By Roy B. Blizzard and David Bivin
It is very difficult for us, almost 2,000 years removed from Jesus’ day, to project ourselves back across the centuries of time to a culture and language so totally foreign to the western mind of today. And yet, before we can even begin to understand the magnificent and thrilling words of Jesus, that is exactly what we must do.
The first thing that one must realize is that Jesus was a Jew. This fact should be obvious; however, it is surprising how many Christians are shocked to learn that Jesus was a Jew. And, not just any ordinary Jew. He was a rabbi, a teacher, one learned in the Scriptures and the religious literature of His day, which was considerable.
There is a general consensus in Christian circles that Jesus was unlearned or unschooled. His knowledge was divine and God-given. It is said, even by some scholars, that because Jesus was unschooled, the people of His day were amazed that he had some knowledge of the Scriptures. This misunderstanding is due in part to a statement made in reference to His home, Nazareth: Can there be anything good from Nazareth? (John 1:46) and to certain statements made about Jesus’ disciples:
And they were amazed and marveled, saying one to another ‘Behold, are not all these which speak Galileans? (Acts 2:7)’
Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and they perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marveled, and took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus (Acts 42:13).
From the above passages the idea has arisen that Jesus, like His disciples, was basically ignorant and uneducated because He was from Galilee. The implication is that Galilee was “sticksville,” or the “boondocks,” and that the people who lived there were basically ignorant.
This line of thinking is fundamentally in error. The level of learning and education in Galilee exceeded that of Judea in Jesus’ day. Galilee surpassed even Judea in its schools of learning, and most of the famous rabbis of Jesus’ day were from Galilee (Johnanan ben Zakkai, Hanina ben Doda, Abba Yose Holikufri, Zadok, Halaphta, Hananian ben Teradyon.) According to Professor Shmuel Safrai, Hebrew University Professor of Jewish History of the period of the Mishnah and Talmud, not only did the number of 1st century Galilean rabbis known from rabbinic literature exceed the number of Judean rabbis, but even the moral and ethical quality of their teaching excelled that of their Judean counterparts (private communication).
In the New Testament, a great deal of space is given to Jesus’ birth; but then, until His appearance in the Temple at age 12, almost nothing; and from age 12 until He began His public ministry at about the age of 30, again, nothing. What was Jesus doing in His early childhood and in His adolescence? We have a very strong indication from a tractate, or chapter, in the Mishnah, the Jewish “Oral Law.” The passage is as interesting as it is pertinent.
At five years of age, one is ready for the study of the Scripture, at ten years of age one is fit for the study of the Mishnah, at the age of thirteen for bar mitzvah, at the age of fifteen for the study of Talmud, at the age of eighteen for marriage, at the age of twenty for pursuing a vocation, at the age of thirty for entering into one’s full vigor…(Avot 5:2l).
Although this statement cannot be dated with certainty and may come from 70 to 150 years after the time of Jesus, it does, nevertheless, reflect what the Jewish boy in Jesus’ day would have been doing in each stage of his growth and development.
Most Christians know that the synagogue is the Jewish house of prayer and worship. Few Christians are aware that each synagogue usually had its own elementary school, or bet-sefer, and its own school, or bet-midrash. As we think of institutions within the framework of Judaism, it is natural to assume that the synagogue, or house of prayer and worship, would be considered most sacred. However, such is not the case. In Judaism, even to this day the bet-midrash is given more prominence and is considered more sacred than the synagogue.
However, there is one fact that is of the utmost importance for our understanding of the subject at hand, and that is: although scrolls, or books for reading and study, were used, and although the practice of writing was highly developed, writing materials were costly and scarce, and all manuscripts had to be written by hand by scribes trained in this profession. Therefore, learning usually meant memorization by constant repetition. Professor Shmuel Safrai, in his article, “Education and the Study of the Torah,” 945-970 in Volume Two of The Jewish People of the First Century, relates:
Individual and group study of the Bible, repetition of the passages, etc., were often done by chanting them aloud. There is the frequent expression “the chirping of children,” which was heard by people passing close by a synagogue as the children were reciting a verse. Adults too, in individual and in group study, often read aloud; for it was frequently advised not to learn in a whisper, but aloud. This was the only way to overcome the danger of forgetting.
