relationship to the earliest Jewish Christians.

The term "Jewish Christian" appears in historical texts contrasting Christians of Jewish origin with Gentile Christians, both in discussion of the New Testament church and the second and following centuries. It is also a term used for Jews who converted to Christianity but kept their Jewish heritage and traditions.

Alister McGrath, former Professor of Historical Theology at Oxford University, claims that the 1st century "Jewish Christians" were totally faithful religious Jews. They differed from other contemporary Jews only in their acceptance of Jesus as the Messiah.

However as Christianity grew throughout the Gentile world, Christians diverged from their Jewish and Jerusalem roots. Jewish Christianity, initially strengthened despite persecution by Jerusalem Temple officials, fell into decline during the Jewish-Roman wars (66-135) and the growing anti-Judaism perhaps best personified by Marcion (c. 150). With persecution by the orthodox Christians from the time of the Roman Emperor Constantine in the 4th century, Jewish Christians sought refuge outside the boundaries of the Empire, in Arabia and further afield. Within the Empire and later elsewhere it was dominated by the Gentile based Christianity which became the State church of the Roman Empire and which took control of sites in the Holy Land such as the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and the Cenacle and appointed subsequent Bishops of Jerusalem.

It has been argued that few Jews joined the Christian movement in the first century and that the movement probably never exceeded 1,000 Jewish members at any one time during the first century. Furthermore the size and importance of the Christian movement in general during the first century tends to be exaggerated by most scholars. By the end of the first century the total Christian population is estimated to have been only 7,530. The term "Jewish Christians" in the 3rd and 4th centuries can refer to groups such as Ebionites, Nazarenes and other groups, and related to these groups are quotation fragments of non-canonical gospels referred to as the "Jewish-Christian Gospels".

Related terms

• Hebrew Christians â€" a 19th-century movement of Jewish converts to Christianity acting semi-autonomously within the Anglican and other established churches. though it is also used in some texts concerning the early church, and Arnold Fruchtenbaum applied the term to Jewish Christians standing aside from the Messianic Judaism movement.

• Hebrew Roots â€" A religious movement that embraces both Old and New Testaments but without the observance of the Jewish Talmud and many Jewish traditions not supported by Scripture.

• Christian Jews â€" a modern term which is frequently encountered in texts dealing with sociology and demographics.

• Judaizers â€" Early Christians who maintained or adopted Jewish religious practices, from the period of the inception of Christianity until approximately the fifth century.

• Judean Christians â€" Christians from Judea who were predominantly Jewish.

Jewish origin of Christianity

According to the Acts narrative, following the crucifixion, resurrection and ascension of Jesus, the disciples, "together with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers" withdrew to the "upper room" (traditionally the Cenacle), in Jerusalem (Acts 1:10-14). Initial preaching (Acts ch. 1-9) was to Jews only. Jesus himself told his followers to observe the teachings of the scribes and Pharisees (Matthew 23:1-4), and that he had come to fulfill the Law and the Prophets, not to abolish them (Matthew 5:17-20). Nevertheless, Saint Paul the Apostle was to later argue that the Law did not apply to Christians of Gentile, as opposed to Jewish, background (Galatians 2:14), though the exact position of Paul of Tarsus and Judaism is still debated. Saint Paul according to Acts 21:17-29 and Acts 24:17-18 is said to have observed the Jewish laws of purification in the Temple at Jerusalem. Saint Paul shaved his head because of a vow he had taken at Cenchrea (Acts 18:18), and he is mentioned in passing to have observed the Jewish religious festivals (Acts 18:21; Acts 20:6; Acts 20:16; I Corinthians 16:8). Saint Paul wrote in Romans 2:13 that the doers of the Law of Moses or Torah are justified in the sight of God, not those who merely hear it. Jesus Christ was celebrating the Jewish religious holiday of the Passover or Feast of the Unleavened Bread when he held the Last Supper with His Apostles according to Matthew 26:17-35, Mark 14:12-15, Luke 22:14-23, John 13:1-38, and I Corinthians 11:23-25.

