New Testament and Jewish Law PDF

THE NEW TESTAMENT AND JEWISH LAW:
A GUIDE FOR THE PERPLEXED

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THE NEW TESTAMENT AND
JEWISH LAW: A GUIDE
FOR THE PERPLEXED
JAMES G. CROSSLEY
Published by T&T Clark International
A Continuum Imprint
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80 Maiden Lane, Suite 704, New York, NY 10038
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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
including photocopying, recording or any information storage or
retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Copyright James G. Crossley, 2010
James G. Crossley has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and
Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the Author of this work.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN: 978-0-567-03433-5 (Hardback)
978-0-567-03434-2 (Paperback)
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A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.
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Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Antony Rowe Ltd,
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For Maurice Casey
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vii
CONTENTS
Acknowledgements viii
Introduction 1
1 Interpreting Jewish Law in Early Judaism 5
2 Sabbath 26
3 Purity and Food 45
4 Divorce, Eye for an Eye and Oaths and Vows 67
5 Circumcision, Family and Interaction with Gentiles 89
Concluding Remarks 116
Notes 119
Bibliography 123
Index 127
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like, as ever, to thank Francis Crossley, Pamela Crossley,
Richard Crossley, Gill Turner, Caroline Watt, Glennis Watt, and Mike
Watt. But I have to single out the perfect duo: Serena and Dominique
Crossley.
I would like to thank Haaris Naqvi and Dominic Mattos for sup-
porting this book and being nice when things got too busy.
I have been writing about and teaching on Jewish Law for over ten
years. This was initially due to the inspiration of Maurice Casey who,
in a scholarly world full of people not prepared to read the details
of Jewish Law in their original languages, has shown himself to be
a righteous Gentile indeed!
viii
1
INTRODUCTION
In the history of New Testament scholarship, and Christianity more
generally, Jewish Law has had a bad press. Right up to the 1970s, the
dominant view of Jewish Law in relation to the New Testament was
that those dedicated to its practices represented a religion (Judaism)
which was cold, harsh, legalistic and, of course, a negative backdrop
for the new religion of grace, Christianity, effectively represented
by figures such as Jesus and Paul. This was all part of a general cul-
tural context whereby Judaism was seen as an inferior religion to
Christianity and where Jews were seen as a particular problem for
social categorization. These views reached their infamous low point
in Nazi Germany and the Holocaust.
General attitudes did not start to change among New Testament
scholars in any serious sense until the 1970s, particularly with the
publication of E. P. Sanders Paul and Palestinian Judaism (1977).
Sanders challenged the dominant negative view of Jewish Law and
Judaism as a cold, harsh religion, obsessed with earning salvation
through observance of the commandments. Instead, Sanders argued,
the general pattern of Jewish religion was to be labelled covenantal
nomism. This involved getting in, that is God making a covenant
with Israel after the graceful election of Israel, and staying in, that
is Israel maintaining this relationship by obeying the commandments.
Within this system, God remained merciful to Israel and provided
means of atoning for sin. Sanders has since gone on to write a techni-
cal book on Jewish Law around the time of Christian origins, Jewish
THE NEW TESTAMENT AND JEWISH LAW
2
Law from Jesus to the Mishnah (1990), a landmark publication in the
study of Jewish Law in relationship to the New Testament. Along
with the work of scholars such as Bernard Jackson, Geza Vermes,
Jacob Neusner, Markus Bockmuehl and David Instone-Brewer (to
name a few), there is a lot of detailed study of Jewish Law which is
theoretically available to New Testament scholars. Much of this work
is, however, highly technical and one of the aims of this book is
to provide a more simplified introduction to Jewish Law for New
Testament studies.
Yet, despite the best efforts of scholars such as those named above,
the specifics of Jewish Law are still regularly misunderstood in New
Testament studies.
1
Even ideas surrounding covenantal nomism,
important though they undoubtedly are, are understood in terms of
systematic Christian theology, such as the language of grace and
works. This is not the place to get involved with Christian theology
and issues of works versus grace but I think it is worth stressing that
this sort of debate still often works with the assumption that works
are somehow wrong, theologically wrong, or even morally wrong
because frequently the idea is that Judaism must have a strong con-
cept of Gods grace and less emphasis on human works. But if it so
happened that masses of ancient Jewish sources were found which
conclusively showed that much of Judaism really did believe that
works were the way to salvation, what would we do then? This book
will work with the assumption that people concerned, even obsessed,
with details of the Law are neither wrong nor right and it will leave
the theological issues of grace and salvation to theologians that way
inclined. By looking at the details of Jewish Law I am not intending
that this book supports the view that Jews were obsessed with details
of the Law or the view that plenty of Jews were not. It is certainly
possible to make a reasonable case that the author of this book is
obsessed with Jewish Law (a claim that has actually been made) and
this author probably would not disagree.
One reason why I am suspicious of some of the judgements made on
Jewish Law is that that those praising Jewish Law conceal theological
INTRODUCTION
3
agendas just as those earlier judgements of scholars from a previous
generation (e.g. Rudolf Bultmann) did. The work of N. T. Wright on
Jesus is flawed for many reasons but one of them is his handling of
Jewish Law. Wright is full of high praise for Jewish Law. Yet it is one
thing to repeatedly praise how wonderful the Law was but this rings
a little hollow when he repeatedly ignores the details of Jewish Law
when he discusses Jesus attitude towards the Law. For instance, on
the issue of family and ethnicity, Wright emphasizes that Jewish texts
such as Ezra 10 may sound extreme to us but were fairly tame by
ancient standards and were part of the self-preservation of the Jewish
people. This is not, as Wright points out in his defence of Judaism, in
any way discreditable (however often people have thought so). But
after pointing out the positives, Wright then says that Jesus, to put it
mildly, set a time-bomb beside this symbol . . . and realized that some
of the symbols had now become (not wicked, or shoddy, but) redun-
dant. On texts such as Mt. 8.2122/Lk. 9.5960, Wright argues that
Jesus comments are quite frankly, outrageous . . . astonishing. But
then Wright qualifies such statements to make sure Judaism does not
come out too badly: we must stress that this does not mean that Jesus
thought such a symbol inherently bad, or even second rate . . .
2
Wrights view of family and ethnicity may be based on fair general-
izations but he focuses on the details of the New Testament texts
while avoiding the details of Jewish texts. This allows him to make
the argument that the sayings attributed to Jesus are, apparently,
shocking. But what if Jesus sayings were sentiments paralleled in
Jewish Law and early Judaism? And is not Wright simply perpetuat-
ing the old idea of Judaism as a backdrop to make Christianity better?
Details are, then, important.
But I do not want this introductory book to be polemical. What
I want to do is to introduce Jewish legal sources which have obvious
thematic relevance for the study of the New Testament, in addition to
being prominent in early Jewish sources outside the New Testament.
The topics chosen reflect this: Sabbath; purity and food; divorce, eye
for an eye, oaths and vows; and ethnicity and interaction with Gentiles.
4
This book will also provide extensive quotations from Jewish sources.
My experience of teaching Jewish Law, and early Judaism in general,
is that these sources are quite alien to students and some of the topics,
especially purity, are particularly complex. The use of primary sources
will hopefully illuminate those topics and explanations which may be
alien and complex to many readers.
There will be little in the way of detailed exegesis of New Testament
texts in this book. While a gentle exegetical prodding cannot always
be avoided, one of the main aims of this book is to provide texts and
themes which can then be used by readers to interpret New Testament
texts. Some of these texts and themes may or may not be of the right
chronological time and geographical place but in many cases these
texts are the closest parallels we have. I leave it up to readers to fol-
low up and decide how relevant some of the later texts may be.
But before we look at specific legal texts, it is worth outlining the
ways in which Jewish Law was understood and interpreted in early
Judaism.
5
CHAPTER 1
INTERPRETING JEWISH LAW
IN EARLY JUDAISM
From the outset it must be strongly emphasized that the following
short history and analysis of Jewish interpretation of the Law is very
basic and only a general outline. Much, much more can be written
and so what will be done here is to cover some of the key issues
which will be of relevance for the rest of this book. I will cover a
period close to one millennium, from the final form of the biblical
texts through to rabbinic literature. The major focus will be on the
different ways in which the Law was interpreted by different Jewish
groups, but some space will be devoted to the role of the Law as a
whole in Jewish identity and reactions against, as well as interactions
with, different cultural contexts. With these explicit qualifications in
mind, we can turn to the earliest interpreters of the Law.
THE LAW AND ITS EARLIEST INTERPRETERS
In very basic terms we can say that the Law or Torah is simply the
first five books of the Bible, namely, Genesis, Exodus, Numbers,
Leviticus and Deuteronomy, otherwise known collectively as the
Pentateuch. What we can probably say with a reasonable degree of
certainty is that the Pentateuch was brought together in more or less
the final form we have it in the Persian period (538332 BCE), in the
aftermath of the exilic period (587/586 BCE538/537 BCE) when
6
the first Temple was destroyed, certain Judeans were exiled, and those
exiled in Babylon returned. Echoes of related themes may be seen
throughout the Pentateuch (cf. Gen. 6.58; 11; Exod. 2.2324; 3.1622;
167; 20.5; Num. 24.8, 23; Deut. 5.9; 6.1012; 7.10; 29.1729). The
Pentateuch contains many, if not most, practices which became
associated with Jewish behaviour in the ancient world, such as the
avoidance of eating pork, avoidance of working on the Sabbath,
a range of ethical teaching, purity laws and so on.
Not even the lengthy legal sections of the Pentateuch could deal
with all of the issues raised in daily life and nor could they deal with
changing historical and social circumstances. Some biblical laws
needed re-interpreting in light of new circumstances. It is one thing
to avoid work on the Sabbath but then what constitutes work?
Plucking grain and eating it (cf. Mk 2.2328; Mt. 12.18; Lk. 6.16)?
Here it might be worth thinking of this issue in a two-fold manner: (1)
biblical Law, i.e. the laws as stated in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testa-
ment; and (2) the interpretation or expansion of biblical Law, i.e.
interpreting the biblical laws to fit new situations, sometimes called
tradition or tradition of the elders in ancient sources. It should
be emphasized from the outset that this two-fold distinction is not
hard-and-fast. Some interpreters of biblical laws believed that their
interpretation was implicit in the biblical Law or that Moses was as
much linked in with the interpretation as he was with, for example,
the Ten Commandments.
This two-fold distinction will be used to highlight different inter-
pretations by different groups and as a means of comparison (we will
see that certain ancient sources compared with something like this
two-fold distinction). It is clear, after all, that plenty of people agreed
with the principle of, for instance, Sabbath observance but disagreed
with how work should be interpreted (see Chapter 2). By the time
of the New Testament the detailed interpretation and re-interpretation
of biblical Law had a long history. We may begin with two books
which came to be closely associated with one another, namely Ezra
and Nehemiah.
INTERPRETING JEWISH LAW IN EARLY JUDAISM
7
The books of Ezra and Nehemiah tell the story of the return of the
exiles under Persian rule. Quite when Ezra and Nehemiah were writ-
ten is not clear but, for our present purposes, precision is not important.
All we need claim for now is that scholars have argued that they were
written down, in something like their final form, in either the Persian
period (538332 BCE) or early in the Hellenistic period (33263
BCE), and so were written, obviously, centuries prior to the New
Testament. This point is important because it seems as if at least some
parts of biblical Law, if not all of biblical Law as a coherent and col-
lected whole (cf. Ezra 7), were available to the writers of Ezra and
Nehemiah because in these books we find examples of re-interpretation
and re-application of certain biblical verses as Hugh Williamson in
has shown in a still impressive piece of exegesis.
1
One of the more prominent examples of such early biblical inter-
pretation concerns mixed marriages in Ezra 9.12:
After these things had been done, the officials approached me and
said, The people of Israel, the priests, and the Levites have not
separated themselves from the peoples of the lands with their
abominations, from the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the
Jebusites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Egyptians, and the
Amorites. For they have taken some of their daughters as wives for
themselves and for their sons. Thus the holy seed has mixed itself
with the peoples of the lands, and in this faithlessness the officials
and leaders have led the way.
Despite plenty of stories about foreign marital partners in the Bible
(e.g. Gen. 16.3; 41.45; Exod. 2.21; Num. 12.1; 2 Sam. 3.3), it is clear
that sentiments similar to Ezra 9.12 are found in the Pentateuch
(e.g. Exod. 34.1116; Deut. 20.1018), especially Deut. 7.14 which
seems to be a basis for Ezra 9.12. Even so, the list of peoples in
Ezra 9.12 appears to be an example of bringing together three dif-
ferent biblical verses dealing with related issues. Reference to the
Hittites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites and the Jebusites
8
can be found in Deut. 7.1, the Ammonites and the Moabites can
be found Deut. 23.3, and the Egyptians may be a reference to the
discussion of forbidden marriages in Leviticus 18, and with Lev. 18.3
more precisely in mind, You shall not do as they do in the land of
Egypt, where you lived, and you shall not do as they do in the land
of Canaan, to which I am bringing you. You shall not follow their
statutes.
In the passages from the Pentateuch, the problem with mixed mar-
riages primarily concerned idolatry. For instance, in Ezra 9.2 there is
clearly a reference to Deut. 7.3, you shall not intermarry with them
[the Hittites, the Girgashites etc.], giving your daughters to their sons
or taking their daughters for your sons, for that would turn away your
children from following me, to serve other gods. But Ezra 9.12
takes this one step further when it gives the justification that the holy
seed has mixed itself with the peoples of the lands. Here we see the
text moving towards a hard ethnic differentiation. While the language
of seed has some background in the promises to Abram/Abraham
but in Genesis 12 (e.g. Gen. 12.13, 7), there is the idea of bringing a
blessing to nations which is conspicuously absent in Ezra 9.12. The
other background which scholars have suggested concerns the purity
of animals, foodstuffs and materials such as in Lev. 19.19, You shall
keep my statutes. You shall not let your animals breed with a different
kind; you shall not sow your field with two kinds of seed; nor shall
you put on a garment made of two different materials.
According to the book of Ezra, there was resolve to divorce for-
eign women according to those who tremble at the commandment
of our God and done according to the Law (Ezra 10.23). This is
most likely an interpretation of the divorce law of Deut. 24.14 where
a wife may be divorced if the husband finds something objection-
able, a phrase that was interpreted in many different ways in early
Judaism, as we will see in Chapter 4, and interpreted in Ezra to
include a reference to divorcing those wives not of the pure seed. This
sentiment may also be expressed in the difficult final verse of the
book of Ezra (10.44).
9
Though we are dealing with interpretation and expansion of
biblical Law, it is clear that in the book of Ezra these views are
deemed authoritative pieces of legal understanding and presumably
indistinguishable, as least in terms of authority, from the biblical
commandments themselves in the eyes of the author(s). For example,
in Ezra 9.14 we read, . . . shall we break your commandments again
and intermarry with the peoples who practise these abominations?
Note Ezras reaction to the news of the holy seed being mixed in
9.12. Ezra tore his garments, pulled out his hair and beard, all a sign
of extreme mourning, and sat appalled until the evening sacrifice
(Ezra 9.34). In Ezra 10.3 Shecaniah believes that sending away
Gentile wives and daughters should be done according to the law.
In 10.19, those who agreed to dismiss their wives give an offering
in the Temple. We might add that the related book of Nehemiah also
engages in its own interpretation and expansion of biblical Law
(Nehemiah 8, 10). As Nehemiah puts it more generally,
Jeshua, Bani, Sherebiah, Jamin, Akkub, Shabbethai, Hodiah,
Maaseiah, Kelita, Azariah, Jozabad, Hanan, Pelaiah, the Levites,
helped the people to understand the law, while the people remained
in their places. So they read from the book, from the law of God,
with interpretation. They gave the sense, so that the people under-
stood the reading. (Neh. 8.78)
SECTARIANISM AND LEGAL INTERPRETATION
A crucial period in the development of the interpretation of Jewish
Law was ushered in with the Maccabean crisis (c. 167164 BCE).
