In the first century, many participants and witnesses of events were still alive, the closest relatives of Jesus were alive, as was Miriam herself. After the death and resurrection of the Master, the Apostles Peter, James, and John chose James as their bishop, the brother of Jesus, and he led the Jerusalem community. For the Apostles the resurrection of Jesus was the eschatological event which had been foretold by the prophets of Israel. That is why Christ’s disciples called on all Jews to acknowledge that they were the true Israel, the community of the New Testament. Here, however, they came up against the stubborn, unrelenting hostility of official Judaism. The apostles then formed a special group which existed within Judaism, alongside other Jewish sects, but remained true to the provisions of the Law and the divine service of the Temple.
In the year forty-nine, the Council of Jerusalem legitimated the practice that Gentiles who had converted to Christianity, “Gentile Christians,” need observe only the commandments given to Noah, which were seven in number. They were not obliged to undergo the ritual of circumcision or the other provisions of Judaic law. The Apostle Paul considered that Jewish Christians themselves were not obliged to adhere to the ancient rules, for example, they need not observe the prohibition on eating with Gentiles, or at the same table as Christians who had not been circumcised. Many Jewish Christians objected to his ruling.
This was the reason behind a dispute which arose at Antioch in that same year of AD forty-nine. In the view of St. Paul, circumcision, observing the Sabbath, and attending divine service in the Temple were no longer required even of Jews, and Christianity was set free from the Judaic religio-political milieu to go out and embrace other peoples. Do you remember St. Peter’s vision on the roof of the house of Simon the Tanner in Jaffa? From the heavens a sheet was lowered containing animals considered unclean by the Jews, and this spectacle was accompanied by a loud voice crying, “What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common!”
This was the moment when a parting of the ways began. The Church in Jerusalem did not break with Judaism, but the teaching of St. Paul led toward a schism which occurred after his death.
Hilda, my dear, the kettle is on the edge of the hob and likely to tip over. It’s full of boiling water and there is nobody among us who could instantly heal you.
The schism deepened when the Romans destroyed the Temple in Jerusalem in AD seventy, and after the defeat of the bar Kokhba uprising in AD one hundred forty or so, the split became final. Before that Jewish Christians lived in Pella and other trans-Jordanian towns, but now Palestine became hellenized, and Jewish Christians began to leave the Middle East. After the second century AD, Jewish Christianity had died out in the East—in Palestine, Arabia, Jordan, Syria, and Mesopotamia. The last remaining Jewish Christian communities were swallowed up five centuries later by Islam. In modern Christianity we find only occasional “archaeological” remains in the liturgy of the Ethiopian and Chaldean Churches.
Thank you, Musa, your coffee is without compare.
A lot of books have been written on this subject and I won’t trouble you with more detail. The most remarkable thing is that the earliest Jewish Christian literary works are very little different from the midrashim, a particular genre of interpretations of text which the rabbis of that time compiled. The Judaic tradition is still there to be seen in the works of such church writers as Barnabas, Justin, Clement of Alexandria, and Irenaeus.
The period of coexistence of Jewish and Greek Christianity ended in the fourth century when the non-Jewish Christian Church became powerful. It assumed a Graeco-Roman form and became the religion of an empire. There is no place in the contemporary Church for the Jewish Church. Christianity as it exists in modern times is Greek Christianity and it repudiated the Jewish influences. The Jewish tradition with its emphasis on strict monotheism is more evident in Islam, which is a kind of interpretation of the Jewish Christian religion. It is the Jewish Christian Church which provides opportunities for a future three-way dialogue between Judaism, Islam, and Christianity.
The Church needs to restore its initial pluralism. Among the world’s many Christian churches, which speak different languages, there should be a place for the Jewish Christian Church. We should go back to the point at which the old division occurred and see what can be put right. Historical Christianity has committed numerous errors. They cannot now be corrected, of course, but understanding what they were and what caused them is something we can do. This new understanding could yield good fruit—reconciliation and love. Christianity is deprived of its universality because of the absence of the Jews. The loss of the Jews is a wound in Christianity which has never healed. The Greek Byzantine component largely distorted the essence of primal Christianity. I would like to return to the source, together with you.
9. December 1966
M
EMORANDUM TO THE
J
ERUSALEM
P
ATRIARCHATE
To Monsignor Mattan Avat
From Brother Elijah
On 11 December 1966, Brother Daniel Stein gave a talk to his community in the recently restored Church of St. Elijah by the Spring. I am placing at your disposal a tape recording of what he said.
Brother Elijah
10. June 1967, Haifa
F
ROM A LETTER FROM
H
ILDA TO HER
M
OTHER
… Daniel had a fever, but I know he can’t bear staying in bed when he is ill. I bought him a lot of medicine and climbed up to the Stella Maris because transportation is unreliable as a consequence of this war. I thought that rather than wait an hour and a half for the bus, it would be better to walk. It would still only take an hour and a half. Would you believe it, when I climbed the mountain, got to the gatekeeper, and handed him the basket of medicine for Daniel, I was told he had gone off early in the morning and wouldn’t be back until evening. I returned to Haifa and had almost reached the town when I saw Daniel whizzing along the road perched on a Vespa motor scooter, his soutane billowing in the wind, with a skinny Hassid being bounced up and down on the pillion. With one hand he was holding on to his broad-brimmed black hat and with the other to Daniel. It was unbelievably funny and the whole street was in stitches. Next day the war came to an end and I cannot describe the scenes here.
There was such joy, such jubilation. They immediately called it the Six-Day War. And then, in the midst of the general rejoicing, Daniel arrived looking out of sorts, sat down, and said, “Happy victory day! This war will figure in every military textbook from now until the end of time. The Arabs will never forgive us for humiliating them like this.” Musa, who had also dropped by, disagreed. “Daniel,” he said, “I know the Arabs better. They will find a way of interpreting their defeat as a great victory. They will not allow the rest of the world to laugh at them.”
Daniel nodded. He really likes Musa. They understand each other at some deep level. He said, “Of course, Musa. Only someone with inner freedom can laugh at himself, and allow others to laugh at him.”