In the eyes of the rabbis, repetition was the key to learning. One who repeats his lesson a hundred times is not like him who repeats it a hundred and one times (Chaggigah 9b).
All kinds of methods were devised to assist the student in memorization. One passage in the Talmud, too lengthy to quote here, tells how even infants were taught to memorize the Hebrew alphabet (Shabbath 104x). In elementary schools the children were instructed in the Hebrew language and in Torah, the Law of Moses.
Lessons took place on all the days of the week including the sabbath when they would, however, read no new material, but repeat earlier lessons. We even find the children going over their lessons on Friday evenings in the synagogue (Safrai: 954).
From these written sources we can say with great certainty what Jesus was doing in His early childhood and adolescence. He was studying, committing vast quantities of material to memory – Scripture, Mishnah (the Oral Law), midrash (commentary on Scripture). halachah (rabbinic legal rulings) – all the available sacred literature of His day. It is important to emphasize that this was exactly what most of the other children of His day were doing. To such an extent that most of the people in Jesus’ day had large portions of this literature firmly committed to memory, and at the very least, almost all the Old Testament. It is only when we understand this that we can understand the peculiar way in which the rabbis of Jesus’ day taught.
As we have already said, Jesus was not only a Jew, He was a rabbi. He had had a thorough education, and when he appears on the scene, He appeared as a rabbi, recognized as such by his peers. There are many passages in the New Testament which illustrate this recognition. Here are a few:
And Jesus answered and said to him, “Simon, I have something to say to you,” and he said, “Rabbi, speak” (Luke 7:40).
And, behold, a certain lawyer stood up, and tempted him, saying, “Rabbi, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” (Luke 10:25 - Matthew 23:36).
And one of the company said unto him, “Rabbi, speak to my brother, that he divide the inheritance with me” (Luke 12:13).
And behold, a man came up to him and said, “Rabbi, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” (Matthew 19:16 - Luke 18:18).
And some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, “Rabbi, rebuke your disciples” (Luke 19:39).
And they asked him, saying, “Rabbi, we know that you speak and teach rightly, and show no partiality, but teach the way of God truly…” (Luke 20:21 - Matthew 22:16).
Then there came to him some of the Sadducees…and they asked him, saying, “Rabbi…” (Luke 20:27 - Matthew 22:23-24).
In the above passages, note the diversity of those who recognize and address Jesus as Rabbi: private individuals, lawyers, the rich young ruler, the Pharisees, the Sadducees – a broad cross section of the people of His day.
But, why is it important to understand that Jesus was a rabbi? Because, in Jesus’ day the rabbis were accustomed to using methods of instruction that are quite foreign to the western mind of today. The term “rabbi” is derived from the Hebrew word rav, which in biblical Hebrew means “great.” The word rav is not a title in biblical Hebrew. By the time of Jesus rav had come to refer to a master, as opposed to a slave, or as opposed to a disciple. The word “rabbi” (pronounced ra-bee), means literally, “my master.” It was used as a form of address when speaking to a learned teacher, or sage. It was not yet a formal title. The rabbi in Jesus’ day was quite different from the present day rabbi. In Jesus’ day, the rabbi almost always had an occupation from which he derived his livelihood. He had not yet become the synagogal functionary that he became in a later period. He was, rather, an itinerant or peripatetic preacher functioning in much the same way as the prophet of the Old Testament. In an age in which there were no highly developed and sophisticated methods of mass communication as we have today, the rabbi had to travel from place to place if he wanted to communicate to the masses his teachings and interpretations of Scripture.
