To wrap up this section, I’d like to ask the all-important question, “Was Jesus a Conservative or Liberal?” Conservative Evangelicals, implicitly and even sometimes explicitly, have long answered this question with the former. However, increasingly Liberal Christians have begun to passionately claim the latter. The truth is, of course, much more complicated.
Sociologists and psychologists in recent decades have coined a term called the “End of History Illusion.” In essence, psychologists noticed that human beings are very good at recognizing the amount of change that has taken place in the past but very bad at recognizing that this process of change will continue into the future. People can look back and easily recognize how much their perspectives, opinions, and psyches have grown and shifted over the past, but they tend to view who they are now as the final product, the denouement of their life’s development.
This happens at the societal level as well, especially in post-Enlightenment societies that are deeply indebted to the idea of progress. We tend to see our moment in history as the final moment, what all those thousands of years of social evolution have been leading to. What this leads to is a pretty profound sense of historical arrogance. We tend to look back at the past as a long series of beta tests leading to us. As a result we tend to condescend to previous cultures and beliefs (without recognizing that someday people will do the same to us).
One of the symptoms of historical arrogance, which plagues many disciplines not the least of which being Biblical Studies, is the assumption that ancient cultures were simplistic and monolithic. We act as though we invented complexity and gray areas. We are the first ones to have disagreements, internal conflict, moral ambiguity, and unmanageable complexity. The truth is of course much more complicated (and much more interesting).
Jesus was born at a wildly complex location, both temporally and geographically, in human history. He was part of a people who had believed for centuries that they had a sacred vocation, but by the time of his birth, they had been conquered by no fewer than four foreign empires: Assyria, Babylon, Greece, and Rome. In the second century BCE, they had briefly established independence from the Greeks (the Maccabean revolts and the event of Hanukkah), but then their rulers (the Hasmonean Dynasty) once again became corrupt and unfaithful to their traditions, leading to the Romans coming and conquering the Land in 69 BCE. They then proceeded to rule with ruthless efficiency and tax much of the Jewish population into poverty.
Moments of social crisis tend to give birth to both creativity and disagreement, and the Jewish crisis in the Roman era was no different. In Jesus’ day, there were no fewer than four major religious-political parties: the Sadducees, the Pharisees, the Essenes, and the Zealots.
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Sadducees:
The Sadducees were closely associated with the Jerusalem priesthood. It is possible that their name is derived from Zadok, the first priest of the Temple in the time of Solomon, which is somewhat ironic because they were not descended from the original Zadokite priesthood in any way. The Sadducees, of all the ancient Jewish sects, had allied themselves most closely with the Roman authorities, and they took their appointments largely from the Roman bureaucracy. The Sadducess were wealthy and aristocratic, benefitting from their stewardship over the Temple, and the High Priests in Jesus’s day (who presided over Jesus’s trial and struck him in the face for “blasphemy”) were Sadducees.
A significant note about the Sadducees was that they were likely the only major Jewish sect in the late Second Temple period that did not believe in resurrection. The Sadducees only accepted the Torah, the first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, as sacred and canonical, and the idea of a “day of the Lord,” an afterlife, and bodily resurrection were later developments of the prophetic texts. Thus, the Sadducees did not believe in an afterlife or a future redemption for Creation.
Logically then, it makes perfect sense that the Sadducees would ally themselves with the Roman authorities and choose political expediency over all else. If this life is all we get and there is no accountability or recompense beyond it, then we might as well make sure we get the best deal possible now. In fact, the Sadducees present us with a fascinating check-and-egg conundrum? Was their theology (narrow cannon, no belief in afterlife) the source of their political philosophy (accommodation, personal privilege), or was their political and economic privilege the source of their theology? (i.e. How do I create a theological framework that won’t challenge the system I benefit from?)
Pharisees:
The second major religious-political sect in the first century was the Pharisees. The Pharisees’ name in Hebrew, Perushim, meant the “separate ones,” which gives a sense of both their strengths and weaknesses as a group. Some historians believe the name may have originated as an insult, but the Pharisees embraced it and appropriated it as their own.
The first-century Jewish historian Josephus tells us that the Pharisees were the most rigorous Biblical scholars among the Jewish sects and that they were trusted the most by the people in religious matters. (The common people tolerated the Sadducess because they presided over the Temple, but it appears they were not big fans of the urban aristocrats.) Unlike the Sadducees, the Pharisees “canon” included the two other sections of the Hebrew Scriptures, Navi’im (the Prophets) and Khetuvim (the Writings), in addition to Torah. As a result, the Pharisees had a robust belief in the afterlife, which included the doctrine of resurrection.
The Pharisees often get a bad rap in modern Christian discussions, largely because most Christians do not understand the historical and religious context of first-century Judaism. Jesus often found himself in conflict with various Pharisees throughout his ministry, usually over hypocrisy, arrogance, and a lack of compassion, but from a theological and Scriptural perspective Jesus and the Pharisees were almost uniformly aligned. Jesus affirmed the Oral Torah, the vast and growing collection of judgments and interpretations prized by the Pharisees, though he sometimes criticized them for giving them privilege over the Written Torah. And nearly every teaching in the Sermon on the Mount has a parallel in Rabbinic literature.