After interaction with Hellenistic culture in Jerusalem (e.g. building
of a gymnasium) and political wrangling with the major international
power blocs, the practice of the Law itself was questioned, including
Jews apparently prepared to undo the marks of circumcision. In the
midst of these controversies, the Seleucid ruler, Antiochus IV, entered
Jerusalem and desecrated the Temple. Jewish practices such as
10
circumcision and Sabbath were banned, as were Torah scrolls. This
led to the Maccabean revolt, the guerrilla movement headed by
Mattathias and his sons, with Mattathias shortly replaced by the
famous Judas Maccabeus. The rebels eventually won and rededicated
the Temple, the event celebrated at the festival of Hanukkah. This
would also lead to the kingdom of ruled the Hasmonean dynasty, a
dynasty which would rule independently until the Roman invasion
in 63 BCE. The Maccabean crisis and the Hasmonean rule were
also controversial in the sense that gave rise to what is usually called
sectarianism, that is, the rise of groups such as Pharisees, Sadducees
and the group at Qumran responsible for the Dead Sea Scrolls per-
haps to be identified with the Essenes. The aims of these competing
groups were so deeply immersed in both court politics and religious
practices that such aims were times indistinguishable.
The stories of martyrdom from the Maccabean crisis can get grue-
some and 2 Maccabees, a text recalling the time of the Maccabean
crisis and its aftermath, has hints of there being a bodily resurrection
for the martyred individual. Most memorably, 2 Maccabees 7 tells the
story of a mother and her sons. The sons refuse to eat unclean food
and are tortured and killed in a particularly violent fashion. They
respond in ways such as the following:
And when he was at his last breath, he said, You accursed wretch,
you dismissed us from this present life, but the king of the universe
will raise us up to an everlasting renewal of life, because we have
died for his laws . . . I got these (hands) from Heaven and because
of his laws I disdain them, and from him I hope to get them back
again. (2 Macc. 2.9, 11)
Indeed, it may well be the general context of the Maccabean crisis
which explains why a more developed form of life-after-death starts
to occur in Jewish literature in its aftermath (e.g. Dan. 12.23;
2 Macc. 7; 14.4346). If the traditional idea of observing the Law
was meant to lead to a wealthy and prosperous life, why were people
11
dying for observing the Law? One solution was to extend reward into
the afterlife. But one thing is clear after the Maccabean crisis, at least
from the perspective of certain Jews: the Law needed to be vigor-
ously defended.
Interpretation of the Law was, unsurprisingly, an issue among the
competing groups or sects. The Dead Sea Scrolls provide strong
evidence of what was surely the strictest group (the Essenes?) in their
attitude towards the Law in early Judaism. Many of the laws may
have pre-dated the group, and indeed may not have been initially
associated with the group at all, but they were certainly ended up
among the Scrolls. The Scrolls expanded and developed the Law to
an extent which sometimes made the group very distinct and separate
from the rest of Judaism. Some instance of expansion and interpreta-
tion of biblical Law should suffice (we will, of course, return to the
Scrolls throughout this book):
On swarming or creeping animals, Lev. 11.2930 says,
These are unclean for you among the creatures that swarm upon
the earth: the weasel, the mouse, the great lizard according to its
kind, the gecko, the land crocodile, the lizard, the sand lizard, and
the chameleon.
In the Damascus Document (CD) these are interpreted to include a
variety of small creatures and larvae of bees:
. . . No-one should defile his soul with any living or creeping ani-
mal, by eating them, from the larvae of bees to every living being
which creeps in water . . . (CD 12.1113)
On draining blood from animals, Lev. 17.1314 says,
And anyone of the people of Israel, or of the aliens who reside
among them, who hunts down an animal or bird that may be eaten
shall pour out its blood and cover it with earth. For the life of every
12
creature its blood is its life; therefore I have said to the people
of Israel: You shall not eat the blood of any creature, for the life of
every creature is its blood; whoever eats it shall be cut off.
This is expanded at Qumran to explicitly include fish, perhaps because
the writer(s) were confronted with particularly bloody fish (of a larger
variety from the Mediterranean?). In other words, fish had to be
slaughtered correctly and have the blood drained before they could be
eaten. As CD put it,
And fish they should not eat unless they have been opened alive,
and their blood poured away. (CD 12.1314)
The Scrolls expand other laws concerning slaughter of animals. For
example, biblical Law prohibits taking the mother creature and her
young on the same day:
But you shall not slaughter, from the herd or the flock, an animal
with its young on the same day. (Lev. 22.28)
If you come on a birds nest, in any tree or on the ground, with
fledglings or eggs, with the mother sitting on the fledglings or on
the eggs, you shall not take the mother with the young. Let the
mother go, taking only the young for yourself, in order that it may
go well with you and you may live long. (Deut. 22.67)
This ruling is expanded and interpreted at Qumran to include, for
example, pregnant animals:
. . . And you shall not sacrifice to me a cow, or ewe, or she-goat,
which are pregnant, for they are an abomination to me. And you
shall not slaughter a cow or a ewe and its young on the same day,
and you shall not kill a mother with its young. (11Q19 52.57; see
also 4Q270 2 ii 15)
13
In some contexts it is the interpretation of the Law which must
override everything. In 4QMMT, a letter outlining that which is
deemed correct legal practice, observing their laws appears to be the
best approach for the preparation for end times: . . . we have written
to you some works of the Torah which we think are good for you and
for your people . . . Reflect on all these matters . . . so that at the end
of time, you may rejoice in finding that some of our words are true
(4Q399 1417 II = 4QMMT C 2532). So, as with Ezra-Nehemiah,
the interpretation of the Law was extremely authoritative. In one doc-
ument, the Temple Scroll (11QT or 11Q19), we even get God speaking
in the first person and thereby giving the re-interpretation of biblical
Law as high an authority as can be imagined. For instance, note the
way in which the holiness of Temple is extended to Jerusalem: . . .
And a man who lies with his wife and has an ejaculation, for three
days shall not enter the whole city of the temple in which I cause my
name to dwell. No blind person shall enter it all their days, and they
shall not defile the city in whose midst I dwell because I, YHWH,
dwell in the midst of the children of Israel for ever and always
(11Q19 45.1114). Not dissimilarly, in the book of Jubilees, a docu-
ment closely associated with the Dead Sea Scrolls group, has their
interpretations of biblical Law linked with Sinai (Jubilees 1).
As some of this might imply (notably 4QMMT), by the time of
the New Testament the different competing interpretations of biblical
Law among various individuals and different groups such as the
Pharisees, the Sadducees and the people responsible for the Dead
Sea Scrolls, were established. The first century CE Jewish historian,
Josephus, describes some legal disagreements between the Pharisees
and Sadducees. In one instance, Jonathan the Sadducee had managed
to work his ways on John Hyrcanus (134104 BCE) and so Hyrcanus
sided with the Sadducees while deserting the Pharisees by abrogating
the regulations which Pharisees had apparently established for the peo-
ple, and punishing those who observe them (Ant. 13.296). According
to Josephus, we have another reason for authority of legal under-
standing namely, popular support hence his addition that from
14
this situation grew the hatred of the masses aimed at Hyrcanus
and his sons (cf. Ant. 13.401403). Josephus also adds a crucial
aside when he explains the differences between the Sadducees and
Pharisees:
. . . the Pharisees have delivered to the people a great many obser-
vances by succession from their fathers, which are not written in
the laws of Moses; and for that reason it is that the Sadducees
reject them, and say that we are to esteem those observances to be
obligatory which are in the written word, but are not to observe
what are derived from the tradition of our forefathers. And con-
cerning these things it is that great disputes and differences have
arisen among them, while the Sadducees are able to persuade none
but the rich, and have not the populace favourable to them, but the
Pharisees have the multitude on their side. (Ant. 13.297298)
Josephus statement illustrates tendencies and ideas we have seen as
early as Ezra-Nehemiah: interpretations and expansions, conflict over
interpretation and the importance of popularity.
There are further stories about Pharisees at court and their legal
traditions, though their influence at court by the time of the New
Testament writings seems to have waned, at least according to
Josephus (cf. Ant. 13.408409; 14.163184; 15.14, 368372; 17.41).
References to Pharisaic tradition also occur in the New Testament.
In Mk 7.123, Jesus is portrayed as criticizing the tradition of the
elders or human tradition of Pharisees, including examples such
as washing hands before meals and immersing various utensils.
Notice again the context of conflict and dispute, comparable with the
disputes Josephus records between Pharisees and Sadducees. Paul
famously claimed to have been, as to the Law a Pharisee (Phil. 3.5)
and elsewhere (Gal. 1.1315) he could also speak of being far more
zealous for the traditions of my ancestors while persecuting the
church (see also Phil. 3.6), perhaps because of legal issues, though
the evidence is far from clear on the nature of the conflict.
15
After the Jewish revolt against Rome and the fall of the Jerusalem
Temple in 70 CE, the rabbinic movement began to emerge in its own
right, probably as the successors to the Pharisaic movement, with some
emphasis on unity rather than sectarianism, though disputes hardly
went away. Rabbinic literature is where some of the most famous
Jewish expansion and interpretation of the biblical Law takes place,
collected in, for instance, the Mishnah, the Tosefta, the Jerusalem/
Palestinian Talmud and the Babylonian Talmud. The Mishnah was
compiled around 200 CE and consists of six themed orders, each of
which contains individual tractates. The themed orders cover a wide
range of differing legal opinions on agricultural laws, festival and
special days, women, damages, holy things and purity. The Tosefta,
similar in thematic structure to the Mishnah indeed it may have
been collected as supplementary material was edited in the third
century CE. The Palestinian Talmud and the Babylonian Talmud were
massive expansions of, and commentaries on, much of the material in
the Mishnah, with the editing of the Palestinian Talmud dated to the
fifth century and the editing of the Babylonian Talmud dating to the
sixth century. While much detailed work has been done by scholars
such as Jacob Neusner and David Instone-Brewer on establishing
pre-70 CE traditions,
2
it is worth re-emphasizing that this material
was finally collected much later than the New Testament and must
always be used with caution for understanding the Law at the time
of the New Testament texts. I remind readers that in this book I will
(largely) be using this material in a comparative way as a potential
means of understanding New Testament legal texts. Readers can pursue
the issue of dating and usefulness themselves should they so wish.
In addition to lengthy individual tractates and passages within
the Mishnah, Tosefta, Palestinian Talmud and Babylonian Talmud
devoted to issues relevant for present purposes (e.g. Sabbath, purity,
tithing), it is notable that the Pharisees turn up in rabbinic literature
and are heavily involved in debates about food laws, Sabbath, tithing,
purity and so on (e.g. m. Tohar. 4.15; m. Hag. 2.7; m. Yad. 4.67;
m. Nid. 4.2; m. Parah 3.7; t. Shabb. 1.15; t. Hag. 3.35). One of the
16
most famous Pharisees found in rabbinic literature was Hillel (late
first century BCEearly first century CE), who is largely portrayed as
the effective founder of rabbinic Judaism in rabbinic literature. Hillel
and his followers, called the School or House of Hillel, are often
contrasted with another Pharisaic faction associated with Shammai
and his followers, called the School or House of Shammai. Another
notable group which might have been connected with the Pharisaic
movement were the associates or haberim, although it should be noted
that the details of such connections are disputed by some scholars. The
haberim were particularly associated with observing a particularly
strict view of the purity and tithing laws. A key passage concerning
the haberim is m. Demai 2.23:
He who undertakes to be trustworthy [one who is assumed to tithe
all of his produce] tithes (1) what he eats, and (2) what he sells,
and (3) what he purchases, and (4) does not accept the hospitality
of a person of the land . . . He who undertakes to be a haber
(1) does not sell to a person of the land wet or dry [produce, either
produce which has been rendered susceptible to impurity or pro-
duce which has not been rendered susceptible], and (2) does not
purchase from him wet [produce, produce which has been ren-
dered susceptible to impurity . . .
Various Pharisaic and/or rabbinic interpretations are given great
authority, with links often given to a great figure from the past, even
to the extent, as we saw with the book of Jubilees, of attributing their
expansions and interpretations to Moses at Sinai:
3
Said Nahum the Scribe, I have received [the following ruling]
from R. Miasha, who received [it] from his father, who received
[it] from the Pairs, who received [it] from the Prophets, [who
received] the law [given] to Moses on Sinai, regarding one who
sows his field with two types of wheat . . . (m. Peah 2.6)
17
Go tell them, Do not be anxious about your vote. I have received
a tradition from Rabban Yohanan b. Zakkai, who heard it from his
teacher, and his teacher from his teacher, a law given to Moses
at Sinai, that Ammon and Moab give poor mans tithe in the
Sabbatical year. (m. Yad. 4.3)
We even get claims such as opposing the teachings of the scribes
weighs heavier than opposing the teachings of the Torah (m. Sanh.
11.3). In addition to plenty of intra-rabbinic debates over the validity
of this or that interpretation (we will return to such issues throughout
this book), we also get evidence of different levels of observance of
expanded Law, most famously involving the people of the land, that
is Jews not strictly observant of rabbinic laws (e.g. m. Dem.12;
m. Aboth 5.1019; m. Sot. 9.15) or those of the haberim (e.g. m. Dem.
23) or the Pharisaic laws:
The clothing of a person of the land is in the status of midras unclean-
ness for Pharisees [who eat ordinary food in a state of uncleanness],
the clothing of Pharisees is in the status of midras uncleanness for
those who eat priestly food. The clothing of those who eat heave
offering is in the status of midras uncleanness for those who eat
Holy Things [officiating priests] etc . . . (m. Hag. 2.7)
LAW AND IDENTITY
For Jews outside Palestine, the Torah was translated in the Greek (the
Septuagint or LXX), a fictional story of which is told in the Letter of
Aristeas. As happens with translation, interpretative decisions had to
be made and even these could reflect legal and cultural decisions. As
Sanders points out, food laws were basically the same in the Diaspora
but new inclusions were made in the LXX (and Philo) to the list of
the ten permitted animals in Deut. 14.45, such as the giraffe, while
others dropped out from the Hebrew list, such as mountain sheep.
18
Philo adds more of his own, such as the more localized (in Egypt)
cranes and geese (Spec. Laws 4.105).
4
Torah observance, as we will see in Chapter 5, became a flashpoint
when Jewish and different Gentile practices came together, particu-
larly in the Jewish Diaspora. The responses to the different cultural
contexts in the ancient world varied greatly, from enthusiastic accom-
modation to hostility.
5
Scholars often talk, sometimes a little too
much, about boundary markers associated with the Torah (especially
food laws, Sabbath observance and circumcision) which functioned
as a means for Jews and outsiders to define who might have been a
Jew. The Roman satirist brought some of these boundary markers
together with reference to the Law in his not-entirely-kind assess-
ment of Judaism:
Some who have had a father who reveres the Sabbath, worship
nothing but the clouds, and the divinity of the heavens, and see no
difference between eating swines flesh, from which their father
abstained, and that of man; and in time they take to circumcision.
Having been wont to flout the laws of Rome, they learn and prac-
tise and revere the Jewish law, and all that Moses handed down in
his secret tome, forbidding to point out the way to any not wor-
shipping the same rites, and conducting none but the circumcised
to the desired fountain. For all which the father was to blame, who
gave up every seventh day to idleness, keeping it apart from all the
concerns of life. (Juvenal, Satires 14.96106)
Philo, the first century Jewish philosopher based in Alexandria, wrote
extensively on the significance of the Law, partly in response to criti-
cism of those practices deemed Jewish. In contrast to Juvenal, Philo
can only gasp in awe at the wonders of the Law and its pervasive
influence in a slightly optimistic assessment:
But this is not so entirely wonderful, although it may fairly by
itself be considered a thing of great intrinsic importance, that his
19
laws were kept securely and immutably from all time; but this
is more wonderful by far, as it seems, that not only the Jews, but
that also almost every other nation, and especially those who make
the greatest account of virtue, have dedicated themselves to
embrace and honour them, for they have received this especial
honour above all other codes of laws, which is not given to any
other code . . . our laws which Moses has given to us . . . influence
all nations, barbarians and Greeks, the inhabitants of continents
and islands, the eastern nations and the western, Europe and Asia;
in short, the whole habitable world from one extremity to the
other. (Mos. 2.17, 20)
Philo was extremely comfortable with Hellenistic philosophy which
was able to underpin such grandiose assessments of Jewish Law and
in a related way meant that Jewish laws could be allegorized to reflect
certain virtues and principles. However, Philo makes a significant
qualification in terms of his construction of Jewish identity because,
unlike some, he famously would not take the allegorical meaning to
one logical conclusion and remove the physical implications of the
commandments:
For there are some men, who, looking upon written laws as sym-
bols of things appreciable by the intellect . . . But now men living
solitarily by themselves as if they were in a desert, or else as if they
were mere souls unconnected with the body . . . overlook what
appears to the many to be true, and seek for plain naked truth by
itself . . . For although the seventh day is a lesson to teach us the
power which exists in the uncreated God, and also that the creature
is entitled to rest from his labours, it does not follow that on that
account we may abrogate the laws which are established respect-
ing it, so as to light a fire, or till land, or carry burdens, or bring
accusations, or conduct suits at law, or demand a restoration of a
deposit, or exact the repayment of a debt, or do any other of the
things which are usually permitted at times which are not days of
20
festival . . . nor because the rite of circumcision is an emblem of
the excision of pleasures and of all the passions, and of the destruc-
tion of that impious opinion, according to which the mind has
imagined itself to be by itself competent to produce offspring,
does it follow that we are to annul the law which has been enacted
about circumcision . . . But it is right to think that this class of
things resembles the body, and the other class the soul; therefore,
just as we take care of the body because it is the abode of the soul,
so also must we take care of the laws that are enacted in plain
terms: for while they are regarded, those other things also will be
more clearly understood, of which these laws are the symbols . . .
