|
And seemingly voiding the laws would result in such as the case. Moreover what Jesus did in regards to the Jews was abdicate laws for them, not the goyim(don't take goyim as an offensive term but instead generic term for non-Jews, goy literally means nations in Hebrew and interestingly enough foreignor in Japanese - there's an interesting midrash about the Asians which may bear relevance to the situation if your curious.) Actually, all the laws you mentioned applied to only Jews. Agricultural laws and other laws pertaining to land pertained only in the land of Israel and to the best of my knowledge only to Jews.
In fact, the non-Jews were only given 7 laws (from Noah, see noahide laws) and the Jews were given 613, which is stated in the Talmud. If anything, Jesus made more laws applicable to non-Jews which is absolutely forbidden in cases of certain laws. Jesus brought down the 10 commandments to the goyim. Which were explicitly given to the Jews. A large percentage of the time when Moses was delivering laws to the people, the Torah explicitly words Moses to "Speak to the Children of Israel" or "speak to the people" or something a log those lines. The children of Israel, were the Jews. And equally as much so whenever Moses spoke to the "people" they were also Jews, since it was only Jews who fled Egypt. Now whether you agree with the while exodus and the biblical account, it's honestly a seperate discussion which is interesting to debate and feel out. But, clearly through scripture you can tell most commandments applied explicity to Jews. In fact, certain laws like for a goy keeping shabbat were punishable by death. Bare in mind though, keeping shabbos for a goy is not an easy task and as I said before, it's extremely rare the death penalty was ever put into effect through court(not trying to be an apologetic to moral relativism, but I don't think they killed goyim for keeling shabbat very often).
I don't know roman history that well, but, I do know Jewish history pretty well. And what I will say is this. During the second temple period, despite the conquering of Jerusalem by the Romans and massive slaughters and defilement of Judaism and the Jewish people as a whole, the Jews to a certain extent did assimilate and bare influence in roman society. Such as Josepheus, who was an ex general in the Jewish army captured by Romans and also hyper-apologetic to roman interests - primarily to benefit the Jewish people I would say, though. In fact, the Romans even assimilated into Jewish culture/Judaism. Like onkelos who translated the Torah from Hebrew to Aramaic(see Targum). He was the descendant of Nero Caeser, I think it was his sisters daughters son... So great uncle? Of course this wasn't the vast majority of Romans, but there was some respect held during certain times and even according to the Talmud, Titus himself acknowledged G-d, or the G-d of the Jews as it was considered at the time of the conquering of Israel. If you care to find references, google tractate gittin 55a1, but the history doesn't start until about 56a1. It mentions the Jewish account of the second temples destruction. I don't expect you to believe all of it, if you're not a person who believes in Torah and all that it probably will strike you as BS - but there is some unquestionabley accurate historical content in it regardless and if you read it feel free to ask me.
But, if you can establish that there was somewhat of a cross cultural exchange, albeit not one strong enough to start a cultural revolution amongst a bunch of pagans who were trying to destroy us, you can see that it does somewhat lay pavement maybe just a little bit for the spread of an abrahamic faith.
For example, when I said josepheus was a massive apologetic, I meant in the sense that he glorified Judaism to be something that it really wasn't. Some of his accounts describe what the Torah says in a very brutal manner saying that we used to be basically slaughter anyone and make all kinds of sacrifices. Saying shabbat was really about sitting around and being lazy, all things which the Romans value. And if you know Judaism and what josepheus was saying, it makes sense that he would do so.
Furthermore, if you consider that roman philosophy/religion is largely an advancement, if you will, of Greek philosophy, you can see other stones being laid for the spread of abrahamic religion. Because a large ammount of Greek philosophy can find influence in Jewish philosophy. You won't really find any jewisj documents from the era though in regards to Jewish philosophy other than the Torah. Primarily since the bulk of Jewish philosophy was found in the Talmud, which was taught orally and not recorded until around 200ce. That only makes sense though if you believe the Oral Torah actually was handed down as an oral tradition, today and even then some Jewish sects and virtually every Christian and Muslim sect denies the validity of such a tradition ever existing. See karaite and saudacee.
So, really the underlying concepts for an empire geared toward buying into abrahamic faith were already there. I mean, the way Constantine discovered his faith was through a dream of a burning cross saying to him if his soldiers wear this they'll win the war they're fighting. Automatically I would assume that at least to a certain extent, and bare in mind I'm not saying to what extent, certainly the roman nobleman who were familiar with their history, primarily the works of josepheus and his apologetic outtake on Judaism, probably had a mind set that Judaism was respectable in certain ways as it appealed to roman values(I.e. lazing around and eating on shabbat, conquering nations, basically every argument taken out of context to people who criticize the Torah to be "evil" and implying savagery). So of course when some guy(Jesus) comes around and takes things out of context by giving everyone a chance to keep the laws of the Torah(which is staunchly forbidden), someone who presumably is admirable of certain aspects of this philosophy/relogion/religious out tske and it's roots will logically gravitate towards adhering more to it. Or at least inquiring. Particularly if it comes to you in a dream of a burning cross telling you you're going to win a battle if you do what the dream is telling you.
|
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
