Nazareth
Nazareth
Lithograph of Nazareth, “April 28th 1839" and signed “David Roberts R.A."
Now, those are famous words, "Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?"
On first evaluation, it appears that the village of Nazareth had a very bad name. Nazareth has been found to be a small village in the first century, probably with less than 150 people from four to five different families, all from one clan. It was a Jewish community, but different Jewish communities followed different rabbinical teachings.
Dr. Charles R. Page II, in his book, Jesus and the Land, page 38, states:
"Since Nazareth was a very small village that was not located on a major trade route and was populated by an ultraconservative Hasidic sect, one can better understand Nathanael's response to Philip's announcement of the arrival of the Messiah: "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" (John 1:46)—that backward, holier-than-thou village in the middle of the countryside!"
Concerning the Hasidic sect at Nazareth, Page continues (p. 62):
"Jesus was reared in a very strict environment among people who thought they had been singled out as the vehicle through which God would redeem humankind. However, somewhere along the way he came to the realization that this is not how God acts—exclusively within the community of one small clan or sect."
Like their contemporaries the Essenes, the Hasidims believed that their sect of Judaism held the true understanding and that the "Anointed One" would rise from within their own people. Knowing this adds more understanding to the response within the synagogue when Jesus read to them from Isaiah, telling them that He was the one they had been waiting for to lead them.
Shmuel Safrai points out that all of the references to the Hasidim in the Second Temple Period related to the Galilean area.
Says Safrai:
"Jesus, who was quite closer to the Hasidim and perhaps even involved with some of them, does not therefore reflect Galilean boorishness or ignorance, but rather the dynamism and ongoing creativity of Jewish life in Galilee.
Lithograph of Nazareth, “April 28th 1839" and signed “David Roberts R.A."
Now, those are famous words, "Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?"
On first evaluation, it appears that the village of Nazareth had a very bad name. Nazareth has been found to be a small village in the first century, probably with less than 150 people from four to five different families, all from one clan. It was a Jewish community, but different Jewish communities followed different rabbinical teachings.
Dr. Charles R. Page II, in his book, Jesus and the Land, page 38, states:
"Since Nazareth was a very small village that was not located on a major trade route and was populated by an ultraconservative Hasidic sect, one can better understand Nathanael's response to Philip's announcement of the arrival of the Messiah: "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" (John 1:46)—that backward, holier-than-thou village in the middle of the countryside!"
Concerning the Hasidic sect at Nazareth, Page continues (p. 62):
"Jesus was reared in a very strict environment among people who thought they had been singled out as the vehicle through which God would redeem humankind. However, somewhere along the way he came to the realization that this is not how God acts—exclusively within the community of one small clan or sect."
Like their contemporaries the Essenes, the Hasidims believed that their sect of Judaism held the true understanding and that the "Anointed One" would rise from within their own people. Knowing this adds more understanding to the response within the synagogue when Jesus read to them from Isaiah, telling them that He was the one they had been waiting for to lead them.
Shmuel Safrai points out that all of the references to the Hasidim in the Second Temple Period related to the Galilean area.
Says Safrai:
"Jesus, who was quite closer to the Hasidim and perhaps even involved with some of them, does not therefore reflect Galilean boorishness or ignorance, but rather the dynamism and ongoing creativity of Jewish life in Galilee.
A trait that is unique to the Hasidim is the referral
to God in a very intimate way as “father” or “abba.”
"It appears . . . that the Hasidim and those associated with them, including Jesus, considered their relationship with God to be one of extreme familiarity . . . However, in Hasidic circles the relationship of a Hasid to God was not just one of 'child of God,' but of a son who can brazenly make requests of his father that someone else cannot make. The Hasid addressed God as 'abba,' 'my father,' or 'my father in heaven'..."
Nathaniel may not have liked the idea of the Messiah coming from a Hasidim sect, since this would have represented a rejection of the other sects of Judaism.
posted by ~serapha~ at 8:13 PM
1 Comments:
I appreciated your article. I too am a fundamentalist. I was wondering how you would respond to an author like Rene Salm and his book "The myth of Nazareth"? The atheist community is praising his work. What say you?
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