Easter is antisemitic?

Always felt Pilate took too much of the blame here. Jewish leaders wanted Jesus dead as he was a threat to the social order and their comfortable lifestyles and power base. Plates hands were tied. Execute Jesus or risk another insurrection and could be him facing an execution order from the Emperor.

Markus Antonius wrote: »

Completely bizarre! Earlier on in the documentary linked above the same historian suggested that Christians should be thankful Judas betrayed Jesus as Christianity wouldn't have gathered momentum had he not been killed! Despite this having an element of truth to it, that this kind of incendiary language is put out on the airwaves with zero challenge just shows how one-sided the debates are. And for him then to implicate Christianity in the holocaust of Jews was absolutely outrageous.

All shown on Easter week too! :rolleyes:

Are you suggesting that Jews were not persecuted by Christians for hundreds of years, culminating in the holocaust? What do you think was the reason for the holocaust?

I don't think I am the one that is reaching.

Markus Antonius wrote: »

I am aware that we are currently in Passover as well as the Easter period but I could not pick my jaw off the floor today with the programs RTE were showing.

First thing I saw was "Countdown to Calvary", which seemed very apt for Easter. But no, it was an account completely skewed from a jewish perspective. Apparently, according to the Israeli historical "experts", the crucifixion of Christ was completely on the head of Pontius Pilate and the Romans and the "misinformation" that it was the Jews who called for his death marked the beginning of antisemitism and caused horrendous events such as the holocaust!!

I was dumbfounded at the ignorance.

Then RTE proceeded to show "One Day in Auschwitz" - a program that seems to think only Jewish people were killed in the holocaust followed by "The Pianist" about the plight of a Jew during the holocaust.

What are RTE thinking? It's the equivalent of Google's ongoing protest against Easter.

Speaking as someone who knows nothing about all of this - I did read something somewhere that goes like this.

Pontius pilate was a fairly aggressive pain in the hoop. No way would he have ‘washed his hands’ of the incident.

Lots of people descended on the city for Passover and by all accounts things were tense. A tinder box waiting to be lit.

Your man, Hay-sus arrives on a donkey effectively quoting heresy. I’m the son of the big man upstairs etc etc. Hay-sus started quite a revolution and frightened a lot of people with his talk of the messiah. (Yes, yes I am the messiah - now **** off).

But hay-sus was a Jew, not a Christian. And there was loads of lads saying they were the son of god. And that I can turn wine into water. And really I’m a shamrock. That was not unusual. It offended the Jews but not unusual.

So pontius topped him before he started something that would wreck the place.

It was only after when the Romans adopted the Christian religion did they change the story to suit themselves. The Jews weren’t gonna change their religion, their beliefs - because of hay-sus.

His followers - the Christians built up a sizeable mass of believers. The Roman emperors noted, adopted it (Constantine I think - in a dream of all things) and it became the religion of the empire - not different to the one that preceded it. Now you can hardly start a state religion by stating that one of its highest state officers (pontius) killt the messiah!! So you say - ah twasnt me, ‘‘twas the Jews. And while you’re at Nicea we can figure out all the other stuff.


Anyway, that’s what I read. It was on the rte website, I think.

I find it better to think about all this religion as the hocus pocus it actually is and think about what would normal humans do in the context of the time.

Actually thinking there’s a god might make you think that one of the religions is right and the other is wrong. And sur that’s mad Ted.

looksee wrote: »

Mod: Karlitob, while you are welcome to give the version of events as you understand it, please do so in a respectful manner, use the proper, appropriate names and omit the expletives. You also may not describe other people's beliefs as hocus pocus.

Before posting on this forum again please read the Charter.

Do not respond to this warning on thread, pm if you wish to query or discuss.

That was a respectful manner. Our views differ.

I don’t accept being told to use ‘proper’ names for the shamrock lad.

The expletive was removed with asterisks as you well know but I suppose it asks the esoteric question - if a bear reads asterisks in a wood, is it still a expletive. You filled in the expletive - not me.

And besides - it is a fairly famous and funny movie. Clearly not funny enough.

And it is hocus pocus - obviously. Peoples ‘firmly held beliefs’ clearly outweigh my freedom of opinion. But not heavy enough to take a little ridicule.

brightspark wrote: »

Considering it is the "Roman" Catholic Church, it is unlikely that the early Romans (starting with Constantine the Great) would want themselves to have been seen as the villains and the Gospels were likely spun to deflect some of the blame to the Jews. (if someone has a copy of the Gospels predating Constantine that wold throw my theory out)

That isn't to say that the Jewish hierarchy at the time wouldn't have wanted what they perhaps saw as a "cult" wiped out, but the Romans ultimately were the ones in charge and would have just as much incentive in squashing any potential rebellion.

