Last week, I noted I’ve been listening to the Bema Podcast with Marty Solomon. Once again, this week’s material borrows heavily from his podcast, specifically episodes 73-81, which can be found at bemadiscipleship.com.
We started to look at what happened to the Jewish people before the arrival of Jesus, when they had returned from exile and splintered into 5 groups, all of which had reached different conclusions about how best to live as people of God in Greek/Roman culture. Jesus had a plan to build a group of disciples – that will become the church – from a potentially volatile mixture with representatives from all approaches. If we can learn from all of them, perhaps we will find a way forward during divisive political times that reflects the teaching and life of Jesus.
* * * * *
LAST WEEK
The Sadducees, the priests in the Temple, became corroborators with Hellenism, enablers who believed Alexander the Great’s euangelion: “Good news! The Kingdom of Greece had arrived!” They loved the focus on self, wealth, power, and comfort. When their insider privilege was threatened by Roman advance, they invited the wealthiest man they knew (Herod) to keep Rome happy with his money and them happy with their continuing status quo by naming him the King of the Jews. They turned into corrupt bullies who were wiped out when the Temple fell. The encouragement: embrace the priestly role God has given to all of us. The caution: not like the Sadducees, whose love of the Empire corrupted their leadership in the Kingdom.
The Herodians were more the cultural version of the Sadducees. They liked the goodies of the self-centered Hellenism, and what had been a community of generosity for the poor and powerless became a community focused on all the pleasures this world had to offer. We said the good thing they brought was that they knew the culture. They were perfectly situated to have a Kingdom impact in Greek and Roman culture. However, they fell in love with the very worldview that conquered them and lived not only in the world, but as the world.[1]
This brings us to the Essenes, Zealots and Pharisees.
Essenes
They thought the corrupt system of the Sadducees was inviting God’s judgment, so they went to the desert to spend what time they had left preparing. Well, most of them did. Priests like Zachariah, who likely had Essene connections,[2] stayed in the system and did his duty. Maybe this is a Group #6: those who believed the temple system was completely corrupt but felt like they couldn’t give up on the call that God gave to priests. Let’s call them the Zachariahns.
The Essenes liked Jeremiah 6:16: “Stand at the crossroads, ask for the ancient past, ask where the good way is, and walk in it and you will find rest for your souls.” The Essenes wanted to be ready for the day when God’s people would again ask about the good way. They went out to the desert to know the path and to walk the path by devoting themselves to knowing, writing, and living the text.
They were serious. Writing the text was a four-person job. One person recited the word from a scroll while another person stood behind that person make sure they got it right. The scribe writing the word had a person looking over his shoulder to make sure he wrote the right word in the right way. Every time they got to the name of God, they all would take a break for a ritual bath in a mikvah before they wrote what they were allowed to write for the name of God just to be sure they were clean enough to do so.[3]
The mikvah was done in a baptistry filled with ‘living water’, water that came from God and moved of its own accord, which meant from either an underground spring or rain. The minute they carried it in a bucket, it was no longer living water. So, they channeled rainwater from the local wadi (a dry streambed that would flood during rainy season) through a plastered canal that ran to the village. They needed to be clean. They were serious about responding to God properly (as they understood it). They were all in. They also liked Isaiah 40:
“Comfort, comfort my people, speak tenderly to Jerusalem…tell her that her sin has been paid for… A voice of one crying out in the desert: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord; make straight in the wilderness a highway for our God. Every mountain brought down and every valley raised up. The rough places made smooth and the rugged places a plain and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed.’”[4]
So, what is the upside of the Essenes? They were all in when it came to knowing and walking the path. They would not put up with corruption in the Temple. They were preparing themselves to stand at the crossroads and speak tenderly to the people when they arrived so the glory of the Lord would be revealed, and they could help people find rest for their souls.
What’s the downside? They’re not talking to anybody. They wanted to stand at the crossroads, but they were not at the crossroads. They were in the middle of the desert waiting for the crossroads to come to them.
ZEALOTS
Remember, the Zealots are part of the Hasidim, the pious ones, who headed to Galilee with the Pharisees as they rejected the compromise of the Sadducees and dedicated themselves to a righteous, uncompromising life. To the Zealot, it was going to take bloody violence to solve their problems and pave the way for the Messiah as God saw how committed they were and responded to their zeal.[5]
They were zealous not only against the Romans but also against the corrupt temple leadership. At one point, a Zealot went into the Temple courts and stabbed a sitting High Priest to death in the Temple courts.