According to Professor Safrai, the itinerating rabbi was the norm, rather than the exception. There were hundreds and perhaps thousands of such rabbis circulating in the land of Israel in Jesus’ day. These rabbis did not hesitate to travel to the smallest of the villages or the most remote parts of the land. They would often conduct their classes in the village square or out under a tree (Safrai, ibid, 965). In some instances, classes would be conducted in someone’s home. Often these classes were small. The rabbis did not hesitate to teach as few as four or five students. According to custom, one could not charge for teaching the Scriptures, so the itinerant rabbi was dependent upon the hospitality and generosity of the community. Many rabbis carried their food with them – a pouch of meal and a few olives. From such they subsisted, not wanting to be a burden to their host. The rabbi’s stay in the community might last from only a few days to weeks, or even months. However, for the long term student (“disciple”), learning from a rabbi meant traveling, since the rabbi was always moving from place to place. If one wanted to learn from a rabbi, one had to “follow after him.”
Implied is the further exhortation to open one’s home to rabbis and their disciples. The rabbi (and his disciples) would naturally need to eat and sleep near where he was teaching. In Rabbinic literature there are many passages which call on the people to show hospitality to the sages. It is now easy for us to see the reason. If the people had not been hospitable, opening their homes for teaching and providing food and lodging for the rabbis and their disciples, it would have been impossible for the rabbis to teach and for the students to learn. Upon the background that can be drawn from Jewish sources, a clear picture of Jesus as a rabbi emerges from our Gospels. When we see Him at the beginning of His ministry, He is walking along the shore of the Sea of Galilee and enlisting disciples with the call, “Come, follow me” (Matthew 4:19). “Follow me,” lech aharai (literally, “walk after me”), was a technical term in Hebrew for becoming a disciple. The call to discipleship sometimes necessitated heartrending decisions. It was, more often than not, a call to leave home. (Note that this was a temporary absence, although it might involve months of study.) We recall the words of the man in Luke 9:61 who said to Jesus, “I will follow you, Lord, but first let me go say goodbye to my family.” The call to discipleship often meant leaving mother, father, wife, children, relatives, friends and traveling the country under adverse and austere conditions. It meant leaving all. We can see this reflected over and over again in the Gospels. To the rich young man in Luke 18:22ff, the call to follow Jesus meant selling all that he had, giving it to the poor, and lech aharai, “walk after me.” Peter reminds Jesus (verse 28) that he and the other disciples are not like the rich man: “We have left “ours” (i.e., home) and followed you.” Jesus responded, “Amen, (You have, and that is commendable) I say to you, there is no one who has left house (i.e., home, family)…for the sake of the kingdom of God who will not receive much more in this life, and in the age to come eternal life.” Note that the Beatitudes, too, are 1) a call to discipleship, but also 2) a promise of life everlasting.
If married, with his wife’s permission, a man could leave home for a period of time in order to study with a rabbi. Sometimes it was the wife who encouraged the husband to leave home to study (See Safrai, Comp. II p. 965). For some, this call to be Jesus’ disciple was too demanding, the price too high to pay, as exemplified by the rich young man, and as demonstrated in the parable of Jesus recorded in Luke 14:16-24.
Perhaps the most beautiful example of hospitality afforded to Jesus and His disciples is that pictured for us in the story of Mary and Martha recorded in Luke 10:38-42 (See Understanding The Difficult Words Of Jesus, 98-103). Mary and Martha had opened their home for both physical and spiritual nourishment – hospitality in the truest sense of the word. Another important point is seen in this story when it is related that Mary was…sitting at the feet of Jesus: This rabbinic expression is a technical term for becoming a disciple.
Notice again the clear picture of Jesus the rabbi that emerges from our Gospels. He itinerates from place to place. He depends upon the hospitality of the people. He teaches in homes or in the open air. He has disciples. His disciples follow Him from place to place. It is the picture of a 1st century rabbi.