(Migr. 8993)
Of course, identity is a matter of perspective and no doubt those
adhering to allegorizing alone saw themselves as Jewish but, from
Philos perspective, it was also the physical performance of the
commandments (e.g. Sabbath observance) that remained crucial.
Otherwise, from this perspective, how can a Jew be a Jew if shut off
from the outward manifestations of Jewish identity performed by the
community?
Using the Torah to emphasize Jewish identity could be done in
different ways, some more confrontational than others. We have
already seen such issues arising in the context of the Maccabean cri-
sis where Jews were remembered as dying heroically for the Law. It
is probably significant that Josephus claims that the Pharisees were
influential among townsfolk and that their sacred rites were followed
by the inhabitants of the cities (Ant. 18.15). By the first century we
know that several towns in and around Palestine were influenced by
Hellenistic culture such as the building of theatres and Herods intro-
duction of four-yearly games in honour of Caesar (Ant. 15.268). Yet,
from one Jewish perspective, this might lead to another Maccabean
crisis which gives reasons to uphold Jewish identity focused on Torah
observance over against the perceived lawlessness of Gentile culture.
In this context, it may well have been that the Pharisees would have
21
been visible adherents of Jewish traditions in the face of the perceived
threat of Gentile culture.
6
Josephus gives us several first century Palestinian examples of the
combustible elements involved with the Torah under imperialism.
One example might be when Caesars slave Stephen was robbed by
Jewish bandits. Troops attempted to find the culprits in the villages en
route to Beth Horon and one soldier committed the provocative act of
burning a copy of the Torah. The resulting uproar led to the procura-
tor pacifying the outraged by ordering the execution of the soldier
(War 2.231; cf. Ant. 20.113115). Arguably the most prominent pre-
Jewish war example is the Emperor Gaius Caligulas attempt to place
a statute of himself in the Temple. According to Josephus, some Jews
promised a harvest of banditry if the threat was carried out (Ant.
18.269275) and brings up the issue of Torah observances: the Jews
appealed to their law and the custom of their ancestors, and pleaded
that they were forbidden to place an image of God, much more of a
man, not only in the sanctuary but even in any unconsecrated spot
throughout the country (War 2.195). The context of the Jewish revolt
against Rome in 6670 CE provides an obvious broader context for
particularly confrontational uses. One revolutionary figure called
Jesus was furious when he believed that Josephus (the historian him-
self) was going to side with Rome. According to Josephus, Jesus
speech was popular and it would seem that the role of the Torah
played a significant part in Jesus rhetorical posturing:
With a copy of the laws of Moses in his hands, he now stepped
forward and said: If you cannot, for your own sakes, citizens,
detest Josephus, fix your eyes on your countrys laws, which your
commander-in-chief intended to betray, and for their sakes hate
the crime and punish the audacious criminal. (Life 13435; cf.
Life 66)
In a not dissimilar way, some Jewish writers could tie in a message
of social justice (of course part of the Law too) with their reading of
22
the Law. Indeed, one notable theme which emerges in early Jewish
texts is that oppression is carried out by those who do not observe
the Law as they ought to (from the perspective of a given writer)
or by Gentiles, deemed beyond the Law by default. The Dead Sea
Scrolls give some particularly ferocious examples. CD, for instance,
is immersed in language about the Law (including the classic idea of
Law and walking on the correct path):
The princes of Judah are those upon whom the rage will be vented,
for they hope to be healed but the defects stick (to them); all are
rebels because they have not left the path of traitors and have defiled
themselves in paths of licentiousness, and with wicked wealth,
avenging themselves, and each one bearing resentment against his
brother, and each one hating his fellow. Each one became obscured
by blood relatives, and approached for debauchery and bragged
about wealth and gain. Each one did what was right in his eyes
and each one has chosen the stubbornness of his heart. They did
not keep apart from the people and have rebelled with insolence,
walking on the path of the wicked ones, about whom God says:
Their wine is serpents venom and cruel poisons of asps. (CD
8.310)
From such perspectives, then, avoidance of social injustice can be
done by what is perceived correct interpretation of the Law. From a
different context, the following may well reflect this kind of thinking
in early Judaism:
And there will be no spirit of error of Beliar any more, for he will
be thrown into fire for ever . . . And those that are in penury for the
Lords sake will be made rich and those who are in want will eat
their fill and those who are weak will be made strong . . . And so,
my children, observe the whole of the law of the Lord, for there is
hope for all who make straight their way. (T. Jud. 25.326.1)
23
The idea of wealth leading to sin is found in early Judaism and is
tied in closely with Law observance as the way to avoid such sin
(e.g. 4Q171 2.916; T. Jud. 25.326.1). This line of thought is also
found in the Gospels. Mark 10.1731 is the story of a rich man who
has observed a list of commandments but needs to supplement this by
selling his properties and giving the proceeds to the poor.
7
The com-
mandments listed in the passage include the Markan Jesus own
expansion of the Law by adding a prohibition of defrauding (Mk 10.19)
to the Ten Commandments (cf. Exod. 20.17/Deut. 5.21) and when
this sort of language is used elsewhere it has strong implications of
not withholding workers wages and avoidance of exploitation (see
e.g. Deut. 24.1415; Mal. 3.5; Sir. 4.1; 1QapGen 20.11; Tg. Onq.
Lev. 5.21; Tg. Ps.J. Lev. 5.23; Tg. Neof. and PsJ. Deut. 24.14;
Tg. Mal. 3.5; Lev. R. 12.1). Presumably a key reason for this addition
was that Jesus was in dialogue with a rich man, precisely the kind of
person who could defraud.
Despite the rich man claiming to have observed the commandments,
including the new one not to defraud, Jesus still severely downplays
the rich mans chances of entering the kingdom of God with the
famous saying, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a
needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God
(Mk 10.25). What this passage seems to be doing is following a
Jewish tradition which rejects the interpretation that wealth and pros-
perity in the here and now as a result of observing the commandments
(cf. Deut. 28.114; Job 1.10; 42.10; Isa. 3.10; Prov. 10.22; Tob. 12.9;
Sir. 3.1, 6; 25.711; 35.13; 44.1015; 51.2730; Bar. 4.1) and places
reward in the life to come (cf. Mk 10.2931; Dan. 12; 2 Macc. 7;
1 En. 92105). Another Jewish text knows that the view of riches as
a reward in the here and now is a problem so it attacks such a view
vigorously:
Woe to you, you sinners! For your money makes you appear like
the righteous, but your hearts do reprimand you like real sinners,
24
this very matter shall be a witness against you, as a record of your
evil . . . When you are dead in the wealth of your sins. Those who
are like you will say of you, Happy are you sinners! (The sinners)
have seen all their days. They have died now in prosperity and
wealth. They have not experienced struggle and battle in their life-
time. You yourselves know that they will bring your souls down to
Sheol; and they shall experience evil and great tribulation in
darkness, nets, and burning flame . . . (1 En. 96.4; 103.58)
The Markan Jesus also fits into that view whereby wealth gets equated
with wickedness (see e.g. CD 4.1519; 1QS 11.12; Ps. Sol. 5.16)
and where you cannot serve God and Mammon (Lk. 16.13/Mt. 6.24).
As an earlier Jewish text put it, if one is excessively rich, he sins
(Ps. Sol. 5.16).
The interpretation of the Torah against those deemed rich is found
elsewhere in the Gospels, most starkly in the parable of the Rich Man
and Lazarus. Here the destitute Lazarus and the opulence of the
rich man are obvious polar opposites. In the afterlife, however, their
positions were reversed: the poor Lazarus gets to be with Abraham
while the rich man suffers fiery torments. There is only one reason
given for this utter reversal of fortunes and that is found in Lk. 16.25:
Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good
things, and Lazarus in like manner evil things; but now he is com-
forted here, and you are in agony. When the rich man wants to warn
his brothers they should not need any warning because it is all there
in scripture. The parable concludes,
He said, Then, father, I beg you to send him to my fathers house
for I have five brothers that he may warn them, so that they will
not also come into this place of torment. Abraham replied, They
have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them. He [the
rich man] said, No, father Abraham; but if someone goes to them
from the dead, they will repent. He said to him, If they do not listen
25
to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if
someone rises from the dead. (Lk. 16.2731)
This should not be understood as a reference to the resurrection for
the simple reason that Lazarus and not Jesus is the one to be sent back
in the way that other figures could be sent back from the dead to warn
the living (cf. 1 Sam. 28.720; Eccl. Rab. 9.10.12).
8
Here, again, we
have the Torah understood to be interpreted from the perspective of the
destitute and those deemed poor and against those deemed wealthy.
SUMMARY
There is far, far more that could be said about the details and the
trends in early Jewish legal interpretation. To re-emphasize: this
chapter is only a brief overview of some of the issues pertinent for the
study of the New Testament. In addition to the importance some Jews
and some non-Jews attached to the Torah as a crucial part of Jewish
identity, we have seen that by the time of the New Testament, devel-
opment and expansion of the biblical commandments was in full
swing. As early as Ezra and Nehemiah we can see application and
creative interpretation to fit new historical and social circumstances,
most notoriously with the issue of mixed marriages and the pure
ethnic seed. With the Maccabean crisis came the emergence of vari-
ous groups at least partly dedicated to the understanding, expansion
and development of the Law in different social and historical circum-
stances. It seems clear that such groups were liable to fall out and
engage in some heated debate, perhaps even violent debate, over the
nature of legal interpretation. One of these groups, the Pharisees,
appear to have been some kind of descendants of those responsible
for the emerging rabbinic movement which has left us with masses
of legal material, much of which is of at least thematic relevance for
comparison with the New Testament. With these general ideas in
mind, we can now turn to more precise legal topics.
26
CHAPTER 2
SABBATH
He [Jesus] respects the Sabbath not because it means going to
church but because it represents a temporary escape from the bur-
den of labor. The Sabbath is about resting not religion. One of the
best reasons for being a Christian, as for being a socialist, is that
you dont like having to work, and reject the fearful idolatry of it
so rife in countries like the United States. Truly civilized societies
do not hold predawn power breakfasts.
Terry Eagleton
1
We could, of course, add Jew to Christian and socialist in the
quotation from Eagleton because Sabbath is a well known day of rest
for Jews, as Eagleton implies when speaking of Jesus. In basic terms
the Jewish day of rest from work is, roughly speaking, Saturday.
More precisely, the day of rest extends from from [Friday] evening
to [Saturday] evening (Lev. 23.32; cf. Neh. 13.19). The observance
within this time frame appears to be assumed in Mk 1.32: That eve-
ning, at sundown, they brought to him all who were sick or possessed
with demons. In other words the people waiting until the Sabbath
was finished before they carried burdens (see below). The Dead Sea
Scrolls retain an extremely precise definition of timing: No-one
should do work on the sixth day, from the moment when the suns
disc is at a distance of its diameter from the gate, for this is what
he said: Observe the Sabbath day to keep it holy (Deut. 5.12) (CD
10.1417).
SABBATH
27
THE DAY OF REST FROM WORK
The key foundational texts for Sabbath observance are Exod. 20.811
and Deut. 5.1215, both in versions of the Ten Commandments.
There is a subtle difference between the two. In Exod. 20.811, the
Sabbath is grounded in Gods activity in Creation: For in six days the
Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them, but rested
the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and con-
secrated it (20.11). In others words, Jews are to rest just like God did
when he created the world. Similar sentiment is emphasized in Exod.
31.1217 where the Sabbath commandment is also, like circumcision,
a sign of the covenant; it is an indication of the relationship between
God and Israel. In Deut. 5.1215, the Sabbath is grounded in Gods
action in the Exodus: Remember that you were a slave in the land of
Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a
mighty hand and an outstretched arm; therefore the Lord your God
commanded you to keep the Sabbath day (5.15). Notice also that in
the Ten Commandments the Sabbath is a day of rest for the whole
of society, the slave, the animal, the child and the resident alien.
Everyone in such contexts has the right to the day off work. The first
century CE Jewish philosopher, Philo, extends this broad view of
society to include nature itself and grounded in a seemingly unusual
principle no one shall touch:
For the rest extends also to every herd and to whatever was made
for the service of man, like slaves serving him who is by nature
their master. It extends also to every kind of tree and plant, for it
does not allow us to cut a shoot, branch or even a leaf, or to pluck
any fruit whatsoever. They are all released and as it were have
freedom on that day, under the general proclamation that no one
shall touch. (Life of Moses 2.22)
But the broad view of society needs qualification. The Sabbath
commandment was, of course, given to the Israelites at Sinai/Horeb.
However, there are different emphases when it comes to Gentiles
28
observing the Sabbath. In the foundational commandment the issue
appears only to a small extent: the resident alien is permitted to
observe the commandment, though so are animals. Isaiah has some
very positive things to say about Gentiles, including comments, for
example, in the context of Sabbath observance: And the foreigners
who join themselves to the Lord, to minister to him, to love the name
of the Lord, and to be his servants, all who keep the Sabbath, and
do not profane, and hold fast my covenant these I will bring to
my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer . . .
(Isa. 56.67). In the eschatological future, From new moon to new
moon, and from Sabbath to Sabbath, all flesh shall come to worship
before me, says the Lord (Isa. 66.23). Around the time of the New
Testament texts, it appears as if there were Gentiles who were attracted
to the idea of a day of rest. As Josephus puts it, though not a little
over-optimistically, humanity
. . . had a great inclination of a long time to follow our religious
observances; for there is not any city of the Greeks, nor any of the
barbarians, nor any nation whatever, where our custom of resting
on the seventh day has not come, and by which our fasts and light-
ing lamps, and many of our prohibitions as to our food, are not
observed. (Apion 2.282)
The Roman satirist Juvenal, in a famous text we saw in the previ-
ous chapter, also suggests certain Gentiles were attracted to the
Sabbath rest but he is not so happy about this: Some who have had a
father who reveres the Sabbath . . . Having been wont to flout the
laws of Rome, they learn and practise and revere the Jewish law . . .
For all which the father was to blame, who gave up every seventh day
to idleness, keeping it apart from all the concerns of life (Juvenal,
Satires 14.96106). On the other hand, there were Jews who thought
Gentiles should not observe the Sabbath. According to Jubilees, a
text dating back to the second century BCE: . . . the creator of all
things blessed it, but he did not hallow all peoples and nations to keep
Sabbath on it, but Israel only: them alone on earth did he allow to eat
SABBATH
29
and drink and keep Sabbath on it (Jub. 2.31). This Jewish only ordi-
nance is also found in rabbinic literature, as in the following example
which deals with the problem of the banned act of carrying a burden
on the Sabbath (see further below):
If a Jew is journeying on the eve of the Sabbath and is overtaken
by nightfall and he has in his hand money or any other object, how
shall he act? The Rabbis have learnt as follows: If nightfall over-
takes a man on the road [on Friday] he hands over his purse to
a non-Jew. And why is it permissible to hand over ones purse to a
non-Jew? Levi said: When the children of Noah were charged
[to observe certain laws], they were given seven Laws only, the
observance of Sabbath not being one of them; therefore have the
Rabbis permitted a Jew to hand over objects to a non-Jew. R. Jose
b. Hanina said: a non-Jew who observes the Sabbath whilst he
is uncircumcised incurs liability for the punishment of death.
Why? Because [non-Jews] were not commanded concerning it . . .
R. Hiyya b. Abba said in the name of R. Johanan . . . the Sabbath
is a [reunion] between Israel and God, as it is said, It is a sign
between Me and the children of Israel (Exod. 31.17); therefore any
non-Jew who, being uncircumcised, thrusts himself between them
incurs the penalty of death . . . (Deut. R. 1.21)
According to biblical Law, the Sabbath could be described as Gods
gift to his people: See! The Lord has given you the Sabbath (Exod.