Many scholars believe that Jesus was himself a Pharisee and that the debates and conflicts he had with other Pharisees were essentially intramural conflicts. This may seem hard to believe given the harshness of Jesus’ words for the Pharisees at times, however, even this fits well with the ethos of Pharisaic Judaism. The Pharisees were rigorous interpreters of Scripture and passionate debaters. Unlike modern, Western Christianity that values “answers,” ancient Judaism valued questions and debate. It was OK to differ on an answer and argue vociferously for your interpretation, because it was the discussion itself that was sacred (not the correct answer). Rabbinic literature preserves multiple interpretations on countless questions along with the insults and conflicts that attended them! Jesus, in arguing with the Pharisees, was in many ways being a good Pharisee!
Essenes:
A third Jewish sect in the time of Jesus was the Essenes. The Essenes are the most mysterious sect within first century Judaism, in part because they wanted it that way. They were a desert monastic community that had retreated from society because they believed the Temple and wider Jewish culture had become corrupt. The leaders within their community appear to have been disenfranchised priests who, though coming from priestly lineage, had found themselves ostracized from the Temple by the Roman-Sadducean coalition. As a result, they retreated to the wilderness near the Dead Sea and started a separatist community.
Most contemporary scholars identify the Essenes with the Qumran Community, whose documents, known popularly known as the Dead Sea Scrolls, were found in a series of caves near the Dead Sea in the late 20th century. From these documents we know that the Essenes had a highly apocalyptic worldview, expecting God to return and judge the nations soon. They referred to themselves as the “Sons of Light” and Gentiles and other groups of Jews as the “Sons of Darkness.” They created a very insular community with little interest in converting outsiders or in the redemption of the people of Israel (beyond themselves). They lived a very ascetic lifestyle, taking vows of poverty and practicing mikvah, ritual immersion, daily.
Many scholars have posited that John the Baptist, with his priestly lineage, strange clothing and diet, ascetic lifestyle, and origins in the desert, spent at least part of his life in an Essene community. However, unlike other Essenes who had permanently abandoned society, John felt called to return to his people with a message of baptism (mikvah) and repentance.
Zealots:
The final major sect within first-century Judaism was not actually a sect but a collection of small fringe groups united only by a worldview and an ambition, to overthrow the Roman occupation of the Holy Land (through violence and military action if necessary). For those of us who love movies like Braveheart and Gladiator, this is the most fun group to study!
In our modern culture, with our post-Enlightenment tendency to compartmentalize life and “spiritualize” religion, we sometimes fail to recognize what a powder keg Jesus’ era was in the Jewish homeland. The Jews believed they were God’s chosen people, meant to be a kingdom of priests and holy nation to the world, and they had survived an Exile to maintain that identity. The Romans on the other hand believed they had been chosen by the gods to bring a golden age of “peace” (pax romana) to humanity, and their leader, Caesar, believed he himself was divine. This creates some uncomfortable social dynamics.
As a result, the Jewish people lived in an almost constant state of rebellion against the Romans. In 6 CE, when Jesus was roughly 10 years old, a man named Judas the Galilean led an anti-census, anti-taxation revolt in Judea. He and his followers told people not to report to a Roman census being conducted and to refuse to pay Roman taxes, and they burned down the houses of Jews who did not heed their call. This blossomed into a small rebellion, which was easily put down by the Romans. It is assumed Judas died in this rebellion, but his ethos lived on. Two of his sons, Simon and Jacob, were executed in 46-48 CE for inciting additional rebellions, and a third son (or perhaps grandson) Menahem became the founder of a small group of assassins known as the Sicarii, named for the small daggers, called Sicae, they used to assassinate Roman soldiers in public before slipping away into the crowds. (They were the Faceless Men of first-century Judaism!)
In 66 CE, the Jewish people once again rebelled against the Romans resulting in the sacking of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE. This is perhaps the greatest tragedy of Jewish history as it has alienated them from their Temple for nearly two millennia, but it was not the end of the fighting. The unrest and resentment continued to foment throughout the empire leading to the Kitos Wars in 115-118 CE, in which groups of Jews in places as disparate as Egypt, Cyprus, Cyrene, Mesopotamia, and Judea rebelled against local Roman authorities. These were once again defeated without much fanfare, but the resistance persisted, cultimating in another rebellion in Judea led by a man named Simon bar Kokhba (Simon Son of the Star) in 132 CE. Simon managed to briefly expel the Romans from Jerusalem and mint his own coinage, but in 135 CE, the Romans pillaged and burned countless villages, destroyed Jerusalem, expelled the remaining Jews, and renamed the land Palestine.
The moral of the story is Jesus’ life and ministry sat at the center of a 300-year period of near constant war in the Jewish homeland, and groups of Jews were always advocating for military resistance to their occupiers.
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Though Jesus remained politically independent (to use wildly anachronistic terms), he did clearly find more commonality with one of the Jewish sects of his day: the Pharisees. As mentioned, we’ve tended to villainize the Pharisees, but their ubiquitous presence in the Gospels actually demonstrates their significance and proximity to Jesus.
The Pharisees were essentially a revival movement. Their goal was to bring about greater religious engagement, faithfulness, and righteousness among the Jewish people. They were the teachers and Bible scholars of their day. Of course, some of them were at times subject to the accusation of arrogance, hypocrisy, and elitism, but by and large they were the most dedicated and trusted group of religious leaders in Israel. If we had to locate Jesus within a party, it would no doubt be the Pharisees. What is fascinating about this, though, is that even within the context of his party, Jesus was still an anomaly.
