Wait. Doesn’t the Pope claim to have inherited power from the holy roman emperor? That means…
**
The butler did it!**
A possibility - Christianity was a initially splinter sect of Judaism. Perhaps the NT was revised to place heavy blame on the Jews because they were trying to recruit in Rome and because it was the easiest way to make the potentially overwhelming parent religion the heavy - a desirable thing when you’re trying to split yourself off.
As to why it’s lasted through until now, well, as has been pointed out there is still a Jewish community, but the Roman empire and Romans in that sense are no more. And you always need a bad guy - a Them to contrast to the virtuous and superior Us.
I know you’re kidding around, but could you please present some evidence that the Romans rewrote the NT to clear themselves? I’m pretty sure they didn’t.
gazpacho also makes a good point. Italians /= Romans.
I’m no theologian, but here I go:
Ok, Satan rebelled against God, God then goes and creates a brand new world with new creatures and something new called "man". Satan, all pissed off because God has replaced him at the drop of a hat, runs off to corrupt man. But, if we accept that God is omnipotent and omniscient, this means that he created this world with full knowledge that Adam and Eve will fall. How can this be reconciled with? Well, we have to keep in mind that although God did nothing to prevent it, Eve and Adam ultimately sinned on their own accord, and since justice cannot be sacrificed they must be punished. But still, we are left with an image of a passive God who stood by and let Satan in. Jesus says to God, "Hey dad, why are you letting Satan gain a victory here? And why let man suffer?" (remember Jesus is part of God, and so it's like God talking to himself with a hand puppet). God replies, "Satan will triumph but briefly and in so doing heap more damnation upon himself...blah-blah-blah... Man I gave the power to stand but the freedom to fall, just like the angels. If he breaks his sole commandment, and he will, he or justice must die. I am a just God, and will not sacrifice Justice and so he will die. That is, unless someone wants to die for him?" Jesus pipes up, "I will die for him Dad." And there was much rejoicing
And so Jesus suffers the penalty for man's sin on the cross, dies, and then goes down to hell to rend hell to pieces and basically put the devil in his place. And so the devil, in corrupting man, lays the ground work for Jesus laying waste to hell (as much as hell can be laid waste to).
And so Man's fall was really a good thing, because then God gave us the immense gift of his son born as man among us. This concept is called the felix culpa, I believe, or "happy guilt" because our breaking of a commandment created something good.
Does this make sense? I don't know anymore, perhaps my ears are still ringing from that English course last semester where we covered *Paradise Lost*. This is the soap opera played out in my head. Does this answer the question? Probably not, hell with it, I spent the time typing and by God you're gonna read it! Suckers...
Anyway, I guess the point is Jesus had to die because Justice cannot be sacrificed by God, and because Jesus had free will too and ultimately had to volunteered for it.
As to why we don't hate Italians? I guess because the early bible writers didn't want to piss off the most powerful empire in the world at the time. And also I've never heard of a Roman named Guiseppe. :)Ok serious answer (and there had been threadage on this before but I don’t know where)–I think the theory right now is that the writer of the book of John (where the blood libel clause comes in and the religious leaders of Jerusalem get a lot of flack) was probably of a 1st/ 2d century judaeo-christian politcal/religious sect/faction which had political reasons (sectarianism, etc) for laying some amount of blame at the hands of the PHARISEES rather than the Roman regional gummint-- I assume some jewish political group or sect at the time had some sort of connection to the Jesus-era Pharisees (historically? metaphorically/similitude?) and the writer of John had it in for them and wished to make them look bad. How the later medieval western European Christians took the ball and ran with it is another issue.
It’s Barabas.
As for why they aren’t blamed…It’s because they had to do it to fulfill the reason for Jesus…
He had to die.
If I’ve learned anything from watching TV it’s that the obvious suspect is always innocent. So the Bible made the Jews look guilty so that they’d ultimately be cleared of all charges and the real culprit would be named.
It was John the Baptist. He brought his young cousin into the business and then had to watch as he took over. The resentment got too much for him, so he faked his own death and tipped off the Romans. Judas was just a patsy. And he’d have gotten way with it too - if it hadn’t been for those meddling apostles and their darn dog.
At least one of the Gospels relates that some in the crowd blamed themselves and felt that responsibility for the death would be placed on them and on their children. That doesn’t mean that the people in the crowd were speaking the desires of God for all times. It doesn’t even mean they were speaking the truth.
If there are ever rumblings against pizza parlor owners, they can quiet the unruly Christians by offering the Cheese of Nazreth Special.
From what I’ve learned from my Pastor, **Oy ** is on the right track (okay, the track that agrees with my Pastor, but he’s a pretty smart guy). At the time the gospels were written, Christianity was a splinter sect of Judaism, but one that was undergoing separation pains from the main body. The understandable and expected conflicts between Jews and Christian/Jews were going on in the synogogues.
At the same time, the Romans were cracking down on religions who didn’t toe the party line - i.e., the monotheists and those who held themselves apart, generally. This means the Jews. The writers of the Gospels had lots of incentive to placate the Romans, and they did this in part by shifting the bulk of the blame onto the Jews, with whom they were in conflict anyway.
My cthulhu, it’s really happening. (Not really)
An article from the respected national paper “The Washington Pox” (DC’s Most Unbalanced News)
CHRISTIAN MOBS ATTACK ITALIANS
THROUGHOUT U.S., SHOUTING
“ROMANS KILLED JESUS”
http://www.dcpox.com/images/Italians2.jpg
By Immaculata Chinoto
NEW YORK, February 27 – “We had warned the authorities about this,” said Italian-American leader Guillermo “Bill” Angelini, “but they allowed Gibson to show his anti-Italian movie anyway. And now our people have paid the price in property and lives.”