16.29). There is a similar rabbinic saying attributed to R. Simeon ben
Menasya and presented in the context of the general idea that saving
life overrides the Sabbath (see below), The Sabbath is delivered to
you and you are not delivered to the Sabbath (Mek. Exod. 31.1217;
cf. b. Yoma 85b). This sentiment is also found prior to the New Testa-
ment in Jub. 2.17: he gave us a great sign, the Sabbath day, so that
we might work six days and observe a Sabbath from all work on the
seventh day. We clearly have a similar sentiment attributed to Jesus
in Mk 2.2728: Then he said to them, The Sabbath was made for
humankind and not humankind for the Sabbath; so the Son of Man is
30
lord even of the Sabbath. It is worth pointing out that this might be a
literal translation of the Aramaic idiom son of man which can refer
both to speaker and a broader group of people. If so, Mk 2.2728
would be a piece of classic parallelism whereby the general sentiment
of the Sabbath as a gift to humanity is repeated in 2.28 but also
with reference to Jesus defending the actions of his disciples pluck-
ing grain on the Sabbath (Mk 2.2326) as part of that gift. In the
parallel versions in Lk. 6.16 and Mt. 12.18, Marks generalizing
The Sabbath was made for humankind, and not humankind for the
Sabbath is dropped, presumably designed to make Jesus the supreme
legal interpreter and remove the generalizing reading of son of man
by making the phrase a title for Jesus alone.
As this might already imply, it is one thing to say avoid work on
the Sabbath but another to precisely define what work actually is.
In biblical Law work includes ploughing time and harvest time
(Exod. 34.21) and Israelites must not kindle a fire in any dwelling
(Exod. 35.2). Outside the Pentateuch, Amos 8.5 mentions merchants
avoiding the selling of grain and wheat on the Sabbath even if, accord-
ing to Amos, they cannot wait for the Sabbath to be finished in order
to make a profit and exploit the poor. Jeremiah 17.1927 opposes
commercial activity on the Sabbath with the famous prohibition,
Thus says the Lord: For the sake of your lives, take care that you do
not bear a burden on the Sabbath day or bring it in by the gates
of Jerusalem. And do not carry a burden out of your houses on the
Sabbath or do any work . . . (Jer. 17.2122).
According to Nehemiah 13, it appears that people were acting in
direct contradiction to the commandment not to work and in direct
contradiction to Jeremiahs prohibition of carrying burdens on the
Sabbath. People were treading wine presses on the Sabbath, and
bringing in heaps of grain and loading them on donkeys; and also
wine, grapes, figs and all kinds of burdens, which they brought into
Jerusalem on the Sabbath day; and I warned them at that time against
selling food. Tyrians also, who lived in the city, brought in fish and
all kinds of merchandise and sold them on the Sabbath to the people
SABBATH
31
of Judah, and in Jerusalem (Neh. 13.15). Nehemiah was not pleased
so he rebuked the nobles of Judah: What is this evil thing that you
are doing, profaning the Sabbath day? (Neh. 13.17) So it is clear that
all these activities ought to be banned on the Sabbath for Nehemiah
and Nehemiah does just that. Just before the Sabbath the gates of
Jerusalem were to be shut and reopened when the Sabbath was over.
Guards were put in place to prevent any burdens from being brought
in on the Sabbath and merchants were intimidated.
This background may shed light on one of the references to the
Sabbath in the fifth century BCE Aramaic documents from Elephantine
in Egypt. It may be the case that this unorthodox Jewish military
community observed the restriction of commercial activity and pos-
sibly even the prohibition of carrying of a burden. Someone called
Uriah mentions a shipment that needs to arrive before the Sabbath.
2
In the healing story of Jn 5.118 it looks as if there is a dispute,
among other things, over carrying a burden in general rather than
simply the more specific reasons given in Jeremiah, Nehemiah and
Elephantine. Jesus says to the would-be healed man, Stand up, take
your mat and walk. And then healed man took up his mat and walked.
John then gives the crucial information to contextualize the response
of the Jews: Now that day was a Sabbath. So the Jews said to the
man who had been cured, It is the Sabbath; it is not lawful for you to
carry your mat (Jn 5.810). A similar generalizing frame of refer-
ence for carrying a burden, rather than simply an economic frame of
reference, is reflected in Mk 1.32 where the people reflect the view of
the Jews of Johns Gospel in that there is waiting for sundown and
the end of the Sabbath before carrying the sick. In other words, there
is the assumption that carrying sick people not acceptable on the
Sabbath.
In early Judaism, the avoidance of carrying a burden out of a house
appears to have been followed, at least in major texts, and in some
very creative ways. Jubilees simply reiterates: And they shall not
bring in or take out anything from one house to another on that day
[the Sabbath] . . . (Jub. 2.30). Perhaps most famously, the issue of
32
carrying a burden out of a house was an issue of some controversy
between Pharisees and Sadducees. As ever, we might want to think of
the discussion in terms of a question arising out of a new situation:
what if you want to eat with friends nearby? One ingenious solution
was to think of ways in which it was understood that one courtyard
could be interwoven with another courtyard so that the two court-
yards become one (generally called an erub) and so any problems
of carrying food from one household to another household were
effectively overcome. There is a rabbinic tractate called Erubin dedi-
cated to such issues and it thereby allowed different households
to celebrate the Sabbath together. It also seems as if the Sadducees
were associated with a position that did not accept such a concept,
at least it appears to be assumed in the following passage: Said
Rabban Gamaliel, A Sadducean lived with us in the same alleyway
in Jerusalem. And father said to us, Make haste and bring all sorts of
utensils into the alleyway before he brings out his and prohibits you
[from carrying about in it] (m. Erub. 6.2).
PRECISELY WHAT IS WORK?
In terms of precise definitions of what constituted work in early
Judaism, we find a range of suggestions. One of the most famous
definitions of work from early Judaism is the rabbinic 39 prohibitions
(m. Shab. 7.2) which include, grinding, shearing wool, weaving, tying
and untying, hunting and preparing a deer, building, hitting with a
hammer and so on. The Damascus Document (CD), found among the
Dead Sea Scrolls, lays out a range of practices which constitute
work. In CD 1012 we have prohibitions of, for instance, saying a
useless or stupid word, lending, speaking about the next days work,
sending a foreigner to do work in place, open a sealed vessel, helping
an animal give birth, using a rope or utensil to help someone who has
fallen into a place of water and so on. Whereas the Mishnah rulings
may look to many of us like fairly obvious expansions to include
different types of work, the CD rulings are more precise still in ways
SABBATH
33
that do not always seem like obvious cases of work and contain cases
of future work even if no present work is actually being carried out.
On the subject of animals, there were some fairly strict rulings,
such as CD 11.1213: No-one should help an animal give birth on
the Sabbath. And if (it falls) into a well or a pit, he should not take
it out on the Sabbath. This appears to have been a radical view.
Mt. 12.1112 argues that animals may be assisted on the Sabbath and
assumes a position with which the opponents of Jesus would agree:
Suppose one of you has only one sheep and it falls into a pit on the
Sabbath; will you not lay hold of it and lift it out? How much more
valuable is a human being than a sheep! So it is lawful to do good on
the Sabbath. At the very least we have echoes of a similar position
from later rabbinic literature: They do not deliver the young of cattle
on the festival, but they help out (m. Shabb. 18.3). Clearly, then,
Jesus (or the Lukan Jesus), Pharisees and later rabbinic literature can
make assumptions that animals can be helped on the Sabbath, a view
unsurprisingly practical in a largely agrarian world. To highlight the
radical nature of CD, animals were not the only ones who could suf-
fer if they fell into dangerous places; humans too. So CD 11.16, And
any living man who falls into a place of water or into a <reservoir>,
no-one should take him out with a ladder or rope or a utensil. That
this was also an extreme view is shown by the common view that any
doubt about saving life, which, as we will see, includes related con-
texts much less dangerous than those proposed by CD, always
overrules the Sabbath.
We might also note that Josephus refers to the Sabbath practices
of the Essenes which have close similarities with CD, perhaps no
surprise if the Essenes were behind a text such as CD: they are
stricter than any other of the Jews in resting from their labours on the
seventh day; for they not only get their food ready the day before, that
they may not be obliged to kindle a fire on that day, but they will not
move any vessel out of its place, nor go to stool thereon (War 2.147).
Jubilees is likewise similar to CD in many ways. A notable parallel is
that both CD and Jubilees (50.8) do not allow speaking about matters
34
of work or of the task to be carried out on the following day. Jubilees
provides numerous Sabbath prohibitions (Jub. 2.1733; 50.613). In
addition to those just noted and those in Scripture, these prohibitions
include: avoiding sex on the Sabbath (because this is work!), tilling
the field, loading an animal, travelling by ship, hunting and slaughter-
ing an animal, war and so on. Notice, as ever, that this is believed to
be a view which is as authoritative as possible: . . . the man who does
any of these things on the Sabbath shall die, so that the sons of Israel
may observe the Sabbaths in accordance with the commandments
concerning the Sabbath of the land, as it is written on the tablets
which he gave into my hands to write out for you the laws of the
seasons . . . (50.13).
Of particular relevance to Mk 2.2328 and parallels the dispute
over Jesus disciples plucking grain on the Sabbath is the following
prohibition from the Damascus Document: No-one is to eat on the
Sabbath day except what has been prepared; and from what is lost in
the field he should not eat, nor should he drink except of what there
is in the camp (CD 10.2223). It seems as if only food prepared
before the Sabbath can be eaten and this includes a prohibition of
anything edible which has dropped to the floor in a field. There are
similar lines of thinking elsewhere in early Judaism. From the book
of Jubilees, which has some close connections with the people
responsible for the Dead Sea Scrolls, we read: . . . they [the sons of
Israel] should not prepare on it [the Sabbath] anything to eat or drink
that they have not prepared for themselves already in their homes on
the sixth day (Jub. 2.29). In the above cited passage from Philo,
recall that plucking fruit was not permitted on the otherwise unknown
principle that no one should touch. Presumably someone like Philo
would have sided with the scribes and Pharisees against Jesus and his
disciples in the debate over plucking grain recorded in Mk 2.2328.
From later rabbinic literature we have a passage which potentially
illuminates the dispute in Mk 2.2328 and parallels: Six rules did the
men of Jericho make . . . For three the Sages criticized them . . . [2]
they eat on the Sabbath fruit which had fallen under a tree . . .
SABBATH
35
(m. Pesahim 4.8). If there is a connection between the Pharisees and
the early rabbis then this passage further explains why (the Markan)
Jesus was questioned about the behaviour of his disciples. From the
perspective of Jesus opponents, plucking grain was something close
to work, even though plucking is not more precisely recorded
as being an issue until the time of the Tosefta (t. Shab. 9.17; cf. y.
Shab. 7.2), though even here it is not technically plucking grain.
However, notice that m. Pesahim 4.8 implies that there are two
sides to the story. Clearly the men of Jericho thought it acceptable
on the Sabbath to eat fruit which had fallen under a tree. Here we are
in the territory of disputes over interpretation or expansion of biblical
Law because we should not forget that there is no biblical prohibition
of picking up fruit, or indeed plucking grain, on the Sabbath. In fact
early rabbinic literature shows that debates over what constituted
work were still recorded despite the 39 prohibitions. The first century
House of Shammai, for example, was recorded as not permitting nets
spread to catch animals, birds, or fish unless there was time for them
to be caught before the Sabbath, whereas the House of Hillel permit-
ted it (m. Shab. 1.6). A certain Rabbi Eleazar was involved in disputes
over details of Sabbath observance, as indeed he was over various
interpretations of the Law. According to another passage from the
tractate Shabbat, Honeycombs which one broke on the eve of the
Sabbath and [the honey] came out on its own they are prohibited.
R. Eleazar permits [the use of honey on the Sabbath] (m. Shab. 22.1)
Similarly, one Eliezer is reported to have said that if someone scraped
honey from a beehive on the Sabbath he is culpable whereas the Sages
disagreed (m. Sheb. 10.7/m. Uq. 3.10).
It is worth noting that Christianity would eventually not become
associated with Sabbath observance and shift the idea of the Lords
Day to Sunday. Such issues were certainly present in the first century
and no doubt were a significant contribution to Christians identifying
themselves over against Judaism and non-Christians identifying
Christianity as something distinctive from Judaism. Most notably, in
Romans it seems that Paul tries to bring together those still observing
36
the Sabbath and those no longer observing the Sabbath: Some judge
one day to be better than another, while others judge all days to be
alike. Let all be fully convinced in their own minds. Those who
observe the day, observe it in honour of the Lord (Rom. 14.56).
In more polemical contexts, Paul seems to be alluding to Sabbath
observance and does not appear to be in favour of it if it means
placing too much emphasis on it in terms of salvation and identity:
Now, however, that you have come to know God, or rather to be
known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and beg-
garly elemental spirits? How can you want to be enslaved to them
again? You are observing special days, and months, and seasons, and
years. I am afraid that my work for you may have been wasted (Gal.
4.911). This may not be too far removed from the sentiments in
Romans when Paul says that if it is to be observed in a Christian
context it is done in honour of the Lord. But from this perspective, the
importance of dedication to Sabbath observance has effectively been
undermined as it is still no longer required. Whether written by Paul
or not, this is effectively confirmed in Colossians: Therefore do not
let anyone condemn you in matters of food and drink or of observing
festivals, new moons, or Sabbaths. Which are a shadow of things to
come; but the body is of Christ . . . (Col. 2.1617).
EXEMPTIONS
Although there were disputed details, there were also widely held
exemptions from the prohibition of work. Priests, for instance, had
to work on the Sabbath and this is rooted in biblical Law. Numbers
28.910 commands the following: On the Sabbath day: two male
lambs a year old without blemish, and two tenths of an ephah of choice
flour for a grain offering, mixed with oil, and its drink offering this
is the burnt offering for every Sabbath, in addition to the regular burnt
offering and its drink offering. Surely this was work, and surely the
priests deserve stoning to death by the logic of biblical Sabbath Law
(Num. 15.3236)! Emphatically not, say early Jewish sources. Yes,
priestly activity on the Sabbath was technically work but it was an
SABBATH
37
acceptable exception. In Jubilees we get a strong defence of the
priestly activity:
. . . rest on it from all the work men have to do, except burn frank-
incense and present offerings and sacrifices in the Lords presence
every day and every Sabbath. This work alone shall be done on
the Sabbath days in the sanctuary of the Lord your God. (Jub.
50.1011)
Similarly in the Damascus Document we get the following: No-one
should offer anything upon the altar on the Sabbath, except the sacri-
fice of the Sabbath, for it is thus written, except your offerings of
the Sabbath [Lev. 23.38] (CD 11.1718). In Matthews version
of the dispute over plucking grain on the Sabbath we find an addi-
tional argument used to defend the disciples actions which assume
the validity of priestly work: . . . have you not read in the law that on
the Sabbath the priests in the Temple break the Sabbath and yet are
guiltless? (Mt. 12.5).
In the dispute over plucking of grain, Mark (followed by Matthew
and Luke) also mentions the actions of a hungry David and his com-
panions (1 Sam. 21) in relation to priestly activity: He [David] entered
the house of God, when Abiathar was high priest, and ate the bread of
the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and he
gave some to his companions (Mk 2.26). While not mentioned explic-
itly by Mark, and no doubt assumed, this refers to some of the priestly
activities on the Sabbath. The bread of the presence, or shewbread,
is changed on the Sabbath and eaten by priests. As Leviticus puts it,
Every Sabbath day he will arrange it before the Lord continually on
behalf of the children of Israel as an eternal covenant. And it will be for
Aaron and for his sons and they will eat it in a holy place (Lev. 24.89).