According to Church tradition, the Roman Centurion Cornelius is considered the first Gentile convert, as recorded in Acts 10, perhaps also a Godfearer or proselyte of the gate though the exact meaning of these terms is disputed. The major division prior to that time was between Hellenistic and non-Hellenistic Jews or Koine Greek and Aramaic speakers. The conversion and acceptance of the Gentile Cornelius can be described in terms of the Judaic teaching which describes strangers becoming part of the community. Acts does not use the term "Jewish Christians", rather those led by James the Just, Simon Peter, and John the Apostle, the "Pillars of the Church", were called followers of "The Way". Later groups, or perhaps the same group by different names, were the Ebionites and Elkasites.

The terms "circumcised" and "uncircumcised", which occur frequently in the New Testament, are generally interpreted to mean Jews and Greeks respectively, who were predominant in the region at the time; however this is an oversimplification as 1st century Iudaea Province also had some Jews who no longer circumcised (usually Hellenized Jews living in the diaspora), and some Greeks (called Proselytes or Judaizers) and others such as Egyptians, Ethiopians, and Arabs who did. See also Abrahamic religion and Circumcision controversy in early Christianity#Jewish background.

The Council of Jerusalem and other developments

It has been argued that this Jewish Christian sect (3,000 +) was in danger of being wiped out as they were being persecuted. The Acts of the Apostles depicts instances of early Christian persecution by the Sanhedrin, the Jewish religious court at the time, however the historical reliability of the Acts of the Apostles is disputed. Peter and John were imprisoned by a "Jewish leadership" ("the priests, the captain of the temple, and the Sadducees") who were "much annoyed because they were teaching the people and proclaiming that in Jesus there is the resurrection of the dead". The Sadducees in particular rejected the Pharisaic doctrine of the resurrection of the dead. Saint Stephen was tried by a Sanhedrin (Jewish Supreme Court) for blasphemy against Moses and God and was stoned to death, under the watch of Paul of Tarsus, before his conversion.

A further blow to this Jewish sect was the death of their second leader (their first leader Jesus having been crucified c.30). According to Josephus, "the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James" met his death after the death of the procurator Porcius Festus, yet before Lucceius Albinus took office â€" which has thus been dated to 62. The High Priest Ananus ben Ananus took advantage of this lack of imperial oversight to assemble a Sanhedrin (although the correct translation of the Greek 'synhedion kriton' is 'a council of judges', see Synedrion for the Greek use of the word) who condemned James "on the charge of breaking the law," then had him executed by stoning. Josephus reports that Ananus' act was widely viewed as little more than judicial murder, and offended a number of "those who were considered the most fair-minded people in the City".

Three events would greatly affect the fortunes of early Jewish Christianity. The first was the Conversion of Paul in the early 30's (and the possible conversion of his teacher Gamaliel), the second was the Council of Jerusalem c.50, and the third was the Destruction of the Second Temple in 70 AD, which according to Josephus was one of the most significant events of the First Jewishâ€"Roman War. Nonetheless, according to the Church History of Eusebius, the line of Jewish Christian bishops of Jerusalem continued until the Bar Kokhba revolt (132-136) when Hadrian renamed the city "Aelia Capitolina" and barred all Jews except for the day of Tisha B'Av. After that, the Jerusalem bishops were uncircumcised Greeks. The Cenacle as it exists today is a Gothic reconstruction, but it may be the location of the original Jewish Christian church.

Heinrich Graetz postulated a Council of Jamnia in 90 that excluded Christians from the synagogues, but this is disputed. Jewish Christians continued to worship in synagogues for centuries. According to Acts 15, the Council of Jerusalem c.50, customarily believed to have been led by James the Just, determined that religious male circumcision (associated but also debated with conversion to Judaism) should not be required of Gentile followers of Jesus, only basic abstentions: avoidance of "pollution of idols, fornication, things strangled, and blood" (KJV, Acts 15:20, also Genesis 11:1-8 (idolatry), 9:20 (sexual depravity), 9:5 (cruelty to animals), 9:3-4 (abstention from blood)). The basis for these prohibitions is not detailed in Acts 15:21, which states only: "For Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogues every sabbath day", stressing that they are Mosaic Commandments which Gentiles must pay attention to. Many, beginning with Augustine of Hippo consider the consensus emphasised the four stipulations based on the Noahide Laws stated in Genesis, and applicable to all people (Noah's descendants after the Flood). On the other hand some modern scholars reject the connection to Noahide Law (Genesis 9) and instead see Lev 17-18 (see also Leviticus 18) as the basis. Some modern Christians are also unclear as to whether this meant that this Apostolic Decree in some way still applies to them or merely that the requirements were imposed to facilitate common participation by Gentiles in the community of Jesus' followers (which at that time included Jewish Christians), so as to remind the Jewish followers of Jesus to uphold those Laws applicable to them (i.e. the full Mosaic Laws). According to Karl Josef von Hefele, this Apostolic Decree is still observed today by the Eastern Orthodox. See also Biblical law in Christianity, Expounding of the Law, and Noahidism.