History is written (or at least spun a little) by the victors after all.

That's just completely incorrect. There are many, many fragments predating Constantine I. There are at least eleven manuscripts, each parts of individual books, like St the Gospel of John or Acts, for the gathering of the entire biblical canon (OT and NT) in one book was rare until recent centuries. Dates start at c. 150 AD, and likely earlier will be located. All of these pseudo texts that some allege are the true feminist Gospel suppressed by evil Constantine, or other nonsense, are newer.

brightspark wrote: »

I know there are fragments...do any of those fragments deal with the events leading up to and including the Crucifixion? (i.e. include Pilates washing of his hands etc)


(and I am not referring to any of the "pseudo texts" just suggesting that the Romans may have changed a few words.

Yes.

The idea that the Romans 'added a few words' is just silly. There is no evidence of that. None. Moreover, the NT was a text in Koine Greek, a lingua franca of ordinary folk in the Roman East, not anything any literary Roman would use as a medium of literary expression. None of the papyri show any of sneaky editing. Later St Jerome, after Constantine was dead, carried out a professional translation to replace the private Latin efforts, the vetus Itala, although making use of the Hebrew texts used by Jews for the OT. We still have all these random parts of the Acts, Letters, Gospels, in the original koine Greek, which show no villainous Constantinian alterations.

Extraordinary claims require evidence that is equally extraordinary. You can provide none.

One example suffices:

John 18:31–33 is on the front of one and on the back verses 37–38 are on the back of one piece.

trial of Our Lord wrote:

ΟΙ ΙΟΥΔΑΙΟΙ ΗΜΙΝ ΟΥΚ ΕΞΕΣΤΙΝ ΑΠΟΚΤΕΙΝΑΙ
OYΔΕΝΑ ΙΝΑ Ο ΛΟΓΟΣ ΤΟΥ ΙΗΣΟΥ ΠΛΗΡΩΘΗ ΟΝ ΕΙ-
ΠΕΝ ΣHΜΑΙΝΩΝ ΠΟΙΩ ΘΑΝΑΤΩ ΗΜΕΛΛΕΝ ΑΠΟ-
ΘΝHΣΚΕΙΝ ΕΙΣΗΛΘΕΝ ΟΥΝ ΠΑΛΙΝ ΕΙΣ ΤΟ ΠΡΑΙΤΩ-
ΡΙΟΝ Ο ΠIΛΑΤΟΣ ΚΑΙ ΕΦΩΝΗΣΕΝ ΤΟΝ ΙΗΣΟΥΝ
ΚΑΙ ΕΙΠΕΝ ΑΥΤΩ ΣΥ ΕΙ O ΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΣ ΤΩΝ ΙΟΥ-
ΔAΙΩN


31 Pilate therefore said to them: Take him you, and judge him according to your law. The Jews therefore said to him: It is not lawful for us to put any man to death;

32 That the word of Jesus might be fulfilled, which he said, signifying what death he should die.

33 Pilate therefore went into the hall again, and called Jesus, and said to him: Art thou the king of the Jews?

Easter is simply the celebration of the spring equinox and takes its name from the Pagan Goddess.
In Hebrew terms it's basically a repurposing of Passover amd therefore not anti anything.

Vestiapx wrote: »

Easter is simply the celebration of the spring equinox and takes its name from the Pagan Goddess.
In Hebrew terms it's basically a repurposing of Passover amd therefore not anti anything.

Did you read past the title of the thread?

brightspark wrote: »

What about the writings of Josephus?

"When Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men among us, had condemned him to the cross,"

vs an Arabic version

"Pilate condemned him to be crucified and to die,"

https://pages.uncc.edu/james-tabor/ancient-judaism/josephus-jesus/


Also if the Jewish authorities wanted Jesus dead (presumably from their viewpoint for blasphemy?) then why not by stoning? (Obviously tolerated by the Romans as Jesus had spared the adulterous woman).