Josephus gives us further detail of this priestly Sabbath practice where
the bread of the Presence is changed every Sabbath:
. . . they were baked the day before the Sabbath, but were brought
into the holy place on the morning of the Sabbath, and set upon the
38
holy table, six on a heap, one loaf still standing opposite one
another; where two golden cups full of frankincense were also set
upon them, and there they remained till another Sabbath, and then
other loaves were brought in their stead, while the loaves were
given to the priests for their food, and the frankincense was burnt
in that sacred fire wherein all their offerings were burnt also; and
so other frankincense was set upon the loaves instead of what was
there before. (Ant. 3.255256; cf. 1 Chron. 9.32; m. Sukk. 5.78;
m. Menah. 11.7; b. Pesah. 47a)
A prominent exception to working on the Sabbath was made in
the case of danger to life. According to m. Yoma 8.6, Further did
R. Mattiah b. Harash say, He who has a pain in his throat they
drop medicine into his mouth on the Sabbath, because it is a matter
of doubt as to danger to life. And any matter of doubt as to a danger
to life overrides the prohibitions of the Sabbath. This principle of
saving life or even any doubts concerning danger to life was
known long before the Mishnah. It appears that Mk 3.4 shows aware-
ness of the principle of saving life in the context of Jesus healings:
Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath, to save life or
to kill? This principle seems to have been developed even earlier,
around the time of the Maccabean crisis. Antiochus commander,
Apollonius, went to Jerusalem and pretended that he had peaceful
intentions. He simply waited until the Sabbath before massacring
large amounts of people. Judas Maccabeus and his gang escaped and
lived in the wild (2 Macc. 5.2427). According to the story, Mattathias,
Judas Maccabeus father, realized that some alternative decision had
to be taken otherwise the situation was going to get desperate:
If we do as our kindred have done and refuse to fight with the gen-
tiles for our lives and for our ordinances, they will quickly destroy
us from the earth. (1 Macc. 2.40)
This is the decision they made: Let us fight against anyone who
comes to attack us on the Sabbath day; let us not die as our kindred
SABBATH
39
died in their hiding places (1 Macc. 2.41). However, not everybody
necessarily accepted this logic. We might recall Jub. 50.1213: . . .
any man who does work on it . . . who fasts or makes war on the
day of the Sabbath, let the man who does any of these on the day of
the Sabbath die. However, fighting if attacked does appear to have
been a widespread view in early Judaism. When the Romans under
Pompey attacked Jerusalem in 63 BCE they did not attack on the
Sabbath because, as Josephus comments, the Jews only acted defen-
sively on Sabbath days. Instead, in a smart move, the Romans set up
their military machinery which they otherwise would not have been
able to do on any other day without the obligatory retaliation (War
1.145147).
If work has to be defined then perhaps it is no surprise that danger
to life was interpreted in different ways. Moreover, rabbinic literature
even allows ways of healing by default if certain healing methods
are not permitted on the Sabbath. In the following passage, direct
application of the medicinal is not allowed but if it just so happened
that the medicinal were included in a more mundane practice . . .
He who is concerned about his teeth may not suck vinegar through
them. But he dunks [his bread] in the normal way, and if he is
healed, he is healed. He who is concerned about his loins [which
give him pain], he may not anoint them with wine or vinegar. But
he anoints with oil not with rose oil. Princes [on the Sabbath],
anoint themselves with rose oil on their wounds, since it is their
way to do so on ordinary days. R. Simeon says, All Israelites are
princes. (m. Shab. 14.4; see also t. Shab. 12.14)
In Mk 3.16 and parallels, Jesus extended the principle of saving life
overruling the Sabbath to include his healings. Here Jesus heals a
man with a withered hand and defends his actions against Pharisees
with the classic argument of saving life: Is it lawful to do good or to
do harm on the Sabbath, to save life or to kill?(Mk 3.4). According
to Mark, the Pharisees really do not like this interpretation, so much
so that they are reported to have sought ways to kill him (Mk 3.6).
40
Of course, the dispute in Mk 3.16 can be read as part of a broader
dispute between Jesus and his opponents (and it does follow directly
on from another Sabbath dispute over plucking grain) rather than
simply just a dispute over healing alone.
The extension of the principle that saving life overrules the
Sabbath to include healings is found in stories particular to Luke. In
Lk. 13.1017 Jesus heals a woman who was unable to stand upright
for 18 years. The synagogue leader takes the position that such curing
is not allowed on the Sabbath while Jesus interprets the releasing of
the woman from what he sees as the bondage of Satan an acceptable
act by reference to another halakic argument: Does not each of you
on the Sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger, and lead
it away to give it water? (Lk. 13.15). This reference to untying
animals and leading them to water assumes a position which was held
by legal interpreters from different perspectives. While there were
rabbinic discussions about the tying and untying of different knots
on the Sabbath (m. Shab. 7.2; 15.1), the various positions relating to
cattle going out on the Sabbath is recorded in some detail (m. Shab.
5.14; m. Erub. 2.14). In such passages we get mention or assump-
tion of the reference to the Sabbath limit, which is mentioned
elsewhere in Erubin (4.5), and is 2000 cubits, approximately the
equivalent of 1000 yards or 915 metres.
3
Presumably there was a non-
exceeding of a Sabbath limit assumed in the dispute in a cornfield
over the plucking of the grain in Mk 2.2328. Here we might also
note that even the stricter views from the Dead Sea Scrolls provide
scope for cattle within the Sabbath limit: No-one should go after an
animal to pasture it outside his city, except for two-thousand cubits
(CD 11.56).
With these texts in mind, the logic of the argument given by the
Lukan Jesus in Lk. 13.15 is to have a general point of agreement on
the issue of leading out cattle on the Sabbath and then claim that if
this can be agreed upon then should not the release of the woman be
celebrated? Unfortunately, we are not given the response of the syna-
gogue leader!
SABBATH
41
In contrast, Luke claims that scribes and Pharisees had no answer
to a related argument given by Jesus when he healed a man with
dropsy (Lk. 14.16): If one of you has a child or an ox that has
fallen into a well, will you not immediately pull it out on a Sabbath
day? (Lk. 14.6). While this was, as we have seen, a position which
might not have easily been agreed with the writers of CD, it does
assume a position with which Pharisees would have agreed. Here we
are back in the realm of saving life overruling the Sabbath and how
Jesus is presented as seeing his healings as a development of this
principle.
PENALTIES FOR SABBATH-BREAKING
According to biblical Law, the punishment for breaking the Sabbath
commandment was, in theory, death. Exodus is explicit: For six
days shall work be done, but on the seventh day you shall have a holy
Sabbath of solemn rest to the Lord; whoever does any work on it shall
be put to death (Exod. 35.2). In Num. 15.3236 a man was stoned
to death for gathering sticks on the Sabbath. Jub. 2.2527 also
endorses the death penalty for breaking the Sabbath, leaving no room
for ambiguity: . . . let them guard this day . . . and not do any work
therein . . . Anyone who pollutes it let him surely die. And anyone
who will do any work therein, let him surely die forever so that the
children of Israel might guard this day throughout their generations
and not be uprooted from the land . . . Despite such warnings, how-
ever, there is no evidence whatsoever of people being put to death for
breaking the Sabbath and the difficulty of undertaking such an act
might be echoed in Mk 3.6, The Pharisees went out and immediately
conspired with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him. In
addition to the legal difficulties of putting some to death for such
matters, a possible reason why no one appears to have been put to
death is that too many Jews were not observing the Sabbath in ways
deemed correct and so many people would have had to have been put
to death. Perhaps destitute Jews and Jewish slaves had little choice
42
but to work on the Sabbath. Journeying on the Sabbath is not allowed
and would potentially have kept at least some Jews from serving
in armies (cf. Ant. 13.251252). Josephus writes about dismissals
of those Jews who were Roman citizens, and were wont to observe
the rites of the Jewish religion, on account of their religion (Ant.
14.237). Notice, however, the qualification of not simply Jews who
were Roman citizens but also those prepared to follow their practices.
Presumably this implies that there were Jews who did, for instance,
serve in the armies and were not wont to observe their religious duties
so strictly.
Even the strictest group in Second Temple Judaism those respon-
sible for the Dead Sea Scrolls decided to go for imprisonment and
appear to directly contradict the biblical commandment:
But everyone who goes astray, defiling the Sabbath and the festi-
vals, shall not be executed, for it is the task of men to guard him;
and if he is cured of it, they shall guard him for seven years and
afterwards he may enter the assembly . . . (CD 12.36)
In rabbinic literature we get the view of deliberate and unintentional
Sabbath violations with further technicalities: He who profanes the
Sabbath in regard to a matter, on account of the deliberate doing
of which they are liable to extirpation, and on account of the inadver-
tent doing of which they are liable to a sin offering (m. Sanh. 7.8).
This is further developed in the Jerusalem Talmud where the idea
of giving warning is suggested. Notice here that, along with the
distinction between advertent and inadvertent, warning is required
making it increasingly more difficult to shift towards the death penalty.
Moreover, the first warning was presumably designed to encourage
observance. The warning may even have been present in the first
century and underlying Marks recording of Sabbath disputes. If
we read Mk 2.233.6 as a continuous whole (and remember there
were no chapter and verse divisions in the earliest versions of the
New Testament) we can observe that from the perspective of Jesus
SABBATH
43
opponents (though not necessarily from the perspective of Jesus
himself) Jesus endorses the deliberate breaking and engages in the
deliberate breaking of the Sabbath prohibition of work. This ends in
Jesus opponents conspiring to kill him (Mk 3.6) and notice Mk 3.2:
They watched him to see whether he would cure him on the Sabbath
so that they might accuse him.
4
CONCLUDING REMARKS
The Sabbath, the day of rest, was the sixth day and lasted from Friday
evening to Saturday evening and was seen as Gods gift to Israel.
According to biblical Law, the Sabbath should be a day of rest for all
of society, including animals, and figures such as Philo interpreted
this to mean the whole of creation. The observance of the Sabbath
became particularly associated with Jews in the ancient world and
attracted both non-Jewish interest and non-Jewish scorn. Much effort
was devoted to defining precisely what work might be. Biblical
Law only gives a handful of examples and this led to broader defini-
tions, including the famous rabbinic 39 prohibitions. Details were, as
ever, disputed: from whether it was acceptable to merge courtyards to
overcome problems of carrying food from one household to another
to whether it was acceptable to fight on the Sabbath, from whether
it was acceptable to pick fruit from the ground to spreading nets
in advance of the Sabbath to catch animals, birds or fish. There
were also exemptions from the Sabbath rest, such as priestly work.
However, the most famous exemption is the principle of saving life
overruling the Sabbath. More practically, it seems as if there was
an avoidance of the death penalty for breaking the Sabbath with
solutions ranging from seven-year imprisonment to warnings and
distinctions made between intentional and unintentional actions.
The New Testament shows a range of views on Sabbath observance.
Synoptic Gospel tradition fits neatly into the range of Jewish views
outlined here in that they are fairly typical debating of the details.
Johns Gospel, however, appears to endorse carrying a burden on
44
Sabbath which is, more or less, directly against biblical Law. This
sort of attitude is echoed in Pauls letters where at least some people
associated with the Christian movement were not observing Sabbath
at all.
45
CHAPTER 3
PURITY AND FOOD
INTRODUCTION: IMPURITY
Issues relating to pure and impure (or clean and unclean) are arguably
the most complex in Jewish Law. In the most basic terms we can say
that impurity (or uncleanness) stands in contrast to purity (or clean-
ness). Lev. 10.10 gives further help: You are to distinguish between
the holy and the common, the unclean and the clean. Quite what
impurity might be is not entirely clear but some definition as general
as the following might help: impurity is a kind of unseen contamina-
tion.
1
The laws of purity and impurity are explained in the biblical
Law, especially in Leviticus 1115. Many purity laws are associated
with the Temple and the priesthood. This is significant because God
was said to dwell in the Temple and so the closer to the Temple a
believer was, the more concern for purity laws they must have. It may
be the case that priests do not necessarily have to have a blanket
avoidance of corpse impurity when not working in the Temple. As
Leviticus put it . . .
The Lord said to Moses: Speak to the priests, the sons of Aaron,
and say to them: No one shall defile himself for a dead person
among his relatives/people, except for his nearest kin: his mother,
his father, his son, his daughter, his brother; likewise, for a virgin
sister, close to him because she has had no husband, he may defile
himself for her. (Lev. 21.13)
46
While God might not like impurity, it was accepted that people will
become impure and so regulations were in place to make sure people
could become pure again. There were a number of different ways
of contracting impurity and a number of ways to become pure
again. In some cases, this would involve the most defiling of all impu-
rities: corpse impurity. According to biblical Law, removal of corpse
impurity included the uses of the ashes of a red heifer and water of
cleansing for sprinkling (Numbers 19). Compare the summary given
by Philo:
And again, in the case of persons who have gone into the house in
which any one has died, the law enjoins that no one shall touch
them until they have both washed their bodies and also the gar-
ments in which they were clothed, and, in a word, it looks upon all
the furniture and all the vessels, and everything which is in the
house, as unclean and polluted. (Spec. Leg. 3.206)
A potentially important passage for the New Testament involves the
case of anyone who sits on an object upon which a man with a dis-
charge has sat, has to wash their clothing, immerse themselves, and
wait until sunset to become clean again (Lev. 15.46). Jesus contact
with the woman with a 12-year bleeding problem in Mk 5.2534
could have involved issues of impurity and the transmission of impu-
rity as she is healed by touching Jesus cloak. Leviticus 15.1924,
2527 says that if someone comes into contact with a woman with a
regular discharge they are impure until the evening and if someone
comes into contact with something upon which such a woman sits or
lies he shall wash his clothes, and bathe in water, and be unclean
until the evening (Lev. 15.1924) and anyone who comes into con-
tact with anything a woman with a discharge of blood for many days,
not during her usual time, sits upon shall wash his clothes, and bathe
in water, and be unclean until the evening (Lev. 15.2527).
The case of what is often called leprosy involves something else.
For a start we need to qualify the term leprosy because it is not the
PURITY AND FOOD
47
equivalent of what we now call leprosy as it is clear from the bibli-
cal texts that clothes and houses, as well as people, could get leprosy
(Leviticus 1314). Whoever got this infection, or whatever it might
be, has to shout unclean, unclean and live outside settled society
until the infection has gone (Lev. 13.4546). If the infection goes,
or when they are clean, they are to be inspected by a priest and the
priest will declare them clean, accompanied by a lengthy sacrificial
procedure involving, among other things, birds and lambs, along
with, among other things, shaving and immersion by the one cured.
We can see the brief outline of this procedure in Mk 1.4045. The
infected man is deemed clean after Jesus heals him and then is sent to
the priest to be officially declared clean:
A leper came to him begging him, and kneeling he said to him,
If you choose, you can make me clean. And moved with compas-
sion, He stretched out His hand, and touched him, and said to him,
I am willing; be cleansed. Immediately the leprosy left him, and
he was made . . . See that you say nothing to anyone; but go, show
yourself to the priest, and offer for your cleansing what Moses
commanded, as a testimony to them. (Mk 1.4042, 44)
By the first century, there was a range of expansions and interpre-
tations of these purity laws to encompass much of everyday life.
However, the role of contracting impurity in the case of an abandoned
corpse was up for debate. Compare the following passage:
A high priest and a Nazir do not contract corpse uncleanness on
account of [burying even] their close relatives. But they do contract
corpse uncleanness on account of a neglected corpse. [If] they were
going along the way and found a neglected corpse R. Eliezer
says, Let a high priest contract corpse uncleanness, but let a Nazir
not contract corpse uncleanness. And the Sages say, Let a Nazir
contract corpse uncleanness, but let a high priest not contract
corpse uncleanness. (m. Nazir 7.1)
48
Some have even argued, Jesus position according to Lukes telling
of the parable of the Good Samaritan (Lk. 10.2537) would have
Jesus closer to the position of Rabbi Eliezer while the character of
the Priest (Levites were not prohibited in biblical Law from contract-
ing corpse impurity) was more closely aligned with the position
of the Sages, though this could be academic as the idea that the
Lukan passage even concerns issues of purity and impurity has been
vigorously disputed. We should also qualify this by pointing out
that the Mishnah talks more specifically of the High Priest and not
an ordinary priest of the sort we find in the parable of the Good
Samaritan.
There has been some, often fierce, debate over whether this expan-
sion of purity laws was a form of people trying to behave as often as
possible like priests serving in Temple, and much depends on how
literally we take the language of purity associated with the priesthood
(and how much emphasis is placed on like in like priests serving in
the Temple). A seemingly extreme version of this view would be that
the whole land ought to be treated as if it were just as pure and holy
as the Temple and some have attributed this view to the Pharisees. On
the other hand, critics of this view have argued that it is impossible
for people to behave like priests in the Temple when outside the
Temple. It might be easy enough for a priest to avoid corpses and
menstruating women when working in the Temple but would this
have been so easy in everyday life? Moreover, some of the purity
laws which interested people at the time of Jesus were not necessarily
priestly, such as those relating to sex and menstruating women. How-
ever, if we do not take the language of behaving like a priest too
strongly and accept that certain people, including certain Pharisees,
dedicated to purity outside the Temple were perhaps imitating priests
to some extent then we might be on to something.