They became insurgents who often used the tactics of terrorists. #sicarri They attacked Hasmonean dynasty (both the priestly class and the Greeks) for an entire century. Jesus will warn his disciples prone to violence that those who live by the sword will die by the sword. The way the Zealot movement ended will prove his point.
A Zealot named Hezekiah led a revolt in 43 BC. Rome came after them. At first, they were just looking for the Zealots fighters, but those Zealots would just hide. So, Rome went after the women and children. In response, the Zealots hid their families in the Caves of Arbel.
The Roman army went to Arbel, set up scaffolding on the cliff face, then lit fires and blew the smoke into the cave so that everybody hiding inside had to come out. They grabbed them with pitchforks and threw them off the scaffolding to their death.
To give you an idea how this story arc ends, let’s skip to AD 66. Rome decided to put statues of Caesar in the Sadducee-led Temple. A bunch of Pharisees met the ships as they sailed into Caesarea and lay in the road to stop this from happening. Tensions were high. Eventually, a revolt that began outside of Caesarea ended up with 20,000 Jews executed in the countryside.
This started a revolution. At one point, several Roman legions found themselves trapped by the Zealots in a fortress in Jerusalem, so they negotiated a settlement to march out of the city to safety if they laid down their arms. As soon as they laid down their arms, the Zealots slaughtered every Roman soldier in the Fortress.
Eventually, Rome pushed them back to a city/fortress called Gamla. A Zealot fighter named Joseph told the residents how to fortify the city before going out to fight Vespasian. He got captured in Galilee[6] and apparently told them how to take Gamla. 4,000 Jews died in the fighting; 5,000 Jews jumped to their own death rather than be conquered.
Masada will be their last stand around AD 70, where close to 1,000 Jewish people led by the remaining Sicarri killed themselves rather than be taken alive. That will be the end of the Zealots.
So, what’s the upside for a Zealot? Zeal. Fire. They care enough about the cause of the Kingdom to give their lives. If God’s people were always committed to give their lives for the cause of Christ, our lives would serve as a powerful witness to the glorious truth for which we live.[7]
What’s the downside? They are fighting for the King the wrong way. There are killing people to expand and/or protect the Kingdom of God, and that’s not the way of the kingdom. The Messiah’s way happens when crooked paths are made straight, not when they are paved in blood. Zealots need to channel their zeal into holiness not expressed in ways that destroys the people who need to hear the message of the Kingdom.
PHARISEES
The Pharisees were Hasidim who decided to respond to the corruption of the priests by enticing the Messiah to come and cleanse the Temple thanks to their absolute devotion to the way of God. They were full of zeal for obedience, not attacking Rome. They were committed to the text, but they did not retreat from society. They lived in the culture, but did not think Hellenism was a euangelion. They were focused around the Galilee Triangle, which I only point out because it will come up later.
The Pharisees believed God would deal with Rome when God was good and ready. They had the entire Old Testament as proof. When God decided it was time to judge or reward a nation, God would make it happen. Meanwhile, they focused on absolute obedience to His commandments. They would develop the Mishnah, thousands of laws that acted like a fence around the 613 laws of the Torah. Surely, that much fencing would keep them safe from breaking the Torah’s laws! I found a PDF online. It was 780 pages long.
This is why the Pharisees were so hard on those who broke even the most minor law. If they could all just be obedient enough, God would save them. If they weren’t, He wouldn’t.
We see this once again in the architecture. Remember Zippori, the Herodian town with mosaic sidewalks and floors? Not so in the towns of the Galilee Triangle (Chorazin, Capernaum, and Bethsaida). Their synagogues have big, roughly cut stones. You won’t find mosaics on their floors or in their courtyards. They were not there to enjoy the luxury of Hellenism.
In the Herodian Quarter, we saw the outline of a Sadducee house with 17 bedrooms. The Pharisees, in contrast, lived in insulas, multifamily dwellings of up to 10 families. They weren’t trying to have their own house, or courtyard, or their own stuff. That was the siren call of Hellenism. The Pharisees believed God called them to share if they were committed to each other as a community. Insula living is a practical example of this.[8]
Jesus critiques the Pharisees, and rightly so. Yet they are his ministry focus for three years.He generally avoided the Sadducees.[9]He called and worked with Herodians, Essenes and Zealots. However, he only pronounced woes on the Pharisees. “Those whom the Lord loves, He chastens.” (Hebrews 12:6) He’s purifying one segment of Judaism: the Pharisees. As odd as this may sound, they have gleaned the best from the other groups. They are, however, missing two crucial things that really, really matter. Here, he addresses the Galilee Triangle to highlight what they still need.