Papyrus P32 Titus Greek 2nd-3rd Century

Papyrus P46 Romans, 1 & 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians,

Colossians, 1 Thessalonians, Hebrews Greek 2nd-early 3rd Century

Papyrus P66 Gospel of John Greek 2nd-3rd Century

Papyrus P77 Gospel of Matthew Greek 2nd-3rd Century

Papyrus P103 Gospel of Matthew Greek 2nd-3rd Century

Majuscule GA0189 Acts of the Apostles Greek 2nd-3rd Century



A searchable selection of biblical papyri and parchment. Papyrus is not necessarily ancient for the Papal chancery used this material until the seventh to eight century, but the ones listed in the link have been dated. The fairly extensive survivals from the second century of writings kept by some usually marginal people should disprove this nonsense that Constantine added words. If an Emperor wanted to do that, he would have had violent rebellion in already heavily Christian Egypt. Its substantial Jewish population might have joined, for while they liked Christians little, they liked Romans less.

You are not particularly making a strong point regarding the different readings of Josephus. The Procurator did execute Jesus, but the Temple authorities and crowd did pressure Pilate, with the Gospel of John relating an implied threat from the crowd that Pilate could find himself considered 'not a friend of Caesar.' Provincials had a right to complain about an unjust governor with this sort of wording, which the Gospel relates. Pilate was later removed and disgraced over his slaughter of Samaritans close to their sacred mountain and Temple at Mount Gerizim (the Samaritan were an element not deported like many other wealthier Jews to Babylon in earlier centuries), the last of many incidents where the Procurator overreacted. An Arab version would usually be inferior to an earlier Greek text, for Greek continued as a lingua franca a substantial time after the Arab conquest, making an Arab text of Josephus quite irrelevantly, for present purposes, late.

Yes it is fundamentally wrong to blame the Holocaust on Christianity



It should also be remembered that all the Apostles and most of the early Christians were Jewish.

Well, in this context we have to remember this rather awkward verse:

Mt 27:25 wrote:

And the whole people said in reply, “His blood be upon us and upon our children.”

It's what the people cry when Pilate, in the preceding verse, says that he thinks Jesus is innocent, but is afraid there will be a riot if he doesn't have him executed. And there's no doubt that this verse was used by Christian leaders in the Middle Ages and later to whip up antisemitic fervour; we have abundant records of that happening on repeated occasions.

Was this, as ex loco says, very wrong? Of course. But did it happen? Yes. So did the Christian movement promote and foster antisemitism? Yes, systematically, for centuries. And did this play a significant role in creating the social and cultural climate in which the Holocaust could play out? Yes. And any attempt by Christians to reckon with and atone for our own communal and institutional history of antisemitism has to confront this.

So, there's two dimensions to this. One I have already referred to; the way Christians have tended to understand this verse, and the use they have made of it, in the past 1900 years. The other is the question of why this verse is there at all. Or, rather, the questions, since you can ask this as a historical question ("Did this happen?") or as a theological question ("What does this verse signify?")

On the historical question, none of the other evangelists, whether writing before Matthew or after him, mention this. Plus, as mentioned earlier in the thread, the behaviour of Pilate described by Matthew is, based on what we know of Pilate from other sources, improbable. So what's going on here?

We note that Matthew includes a great amount of often very colourful details that other evangelists omit. It's Matthew, for example, who tells us that at the moment of Jesus' death . . .

Mt 27:51-53 wrote:

. . . behold, the veil of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth quaked, rocks were split, tombs were opened, and the bodies of many saints who had fallen asleep were raised. And coming forth from their tombs after his resurrection, they entered the holy city and appeared to many.

Seriously? This happened? And neither Mark nor Luke nor John thought it worth mentioning? And there are lots of other "flourishes" in Matthew that have no parallel in other gospels.

A common account for this is that Matthew's flourishes are a literary device; they're not necessarily things that actually happened, or they may be things that happened that Matthew embroiders with spectacular detail. Either way, he does this in order to call attention to, or help the reader understand, the theological significance of the things that did actually happen. (And, no, he's not trying to mislead his readers; he expects they will understand that he's doing this.) So, if Mt 27:25 is one of these flourishes, the question becomes, why does Matthew tell us that the crowd accepted responsibility for the death of Jesus?

I'm pretty sure that we would all answer "well, not so as to pave the way for the Holocaust, anyway". But that theological answer has to sit with the uncomfortable fact that, from a historical point of view, it did play its part in paving the way for the Holocaust. Whether that's Matthew's fault, or the fault of later generations of Christians who read and interpreted Matthew in a particular way, is perhaps not, from the perspective of countless millions of murdered Jews, an important question; either way, it's Christianity's fault.