2

A related issue and notable development of the purity laws is the
thinking and practice of the Essenes, who clearly saw their commu-
nity in priestly terms and strictly maintained a state of purity as often
as possible. Compare the following description from Josephus:
PURITY AND FOOD
49
. . . they assemble themselves together again into one place; and
when they have clothed themselves in white veils, they then bathe
their bodies in cold water. And after this purification is over, they
all meet together in an apartment of their own, into which it is not
permitted to any of another sect to enter; while they go, after a
pure manner, into the dining room, as into a certain holy temple . . .
but a priest says grace before the meal; and it is unlawful for any-
one to taste of the food before grace is said. The same priest, when
he has dined, says grace again after the meal; and when they begin,
and when they end, they praise God, as he that bestows their food
upon them; after which they lay aside their [white] garments, and
betake themselves to their labours again till the evening . . . Now
after the time of their preparatory trial is over, they are divided into
four classes; and so far are the juniors inferior to the seniors, that
if the seniors should be touched by the juniors, they must wash
themselves as if they had intermixed themselves with the company
of a foreigner. (War 2.129131, 150)
As we have seen in passing, the dominant explanation for the question
of who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls is that they were Essenes. One of
the reasons for this is that there appears to be a very similar role on
issues of purity and the purity of the community in the Scrolls where
meals were eaten in a state of purity. Whatever explanation we choose
for the authorship of the Scrolls, the idea of a pure priestly commu-
nity is clear enough, most strikingly in the Community Rule (1QS):
This is the rule for the men of the community . . . They should keep
apart from the congregation of the men of justice in order to con-
stitute a Community in law and possessions, and acquiesce to the
authority of the sons of Zadok, the priests who safeguard the
covenant . . . He shall swear a binding oath to revert to the Law of
Moses, according to all that he commanded, with whole heart and
whole soul, in compliance with all that has been revealed of it to
the sons of Zadok, the priests who keep the covenant and interpret
50
his will . . . He should not go into the waters to share in the pure
food of the men of holiness, for one is not cleansed unless one
turns away from ones wickedness, for he is unclean among all
the transgressors of his word . . . (1QS 5.12, 89, 13, 14)
Archaeological evidence has shown that immersion pools for the
removal of impurity were present throughout first century Palestine.
The importance of immersion pools (sg. miqweh; pl. miqwaoth) is
grounded in biblical Law. We have already mentioned cases in
Leviticus 15 of people having to immerse themselves and wait until
sunset. The water should be, according to Leviticus 15, fresh water
(Lev. 15.13). According to Leviticus 11, a spring or a cistern holding
water shall be clean (Lev. 11.36). In addition to people, a variety of
utensils (kelim) had to be immersed in precise cases (Lev. 11.3233;
15.12) and we will return to these issues shortly.
The concern for immersion was expanded and interpreted in early
Judaism and a whole rabbinic tractate, Miqwaoth, is dedicated to the
very issue. It also seems as if certain Jews were concerned to eat their
ordinary food in a state of purity and immerse themselves. There is
a possible hint of this in the book of Judith:
. . . and sent this message to Holofernes: Let my lord now give
orders to allow your servant to go out and pray. So Holofernes
commanded his guards not to hinder her. She remained in the
camp three days. She went out each night to the valley of Bethulia,
and bathed at the spring in the camp. After bathing, she prayed the
Lord God of Israel to direct her way for the triumph of his people.
Then she returned purified and stayed in the tent until she ate her
food toward evening. On the fourth day Holofernes held a banquet
for his personal attendants only, and did not invite any of his
officers. (Judith 12.610)
In Marks Gospel, we read, according to some translations, they do
not eat anything from the market unless they wash it. However, an
PURITY AND FOOD
51
alternative translation is when they come from the market-place,
they do not eat unless they immerse themselves. Grammatically, by
far the best way to translate this verse is in terms of bodily immersion
but there is an additional, but no less important, cultural argument:
there are numerous examples of bodily immersion from earliest
Judaism and, as far as I am aware, there are no examples of washing
food in the context of hand-washing. The bringing together of wash-
ing hands and immersion before a bodily meal and attributing it to
a Pharisaic (and indeed broader) practice is reflected in rabbinic lit-
erature. This is a complex area of study so it is worth discussing both
washing hands and bodily immersion separately before seeing how
they are both connected with eating.
WASHING HANDS
Washing hands before ordinary food is documented in rabbinic litera-
ture in the sense that it is an assumed practice even if the details are
disputed. Put quite simply in one passage from the Mishnah, They
wash the hands for unconsecrated food . . . (m. Hag. 2.5). But why
wash hands before an ordinary meal for reason other than basic hygiene?
Here we need to move into arguably the most complex area of all: the
transmission of impurity from unwashed hands to food to eater.
3

The transmission of impurity according to rabbinic literature is
based on a graded system of impurity. A father of impurity is a scrip-
tural source of impurity, such as a menstruating woman or a leper,
and can render something impure in the first degree (or first remove
from the scriptural source). Something rendered impure in the first
degree can then render something impure in the second degree
(or second remove from the scriptural source) and something in the
second degree can then render something else impure in the third
degree and, finally, something impure in the third degree can then
render something impure in the fourth degree. Certain objects can
only be susceptible to certain degrees of impurity. Typically, only
things associated with the priesthood and Temple were susceptible to
52
third and fourth degree impurity due to their particularly holy nature.
Hands were conventionally susceptible to impurity in the second
degree while food was only able to be made unclean by a father of
impurity or something of first degree impurity:
He who pokes his hands into a house afflicted with nega (lep-
rosy) his hands are in the first remove of uncleanness, the
words of R. Aqiba. And sages say, His hands are in the second
remove of uncleanness. Whoever imparts uncleanness to clothing,
when in contact [with them] imparts uncleanness to the hands
So that they are in the first remove of uncleanness. Said they to
R. Aqiba, When do we find that the hands are in the first remove
of uncleanness under any circumstances whatsoever? He said to
them, And how is it possible for them to be in the first remove
of uncleanness without his bodys [being] made unclean, outside
of the present case?
Food and utensils which have been made unclean by liquids
impart uncleanness to the hands so that they are in the second
remove of uncleanness, the words of R. Joshua.
And the sages say, That which is made unclean by a Father of
Uncleanness imparts uncleanness to the hands. [That which has
been made unclean] by an Offspring of Uncleanness does not
impart uncleanness to the hands. (m. Yad. 3.1)
. . . the third remove is clean for unconsecrated food . . . (m. T. Yom
4.1, 3)
In terms of hand-washing before ordinary meals, it would seem as
if we have a problem with this logic because impure hands (assumed
to be second degree impure) cannot make food impure. Thus, impure
hands by themselves cannot make food impure and so, according to
this logic, why bother washing hands if it makes no difference? Here
liquids become extremely important in the transmission of impurity.
PURITY AND FOOD
53
The importance of liquids in the transmission of impurity has a bibli-
cal basis. In Lev. 11.3234, 38 we read:
And anything upon which any of them falls when they are dead
shall be unclean, whether an article of wood or cloth or skin or
sacking, any article that is used for any purpose; it shall be dipped
into water, and it shall be unclean until the evening, and then
it shall be clean. And if any of them falls into any earthen vessel,
all that is in it shall be unclean, and you shall break the vessel.
Any food that could be eaten shall be unclean if water from any
such vessel comes upon it; and any liquid that could be drunk
shall be unclean if it was in any such vessel . . . but if water is
put on the seed and any part of their carcass falls on it, it is unclean
for you.
The concept of water put on was developed further by the time of
rabbinic literature, most notably in the rabbinic tractate Makshirin.
In rabbinic literature it becomes clear that liquids have an intensify-
ing function in the transmission of impurity. In a famous and much
discussed passage (and one to which we will return), attributed to
the first century houses of Hillel and Shammai, the Mishnah records
that the House of Shammai say, They wash the hands then mix the
cup whereas the House of Hillel say, They mix the cup then wash
the hands (m. Ber. 8.2). The role of liquids underlies the dispute in
this passage and this is made explicit in the version in the Tosefta
where the House of Shammais order of washing hands then mixing
the cup is explained: lest liquids on the outer surface of the cup
become impure through contact with hands and in turn render the
cup impure (t. Ber. 5.26).
In terms of hands and food, this meant that something of second
degree impurity, such as impure hands, could pass on impurity to
ordinary food: this one [food] says [to liquid], The things which made
you unclean could not have made me unclean but you have made me
unclean (m. Parah 8.7; cf. m. Zab. 5.12; m. Hul. 2.5; b. Hul. 33a).
54
Rabbinic literature also gives us a range of liquids which defile such
as dew, water, wine, oil, blood, milk and honey (m. Maksh. 6.4), all
of which are directly relevant to the meal table. Rabbinic literature
gives practical examples of the transmission of impurity from hands
to food via a liquid. Compare, for instance, the following: He who
slaughters a beast, a wild animal, or fowl, from which blood did
not exude they are valid. And they are eaten with dirty hands,
because they have not been made susceptible to uncleanness by
blood (m. Hul. 2.5). This involves the slaughtering of wild animals,
and thus ordinary, non-priestly, food, and the blood acts as a conduc-
tor for impurity. If there is no blood, the animal may be eaten with
impure hands because the impurity cannot pass from hands to the
food without a liquid.
As ever, we should note that there were different views on matters
relating to the washing of hands and the transmission of impurity.
While there were some who did not view hand-washing in itself as
the highest of priorities (t. Ber. 5.13), there were rabbis who (contro-
versially) believed food could become impure in the third degree:
R. Aqiba . . . Thus has Scripture taught concerning a loaf of bread
unclean in the second remove, that it imparts uncleanness in the
third remove [to a loaf of bread with which it comes into contact]
(m. Sotah 5.3). Others, notably in later in the rabbinic period, claimed
a lack of sufficient biblical basis such as the following from the
Babylonian Talmud: the washing of hands for secular food is not
from the Torah (b. Ber. 52b). One solution to such a potential prob-
lem is found in the thinking of Rab Judah who argued that the washing
of hands was instituted by Solomon (b. Shab. 14b; cf. b. Erub. 21b).
According to R. Idi b. Abin in the name of R. Isaac b. Ashian washing
hands before non-priestly food was more a useful practice for
handling priestly food (b. Hullin 105a). Others, though, were more
serious about washing hands:
Our Rabbis taught: R. Aqiba was once confined in a prison-house
and R. Joshua the grits maker was attending on him. Every day,
PURITY AND FOOD
55
a certain quantity of water was brought in to him. On one occasion
he [R. Joshua] was met by the prison keeper who said to him,
Your water to-day is rather much; do you perhaps require it for
undermining the prison? He poured out a half of it and handed to
him the other half. When he [R. Joshua] came to R. Aqiba the latter
said to him, Joshua, do you not know that I am an old man and
my life depends on yours? When the latter told him all that had
happened [R. Aqiba] said to him, Give me some water to wash
my hands. It will not suffice for drinking, the other complained,
will it suffice for washing your hands? What can I do, the for-
mer replied, when for [neglecting] the words of them [the Rabbis]
one deserves death? It is better that I myself should die than that
I should transgress against the opinion of my colleagues [who
ordained the washing of hands before meals]. It was related that he
tasted nothing until the other had brought him water wherewith to
wash his hands. When the Sages heard of this incident they
remarked, If he was so [scrupulous] in his old age how much
more must he have been so in his youth; and if he so [behaved]
in a prison-house how much more [must he have behaved in such
a manner] when not in a prison-house. (b. Erub. 21b)
On the role of liquids, it is worth pointing out that the idea of a liq-
uid conducting impurity was developed in early Judaism by the time
of the New Testament texts. The Dead Sea Scrolls, for instance, applied
the laws of liquids to different situations and this is seen in 4Q284a
and 4Q274 (frag. 3), the 4QTohorot texts. All crops were susceptible
to impurity if they became wet. This was even more so in the case of
foodstuffs such as grapes which contain liquid that can easily come
to the surface and thus conduct impurity. This meant that even those
who harvested had to harvest the crops in a state of purity. This would
have been very important for the Dead Sea Scrolls group because the
communal meals at Qumran were eaten in a state of purity.
Another important text from Qumran which discusses the impurity
of liquids is 4QMMT
a
(=4Q394) frag. 8, col. IV 57, where we read
56
that in no circumstances should liquids be regarded as preventing
impurity: . . . also concerning liquid streams: we say that in these there
is no [pu]rity, and also that liquid streams cannot separate impure
[from] pure, because the liquid of the liquid streams and their vessels
is alike, the same liquid. Here it appears to be the case that if liquid
was poured from an impure vessel into a pure vessel the pure vessel
becomes impure because of the liquid conducting impurity. Indeed,
it implies that if liquid was poured from a pure vessel into an impure
vessel, all would become unclean due to the impurity being conducted
by water. This sort of position appears to have been rejected by the
Pharisees and accepted by the Sadducees according to the Mishnah:
Say Sadducees: We complain against you, Pharisees. For you declare
clean an unbroken stream of liquids (m. Yad. 4.7). Oil was a liquid
which could also be deemed to transmit impurity. In the Dead Sea
Scrolls this is certainly the case with a corpse. According to CD 12.1517,
. . . And all the wood and the stones and the dust which are defiled
by mans impurity, while with stains of oil in them, in accordance
with their uncleanness will make whoever touches them impure . . .
WASHING HANDS AND THE TEBUL YOM
One question we might ask is this: precisely what is being prevented
from becoming impure by washing hands? John Poirier has argued
that passages such as b. Ber. 28a, and the idea of a person whose
insides are not as their outsides, concern an early idea associated
with those who disagreed with Pharisees, namely those people who
did not keep their insides pure through the washing of hands while
keeping their outsides pure through immersion.
4
We may well have
a first century example of this from Mark 7. Mark 7.123 is framed
in terms of a dispute over hand washing (Mk 7.15) and Jesus
response and rejection of such a view of impurity is that, there is
nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things
that come out are what defile (Mk 7.15). Mark also adds that
Pharisees immerse themselves in this context (Mk 7.3) and this too
PURITY AND FOOD
57
reflects issues relating to hand-washing and, in particularly, the issue
of the tebul yom. The tebul yom is simply someone who has immersed
that day and is waiting for sunset to be deemed pure again, something
we have already seen in passing with reference to Leviticus 15. The
status of the tebul yom was a debateable issue because, according
to rabbinic literature, the tebul yom could do many, though certainly
not all, things a pure person could do.
In rabbinic literature, the idea of the tebul yom in relation to the
washing of hands is, as in Mk 7.15, a significant issue. Like hands,
a tebul yom is assumed second degree impure. However, unlike hands,
a tebul yom could not render a liquid impure, despite both being
second degree impure. This might seem to make the process of hand
washing unnecessary if a person had immersed first, as in Mk 7.3,
because there should be no problem in making things impure, should
there not? There was, however, an important qualification: while the
whole body could be immersed, hands were deemed to be able to
become impure separately and in distinction from the rest of the body
and so hands still had to be washed to prevent the transmission of
impurity. Compare the following:
A cooking pot which is full of liquids, and which a tebul yom
touched if it was liquid of heave offering, the liquids are unfit,
but the pot is clean. And if it was liquid of unconsecrated, all is
clean. And if his hands were dirty, all is unclean. This rule is more
stringent in the case of hands than in the case of the tebul yom. And
more stringent is the rule pertaining to the tebul yom than pertain-
ing to hands: For a matter of doubt in connection with the tebul
yom spoils heave offering, but as to hands, a matter of doubt con-
cerning them is deemed to be clean. (m. T. Yom 2.2)
This seems to be the sort of logic Mark attributes to the dispute
between Jesus and the Pharisees. According to Mark, the Pharisees
immerse on return from the marketplace but still insist on washing
their hands before an ordinary meal.
58
IMMERSION AND WIPING OF UTENSILS
Mark mentions various other details relating, contextually at least, to
the washing of hands, such as: the washing of cups, pots, and bronze
kettles [and beds] (Mk 7.4). These practices appear to have been
grounded in biblical law but expanded and interpreted in Second
Temple Judaism. We have already seen the context of the biblical
precedent for such laws in Lev. 11.3033 and we can add another:
Any earthen vessel that one with the discharge touches shall be
broken; and every vessel of wood shall be rinsed in water (Lev. 15.12).
This is expanded more generally in the numerous passages dealing
with the uncleanness of wood in the Mishnah such as the following:
Utensils of wood, leather, bone, or glass that are flat are not suscep-
tible to uncleanness. If they form a receptacle they are susceptible
(m. Kelim 15.1). With Lev. 11.3033 in mind, the practice of immers-
ing other kinds of utensils was developed in rabbinic literature. There
are more general statements in rabbinic literature concerning the
immersion of vessels such as the following: R. Meir says: Vessels
may be immersed in the water but not in the mud. R. Joshua says:
Either in the water or in the mud . . . (m. Miqw. 3.10). Like the
bronze kettle of Mk 7.4, m. Kelim 11.1 indicates that metal objects
are indeed susceptible: Utensils of metal are susceptible to unclean-
ness whether they are flat or whether they form a receptacle . . .