Within the Pharisaic movement, there were both “conservative” and “liberal” schools of thought. In the half century before Jesus, the two major sages were Hillel and Shammai, each of whom founded a school, created countless disciples, and exercised immense influence upon Rabbinic thought over the following centuries.
Shammai is presented in Rabbinic literature as somewhat of a curmudgeonly soul. He was intense and rigid, and he favored a more narrow, literal, letter-of-the-law interpretation of Scripture. Accordingly, his school became the “conservative” voice in the Pharisaic community. By contrast, Hillel is presented in Rabbinic literature as a character of greater levity and charisma. He favored a more flexible, spirit-of-the-law interpretation of Scripture, seeking to discern how Scriptural texts applied in shifting contemporary contexts. As a result, the school of Hillel became the more “liberal” wing of Pharisaism.
One story in particular illustrates the differences in both personality and interpretation between Hillel and Shammai. One Rabbinic text explains:
There was another incident involving one gentile who came before Shammai and said to Shammai: Convert me on condition that you teach me the entire Torah while I am standing on one foot. Shammai pushed him away with the builder’s cubit in his hand. This was a common measuring stick and Shammai was a builder by trade. The same gentile came before Hillel. He converted him and said to him: That which is hateful to you do not do to another; that is the entire Torah, and the rest is its interpretation. Go study. (Shabbat 31a.)
This texts reveals a difference in disposition, particularly toward gentiles (i.e. non-Jews). Shammai has little patience for his gentile questioner’s ignorance and lack of investment, whereas Hillel embraces him with greater grace and patience. However, there is a deeper interpretive difference here as well.
The rabbis of Jesus’s day had identified 613 commandments in the Torah, and one of the common debates of the day was, “Can these laws be reduced and summarized? Is there a greatest commandment or a unifying idea that encompasses the spirit of the whole law? Or must Torah study always be an all-or-nothing commitment to each commandment?” The gentile’s request that the Torah be taught to him while the teacher stands on one foot (i.e. in a very short period of time... old men can’t stand on one foot for long!) is an indirect way of asking this question. “Can the Torah meet me where I am? Is there an overarching idea that can help me enter into this faith world? Or must I commit to all 613 commands right this second?”
For Shammai, the answer was clear. “Don’t ask me for a summary or reduction! I will not give you a lowest common denominator version of Torah. In fact, let me grab my stick and teach you a lesson.” On the other hand, Hillel seems more than willing to provide the man with an introductory idea that encompasses the spirit of Torah. “That which is hateful to you do not do to another; that is the entire Torah, and the rest is its interpretation. Now, go learn more.”
Perhaps as you were reading this story, it dawned on you that Jesus once had an interaction that was remarkably similar to this one. In Matthew 22, and man comes to Jesus and asks, “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” And Jesus responds:
“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22:36-40)
Similarly, in Matthew 7, Jesus says:
In everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets. (Matthew 7:12)
In each case, Jesus reframes Hillel’s negative statement (“that which is hateful, don’t do”) into a positive (“love your neighbor,” “do to others,”), but the general sentiment is the same. Yes, the Torah can be summarized, and that summary looks like loving and treating others as you want to be treated. Hillel and Jesus share an interpretive worldview.
This is, in fact, precisely the point of this discussion. On the Hillel-Shammai divide, Jesus usually agreed with Hillel. In fact, because of the remarkable similarities in their theology and teaching, some Jewish scholars have suggested that Jesus may have been a student of Hillel’s in his youth. We have no means of confirming or disproving this, but it is clear Jesus usually agreed with the House of Hillel on most interpretive and ethical matters.
However, he did not agree with Hillel on everything. In Matthew 5, in the famous you-have-heard-it-said passages, Jesus addressed the issue of divorce saying,
“It has been said, ‘Anyone who divorces his wife must give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, makes her the victim of adultery, and anyone who marries a divorced woman commits adultery. (Matthew 5:31-32)
It can be hard for us to read this passage without filtering it through the lens of modern Christianity, particularly the church’s harsh treatment of divorced people. However, a more nuanced discussion underlies Jesus’ statement.
The issue of divorce was quite controversial in the time of Jesus. Deuteronomy 24:1 insinuated that a man could divorce his wife if he finds “something indecent” (Hebrew: ervat davar) about her. However, Deuteronomy did not define what constituted “something indecent,” so the rabbis of Jesus’ day (as they did with all Torah texts) sought to interpret and define what this meant.
The issue opened yet another fault line between the Schools of Shammai and Hillel. Shammai took a very narrow interpretation of the term ervat davar, suggesting it meant only marital infidelity. Thus, Shammai’s position was that a man could not divorce his wife unless she had been sexually unfaithful. On the other hand, Hillel took a more liberal approach to the text. Hillel interpreted ervat davar to mean a wide range of things as trivial as being a poor cook. One of Hillel’s spiritual descendants, Rabbi Akiva, would later say that simply finding a woman more attractive was reasonable grounds for divorce.
There are two things that must be pointed out in this discussion. First, Jesus, despite his affinity for the ethics and theology of Hillel, dissents from his “party” on this particular issue. Here he agrees wholeheartedly with the School of Shammai. In fact, in Matthew 19, Jesus is again asked to weigh in on this issue, and he says specifically in that instance, “I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery” (Matthew 19:9). Jesus takes the “liberal” view when he feels it is right, and he takes the “conservative” view when he believes it is right.