Then He began to denounce the cities where most of His mighty works had been done because they did not repent. “Woe to you, Chorazin. Woe to you, Bethsaida, for if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for Tyre and Sidon and than for you. And for Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? Will you be brought down to Hades? For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day, but I tell you that it will be more tolerable on the day of judgment in the land of Sodom than for you.” (Matthew 11:20–24)
The Tyre and Sidon reference goes back to a passage about arrogance in the book of Isaiah.[10]The Sodom and Gomorrah reference has to do with a failure of compassion and hospitality.[11] Two groups of people epically condemned for their pride and hostility are going to judge the Pharisees, the Hasidim, the “pious ones.”
The Pharisees had the Text; they had devotion; they had at least a stated commitment to obedience; they had zeal for the way of God and longed for the Messiah to arrive. What they didn’t have was humility/repentance and compassion.
When we won’t eat with sinners like Jesus did; when we lack a life-orienting compassion for the poor, the outcast, the sick, the immigrant, the tax collectors and Samaritans in our midst, we are Pharisees who need to learn mercy and compassion.
If we claim the name of Jesus and insist the 10 Commandments be posted so that American can learn Judeo/Christian morals, and we break those commandments consistently and even boldly, we are hypocritical Pharisees need to learn repentance and humility.[12]
* * * * *
So, disciples of Jesus, “What do we do with the United States?” How do we learn from and value each other in the midst of the different responses represented in this room? Is there a way to find unity in our diversity? Jesus thought so; we should too. Let’s focus on what was of value from the different approaches. Perhaps in piecing them all together we can find wisdom.
We need zeal, but it needs to be zeal for the written word of God and Word made Flesh, not a zeal for civil war and violence of any kind. We don’t want that holy, zealous fire to go out, but we don’t want it to flare up such that it burns others. Zealotry requires observation, supervision, self-reflection. It requires us to see if we are scorching those around us. It’s probably going to take a community that cares about each other to help us figure out how to keep the embers from going cold and from starting a destructive wildfire.
We need to be committed to the Word, both written and made human in Jesus. We need Essenes whose love of the Word written and incarnate inspire all of us to love the Word as well.[13] If we all valued what God had to say as much as they did, and if we all let it order our lives like they did, that in itself would be huge. It’s probably going to take a community that cares about each other to make this a labor of love and not legalism, a community where we see the exciting Christ-like transformation that the Word brings to our lives.
We need to know the culture. The early church did not isolate. They boldly redeemed culture Hellenistic images.
The church took the iconic kriophoros, or lamb bearer, and used it to portray Christ as the Good Shepherd.
The church used the praying figure of the pagan orant to symbolize Christian piety.
The classic image of Jonah under the withered vine was based on the story and popular pictures of Endymion, a young man who fell in love with a goddess.
A fresco of Christ as Orpheus in the Catacombs of Peter and Marcellus in Rome dates from the 4th century. Clement wrote, “Orpheus pacified wild beasts by the power of his song…Jesus’ new song tames ‘the most intractable of all animals – man.’”
The first Christians didn’t move out of the neighborhood once they became disciples of Christ. They saw a broken and dying world often odds with their new citizenship – and it broke their hearts. They stayed there and sought to bring the reality of new life in the Kingdom of Heaven to earth. How do we do this without becoming Herodians? It’s probably going to take a communitywhere a lot of thoughtful conversation, prayer and study help to keep us in the world but not of it.
We must understand the effectual power of obedience.[14] The Pharisees were wrong to believe that they had to earn God’s return by being good enough. They were not wrong about the importance of a consistent, obedient walk in the path of God. When faithful obedience becomes the consistent rhythm of our life, we are free from the controlling power and the terrible harvest of sinful choices; we will increasingly understand why Jesus said God’s path brings life; and we will impact others in life-giving ways.[15] But…obedience can be hard, both knowing what to do in hard/confusing situations and acting on what we know. It might take a community of accountability, truth and grace with which to link arms so we can find the path and walk in it.
* * * * *
It turns out we need each other to mature and grow into the kind of church community that looks like a “new humanity” Jesus talked about in Ephesians 5. We are united in Jesus and filled with His Spirit so that this ‘body’ with many parts works together as God intended (1 Corinthians 12).
We want Essenes with the Herodians to remind them to stay true to the Word; we want Herodians with the Essenes to get them out of their ineffective isolation.
We need the Zacharians and the Essenes to be in communication: “You might need to get out of that corrupt system of politics and religious institutions.” “You might need to stay in it.”
We want Pharisees with the Zealots to remind them to be zealous for obedience, mercy and holiness, not violence, antagonism, and revenge.