Early Jewish Christians included those who believed non-Jews must become Jews and adopt Jewish customs. They were derogatively called Judaizers, and even Paul used this term against Jesus's student Peter in public according to Young's Literal Translation of Gal 2:14:

But when I saw that they are not walking uprightly to the truth of the good news, I said to Peter before all, `If thou, being a Jew, in the manner of the nations dost live, and not in the manner of the Jews, how the nations dost thou compel to Judaize?

However, even Barnabas, Paul's partner up till then, sided with Peter. Catholic Encyclopedia: Judaizers: The Incident at Antioch claims: "St. Paul's account of the incident leaves no doubt that St. Peter saw the justice of the rebuke." however, L. Michael White's From Jesus to Christianity claims: "The blowup with Peter was a total failure of political bravado, and Paul soon left Antioch as persona non grata, never again to return." See also Incident at Antioch and Pauline Christianity. Scholar James D. G. Dunn, who coined the phrase "New Perspective on Paul", has proposed that Peter was the "bridge-man" (i.e., the pontifex maximus) between the two other "prominent leading figures" of early Christianity: Paul and James the Just.

Marcion in the 2nd century, called the "most dangerous" heretic, rejected the Twelve Apostles, and interpreted a Jesus who rejected the Law of Moses using 10 Pauline Epistles and the Gospel of Luke. For example, his version of Luke 23:2: "We found this fellow [Jesus] perverting the nation and destroying the law and the prophets". Irenaeus in turn rejected Marcion and praised the Twelve Apostles in his Against Heresies 3.12.12:

"...being brought over to the doctrine of Simon Magus, they have apostatized in their opinions from Him who is God, and imagined that they have themselves discovered more than the apostles, by finding out another god; and [maintained] that the apostles preached the Gospel still somewhat under the influence of Jewish opinions, but that they themselves are purer [in doctrine], and more intelligent, than the apostles."

According to Eusebius' History of the Church 4.5.3â€"4: the first 15 Bishops of Jerusalem were "of the circumcision". The Romans destroyed the Jewish leadership in Jerusalem in year 135 during the Bar Kokhba Revolt. However, that does not necessarily mean an end to Jewish Christianity, any more than Valerian's Massacre of 258, (when he killed all Christian bishops, presbyters, and deacons, including Pope Sixtus II and Antipope Novatian and Cyprian of Carthage), meant an end to Roman Christianity. Traditionally it is believed the Jerusalem Christians waited out the Jewishâ€"Roman wars in Pella in the Decapolis (see flight to Pella). After the Jewishâ€"Roman wars (66â€"135), which Epiphanius believed the Cenacle survived, the significance of Jerusalem to Christians entered a period of decline, Jerusalem having been temporarily converted to the pagan Aelia Capitolina, but interest resumed again with the pilgrimage of Helena (the mother of Constantine the Great) to the Holy Land c. 326â€"28. According to the church historian Socrates of Constantinople, Helena claimed to have found the cross of Christ, after removing a Temple to Venus (attributed to Hadrian) that had been built over the site. For that reason she is seen as the Patron Saint of Archaeologists. Jerusalem received special recognition in Canon VII of the First Council of Nicaea in 325. Later, under Justinian I (527-565), it was designated one of the Pentarchy, though the Pentarchy has never been recognized by Roman Catholicism which instead claims Papal supremacy.