Second, in this particular instance, the “conservative” view (taken by Shammai and Jesus) is actually the one that protects the marginalized! Perhaps you noticed that all the texts and interpretations mentioned spoke specifically and only to men. In ancient Israel, women did not have the power of divorce. Only men were able to dissolve a marriage. Thus, the entire discussion about divorce was less about the importance of staying together and more about the power and privilege of men. Hillel’s interpretation enabled men to dissolve marriage no matter how trivial and capricious their reasoning with almost no accountability. On the other hand, the curmudgeonly conservative Shammai, protected the rights and safety of women by restricting the privilege and prerogative of men. (Didn’t see that twist coming did you?)
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I once wrote an article for a local newspaper on this very topic, and though they loved the content of the piece, they didn’t like the title. (I don’t remember precisely what it was, but it was probably attempting to be too witty.) Thus, they retitled it something like, “Was Jesus a Conservative or Liberal? Is a Complicated Question.” I politely disagree. It’s not a complicated question. It’s an absurd question! Because it assumes that “Conservative” and “Liberal” actually mean something. It assumes that those categories and terms actually dictate the realities of political discourse. I am convinced that when you become truly Christian (i.e. seeking first the Kingdom of God), those terms progressively have less and less meaning to you.
Jesus’ Gospel transcends political parties. It did then, and it certainly should now. Our call as disciples of Jesus is to be like Jesus. To be conformed into his image more each day. And what was Jesus like? He was an intelligent anomaly. He was a critical thinker that never retreated into the safety of a tribe. Instead he affirmed aspects of every sect of his day, while also critiquing the ways they had lost perspective. He was likely viewed as too liberal by the conservatives in his culture and too conservative by the liberals in his culture. He seemed to reject oversimplifications and false associations. And he taught most often in parables, which seems to indicate he wanted people to think and wrestle with things themselves. He didn’t want his followers to simply regurgitate dogma. He wanted them to wrestle with big ideas and concepts and come to conclusions on their own.
Finally, it is worth noting the diversity of perspectives Jesus included among his disciples and in his life. As mentioned, John the Baptist may have been an Essene at some point. His disciples included Galilean fisherman (i.e. blue-collar country folk), a tax-collector (i.e. a white-collar bureaucrat working for the Romans), and “Simon the Zealot” (i.e. a political dissident with revolutionary tendencies). He doesn’t seem to want to fill his inner circle with people who all fit a certain profile. Instead he fills it with diversity of thought and a wide range of life experiences.
If we are called not simply to believe in Jesus but to follow him, it seems to me we will have to follow him in these ways too. In rejecting reductionist party paradigms and homogenized communities. We will need to be people with the intelligence to recognize that the Gospel relativizes all other paradigms and the courage and thoughtfulness to offer both qualified affirmation and critique to all political parties demanding our allegiance!
Sociologists and psychologists in recent decades have coined a term called the “End of History Illusion.” In essence, psychologists noticed that human beings are very good at recognizing the amount of change that has taken place in the past but very bad at recognizing that this process of change will continue into the future. People can look back and easily recognize how much their perspectives, opinions, and psyches have grown and shifted over the past, but they tend to view who they are now as the final product, the denouement of their life’s development.
This happens at the societal level as well, especially in post-Enlightenment societies that are deeply indebted to the idea of progress. We tend to see our moment in history as the final moment, what all those thousands of years of social evolution have been leading to. What this leads to is a pretty profound sense of historical arrogance. We tend to look back at the past as a long series of beta tests leading to us. As a result we tend to condescend to previous cultures and beliefs (without recognizing that someday people will do the same to us).
One of the symptoms of historical arrogance, which plagues many disciplines not the least of which being Biblical Studies, is the assumption that ancient cultures were simplistic and monolithic. We act as though we invented complexity and gray areas. We are the first ones to have disagreements, internal conflict, moral ambiguity, and unmanageable complexity. The truth is of course much more complicated (and much more interesting).
Jesus was born at a wildly complex location, both temporally and geographically, in human history. He was part of a people who had believed for centuries that they had a sacred vocation, but by the time of his birth, they had been conquered by no fewer than four foreign empires: Assyria, Babylon, Greece, and Rome. In the second century BCE, they had briefly established independence from the Greeks (the Maccabean revolts and the event of Hanukkah), but then their rulers (the Hasmonean Dynasty) once again became corrupt and unfaithful to their traditions, leading to the Romans coming and conquering the Land in 69 BCE. They then proceeded to rule with ruthless efficiency and tax much of the Jewish population into poverty.
Moments of social crisis tend to give birth to both creativity and disagreement, and the Jewish crisis in the Roman era was no different. In Jesus’ day, there were no fewer than four major religious-political parties: the Sadducees, the Pharisees, the Essenes, and the Zealots.
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Sadducees:
The Sadducees were closely associated with the Jerusalem priesthood. It is possible that their name is derived from Zadok, the first priest of the Temple in the time of Solomon, which is somewhat ironic because they were not descended from the original Zadokite priesthood in any way. The Sadducees, of all the ancient Jewish sects, had allied themselves most closely with the Roman authorities, and they took their appointments largely from the Roman bureaucracy. The Sadducess were wealthy and aristocratic, benefitting from their stewardship over the Temple, and the High Priests in Jesus’s day (who presided over Jesus’s trial and struck him in the face for “blasphemy”) were Sadducees.