How did the rabbis in the time of Jesus teach? What were their methods of teaching? What were they teaching?
It is correct to state that the focus of all the rabbis teaching was the Law. For the rabbis, the “Law” consisted not only of the Written Law, but of the Oral Law as well. The Written Law was the Torah, or the five books of Moses (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy), that God gave to Israel at Sinai. In addition to this written revelation, Moses also received, according to the rabbis, additional commandments or instructions that were communicated orally. These additional commandments were designated by the rabbis as the Oral Law.
The Oral Law is divided into two catagories: halachah and haggadah. Halachah is from the Hebrew root halach, meaning “to walk,” or “to go.” In other words, halachah is that path or way in which one is to walk. Halachah is the term used to refer to the whole legal system in Judaism. It includes the 613 written commandments of the Torah and all of the legal rulings and decisions of the rabbis found in the Oral Law.
Haggadah, from the Hebrew root nagad (“to draw out; to narrate or tell”), is everything that is not halachic; the non-legal portion of the Oral Law; that part which does not deal with religious laws or regulations. According to the Jerusalem Talmud (Horavot 3:8. 48c), the purpose of the haggadah, unlike the purpose of the halachah, is not to state what is “forbidden” or “permitted” nor to declare what is “pure” or “impure.” Haggadah includes history, narrative, story, legends, fables, poetry, dirges, prayers, parables, proverbs, allegories, metaphors, hyperboles, analogies, and more. The haggadah is not written as a legal textbook, nor a digest of legal precedents. It is moral and ethical instruction about personal faith and the ways of God. It strives to teach man how to live in harmony with God and in harmony with his fellow man. Its fundamental purpose is to reach out and touch the heart of man that he might “know the Creator of the world and adhere to His ways” (Sifre, Deuteronomy 49).
The common man loved haggadah. He was strengthened and encouraged by it. It was the spiritual food that nourished the soul. The sermons for the common people were mainly haggadah. More technical discussions were reserved for advanced disciples. The itinerating rabbi-preacher loved haggadah as well. It caught the people’s ear and drew the people to God. And, the rabbi that could do that – draw the people closer to God that they might know His presence and feel His power – was highly esteemed. Great crowds would throng to hear his words and disciples would eagerly follow after him.
In Jesus’ day, the stress was still upon haggadah rather than halachah. In their teaching and preaching the rabbis still focused primarily on contemporary problems and the application of biblical principles in everyday life, rather than on theoretical discussions of the legal aspects of the Law.
As surprising as it may seem, we have a record of more of the sayings and the deeds of Jesus than any other 1st century rabbi. Thus, the even greater importance of the Gospels as a witness to rabbinic, haggadic style in the 1st century. In Jesus, we find the classic example of the peripatetic rabbi. His teaching abounds in inspirational instruction that lifts man to God. It abounds in parables, moral and ethical maxims, exhortations, words of comfort and reproof, etc. To quote the great Jewish historian, Joseph Klausner, for many years professor at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem:
In his [Jesus] ethical code there is a sublimity, distinctiveness, and originality in form unparalleled in any other Hebrew ethical code; neither is there any parallel to the remarkable art of his parables. The shrewdness and sharpness of his proverbs and his forceful epigrams serve in an exceptional degree, to make ethical ideas a popular possession (Jesus of Nazareth; His Life, Times, and Teaching, 414).
Due to exciting breakthroughs in synoptic studies by the late Dr. Robert Lindsey, working together in Jerusalem with the late Professor David Flusser, it is now possible to reconstruct many of the discourses of Jesus and recover their original contexts. This breakthrough has made it possible to better understand not only the teaching methods and style of Jesus, but also His teaching format, the way in which He organized His discourses. These discoveries have far reaching implications for better understanding the method and style of the haggadic preacher of the 1st century.