We want the Zealots and Pharisees with the Sadducess to remind them that the Empire is not the Kingdom, and that the urge to compromise must be resisted.
We need Jesus to remind us all that a lifestyle of repentance, humility and mercy must go with love of the word and The Word, so that we will be able to stand in the crossroads of the world with truth, grace, and integrity, preparing the way so that the glory of the Lord will be revealed.
We can do this. We have the text (Bible), the Word (Jesus), the Holy Spirit. We are equipped to be a new kind of humanity whose Jesus-centered community displays the loving power of God by demonstrating the miraculous power of a transforming Savior, who breaks down barriers and reconciles us to Christ and
____________________________________________________________________________
[1]We have to watch out for what Michael Gorman calls a set of myths that we can begin to believe about the empires in which we live. A “myth of righteousness” sets values of the Empire on par with the values of the Kingdom (in which both are seen as part of the euangelion, the good news of God’s plan for the world). A “myth of greatness” becomes defined by the standards of Babylon and Rome: financial, political, and/or military strength as the markers of success. A “myth of innocence” sees the power, prosperity, and peace of the (apparently) righteous and great Empire as achieved by and sustained by thoroughly righteous means and people. A “myth of worthiness” demands an appreciation of and allegiance to the state as a profoundly moral responsibility for Christians. (from Reading Revelation Responsibly)
[2] If his son, John the Baptist was trained by Essenes, Zechariah would have been the one to make that happen. “Everything about John the Baptist smacks and rings of Essene theology and worldview, except for the way that he engages the populist…The Essenes separated themselves and wanted culture to come to them when the end times came.” (Marty Solomon, bemadiscipleship.com)
[3] They had an error rate over a large amount of time of 2%. It’s remarkable.
[4] They believed that if they would stay true to their call, God would show up. Interestingly, the Jordan River flows into the Dead Sea less than three miles away. That’s where John the Baptist baptized Jesus. Hmmm.
[5] This inspired them to buy into what some have called the ‘myth of redemptive violence,’ the belief that that evil can only be defeated by good people violently wielding power “Redemptive violence gives way to violence as an end in itself. It is no longer a religion that uses violence in the pursuit of order and salvation, but one in which violence has become an aphrodisiac, sheer titillation, an addictive high, a substitute for relationships. Violence is no longer the means to a higher good, namely order; violence becomes the end.” (Walter Wink, “The Myth Of Redemptive Violence.”)
[6] Vespasian adopted Joseph as a son, changing his name to Josephus Flavius, famed Jewish historian.
[7] The early church is going to be full of this kind of zeal. The blood of the martyrs, not the blood spilled by Zealots, will be seed of the early church.[7]
[8] Peter and Andrew, James, John, and possibly Philip were from Bethsaida.
[9] Generally. He cleanses the Temple at the beginning and end of his ministry.
[10] Isaiah 23-24
[11] “Ancient stories give hints about the evil in Sodom. Travelers who came into the city would be robbed, stripped, and held captive within the city. They would wander the streets slowly starving to death, to the great amusement of the citizenry. One account relates that visitors to Sodom were offered a bed according to the Middle Eastern laws of hospitality, but it was a bed of torture. Short people were stretched. Tall people had their legs cut off. If a traveler had no money, he would be given bricks of gold and silver with his name on them! But nobody would sell him bread and water, even for all that gold and silver, so the traveler slowly died of starvation. The Sodomites gathered around the corpse and took back the gold and silver.” http://www.susancanthony.com/res/dennis/canaan.html
[12] Another example is the (proper) denunciation of sexual abuse, grooming, human trafficking, etc. So… In a nine-week period ending in April of 2023, attorney Kristen Browde kept track of all people arrested in the US for charges of child sexual abuse. Out of 308 cases…39% were in Christian ministry positions. In 2022, the SBC released a list of 700 pastors accused of sexual abuse. Over 7,000 claims of sexual abuse by church staff, congregation members, volunteers, or the clergy were made to just three insurance companies over a 20-year period (Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 2007). Add to it what happened in the Catholic church. Woe to those who call out the sexualization of our culture and the grooming of children in others when they do the same. It will be more tolerable on the day of judgment for those in Sodom and Tyre.
[13] 45% of people who claim to be Christian in the US read their Bible at least once a week? 45%. Everyone else is once a month or less. 35% say they seldom or never read it.
[14] We also need to value the role we have as priests. We talked about this last week, so I’m going to refer you back to those notes J
[15] Add to that the idea that our life, not just our words, becomes a witness. When we say, “Good news! The Kingdom of God is here!” people will look at how our lives have been impacted to reach some conclusions about whether it’s good news or not.