Circumcision controversy

A common interpretation of the circumcision controversy of the New Testament was that it was over the issue of whether Gentiles could enter the Church directly or ought to first convert to Judaism. This controversy was fought largely between opposing groups of Christians who were themselves ethnically Jewish. According to this interpretation, those who felt that conversion to Judaism was a prerequisite for Church membership were eventually condemned by Paul as "Judaizing teachers".

The source of this interpretation is unknown; however, it appears related to Supersessionism or Hyperdispensationalism (see also New Perspective on Paul). In addition, modern Christians, such as Ethiopian Orthodox and Coptic Orthodox still practice circumcision while not considering it a part of conversion to Judaism, nor do they consider themselves to be Jews or Jewish Christians. Roman Catholicism condemned circumcision for its members in 1442, at the Council of Florence.

Communities whose origins reflect both Judaism and early Christianity

Role of Hellenistic Judaism

Both Early Christianity and Early Rabbinical Judaism were far less 'orthodox' and less theologically homogeneous than they are today; and both were significantly influenced by Hellenistic religion and borrowed allegories and concepts from Classical Hellenistic philosophy and the works of Greek-speaking Jewish authors of the end of the Second Temple period... before the two schools of thought eventually firmed-up their respective 'norms' and doctrines, notably by diverging increasingly on key issues such as the status of 'purity laws', the validity of Judeo-Christian messianic beliefs, and, more importantly, the use of Koine Greek and Latin as sacerdotal languages replacing Biblical Hebrew...etc.

Certain Christian communities of India, Syria, Lebanon, and Israel/Palestinian Territories have traditionally been associated with some 1st-century Jewish Christian heritage. The Syriac Orthodox Church, the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch, and the Melkite Greek Catholic Church of Antioch are churches with known Jewish Christian membership that dates as far back as the 1st century. All three churches had common origins in terms of membership, where the majority of adherents was a mix of Greeks and Hellenized Jews and Syrians from Antioch and the rest of Syria who adopted the new faith. The Syriac Orthodox Church follows the Antiochene rite that celebrates liturgy in Syriac and still carries some particular customs that are considered today as purely Judaic in nature.

Beyond Antioch, Alexandretta and Northwestern Syria, the main centers of Hellenistic Judaism in the Levant before the destruction of the Second Temple, the opening verse of Acts 6 points to cultural divisions between Hellenized Jews and Aramaic-speaking Israelites in Jerusalem itself: “it speaks of "Hellenists" and "Hebrews." The existence of these two distinct groups characterizes the earliest Christian community in Jerusalem. The Hebrews were Jewish Christians who spoke almost exclusively Aramaic, and the Hellenists were also Jewish Christians whose mother tongue was Greek. They were Greek-speaking Jews of the Diaspora, who returned to settle in Jerusalem. To identify them, Luke uses the term Hellenistai. When he had in mind Greeks, gentiles, non-Jews who spoke Greek and lived according to the Greek fashion, then he used the word Hellenes (Acts 21.28). As the very context of Acts 6 makes clear, the Hellenistai are not Hellenes."

Some historians believe that a sizeable proportion of the Hellenized Jewish communities of Southern Turkey (Antioch, Alexandretta and neighboring cities) and Syria/Lebanon eventually converted to the Greco-Roman branch of Christianity that eventually constituted the “Melkite” Churches of the MENA area: “As Jewish Christianity originated at Jerusalem, so Gentile Christianity started at Antioch, then the leading center of the Hellenistic East, with Peter and Paul as its apostles. From Antioch it spread to the various cities and provinces of Syria, among the Hellenistic Syrians as well as among the Hellenistic Jews who, as a result of the great rebellions against the Romans in A.D. 70 and 130, were driven out from Jerusalem and Palestine into Syria ”

Surviving Byzantine and 'Syriac' communities in the MENA area

Some typically Grecian "Ancient Synagogal" priestly rites have survived partially to the present, notably in the distinct church service of the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch and the Melkite Greek Catholic communities of the Hatay Province of Southern Turkey, Syria and Lebanon.