A significant note about the Sadducees was that they were likely the only major Jewish sect in the late Second Temple period that did not believe in resurrection. The Sadducees only accepted the Torah, the first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, as sacred and canonical, and the idea of a “day of the Lord,” an afterlife, and bodily resurrection were later developments of the prophetic texts. Thus, the Sadducees did not believe in an afterlife or a future redemption for Creation.
Logically then, it makes perfect sense that the Sadducees would ally themselves with the Roman authorities and choose political expediency over all else. If this life is all we get and there is no accountability or recompense beyond it, then we might as well make sure we get the best deal possible now. In fact, the Sadducees present us with a fascinating check-and-egg conundrum? Was their theology (narrow cannon, no belief in afterlife) the source of their political philosophy (accommodation, personal privilege), or was their political and economic privilege the source of their theology? (i.e. How do I create a theological framework that won’t challenge the system I benefit from?)
Pharisees:
The second major religious-political sect in the first century was the Pharisees. The Pharisees’ name in Hebrew, Perushim, meant the “separate ones,” which gives a sense of both their strengths and weaknesses as a group. Some historians believe the name may have originated as an insult, but the Pharisees embraced it and appropriated it as their own.
The first-century Jewish historian Josephus tells us that the Pharisees were the most rigorous Biblical scholars among the Jewish sects and that they were trusted the most by the people in religious matters. (The common people tolerated the Sadducess because they presided over the Temple, but it appears they were not big fans of the urban aristocrats.) Unlike the Sadducees, the Pharisees “canon” included the two other sections of the Hebrew Scriptures, Navi’im (the Prophets) and Khetuvim (the Writings), in addition to Torah. As a result, the Pharisees had a robust belief in the afterlife, which included the doctrine of resurrection.
The Pharisees often get a bad rap in modern Christian discussions, largely because most Christians do not understand the historical and religious context of first-century Judaism. Jesus often found himself in conflict with various Pharisees throughout his ministry, usually over hypocrisy, arrogance, and a lack of compassion, but from a theological and Scriptural perspective Jesus and the Pharisees were almost uniformly aligned. Jesus affirmed the Oral Torah, the vast and growing collection of judgments and interpretations prized by the Pharisees, though he sometimes criticized them for giving them privilege over the Written Torah. And nearly every teaching in the Sermon on the Mount has a parallel in Rabbinic literature.
Many scholars believe that Jesus was himself a Pharisee and that the debates and conflicts he had with other Pharisees were essentially intramural conflicts. This may seem hard to believe given the harshness of Jesus’ words for the Pharisees at times, however, even this fits well with the ethos of Pharisaic Judaism. The Pharisees were rigorous interpreters of Scripture and passionate debaters. Unlike modern, Western Christianity that values “answers,” ancient Judaism valued questions and debate. It was OK to differ on an answer and argue vociferously for your interpretation, because it was the discussion itself that was sacred (not the correct answer). Rabbinic literature preserves multiple interpretations on countless questions along with the insults and conflicts that attended them! Jesus, in arguing with the Pharisees, was in many ways being a good Pharisee!
Essenes:
A third Jewish sect in the time of Jesus was the Essenes. The Essenes are the most mysterious sect within first century Judaism, in part because they wanted it that way. They were a desert monastic community that had retreated from society because they believed the Temple and wider Jewish culture had become corrupt. The leaders within their community appear to have been disenfranchised priests who, though coming from priestly lineage, had found themselves ostracized from the Temple by the Roman-Sadducean coalition. As a result, they retreated to the wilderness near the Dead Sea and started a separatist community.
Most contemporary scholars identify the Essenes with the Qumran Community, whose documents, known popularly known as the Dead Sea Scrolls, were found in a series of caves near the Dead Sea in the late 20th century. From these documents we know that the Essenes had a highly apocalyptic worldview, expecting God to return and judge the nations soon. They referred to themselves as the “Sons of Light” and Gentiles and other groups of Jews as the “Sons of Darkness.” They created a very insular community with little interest in converting outsiders or in the redemption of the people of Israel (beyond themselves). They lived a very ascetic lifestyle, taking vows of poverty and practicing mikvah, ritual immersion, daily.
Many scholars have posited that John the Baptist, with his priestly lineage, strange clothing and diet, ascetic lifestyle, and origins in the desert, spent at least part of his life in an Essene community. However, unlike other Essenes who had permanently abandoned society, John felt called to return to his people with a message of baptism (mikvah) and repentance.
Zealots:
The final major sect within first-century Judaism was not actually a sect but a collection of small fringe groups united only by a worldview and an ambition, to overthrow the Roman occupation of the Holy Land (through violence and military action if necessary). For those of us who love movies like Braveheart and Gladiator, this is the most fun group to study!
In our modern culture, with our post-Enlightenment tendency to compartmentalize life and “spiritualize” religion, we sometimes fail to recognize what a powder keg Jesus’ era was in the Jewish homeland. The Jews believed they were God’s chosen people, meant to be a kingdom of priests and holy nation to the world, and they had survived an Exile to maintain that identity. The Romans on the other hand believed they had been chosen by the gods to bring a golden age of “peace” (pax romana) to humanity, and their leader, Caesar, believed he himself was divine. This creates some uncomfortable social dynamics.