In general, it can now be seen that Jesus’ format was as follows:
- Jesus would see an incident and it would be affirmed by him with the use of the Hebrew word amen,
- Jesus would then comment on the incident in the form of instruction to His disciples,
- His instruction was then followed by two parables…for…out of the mouth of two witnesses is a thing established.
The Gospel records of the teaching of Jesus are also a prime source of information for understanding haggadic methods of scriptural interpretation. A wide variety of methods were used. One list of 32 haggadic hermeneutical principles is found in the Baraita of the Thirty-Two Rules, which is attributed to Eliezar ben Yose, the Galilean, CE 150. This Baraita is inserted in some printed editions of the Talmud after the tractate Berachot. It is also found in the preface to the Midrash Ha-Gadol on Genesis, and at the beginning of Mirash Mishnat Rabbi Eliezer. In the Gospels we can see the application of these rules of interpretation in the teaching of Jesus.
Of the haggadic methods of interpretation, the most frequently used by Jesus is remez. Remez, or hinting, is a very rabbinic way of making a statement or declaration about something or someone by alluding to an Old Testament verse or passage of Scripture. Jesus hints at a biblical verse or passage just by mentioning one key word or phrase in the passage. His listeners, knowing the Bible by heart, much in the same way hear a key phrase and can recall the whole passage. Often, the point being taught is found in the biblical passage immediately before or just after the “hint” from that passage. However, it was unnecessary, in fact a waste of time, to quote a long passage from the Bible which the listeners all knew from memory. The moment the “hint” was given, the whole passage hinted at immediately burst into the mind of each listener.
John the Baptist uses this method when he asks Jesus: “Are you he who is to come?” (Matthew 11:3). In other words, "Are you the Messiah?” John alludes to “The Coming One” of Malachi 3:1 and Zachariah 9:9. Jesus uses this same method in answering John: “The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are brought back to life, and the poor have the good news preached to them.” In other words, “Yes, I am the Messiah.” Jesus alludes to Isaiah 29:18, 35:5-6, 42:7, and 61-1, and John understood exactly what Jesus was saying. The allusions by John and by Jesus to Old Testament Scriptures are not only their way of communicating with each other in a highly rabbinic and abbreviated way, a kind of oral shorthand, but these allusions are also their haggadic interpretations of the Scriptures alluded to. Each is declaring that he understands these Scriptures to be messianic Scriptures, references to the promised Messiah.
Jesus was a Jewish rabbi. That this is so difficult for large segments of the Christian community to see, only illustrates how dim is the recollection of their Jewish origins and to what extent they have assimilated into the pagan culture that surrounds us. We wonder what kind of dynamic organism the Church might have been throughout the ages had she clung more closely to her Hebraic roots rather than embracing and becoming amalgamated with the pagan Hellenistic oriental philosophy that persists in the Church even to this day.
We, quite frankly, are extremely concerned by the present day situation in Christendom. We see little hope for organized Christianity extricating itself from the quagmire of 19 centuries of pagan influence unless there is a concerted and intelligent endeavor to return to the historic foundations of biblical faith which are firmly established in the Land of Israel and the Judaism of Jesus’ day. It would seem that Christianity’s only hope is to see Jesus as He really is – an observant Jew, a Jewish rabbi, a Jewish Messiah. The “Gentile” Church must become more Jewish, and purge itself of the pagan influences of the last 19 centuries. May those who are not of Jewish parentage quickly rid themselves of the arrogance of which Paul warned the Roman Christians:
Do not boast over the branches. If you do boast, remember it is not you that supports the root, but the root that supports you. So do not become proud, but stand in awe. Note…God’s kindness to you, provided you continue in His kindness (Romans 11:18, 20,22).
Do not forget that non-Jews are spoken of as wild olive shoots grafted in among the natural shoots to share the nourishment of the olive tree (Romans 11:17) adopted, to use another of Paul’s metaphors (Galatians 4:5), into a Jewish family.