The unique combination of ethnocultural traits inhered from the fusion of a Greek-Macedonian cultural base, Hellenistic Judaism and Roman civilization gave birth to the distinctly Antiochian “Middle Eastern-Roman” Christian traditions of Cilicia (Southeastern Turkey) and Syria/Lebanon:

" The mixture of Roman, Greek, and Jewish elements admirably adapted Antioch for the great part it played in the early history of Christianity. The city was the cradle of the church."

Members of theses communities still call themselves Rûm which literally means "Eastern Roman", "Byzantine" or "Asian Greek" in Turkish, Persian and Arabic. The term "Rûm" is used in preference to "Ionani" or "Yāvāni" which means "European Greek" or "Ionian" in Classical Arabic and Ancient Hebrew.

Most MENA area "Melkites" or "Rûms", can trace their ethnocultural heritage to the Greek and Macedonian settlers and Southern Anatolian Hellenized Jewish communities of the past, founders of the original "Antiochian Greek" communities of Cilicia and Northwestern Syria. Counting members of the surviving minorities in the Hatay Province of Turkey, in Syria, Lebanon, Northern Israel and their relatives in the diaspora, there are more than 1.8 million Greco-Melkite Christians residing in the Northern-MENA, the US, Canada and Latin America today i.e. Greek Orthodox and Greek Catholic Christians under the ancient jurisdictional authority of the patriarchates of Antioch and Jerusalem ("Orthodox" in the narrow sense) and/or their Uniat offshoots ("Catholic" or "united" with Rome).

Today, certain families are associated with descent from the early Jewish Christians of Antioch, Damascus, Judea, and Galilee. Some of those families carry surnames such as Youhanna (John), Hanania (Ananias), Sahyoun (Zion), Eliyya/Elias (Elijah), Chamoun/Shamoun (Simeon/Simon), Semaan/Simaan (Simeon/Simon), Menassa (Manasseh), Salamoun/Suleiman (Solomon), Youwakim (Joachim), Zakariya (Zacharias) and others.

Contemporary movements

Jewish Christians are ethnic Jews who have converted to or have been raised in Christianity. They are mostly members of Catholic and Protestant congregations, and are generally assimilated culturally into the Christian mainstream, although they retain a strong sense of their Jewish identity. Some such Jewish Christians also refer to themselves as "Hebrew Christians". One example of this is the Isaric Christians (Bnei Makir) of Indonesia. Another example, the Nasrani (Saint Thomas Christians) of India, is farther removed from Judaism, but does historically have strong Jewish ties and still retains certain Jewish traditions.

The Hebrew Christian movement of the 19th century was a largely Anglican led, and largely integrated initiative, with figures such as Michael Solomon Alexander, Bishop of Jerusalem 1842-1845. Though figures such as Joseph Frey were more assertive of Jewish identity and independence.

Messianic Judaism is a religious movement that incorporates elements of Judaism with the tenets of Christianity. Adherents, many of whom are ethnically Jewish, worship in congregations that include Hebrew prayers. They circumcise their sons and often observe kosher dietary laws and Saturday as the Sabbath. Although they do recognize the New Testament as holy scripture, most do not use the label "Christian" to describe themselves.

The two groups are not completely distinct; some adherents, for example, favor Messianic congregations but freely live in both worlds, such as theologian Arnold Fruchtenbaum, the founder of Ariel Ministries.

See also

References

Bibliography

External links

• Simchat Torah Beit Midrash:- Jewish Christians
• Jewish Studies for Christians
• Scripture & Torah Study Resources
• Walter Bauer's ORTHODOXY AND HERESY Appendix 1: On the Problem of Jewish Christianity
• Frontline: From Jesus to Christ: The First Christians: Wrestling with their Jewish Heritage at PBS
• Medieval Sourcebook: Saint John Chrysostom (c.347-407) : Eight Homilies Against the Jews at Fordham University
• Jewish Encyclopedia: Christianity in its relation to Judaism: Early Christianity a Jewish Sect
• The Ascendance of Messianic Judaism in the Context of Hebrew Christianity by William Greene, Ph.D.
• Historical references to the original (pre-Pauline) Jesus movement
• O.Skarsaune, R.Hvalvik, ed.: Jewish Believers in Jesus: The Early (5) Centuries