There has been widespread rioting aimed at the Italian descendants of Romans. In most major cities with a visible Italian community, mobs attacked Italians, setting fire to their pushcarts, salumerias, and gelaterias.
Gibson’s film, The Passion of the Christ, has a strong undercurrent of anti-Italianism, appearing to blame the crucifixion on Romans and, by extension, all Italians. Gibson denied it, but the results seem to speak for themselves.
In New York, Christian mobs swarmed out of Midtown multiplexes and marched downtown to Little Italy, where they engaged in an orgy of burning, looting and attacking Italians with crucifixes and brochures from the movie.
Italians fled to the safety of nearby Jewish neighborhoods. One survivor told police, “This is like the pogrominis we suffered in Europe. When are they going to stop blaming us for something that happened 2000 years ago?”
The roots of anti-semitism were always much more complex than simply a belief that ‘the Jews killed Jesus’. For one thing, the origins of anti-semitism predate Christianity, being a common feature throughout the Roman world. ‘John’ was either exploiting or reflecting an existing prejudice. Thereafter the ‘blood libel’ was never the only reason why most Christians were prejudiced against the Jews and it is debateable how often it was even the main one. A useful scriptural justification, yes, but then you don’t believe that the justifications people give for their actions are always the real reasons, do you?
But the fact that most people now agree that ‘one group can not be held accountable for the actions of a few of it’s members 2000+ years ago’ is precisely the reason why they blame neither the Jews nor the Italians for Jesus’ death. Moreover, that this hasn’t stopped anti-semitism only reinforces the point that the belief that ‘the Jews killed Jesus’ was only ever one strand within Western anti-semitism.
You’ve started with a simplistic premise and then appear surprised that it seems so inadequate.
Simplistic? Duh. Please note in my original post how I use a Monty Python quote and say "Please note that this is not to be taken seriously. " That is not to say that I don’t think the catholic church has a lot to answer to.
Ya know, it was the “and on our children” bit that put an end to my churchgoing days. I’m sitting there thinking, the Jews stopped rioting (according to the version being read by the priest at mass), to say in one voice “his blood be on us and on our children”? No way that happened. Riots and unanimous pronunciations with major and perpetual sociological and theological implications just don’t go together. I’m picturing some early Christian scribe somewhere thinking, “OK, Pilate washed his hands and the Jews got their unruly way. How can I really screw the Jews? We need to differentiate ourselves from the Jews in the eyes of our potential converts, the Romans, who otherwise don’t give shit.” “I know!”, says the scribe. “I’ll make it look like the Jews accepted responsibility for Jesus’ death as a race. Its not enough to blame those bastard Pharisees as someone might say that the Jews as a whole had nothing to do with it! Outstanding!”
Anyway, at this point my kids know far more about Greek and Roman mythology than they do about Christian mythology. I’m thinking about thoroughly indoctrinating them into believing in the fairie folk and their ongoing influence on our lives. It just makes more sense than this Christian thing these days.
CJ
What he said.
Are there really any significant group of Xtians who currently blame the living Jewish people? I mean- blaming the then High Preist seems to be more or less correct.
Sure, at times in History, Jews were reviled as “they killed jesus”- but that was really just an excuse. They were hated really because they were *different *and somewhat successful.
Southern Slaveholders occasionally claimed the “Negroes deserved slavery because of the Curse of Ham”- but I doubt if many really beleived that.
No, I’m not taking it too seriously but it is a good question. I distrust the New Testatment writers on this because of several factors. The time period between the events and the actual enscription of the Gospels. Who wrote them and for what reason? Can we take them as truly factual events or were they written to portray a particular point of view? Can we truly trust what’s said about the Jews or the Romans when compared to the historical record?
Also, without the cruxifiction, the whole idea of sacrafice and redemption, which is central to Christianity, loses its importance. Without the cruxifiction, the main story in the Gospels is about this guy Jesus who said, “Let’s be nice to one another!” There’s nothing wrong with that, but Christianity loses a **lot[/]b of its impact without the cruxifiction.
Finally, the actions of the J/C/I God, who needs a sacrifice to atone for the Fall just seems too illogical to me, especially for a god who is all-knowing, all-seeing and all-powerful.
Sorry, this isn’t meant to bash Christianity, but simply to show what I consider major flaws in its theology.
You and I are on the same page, but in my attempt to list people who could actually believe that the jews could have anything to do with a crucifixtion, when they were a subjigated group, I somehow put down your name as a support of the theory that believes every jot and tittle of the bible. That was a cut and paste typo. Sorry.
P.s. This is irrevivate to the topic, but I feel I must say it. Tov pizza, I pit you. It calls itself “Baltimore’s Best Kosher Pizza” but that is because it was the only kosher pizza place around for years. Tov pizza, you suck. This is harping back on post 10 and eleven, if you are wondering.
Are you saying that this whole thread was intended to be a joke? You’ve introduced, in a humorous way, some very involved concepts that could support discussion and, maybe, some learning and other good stuff.
Having introduced the topic, it’s disingenuous of you to say “hey, it was just a joke” when somebody points out a problem in your reasoning. You owe your respondants a little more respect than that in GD.
I see no problem in my reasoning, for we live in a world which had the inquisition. If there was no scriptural justification, then perhaps the level of prosecution would have not gotten that high or maybe it would have. Not having lived in a world where 2000+ years ofchristian persecution did not took place, I don’t feel I can claim one way or another, but perhaps a group might wander of while waiting for the head of their movement to come up with a reason to hate the other side.
Because Italians by in large became followers.