As a result, the Jewish people lived in an almost constant state of rebellion against the Romans. In 6 CE, when Jesus was roughly 10 years old, a man named Judas the Galilean led an anti-census, anti-taxation revolt in Judea. He and his followers told people not to report to a Roman census being conducted and to refuse to pay Roman taxes, and they burned down the houses of Jews who did not heed their call. This blossomed into a small rebellion, which was easily put down by the Romans. It is assumed Judas died in this rebellion, but his ethos lived on. Two of his sons, Simon and Jacob, were executed in 46-48 CE for inciting additional rebellions, and a third son (or perhaps grandson) Menahem became the founder of a small group of assassins known as the Sicarii, named for the small daggers, called Sicae, they used to assassinate Roman soldiers in public before slipping away into the crowds. (They were the Faceless Men of first-century Judaism!)
In 66 CE, the Jewish people once again rebelled against the Romans resulting in the sacking of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE. This is perhaps the greatest tragedy of Jewish history as it has alienated them from their Temple for nearly two millennia, but it was not the end of the fighting. The unrest and resentment continued to foment throughout the empire leading to the Kitos Wars in 115-118 CE, in which groups of Jews in places as disparate as Egypt, Cyprus, Cyrene, Mesopotamia, and Judea rebelled against local Roman authorities. These were once again defeated without much fanfare, but the resistance persisted, cultimating in another rebellion in Judea led by a man named Simon bar Kokhba (Simon Son of the Star) in 132 CE. Simon managed to briefly expel the Romans from Jerusalem and mint his own coinage, but in 135 CE, the Romans pillaged and burned countless villages, destroyed Jerusalem, expelled the remaining Jews, and renamed the land Palestine.
The moral of the story is Jesus’ life and ministry sat at the center of a 300-year period of near constant war in the Jewish homeland, and groups of Jews were always advocating for military resistance to their occupiers.
*******
In other words, Jesus’ culture was not simple and monolithic. There were competing parties and ideologies, all dealing with the theological and political crises of the day in different ways. They were fragmented much like we are. They were full of mistrust for one another like we are. They accused one another of betraying their nation, being ignorant and shortsighted, and compromising with “secular” culture just like people in our culture do.
For the purposes of our current discussion, the important thing to realize is that Jesus did not situate himself neatly in any of these parties. Instead, he offered each of them a measure of critique.
His conflicts with the Pharisees are well documented. Perhaps the best microcosm of Jesus’ critique of the Pharisees can be found in Matthew 23:23:
“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former.
Jesus affirmed the Pharisaic methods of Biblical interpretation and their theology, but he often condemned their shortsightedness and lack of compassion. He affirmed the major contours of their thought while condemning their methods and their tendency to get lost in dogmatic minutia at the expense of people in need.
However, Jesus also critiques and exposes the faulty assumptions and lack of wisdom in the other parties as well. In Matthew 22, Jesus tells the Sadducees, “You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God,” because of their rejection of portions of Scripture, the doctrine of resurrection, and their lack of belief that God could overcome the current political order.
Jesus’s critique of the Essenes and Zealots are more implicit since we do not have recorded interaction between him and representatives of these groups. However, his entire ministry serves as a critique of their worldviews. By calling people to “repent and believe the good news” because the Kingdom of God was at hand, he was rejecting the Essenes’ isolationism. From beginning to end, his goal is to bring more and more people into this new movement of God’s in the world. Likewise, Jesus’s desire to keep some of his miracles secret (at least for a time), his intentionally avoidance crowds that wanted to make him King by force (John 6:14-15), and his ultimate death on the Cross are all implicit critiques of the Zealot philosophy.
When you see Jesus within the socio-political context of his day, you can make the strong case that what he did was incorporate the best of each of these ideologies into his own, while critiquing and rejecting their worst. He spends 40 days fasting in the desert before his ministry (just like the Essenes), but he returns to heal and suffer with his people (unlike the Essenes). He refuses to acquiesce to Roman authority (like the Zealots), even engaging in prophetic displays against their pretense to divinely sanctioned authority, while rejecting the myth of redemptive violence (unlike the Zealots). He affirms the authority of Scripture (like the Pharisees), while rejecting the myopia that often leads religious people to miss the forest through the trees, prioritizing the letter of the law over the spirit of the law (unlike the Pharisees)! He loves and respects the Temple and its meaning to his people (like the Sadducees), while also turning over tables to expose its corruption and seeing a reality beyond the Temple (unlike the Sadducees).
If we are to take Jesus as a model for how to live life in the socio-political arena (which if we call ourselves Christians, I’m pretty sure we’re supposed to), it is clear we should view all political parties with a measure of suspicion. Within the fragmented context of his day, Jesus never ascribes to any one reductive political or religious paradigm. Instead he views each one soberly, affirming some elements while critiquing others.
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For the purposes of our current discussion, the important thing to realize is that Jesus did not situate himself neatly in any of these parties. Instead, he offered each of them a measure of critique.
His conflicts with the Pharisees are well documented. Perhaps the best microcosm of Jesus’ critique of the Pharisees can be found in Matthew 23:23:
“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former.
Jesus affirmed the Pharisaic methods of Biblical interpretation and their theology, but he often condemned their shortsightedness and lack of compassion. He affirmed the major contours of their thought while condemning their methods and their tendency to get lost in dogmatic minutia at the expense of people in need.
However, Jesus also critiques and exposes the faulty assumptions and lack of wisdom in the other parties as well. In Matthew 22, Jesus tells the Sadducees, “You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God,” because of their rejection of portions of Scripture, the doctrine of resurrection, and their lack of belief that God could overcome the current political order.
