Hebrew Roots Q & A

Q: Is it legitimate to use the term "Judaism" as the name for the religion of Jesus and the early disciples? Is that the name of the religion of the Old Testament – and did members of other tribes consider themselves adherents to Judaism? Did Abraham practice Judaism?

A: An excellent question! Prof. Marvin Wilson, writing in Our Father Abraham, explains it this way: "Judaism may be defined as the religion and culture of the Jewish people. Jewish civilization includes historical, social, and political dimensions in addition to the religious. The word Judaism derives from the Greek Ioudaismos, a term first used in the intertestamental period by Greek speaking Jews to distinguish their religion from Hellenism (see 2 Macc. 2:21; 8:1; 14:38). In the New Testament the word appears twice (Gal. 1:13-14) in reference to Paul’s prior consuming devotion to Jewish faith and life.

"Hebrew religion began to give rise to Judaism after the destruction of the Temple and the Exile of Judah in 586 B.C. The term Jew, in its biblical use, is almost exclusively postexhilic. The Jewish religion of the biblical period evolved through such historical stages as the intertestamental, rabbinic, and medieval to the modern period of the nineteenth century with Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform Judaism."

Prior to the time of the exile, it would have been more appropriate to refer to the "Hebrew religion," though among themselves, the "People of the Book" did not consider what they had to be a religion, but rather a way of life based on a relationship with Yahweh.

From the time of Joshua to the days when the two houses of Israel we formed the worship of Yahweh had been at best spotty and intermittent. Periodic revivals kept the Hebrew religion alive. The northern house, with its capital at Samaria, became completely subverted by paganism. God therefore allowed the Assyrians to besiege and conquer it in 721-718 BCE. Some northern Israelites died in the siege. Others died of starvation. Some remained behind. Others were taken captive. II Kings 17:5-6 tells us that Assyria besieged Samaria for three years before taking it. It tells us that in the ninth year of Hoshea the king of Assyria "carried Israel away into Assyria." According to Assyrian records, the number of Israelites actually carried captive from the once populous kingdom was really quite small. "In the beginning of my reign, in my first year [December 722] Samaria I besieged, I captured. Twenty-seven thousand two hundred and ninety persons of its inhabitants I took captive; fifty chariots for my royal equipment I chose; I made it [Samaria] greater than it had been before; people of the lands (I had conquered, I settled there. I appointed my governor over them). Tribute, taxes, I imposed upon them as upon Assyrians" (Inscription from Sargon quoted in The Heart of Hebrew History by H.I. Hester, p. 222).

While in Assyrian captivity, part of this relatively small number of northern Israelites was at least partially assimilated into the local populace losing their identity as Israelites. Others undoubtedly maintained their Hebrew identity. As Hester writes, "It is to be remembered that when the Jewish people were allowed to return from Babylonian exile under Cyrus, king of Persia, in 536 BC. To go back home, remnants of all twelve tribes were included in these groups" (Hester, p. 222).

When people of all Israelite tribes again took up the Hebrew religion in Eretz Yisrael, they came to be viewed as "Jews" and their religion as "Judaism." It is therefore appropriate to call the practice of Jesus, his first apostles, and Paul, "Judaism"- as did Paul himself. A common term among scholars is "the Judaism of the 2^nd Temple period." Professor David Flusser of Hebrew University, a noted authority on Jesus, writes, "The early Christian writings reflect ideas, beliefs, views and trends in Second Temple Judaism. They reflect the world of the Sages, including the Sages’ Biblical exegesis, their parables, and even their own uncertainties" (Jewish Sources in Early Christianity by David Flusser, p. 9). Flusser puts it even more succinctly when he writes, "The truth of the matter however, is that there is no difference between the views of Jesus and authentic Jewish tradition" (Flusser, p. 25).

Prof. Wilson says, "Jesus was a Jew, not a Christian of gentile origin" (Our Father Abraham, p. 12). Abraham is often called "the first Jew" in Judaism because he is "the father of the faithful" – though genetically, he was a gentile from Chaldea, and the "religion" of Israel had not yet been created in his day.