(m. Kelim 11.1).
One material that Mark would not have been referring to was
earthenware because earthenware had to be smashed if impure (Lev.
11.33). Another material probably not implied by Mark because,
according to the Mishnah, for instance, stone was not necessarily
susceptible to impurity: an oven made of stone or metal is clean . . .
A stove made of stone or of metal is clean . . . These utensils afford
protection with a tightly stopped-up cover: vessels [made] . . . of
stone . . . (m. Kelim 5.11; 10.1). In fact, a key archaeological find to
support a widespread dedication to purity outside the Temple is stone
vessels. Throughout the whole of Palestine/Israel stone vessels have
PURITY AND FOOD
59
been found. For some scholars this suggests that at least some people
were concerned with having meals in a state of purity in different
geographical areas and, given that the ruling on stone vessels is found
in rabbinic literature and given the connections between the Pharisees
and the rabbis, that this practice can probably can be said to have
been a Pharisaic concern in the first century.
One particular utensil mentioned in some manuscripts of Marks
Gospel, and which has caused confusion among ancient copyists and
modern scholars alike, is the mention of the immersion of beds or,
better, dining couches (Mk 7.4). The confusion is typically over the
impossibility of the given interpreter imagining people to have done
such things and it has even been known for scholars to claim Mark
invented the practice. However, it is quite clear that certain practices
were discussed in rabbinic literature as in the following passages:
[If] one immersed the bed/dining couch therein, even though its
legs sink down into thick mud it is clean, because the water
touched them before [the mud did]. (m. Miqw. 7.7)
He who unties the bed/dining couch to immerse it . . . (m. Kelim
19.1)
While some have argued that this could be a reference to the beds
of Leviticus 15 which become impure, this is probably not the case.
In addition to the word for bed in Leviticus 15 not typically having
the connotations of dining couches (in contrast to Mark 7 and the
above passages from the Mishnah), there is no mention of immersion
for the beds of Leviticus 15. Instead, the beds of Mark 7 and the
Mishnah passages are part of the same general laws of utensils
found in Lev. 11.32 and 15.12.
5
Why immerse all these kinds of utensils and furniture? Again, the
issue involves the transmission of impurity and we have a notable
discussion of a directly related issue in a passage recorded in Matthew
(and Luke):
6
60
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the
outside of the cup and of the plate, but inside they are full of greed
and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of
the cup [and of the plate], so that the outside also may become
clean. (Mt. 23.2526; see also Lk. 11.3941)
The cleansing of cups and the idea of insides and outsides of cups are
further complex purity issues discussed in rabbinic literature. We
have already seen m. Ber. 8.2: The House of Shammai say, They
wash the hands and then mix the cup [of wine]. But the House of
Hillel say, They mix the cup and then wash the hands as well as
the important interpretation of this dispute in the Tosefta:
The House of Shammai say, They wash the hands then mix the
cup lest liquids on the outer surface of the cup become impure
through contact with hands and in turn render the cup impure. The
House of Hillel say, The outer surface of the cup is always deemed
impure. (t. Ber. 5.26)
The other most prominent text in discussions of washing cups is
m. Kelim 25 where the distinction between the inside and outside
of certain things is made bluntly at the beginning: All utensils have
outsides and an inside (m. Kelim 25.1). The idea of a third part of
utensils is also present but not without controversy, firstly between
R. Tarfon and R. Aqiba and then R. Meir and R. Yose. The passage is
difficult and ought to be quoted at length: (m. Kelim 25.7a)
All utensils have outer parts and an inner part, and they [further]
have a part by which they are held. R. Tarfon says, [This distinc-
tion in the outer parts applies only] to a large wooden trough.
Aqiba says, To cups. R. Meir says, To the unclean and the clean
hands. Said R. Yose, They have spoken only concerning clean
hands alone. How so? [If] ones hands were clean, and the outer
PURITY AND FOOD
61
parts of the cup were unclean, [and] one took [the cup] with its
holding part, he need not worry lest his hands be made unclean on
the outer parts of the cup. [If] one was drinking from a cup, the
outer parts of which are unclean, one does not worry lest the liquid
which is in his mouth be made unclean on the outer parts of the
cup and go and render the [whole] cup unclean. A kettle [unclean
on the outside] which is boiling one does not worry lest the liq-
uids go forth from it and touch its outer parts and go back to the
inside [and make it unclean]. (m. Kelim 25.78)
The discussion between the houses of Shammai and Hillel previously
mentioned accord with the two different positions of R. Meir and
R. Yose in this passage from Kelim. As R. Biban in the name of
R. Yohanan put it according to the Palestinian Talmud, The opinion
of the House of Shammai accords with the view of R. Yose, and
the opinion of the House of Hillel accords with the view of R. Meir
(y. Ber. 8.2).
The position of Yose and the House of Shammai is this: [If] ones
hands were clean, and the outer parts of the cup were unclean, [and] one
took [the cup] with its holding part, he need not worry lest his hands
be made unclean on the outer parts of the cup (m. Kelim 25.8). But, as
the House of Shammai put it, this position cannot apply to impure hands
lest liquids on the outer surface of the cup become impure through
contact with hands and in turn render the cup impure (t. Ber. 5.26).
The position of Meir and the House of Hillel is this: [If] ones
hands were clean, and the outer parts of the cup were unclean, [and]
one took [the cup] with its holding part, he need not worry lest his
hands be made unclean on the outer parts of the cup (m. Kelim 25.8).
Where Yose and the House of Shammai first washed the hands, Meir
and the House of Hillel do not think the issue of liquids on the outer
surface of the cup is relevant and so even impure hands could not
make the whole cup impure through contact with the liquid on the
outside of the cup.
62
How can an outside of a cup become clean if we follow Matthews
polemic that Pharisees wash the outside of the cup? This idea of
washing the outside of the cup can get even more confusing because
if utensils such as cups became impure then, as we have seen, the
simple solution was to immerse them. But when cups are immersed
then the whole cup is obviously immersed, not simply the outside
(cf. m. Miqw. 5.6; 6.2, 56). However, there were outer parts of the
cup (the handle, the rim, the handles etc) which were not immersed
but wiped according to Kelim:
Bases of utensils, and their rims, and their hangers, and the handles
of utensils which hold [something = which have a receptacle],
on which fell [unclean] liquids one dries them, and they are
clean . . . A utensil, the outer parts of which have been made
unclean with liquids the outer parts are unclean. Its inside, its
rims, hangers, and handles are clean. [If] its inside is made unclean,
the whole is unclean. (m. Kelim 25.6)
It may well be, then, that this wiping of certain outside parts of cups
is reflected in the polemic recorded more generally in Mt. 23.2526.
LIQUIDS, UTENSILS AND THE PEOPLE OF THE LAND
Related divergent viewpoints on purity occur in rabbinic literature
and particularly with reference to the people of the land, sometimes
seen as an important background to gospel passages on purity. The
people of the land are best understood as a religious category rather
than a class based category (e.g. the poor): this group could include
people from agricultural workers to people who owned property and
slaves (e.g. t. Dem. 3.5; t. Abod. Zar. 3.9) and were defined in terms
of their observance of rabbinic or Pharisaic or haberim tithing and/or
purity laws (t. Abod. Zar. 3.10; b. Ber. 43b; b. Git. 61a; b. Ned. 90b;
ARN [A] 41; cf. m. Hag. 2.7). The issues are conveniently summa-
rized in the following reflections in the Babylonian Talmud: It has
PURITY AND FOOD
63
been taught, Who is a person of the land? Anyone who does not
eat his secular food in ritual purity. This is the opinion of R. Meir.
The Sages, however, said, Anyone who does not tithe his produce
properly. (b. Ber. 47b). We might compare a first century example
of an overarching religious categorization covering different class
distinctions where Josephus describes the building of Tiberias in
Galilee. What reference to the Jesus tradition may already show,
people did disagree on how to interpret purity laws. Josephus gives
an example in his discussion of the building of the Galilean city of
Tiberias by Herod Antipas:
The new settlers were a promiscuous rabble, no small contingent
being Galilean, with such as were drafted from territory subject to
him [Herod Antipas] and brought forcibly to the new foundation.
Some of these were magistrates. Herod accepted as participants
even poor men who were brought in to join the others from any
and all places of origin. It was question whether some were even
free beyond cavil. These latter he often and in large bodies liber-
ated and benefited imposing the condition that they should not quit
the city, by equipping houses at his own expense and adding new
gifts of land. For he knew that this settlement was contrary to the
law and tradition of the Jews because Tiberias was built on the site
of tombs that had been obliterated, of which there were many
there. And our law declares that such settlers are unclean for seven
days. (Ant. 18.3638)
Willingly or not, people from different parts of the social spectrum
were to populate Tiberias and face continual problems of impurity.
From Antipas perspective, any potentially mischievous Pharisees,
or anyone else dedicated to purity laws, could presumably be kept at
a distance.
More specifically, the people of the land were perceived to be
suspect in transmission of impurity. This is assumed in the following
example: He who gives over his key to a person of the land the
64
house is clean, for he gave him only [the charge of] guarding the key
(m. Tohorot 7.1). Others took another line. According to R. Simeon,
He who gave a key to a person of the land the house is unclean
(t. Tohorot 8.1). Both cases clearly assume that in some way the
person of the land is a problem in relation to keeping pure. Specifics
were further debated (m. Tohorot 7.2). The Pharisees interest in the
people of the land and purity is recorded in a famous passage of a
gradation of purity/impurity moving from the people of the land
through to the Temple itself:
The clothing of a person of the land is in the status of midras
uncleanness [e.g. one with a discharge] for Pharisees [who eat
ordinary food in a state of uncleanness], the clothing of Pharisees
is in the status of midras uncleanness for those who eat terumah
[i.e. priests]. The clothing of those who eat heave offering is in
the status of midras uncleanness for those who eat Holy Things
[i.e. officiating priests] etc . . . (m. Hagigah 2.7)
Here the impurity of the clothes of a person of the land is compared
with the impurity of one with a discharge and connections with scrip-
tural impurity (or fathers of impurity) are found elsewhere in rabbinic
literature. They are suspect in relation to utensils: He who deposits
utensils with a person of the land they are unclean with corpse
uncleanness and unclean with midras uncleanness (m. Tohorot 8.2).
The people of the land are also deemed to be careless with liquids
which, of course, are extremely important in the transmission of
impurity (cf. t. Abod. Zar. 4.11) and there are debates over the speci-
fics of what comes under the law of water being put on: The water
which comes up (1) on the snares, (2) on the gins, and (3) on the nets
is not under the law, If water be put. And if he shook [them to remove
the water], it [the water which is detached] is under the law, If water
be put (m. Maksh. 5.7). The significance of liquids is reinforced in
definitions of a haber and their strict purity laws in relation to the
PURITY AND FOOD
65
people of the land. A haber, according to the Mishnah, is partly
defined by not purchasing wet produce which has been rendered sus-
ceptible to uncleanness . . . (m. Demai 2.3), though dry produce is,
according to the Palestinian Talmud, allowed because people of the
land are deemed trustworthy with respect to rendering produce sus-
ceptible to impurity (y. Demai 2, 22d).
SUMMARY
Whether the rabbinic debates over the people of the land are a precise
context for the gospel disputes is for another discussion. For now,
following the spirit of this book, the intention is just to show the
developments of debates over purity laws which have thematic links
with New Testament texts. We have seen that impurity is a kind of
unseen contamination which needs to be avoided especially, but not
exclusively, closer to the heart of the Temple the Jewish believer
becomes, hence many purity laws associated with Temple and priest-
hood. Of course, given that impurity could be contracted from, for
instance, corpses, sexual intercourse, menstruating women, and people
with skin diseases, then it was perhaps inevitable that people would
become impure. Indeed, biblical Law gives plenty of instruction for
becoming pure again.
The purity laws were developed by certain groups and figures to
encompass all of daily life, or at least as much as possible. The group
responsible for the Dead Sea Scrolls wrote about eating communal
meals in a state of purity. It seems that groups such as the Pharisees
were keen to eat their ordinary food in a state of purity. This involved
bodily immersion, immersion of various utensils (e.g. cups) and, ulti-
mately, the washing of hands. This practice prevented the transmission
of impurity from hands to food (via a liquid) to the eater. The reason-
ing for this, it seems, was to keep the insides pure. Of course, details
were disputed and it looks as if the Jesus of Mark (and Matthew)
was among those rejecting the significance of hand-washing before
66
ordinary meals and the transmission of impurity to the insides.
The people of the land were also among those with a more lax atti-
tude relating to these expanded purity laws and the role of liquids
in the transmission of impurity.
67
CHAPTER 4
DIVORCE, EYE FOR AN EYE AND
OATHS AND VOWS
The three categories of divorce, eye for an eye and oaths/vows are
brought together in this chapter because they occur in a much dis-
cussed and much misunderstood (at least in terms of Jewish law)
section in Matthews Gospel: the so-called antitheses (Mt. 5.2148).
We may broadly call this civil law in that they are the kinds of legal
interpretations which have had an influence on legal systems right up
to those in liberal democracies in a way that, say, laws of impurity
have not. Indeed, part of the reasoning for this is that these sorts of
laws are not flashpoints in earliest Christianity when the issue of the
Law arose and are more broadly applicable to human societies.
Despite this, however, people still regularly interpret such texts in
terms of difference from Judaism and so more details of Jewish Law
are required for further insight. We may begin with divorce.
DIVORCE
In many texts, as we will see, divorce is thought to be a necessary
evil, even if some would provide easier means of divorce than
others. Figures such as Jesus and Paul believed that divorce was a
bad thing (cf. Mal. 2.1316; Mk 10.5; 1 Cor. 7.1016; m. Git. 9.10;
b. Git. 90b). Marriage, so the logic of this sort of argument went,
ought to be a very good thing. So Mk 10.68, citing Gen. 1.27; 2.24:
But from the beginning of creation, God made them male and female.
68
For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined
to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. So they are no longer
two, but one flesh. This sort of view was known elsewhere, with the
Genesis texts being central, as in the following example from the
Dead Sea Scrolls: The builders of the wall . . . are caught twice in
fornication: by taking two wives in their lives, even though the prin-
ciple of creation is male and female he created them (CD 4.21).
If marriage was deemed so important, then perhaps it is no surprise
that adultery was, ideally, punishable by death:
If a man commits adultery with the wife of his neighbour, both the
adulterer and the adulteress shall be put to death. (Lev. 20.10)
If a man is caught lying with the wife of another man, both of them
shall die, the man who lay with the woman as well as the woman.
So you shall purge the evil from Israel. (Deut. 22.22)
However, as with Sabbath punishments, there is no evidence the death
penalty was ever imposed, presumably because far too many people
would have to be killed. The closest we get in the first century is the
story found in some versions of Johns Gospel (Jn 8.111) where
scribes and Pharisees bring an adulterous woman to Jesus and men-
tion the not indelicate point that the Law commands that such a
woman ought to be stoned. They are said to try to catch Jesus out in
order to bring a charge against him by asking, Now what do you
say? (Jn 8.6). Jesus was said, of course, to give his famous answer
about the one without sin casting the first stone but perhaps more
significantly for our purposes we have an example where there seems
to be an assumption that people were avoiding the Law by not stoning
such adulterous people and the test was, presumably, to see how Jesus
could answer the question by contradicting the Law. But whatever
we make of this story, it remains that this woman does not provide
evidence of someone being stoned for adultery.
1
The foundational biblical text for divorce was Deut. 24.14:
DIVORCE, EYE FOR AN EYE AND OATHS AND VOWS
69
Suppose a man enters into marriage with a woman, but she does
not please him because he finds something objectionable about
her, and so he writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand
and sends her out of his house; she then leaves his house and goes
off to become another mans wife. Then suppose the second man
dislikes her, writes her a bill of divorce, puts it in her hand and
sends her out of his house (or the second man who married her
dies); her first husband, who sent her away, is not permitted to take
her again to be his wife after she has been defiled; for that would
be abhorrent to the LORD, and you shall not bring guilt on the
land that the LORD your God is giving you as a possession.