Jesus’s critique of the Essenes and Zealots are more implicit since we do not have recorded interaction between him and representatives of these groups. However, his entire ministry serves as a critique of their worldviews. By calling people to “repent and believe the good news” because the Kingdom of God was at hand, he was rejecting the Essenes’ isolationism. From beginning to end, his goal is to bring more and more people into this new movement of God’s in the world. Likewise, Jesus’s desire to keep some of his miracles secret (at least for a time), his intentionally avoidance crowds that wanted to make him King by force (John 6:14-15), and his ultimate death on the Cross are all implicit critiques of the Zealot philosophy.
When you see Jesus within the socio-political context of his day, you can make the strong case that what he did was incorporate the best of each of these ideologies into his own, while critiquing and rejecting their worst. He spends 40 days fasting in the desert before his ministry (just like the Essenes), but he returns to heal and suffer with his people (unlike the Essenes). He refuses to acquiesce to Roman authority (like the Zealots), even engaging in prophetic displays against their pretense to divinely sanctioned authority, while rejecting the myth of redemptive violence (unlike the Zealots). He affirms the authority of Scripture (like the Pharisees), while rejecting the myopia that often leads religious people to miss the forest through the trees, prioritizing the letter of the law over the spirit of the law (unlike the Pharisees)! He loves and respects the Temple and its meaning to his people (like the Sadducees), while also turning over tables to expose its corruption and seeing a reality beyond the Temple (unlike the Sadducees).
If we are to take Jesus as a model for how to live life in the socio-political arena (which if we call ourselves Christians, I’m pretty sure we’re supposed to), it is clear we should view all political parties with a measure of suspicion. Within the fragmented context of his day, Jesus never ascribes to any one reductive political or religious paradigm. Instead he views each one soberly, affirming some elements while critiquing others.
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Though Jesus remained politically independent (to use wildly anachronistic terms), he did clearly find more commonality with one of the Jewish sects of his day: the Pharisees. As mentioned, we’ve tended to villainize the Pharisees, but their ubiquitous presence in the Gospels actually demonstrates their significance and proximity to Jesus.
The Pharisees were essentially a revival movement. Their goal was to bring about greater religious engagement, faithfulness, and righteousness among the Jewish people. They were the teachers and Bible scholars of their day. Of course, some of them were at times subject to the accusation of arrogance, hypocrisy, and elitism, but by and large they were the most dedicated and trusted group of religious leaders in Israel. If we had to locate Jesus within a party, it would no doubt be the Pharisees. What is fascinating about this, though, is that even within the context of his party, Jesus was still an anomaly.
Within the Pharisaic movement, there were both “conservative” and “liberal” schools of thought. In the half century before Jesus, the two major sages were Hillel and Shammai, each of whom founded a school, created countless disciples, and exercised immense influence upon Rabbinic thought over the following centuries.
Shammai is presented in Rabbinic literature as somewhat of a curmudgeonly soul. He was intense and rigid, and he favored a more narrow, literal, letter-of-the-law interpretation of Scripture. Accordingly, his school became the “conservative” voice in the Pharisaic community. By contrast, Hillel is presented in Rabbinic literature as a character of greater levity and charisma. He favored a more flexible, spirit-of-the-law interpretation of Scripture, seeking to discern how Scriptural texts applied in shifting contemporary contexts. As a result, the school of Hillel became the more “liberal” wing of Pharisaism.
One story in particular illustrates the differences in both personality and interpretation between Hillel and Shammai. One Rabbinic text explains:
There was another incident involving one gentile who came before Shammai and said to Shammai: Convert me on condition that you teach me the entire Torah while I am standing on one foot. Shammai pushed him away with the builder’s cubit in his hand. This was a common measuring stick and Shammai was a builder by trade. The same gentile came before Hillel. He converted him and said to him: That which is hateful to you do not do to another; that is the entire Torah, and the rest is its interpretation. Go study. (Shabbat 31a.)
This texts reveals a difference in disposition, particularly toward gentiles (i.e. non-Jews). Shammai has little patience for his gentile questioner’s ignorance and lack of investment, whereas Hillel embraces him with greater grace and patience. However, there is a deeper interpretive difference here as well.
The rabbis of Jesus’s day had identified 613 commandments in the Torah, and one of the common debates of the day was, “Can these laws be reduced and summarized? Is there a greatest commandment or a unifying idea that encompasses the spirit of the whole law? Or must Torah study always be an all-or-nothing commitment to each commandment?” The gentile’s request that the Torah be taught to him while the teacher stands on one foot (i.e. in a very short period of time... old men can’t stand on one foot for long!) is an indirect way of asking this question. “Can the Torah meet me where I am? Is there an overarching idea that can help me enter into this faith world? Or must I commit to all 613 commands right this second?”
For Shammai, the answer was clear. “Don’t ask me for a summary or reduction! I will not give you a lowest common denominator version of Torah. In fact, let me grab my stick and teach you a lesson.” On the other hand, Hillel seems more than willing to provide the man with an introductory idea that encompasses the spirit of Torah. “That which is hateful to you do not do to another; that is the entire Torah, and the rest is its interpretation. Now, go learn more.”
