Christianity and its departure from Judaism

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Hi guys,

I’ve long been struggling with Christianity. I grew up Catholic, considered myself agnostic for a while, then came back to the faith. I attend mass regularly, but in the back of my head, I have tons of questions. I believe Jesus was the son of God about 50% of the time, and the other 50% of the time I don’t. I believe strongly in God.

Quite by accident, I came across this video recently.
youtube.com/watch?v=BMHuUIYCA0o

Being that I was already shaky in my faith, I found it pretty interesting. Parts made me kind of uncomfortable, but they were somewhat convincing.

If anyone else wants to watch and offer their perspectives, that’d be great.

Mainly, I just wanted to prompt a historical discussion of Christianity and its departure from Judaism. How do we know we’re right? How did thought shift from the Messiah being human to the Messiah being God? Are these not radical departures from Jewish thought?
 
Christianity did not depart from Judaism; rather, most of the Jews departed from the revealed religion when they refused to accept the Messiah (cf. John 1:11).

How do we know that Christianity is the authentic continuation of the revealed religion?

First, the religion of the Old Law doesn’t exist anymore. If it did, there would be a temple and animal sacrifices. What most people today call “Judaism” is not the religion of the Old Law, but *Rabbinical *Judaism, a diverse family of sects which came into existence long after the Old Law had reached its fulfillment in Christ. Indeed, in its present forms, Rabbinical Judaism did not take shape until centuries after the Ascension. Far from being a single religion, it is a panoplea of religions which vary greatly in theology and practice. (Some of them would probably say the same of Christianity, but we can demonstrate that there is but one faith and one Church by our link with St. Peter; whereas they can do no such thing.)

Secondly, look at the Old Testament. It is replete with prophecies and allusions to the Messiah which were fulfilled by Jesus. The crucifixion is not only prophesied by described in many details. Many online resources have lists of such Old Testament passages, for example, this one.

So I wouldn’t waste your time watching Rabbinical Jewish propaganda; the religions they are arguing for depart significantly from the religion of the Old Law and to varying degrees. They have no ground to stand on, other than the vague association in the public eye between the religion of the Old Law and the family of religions which people today collectively call “Judaism”.
 
lllj said:
Hi guys,

I’ve long been struggling with Christianity. I grew up Catholic, considered myself agnostic for a while, then came back to the faith. I attend mass regularly, but in the back of my head, I have tons of questions. I believe Jesus was the son of God about 50% of the time, and the other 50% of the time I don’t. I believe strongly in God.

Quite by accident, I came across this video recently.
youtube.com/watch?v=BMHuUIYCA0o

Being that I was already shaky in my faith, I found it pretty interesting. Parts made me kind of uncomfortable, but they were somewhat convincing.

If anyone else wants to watch and offer their perspectives, that’d be great.

Mainly, I just wanted to prompt a historical discussion of Christianity and its departure from Judaism. How do we know we’re right? How did thought shift from the Messiah being human to the Messiah being God? Are these not radical departures from Jewish thought?
Click to expand...
Christs teachings are so absolutely overwhelmingly beautiful that everything else should pale in comparison in my view.
 
You seem to be overlooking the destruction of the temple in AD70.

This was not the first time it had happened. Jews did not cease to be Jews they adapted to worshipping God without a temple, while praying continuallynfor it’s restoration.

Christians stopped going to Jewish Synagogue services soon after when anti-Christian Creedal statements were introduced into Jewish liturgy. Thus the separation was complete.
 
I’ve heard that the Apostles and everyone continued to go to the synagogue, then went home to someone in order to break the bread (say thanks - Eucharist).
Then later at some point they held services and broke the bread at peoples houses altogether.

Paul must have done an awful lot to bring the early Christians together with Jews and to find a common denominater.
 
Ad_Orientem said:
Christianity did not depart from Judaism; rather, most of the Jews departed from the revealed religion when they refused to accept the Messiah (cf. John 1:11).

How do we know that Christianity is the authentic continuation of the revealed religion?

First, the religion of the Old Law doesn’t exist anymore. If it did, there would be a temple and animal sacrifices. What most people today call “Judaism” is not the religion of the Old Law, but *Rabbinical *Judaism, a diverse family of sects which came into existence long after the Old Law had reached its fulfillment in Christ. Indeed, in its present forms, Rabbinical Judaism did not take shape until centuries after the Ascension. Far from being a single religion, it is a panoplea of religions which vary greatly in theology and practice. (Some of them would probably say the same of Christianity, but we can demonstrate that there is but one faith and one Church by our link with St. Peter; whereas they can do no such thing.)

