New Testament understanding through the Jewish perspective

The New Testament can be understood better through the eyes (perspective), among other things, of the Judaism of the First Century. We can understand the New Testament best through the interplay of Old Testment, and contemporary with the New Testament Jewish understandings and practice, thus avoiding reading in from our own post New Testament and cultural perspectives. This will not only help to the understanding of the New Testament, but also to the understanding of how to apply it rightly to our present situations.

Example 1.

We are so used to living in the Christian or Christian influenced world that we just assume monogamy, one man and one woman, to be the starting position from which we build our married life. We view polygamy as a deviation perhaps of Islam, paganism, and view the polygamy of the biblical forefathers - Abraham, and Jacob with their wives (and concubines) in particular, but King David, King Solomon (surely his many wives got him in trouble!) as well, as something special and antiquated, and basically bracketed out from our consciousness. In addition, we encounter the problems of the modern mission field involving multiple marriages of recent converts to the Lord. What to do? "Require" that they divorce all their wives but one? Which one should they keep. The first? Any other criteria? Perhaps, divorce none and have a polygyomous church grow up? And what of the benefit that has accrued in certain situations by polygamous marriage - such as tribes where the men have almost been wiped out in wars and an overabundance of starving woman and children? Who would take care of them but the remaining men? What is the solution?

But the practice of Abraham and Jacob did not stop with the first century. In European Ashkenazi Judaism it continued on into the Middle Ages; and may only have been forbidded then by the influence of Christianity, while the Jews of Arab lands continued polygamy until this century, The Yemenite Jews immigrating to Israel after 1948 often came with multiple wives, and only now is that generation dying out and single marriage, which the State requires, is the non deviating rule.

Kmowing the normalcy of polygamy through the ages gives us and advantage of how to understand the Bible and how to apply it.

We can see that a bishop or overseer, in I Timothy 3:2, is to have only one wife, is, first of all, not speaking in referance to divorce and remarriage , but to the situation of polygamy. Then we can see, the wisdom of the rule of one wife for elders of the church - there is just too much to do and be responsible for in the work of the church that any more than one wife will deprive from the church and deprive from the family. Then we can see, that these are not iron clan rules, deviation from which is sin, but good and responsible quides that Paul is giving Timothy for the chosing of the leaders (and servants) of the Church. Then we can see, how it all fits in with the other guides - Don't chose a man that can't love and manage his own family, nor a man that has a bad reputation or drinks too much to lose sobriety, etc. And we can understand that all that needs to apply to our own situation in our century. And we can see that these were recommendations primarily to Timothy who had a task probably different from most of us, so we must truly learn the principles behind to make the wisdom of God's Word then applicable and real for our lives today. And we can see that the activity of the Holy Spirit did not end with the first century- and must not end for us in this century, by we must learn, and be enabled by Him to now apply what He has already told us in the Holy Scriptures for our present generation with its particulur problems.

Example 2.

Telling without saying. Four methods of Jewish Biblical interpretation are:

Peshat = the meaning simply on the surface of the text

Remez = the hint or clue to the deeper meaning than the surface

Derash = a more searching of the all facets relevant to the text and involving stories, customs, sayings, even analysis of the Hebrew letters, and relating to all facets of life

Sod = the secret and hidden, sometimes esoteric meaning of the text.

Together the first letters (consonents) of these words spell PaRDeS = Paradise. The second word, Remez, means hint or indication, and that is "telling without saying". This method is used in the writing of the account of the Gospel of Matthew of the giving of the "Sermon on the Mount" beginning with the Beatitudes "Blessed are..." This is rightly seen, in this most Jewish of Gospels, as the new Law , or, better, Teaching (Torah) of the Kingdom of Heaven paralleling and then exceeding the Old Law of Mount Sinai.

In the account of Luke, it is the Sermon on the Plain. In Matthew, it is the Sermon on the Mount. Both are historically correct as the location on the north shore of the Sea of Galilee is a high hill fanning out to a plain and meeting the sea. Why does Matthew prefer to use a Mountain? Because this will recall to listeners and readers of the Gospel that other mount, Mount Sinai, which Moses had ascended to receive the now "Old Law".

Matthew 5:1,2. " Seeng the crowd of people, Jesus went up into the Mountain, and then sitting down, he called to him his followers, and then he opened His mouth, saying, 'Blessed are..'"

There was really no reason to tell us that He sat down - except that it is a Remez. It is an indication that the One wielding the authority was now, not Moses, but the Messiah come among His people. This follows from what was understood by the people, and can be understood, as well, by us, namely - Synagogues had within them the "Seat of Moses" . One can still see the Seat of Moses on the right side near the entrance of the ruins of the Chorazin synagogue on the hill above the north shore of the Sea of Galilee. Jesus gave a general caution to His twelve, His Apostles and Apprentices, not to be disobedient to what the Pharisees say - just don't do what they do! As it is they that now sit "on the seat of Moses".

And so the "greater than Moses" ascended also a hill, as Moses did in Sinai, and He "sat down" and they gathered around Him to hear, and "He opened His mouth and said". The "position" of authority is not standing (to preach) as it is in modern churches, but rather sitting. It is not clear why this is so. Some suggestions: that authority was naturally derived from experienced distilled from age, and sitting was natural to older men; that sitting is the natural position of derived authority from Scripture which is spread before one in the form of Scrolls. Whatever the merit in these suggestions, sitting was the position of authority in 1st century Judaism. This probably influenced the posturing of the bishops of slightly later centuries as sitting with their clergy clustered aroung them.

"He opened his mouth saying...". The only way you can say, of course, is by opening the mouth, but here there is another Remez. It is the Biblical indicator of "speaking authoritatively" adapted from the (Hebrew - VaYa'an vaY'omer), and what came out was the Torah of the Kingdom of Heaven through the Messiah, a Torah at once fullfilling and then transcending the law of Moses given at Sinai. Blessed are the poor in spirit...

See Also

• Passover Seder
• Church
• Judaism
• Cathedral
• Eucharist
• Adiabene
• Aramaic
• Targum
• Midrash
• Sign of the Cross
• Aramaic Church
• Had Gadya
• Kaddish
• Passover
• Hebrew, "Hebrew in the Bible" section