Perhaps as you were reading this story, it dawned on you that Jesus once had an interaction that was remarkably similar to this one. In Matthew 22, and man comes to Jesus and asks, “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” And Jesus responds:
“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22:36-40)
Similarly, in Matthew 7, Jesus says:
In everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets. (Matthew 7:12)
In each case, Jesus reframes Hillel’s negative statement (“that which is hateful, don’t do”) into a positive (“love your neighbor,” “do to others,”), but the general sentiment is the same. Yes, the Torah can be summarized, and that summary looks like loving and treating others as you want to be treated. Hillel and Jesus share an interpretive worldview.
This is, in fact, precisely the point of this discussion. On the Hillel-Shammai divide, Jesus usually agreed with Hillel. In fact, because of the remarkable similarities in their theology and teaching, some Jewish scholars have suggested that Jesus may have been a student of Hillel’s in his youth. We have no means of confirming or disproving this, but it is clear Jesus usually agreed with the House of Hillel on most interpretive and ethical matters.
However, he did not agree with Hillel on everything. In Matthew 5, in the famous you-have-heard-it-said passages, Jesus addressed the issue of divorce saying,
“It has been said, ‘Anyone who divorces his wife must give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, makes her the victim of adultery, and anyone who marries a divorced woman commits adultery. (Matthew 5:31-32)
It can be hard for us to read this passage without filtering it through the lens of modern Christianity, particularly the church’s harsh treatment of divorced people. However, a more nuanced discussion underlies Jesus’ statement.
The issue of divorce was quite controversial in the time of Jesus. Deuteronomy 24:1 insinuated that a man could divorce his wife if he finds “something indecent” (Hebrew: ervat davar) about her. However, Deuteronomy did not define what constituted “something indecent,” so the rabbis of Jesus’ day (as they did with all Torah texts) sought to interpret and define what this meant.
The issue opened yet another fault line between the Schools of Shammai and Hillel. Shammai took a very narrow interpretation of the term ervat davar, suggesting it meant only marital infidelity. Thus, Shammai’s position was that a man could not divorce his wife unless she had been sexually unfaithful. On the other hand, Hillel took a more liberal approach to the text. Hillel interpreted ervat davar to mean a wide range of things as trivial as being a poor cook. One of Hillel’s spiritual descendants, Rabbi Akiva, would later say that simply finding a woman more attractive was reasonable grounds for divorce.
There are two things that must be pointed out in this discussion. First, Jesus, despite his affinity for the ethics and theology of Hillel, dissents from his “party” on this particular issue. Here he agrees wholeheartedly with the School of Shammai. In fact, in Matthew 19, Jesus is again asked to weigh in on this issue, and he says specifically in that instance, “I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery” (Matthew 19:9). Jesus takes the “liberal” view when he feels it is right, and he takes the “conservative” view when he believes it is right.
Second, in this particular instance, the “conservative” view (taken by Shammai and Jesus) is actually the one that protects the marginalized! Perhaps you noticed that all the texts and interpretations mentioned spoke specifically and only to men. In ancient Israel, women did not have the power of divorce. Only men were able to dissolve a marriage. Thus, the entire discussion about divorce was less about the importance of staying together and more about the power and privilege of men. Hillel’s interpretation enabled men to dissolve marriage no matter how trivial and capricious their reasoning with almost no accountability. On the other hand, the curmudgeonly conservative Shammai, protected the rights and safety of women by restricting the privilege and prerogative of men. (Didn’t see that twist coming did you?)
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I once wrote an article for a local newspaper on this very topic, and though they loved the content of the piece, they didn’t like the title. (I don’t remember precisely what it was, but it was probably attempting to be too witty.) Thus, they retitled it something like, “Was Jesus a Conservative or Liberal? Is a Complicated Question.” I politely disagree. It’s not a complicated question. It’s an absurd question! Because it assumes that “Conservative” and “Liberal” actually mean something. It assumes that those categories and terms actually dictate the realities of political discourse. I am convinced that when you become truly Christian (i.e. seeking first the Kingdom of God), those terms progressively have less and less meaning to you.
Jesus’ Gospel transcends political parties. It did then, and it certainly should now. Our call as disciples of Jesus is to be like Jesus. To be conformed into his image more each day. And what was Jesus like? He was an intelligent anomaly. He was a critical thinker that never retreated into the safety of a tribe. Instead he affirmed aspects of every sect of his day, while also critiquing the ways they had lost perspective. He was likely viewed as too liberal by the conservatives in his culture and too conservative by the liberals in his culture. He seemed to reject oversimplifications and false associations. And he taught most often in parables, which seems to indicate he wanted people to think and wrestle with things themselves. He didn’t want his followers to simply regurgitate dogma. He wanted them to wrestle with big ideas and concepts and come to conclusions on their own.
Finally, it is worth noting the diversity of perspectives Jesus included among his disciples and in his life. As mentioned, John the Baptist may have been an Essene at some point. His disciples included Galilean fisherman (i.e. blue-collar country folk), a tax-collector (i.e. a white-collar bureaucrat working for the Romans), and “Simon the Zealot” (i.e. a political dissident with revolutionary tendencies). He doesn’t seem to want to fill his inner circle with people who all fit a certain profile. Instead he fills it with diversity of thought and a wide range of life experiences.
If we are called not simply to believe in Jesus but to follow him, it seems to me we will have to follow him in these ways too. In rejecting reductionist party paradigms and homogenized communities. We will need to be people with the intelligence to recognize that the Gospel relativizes all other paradigms and the courage and thoughtfulness to offer both qualified affirmation and critique to all political parties demanding our allegiance!
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