Secondly, look at the Old Testament. It is replete with prophecies and allusions to the Messiah which were fulfilled by Jesus. The crucifixion is not only prophesied by described in many details. Many online resources have lists of such Old Testament passages, for example, this one.

So I wouldn’t waste your time watching Rabbinical Jewish propaganda; the religions they are arguing for depart significantly from the religion of the Old Law and to varying degrees. They have no ground to stand on, other than the vague association in the public eye between the religion of the Old Law and the family of religions which people today collectively call “Judaism”.
Click to expand...
I believe this and other posts exaggerate the logical discontinuity that of course would arise from loss of the Temple. However, and quite notwithstanding, there is also a profound logical continuity. After all, this is not the first time the Jews haven’t had a Temple. During the Exile for starters but even the Temple itself was something of an innovation and addition to the Mosaic covenant ushered in by the prophets on divine instruction (e.g., the entire period of the judges did not include a Temple). Modern Jewish anti-missionary tracts reveal a very close Messianic expectation (I mean by way of criteria) that was contemporary at the time of Jesus.

Now to be sure Jews today might have a difficult time relating to the Jews of Jesus’ day vis-a-vis the profound cultural identification with the Temple as such. Jesus is consistently portrayed as being an enemy of Jewish cultural or religious identity and continuity on account of his apparent opposition to the Temple as such, which was a profound -even the very central - symbol of Jews and Judaism at the time to an extent neither we Christians nor modern Jews could probably fully appreciate. Questions about Messianic criteria or fidelity to the Torah are often brushed aside in the NT by Jews and subordinated (or ignored completely) to charges against Jesus that he seemed to oppose the Temple structure, institution and system; I mean, for then contemporary Jews that was the more serious and weightier accusation and constituted a direct attack on Jewish cultural idenity and unity: the Temple cult apparently, at the end of the day, trumped even the law or the prophets.

The descruction of the Temple by the Romans would have profound consequences for both Jews and Christians. With the Jews the consequences are obvious and well known; however, for the Christians, the consequences were also drastic: primarily because, e.g., the Gospels were all written apparently with an assumption that the audience was already perfectly familiar with Jewish liturgical life (feasts and pilgrimages centering around the Temple) or, at least, that this information could be readily or easily known or had. And this rhythm of life is taken for granted as supplying the context or back-drop to Jesus’ doctrine and actions. Once this was taken away Jesus’ rather bold claims to, e.g., divinity in many instances suddenly do not seem quite so apparent, because the liturgical context or back-drop they were said in is no longer readily or easily known.
 
Fr_P said:
… Jews did not cease to be Jews they adapted to worshipping God without a temple…
Click to expand...
Father, your point is well taken. I concede that the separation was gradual.

My point is that Old Testament Judaism is no longer practiced today. Thus any claim on the part of Rabbinical Jewish bodies to be the authentic continuation of the revealed religion is without foundation. For them, the continuity does not exist, except in certain theological and cultural elements that have been handed down (but incompletely, and admixed with various elements foreign to the Old Testament, and in some cases opposed to it).

Since Christians do not claim to perpetuate the religion of the Old Law as such, but rather to adhere to its fulfillment in the New, our claim to authentic continuity does not face the same objection.
 
lllj said:
Hi guys,

I’ve long been struggling with Christianity. I grew up Catholic, considered myself agnostic for a while, then came back to the faith. I attend mass regularly, but in the back of my head, I have tons of questions. I believe Jesus was the son of God about 50% of the time, and the other 50% of the time I don’t. I believe strongly in God.

Quite by accident, I came across this video recently.
youtube.com/watch?v=BMHuUIYCA0o

Being that I was already shaky in my faith, I found it pretty interesting. Parts made me kind of uncomfortable, but they were somewhat convincing.

If anyone else wants to watch and offer their perspectives, that’d be great.

Mainly, I just wanted to prompt a historical discussion of Christianity and its departure from Judaism. How do we know we’re right? How did thought shift from the Messiah being human to the Messiah being God? Are these not radical departures from Jewish thought?
Click to expand...
If you are struggling with your faith, I would recommend you read the Divine Mercy chaplet. It contains very powerful prayers.
 
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