The phrase finds something objectionable about her became one of
the foci for debate on issues of divorce. Precisely what constitutes
something objectionable? In a notable way to end the Mishnah trac-
tate Gittin, two famous interpretations of Deut. 24.14 are represented
by two major rabbinic traditions, the strict House of Shammai, on
the one hand and the not-so-strict House of Hillel and R. Aqiba,
on the other:
The House of Shammai say, A man should divorce his wife only
because he has found grounds for it in unchastity, since it is said,
Because he has found in her indecency in anything [i.e. something
objectionable] (Deut. 24.1). And the House of Hillel say, Even if
she spoiled his dish, since it is said, Because he has found in her
indecency in anything [i.e. something objectionable]. R. Aqiba
says, Even if he found someone else prettier than she, since it is
said, And it shall be if she find no favour in his eyes (Deut. 24.1).
(m. Git. 9.10; cf. Sifre Deut. 269; y. Sota 1.2, 16b)
Such concerns over the phrase something objectionable is pre-
sumably underlying the question asked by the Pharisees in Matthews
Gospel, Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any cause?
(Mt. 19.3). Certainly the stricter idea of a man divorcing his wife
70
for sexually related acts was present by the first century. Markus
Bockmuehl has shown that the husband would be required to divorce
an adulterous or raped wife because the wife was made unclean.
2
This
sort of view is echoed, for instance, in the retelling of the story of
Abram and Sarai (Abraham and Sarah) in Egypt. According to Philo,
the Egyptian leader wanted to seduce Sarai but God protected her
and physically punished him thereby protecting Sarais chastity and
protecting the marriage from violation (Abr. 938). According to the
Genesis Apocryphon from the Dead Sea Scrolls, Abram pleads with
God, Do justice for me against him and show your mighty arm
against him, and against all his house. During this night, may he not
be able to defile my wife, separated from me . . . (1QapGen. 20.15).
We can also compare Mt. 1.19 here when Joseph believes Mary has
been unfaithful and the text simply assumes Mary will be divorced:
Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public
disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly. Similarly, according to later
rabbinic literature it seems as if a husband was to divorce an adulter-
ous wife:
Aforetimes they did rule: three sorts of women go forth and collect
their marriage contract: she who says, I am unclean for you . . .
They reverted to rule: so that a woman should not covet someone
else and spoil [her relationship with] her husband, but: she who
says, I am unclean for you, must bring proof for her claim . . .
(m. Ned. 11.12)
We may also have another New Testament parallel in the case of
the woman Jesus meets at the well in John 4. Jesus said to her, for
you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your
husband. What you have said is true! (Jn 4.18). This woman is a
Samaritan and thus not Jewish (as John puts it, Jews do not share
things in common with Samaritans Jn 4.9) but Samaritans also
have the Pentateuch as a central document and so here we may be
dealing with assumed cases of divorce for adultery.
71
In terms of divorce for adultery, we could follow David Instone-
Brewer here and compare Mk 10.5 on the role of Deut. 24.14: But
Jesus said to them, Because of your hardness of heart he wrote this
commandment for you. Instone-Brewer suggests that the phrase
hardness of heart is an echo of scriptural concerns for Israels hard-
ness of heart that occurs metaphorically in the context of marriage
and divorce and the charge that Israel has repeatedly committed
adultery by more than fluttering her eyelids at idols and without
listening to God. Thus divorce is inevitable (Jer. 34, esp. LXX
Jer. 4.4).
3

The Hillel/Aqiba view of divorce for almost anything was also
present by the time of the first century. In Matthews longer version
of the divorce passage (Mt. 19.112) we can see this. Matthew here
and elsewhere (Mt. 5.32) makes qualifications not explicitly present
in Mark when he adds his famous exception clauses: And I say
to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for porneia (sexual immo-
rality), and marries another commits adultery (Mt. 19.9). However,
even with these exception clauses it is clear that Matthew at least
knows of views which find it difficult to accept divorce, even for the
reason of porneia: His disciples said to him, If such is the case of a
man with his wife, it is better not to marry to which Jesus replies,
Not everyone can accept this teaching, but only those to whom it is
given (Mt. 19.1011). This clearly assumes a situation where men
were expecting to divorce wives for a wider range of reasons, perhaps
agreeing with the position of the House of Hillel and R. Aqiba. More
than 250 years prior to Matthew, Ben Sirah had the following to say
about wives and divorce:
I would rather live with a lion and a dragon than live with an evil
woman. A womans wickedness changes her appearance, and
darkens her face like that of a bear. Her husband sits among the
neighbours, and he cannot help sighing bitterly . . . Dejected mind,
gloomy face, and wounded heart come from an evil wife. Drooping
hands and weak knees come from the wife who does not make her
72
husband happy . . . If she does not go as you direct, separate her
from yourself . . . But it is heartache and sorrow when a wife is
jealous of a rival, and a tongue-lashing makes it known to all.
A bad wife is a chafing yoke; taking hold of her is like grasping a
scorpion. A drunken wife arouses great anger; she cannot hide her
shame. (Sirach 25.1618, 23, 26; 26.68 [my italics])
While these sentiments may not provide quite as easy means to
divorce, clearly they are along the same lines as those of Hillel, Aqiba
and certain figures linked with Matthews Gospel in that a women is
to be divorced if she does not please her husband in very general
terms.
One of the functions of the stricter view of divorce may have
been an attempt to prevent people from divorcing simply for the
sake of remarriage, something which might have been seen in argu-
ments favouring divorce for the wife burning supper or a prettier
wife being found. The critique of divorce for the sake of remarriage
is certainly emphasized, in their own different ways, in the different
Gospel traditions whereby remarriage becomes equated with adultery.
For instance:
Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery
against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another,
she commits adultery. (Mk 10.1112)
But I say to you that anyone who divorces his wife, except on the
ground of porneia, causes her to commit adultery; and whoever
marries a divorced woman commits adultery. (Mt. 5.32)
Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adul-
tery, and whoever marries a woman divorced from her husband
commits adultery. (Lk. 18.18)
Of course in the case of Matthew it seems that deemed sexual immo-
rality is the exception: . . . anyone who divorces his wife, except on
73
the ground of porneia . . . (Mt. 5.32). While there is an argument
(accepted by this author) that Mark assumes the exception clause we
find in Matthew (and remember Matthew adds the exception clause
only to say that even this is too difficult), a widely held view is that
Mark reflects an absolute prohibition of divorce. It is often suggested
that such an absolute prohibition of divorce is found in the Dead Sea
Scrolls:
There are Belials three nets about which Levi, son of Jacob spoke,
by which he catches Israel and makes them appear before them
like three types of justice. The first is fornication; the second,
wealth; the third, defilement of the Temple. He who eludes one
is caught in another and he who is freed from that, is caught in
another. The builders of the wall who go after Zaw-Zaw is the
preacher of whom he said: Assuredly they will preach (Mic. 2.6)
are caught twice in fornication: by taking two wives in their lives,
even though the principle of creation is male and female he made
them (Gen. 1.27), and the ones who went into the ark went in two
by two in to the ark (Gen. 7.9). And about the prince it is written:
He should not multiply wives to himself (Deut. 17.17). However,
David had not read the sealed book of the law which was in the
ark, for it had not been opened in Israel since the day of the
death of Eleazar and of Jehoshua, and Joshua and the elders who
worshipped Ashtaroth . . . (CD 4.155.4)
On the day when they proclaim [him] king . . . And he shall take no
other wife in addition to her for she alone will be with him all the
days of her life. And if she dies, he shall take for himself another
from his fathers house, from his family. (11QT 57.2, 1719)
The phrase, taking two wives in their lives (CD 4.155.4), has been
much contested. Does it mean divorce is absolutely prohibited? Or
is it an emphatic defence of monogamy over against polygamy?
Or perhaps even a critique of remarrying? Then there is the role of the
ruler. In CD, the prince is not to have multiple wives, while in 11QT
74
it seems as if the ruler cannot practise polygamy and should not
divorce the woman during her life. Whatever we make of these texts
we should add that the same documents from the Dead Sea Scrolls
appear to assume the possibility of divorce, or the validity of divor-
cees, at least in certain circumstances:
4

And every vow of a widow or a divorcee, everything by which she
binds herself formally will stand upon her, as everything which
issues from her mouth . . . (11QT 54.45)
If a man seduces a young virgin who is not betrothed, and she is
permitted to him by the law and he lies with her and is discovered,
then the man who lay with her shall give the girls father fifty
silver shekels and she will be (his) wife, since he raped her; and he
cannot dismiss her all his days . . . (11QT 66.811)
And no-one should make a deed of purchase or of sale without
informing the Inspector of the camp; he shall proceed in consul-
tation lest they e[rr. And likewise] with regard to [any]one who
ma[rr]ies a wom[an] and [ . . . in] consultation. And likewise, with
regard to anyone who divorces . . . (CD 13.1517)
It might have been observed that the there has been a significant
gender imbalance in the presentation of the divorce texts. Clearly, the
material presented concerns men divorcing women. However, both
Mark (see above) and Paul mention the idea of women divorcing
men. Paul, for instance, said, To the married I give this command
not I but the Lord that the wife should not separate from her husband
(1 Cor. 7.10). It is often suggested that this reflects Roman rather
than Jewish law because, so the argument goes, Jewish law did not
allow the possibility of divorce. This is certainly the only concern
written in Deut. 24.14 (Suppose a man enters into marriage with
a woman, but she does not please him . . . he writes her a certificate
75
of divorce . . . ). This commonly held view, however, needs to be
qualified, at least in terms of Judaism outside the Bible, because there
are examples of women particularly elite women divorcing their
husbands. In the fifth century BCE, the Jewish colony at Elephantine
(an island on the Nile) allows the possibility of women divorcing
husbands.
5
Closer to the time of the New Testament, Josephus gives a
seemingly controversial example:
Sometime afterwards Salome had occasion to quarrel with
Costobarus and soon sent him a document dissolving their mar-
riage which was not in accordance with Jewish law. For it is (only)
the man who is permitted by us to do this, and not even a divorced
woman may marry again on her own initiative unless her husband
consents. Salome, however, did not chose to follow her countrys
law but acted on her own authority and repudiated her marriage . . .
(Ant. 15.259260)
Papyrus Seelim 13, a text from the Judean desert dating to the early
second century CE, is another probable example of a woman divorc-
ing her husband. According to the following reconstruction and
translation by David Instone-Brewer we have a scribe writing on
behalf of the wife:
6
I, Shelamzion, daughter of Joseph Qebshan, of Ein Gedi, with
you, Eleazar son of Hananiah who had been her husband before
this time, this is from her to you a bill of divorce and release. (lines
47)
There are more indirect examples in rabbinic literature relating
to women leaving their husbands, or rather being able to petition
for a divorce. These typically involve sex or at least that which is
related by implication, namely, the not-particularly-pleasing hus-
band. In some ways what we find is the gender reversal of Aqibas
76
finding-one-fairer argument. So women can petition for divorce if
a husband has a particularly unpleasant job and different types of
physical issues which are problematic for the wife:
A man who suffers blemishes they do not force him to put her
away. Said Rabban Simeon b. Gamaliel, Under what circum-
stances? In the case of small blemishes. But in the case of major
blemishes, they do force him to put her away. And these are the
ones whom they force to put her away: he who is afflicted with
boils, or who has polypus, or who collects [dog excrement], or a
coppersmith, or a tanner whether these [blemishes] were present
before they were married or whether after they were married they
made their appearance. (m. Ketub. 7.2, 910)
Perhaps, and only perhaps, there is also an implication that the
Samaritan woman in John 4 had some agency in previously getting
divorced. At the very least she was active in going out and finding
a man:
Jesus said to her, Go, call your husband, and come back. The
woman answered him, I have no husband. Jesus said to her, You
are right in saying, I have no husband; for you have had five
husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What
you have said is true! (Jn 4.1618)
EYE FOR AN EYE
The famous eye for an eye saying is an ancient principle but which
for our purposes is grounded in Exod. 21.2227:
When people who are fighting injure a pregnant woman so that
there is a miscarriage, and yet no further harm follows, the one
responsible shall be fined what the womans husband demands,
paying as much as the judges determine. If any harm follows, then
you shall give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for
77
hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for
stripe. When a slaveowner strikes the eye of a male or female
slave, destroying it, the owner shall let the slave go, a free person,
to compensate for the eye. If the owner knocks out a tooth of a
male or female slave, the slave shall be let go, a free person, to
compensate for the tooth.
This concept may well have been used to place a limit on vendettas
but just how literally this verse and sentiment was and is to be inter-
preted was and is debated. The text itself is sufficiently ambiguous
to generate the different interpretations. On the one hand, the context
of Exod. 21.24 seems to point in a different direction. For example,
in 21.22 we read, When, in the course of a brawl, a man knocks
against a pregnant woman so that she has a miscarriage but suffers no
further hurt, then the offender must pay whatever fine the womans
husband demands after assessment. In the verses that follow,
vv. 2627, we then read, When a man strikes his slave or slave girl
in the eye and destroys it, he shall let the slave girl go free in compen-
sation for the eye. When he knocks out the tooth of a slave or a
slave girl, he shall let the slave go free in compensation for the tooth.
The context emphatically reads the eye for an eye principle in terms
of compensation.
On the other hand, at least read aside from its literary context, the
language of eye for eye, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound
and so on does by itself seems black and white. Indeed, other Old
Testament/Hebrew Bible texts appear to use the eye for an eye princi-
ple literally. One eye-watering example is from Deut. 25.1112:
When two men are fighting and the wife of one of them comes near
to drag her husband clear of his opponent, if she puts out her hand
and catches hold of the mans genitals, you shall cut off her hand and
show her no mercy. In the context of the Flood and some command-
ments with some authority in later Judaism, God said to Noah, He that
sheds the blood of a man, for that man his blood shall be shed . . .
(Genesis 9.6).
78
So, it seems as if we have two views of how to interpret an eye for
an eye: one is literal and physically violent; the other is not literal
and financial/compensatory. With these different interpretations in
the Bible itself, it is little wonder that different versions were cham-
pioned. Some, such as Josephus, show the possibility of hedging bets
and going for both interpretations:
He that maims anyone, let him undergo the like himself, and be
deprived of the same member of which he has deprived the other,
unless he that is maimed will accept money instead of it; for the
law makes the sufferer the judge of the value of what he has suf-
fered, and permits him to estimate it, unless he will be more severe.
(Ant. 4.280)
However, in certain circles there was a hardening of the two
interpretative categories in the sense that they were not necessarily
as compatible as Josephus would have them. Rabbinic literature
emphatically falls on the side of the non-violent and financial and
compensatory. Translations of, and commentaries on, Exod. 21.24
make this quite clear. However, it does seem that the metaphorical
reading was increasingly becoming the more dominant. In the Aramaic
paraphrases of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Targum), the idea of
financial compensation is made explicit in the fairly loose translation.
In Targum PseudoJonathan to Exod. 21.24, for instance, we read,
The value of an eye for an eye, the value of a tooth for a tooth, the
value of a hand for a hand, the value of a foot for a foot . . . In a
rabbinic commentary this interpretation is spelled out if anything
even clearer:
Eye for Eye. This means, monetary compensation for an eye. You
interpret it to mean money for an eye . . . for any injuries resulting
in a permanent defect and affecting chief organs and visible, though
inflicted intentionally, one is subject only to payment of indemnity.
(Mekilta de-Rabbi Ishmael on Exod. 21.24 [III.6769])
79
In earlier rabbinic texts, the principle of compensation rather than
violent retribution is clear, even if the text of Exod. 21.24 it is not:
If a man wounded his fellow he thereby becomes liable on five
accounts: for injury, for pain, for healing, for loss of time, and for
indignity inflicted. For injury thus if he blinded his fellows
eye, cut off his hand, or broke his foot, [his fellow] is looked upon
as if he were a slave to be sold in the market: they assess how
much he was worth and how much he is worth now. For pain
thus, if he burnt his fellow with a spit or a nail, even though it was
on his finger-nail where it would leave no wound, they estimate
how much money such a man would be willing to take to suffer
so . . . (m. Baba Qamma 8.1)
It may be that the text of Exod. 21.24 is simply assumed to be under-
lying the discussion in this rabbinic passage. This Mishnah passage
was interpreted and expanded in the Babylonian Talmud, Baba Qamma
83b84a, where the reference to Exod. 21.24 is made quite explicit.
Here there is a lengthy discussion of the validity of the financial com-
pensation in relation to Exod. 21.24 and this interpretation is again
emphatically favoured over the more literal interpretation. Numerous
early rabbis are cited in favour of this interpretation with only one
exception to which we will return. But anyway it begins like this:
Why [pay compensation]? Does the Divine Law not say, Eye for
an eye? [Exodus 21.24] Why not take this literally to mean [putting
out] the eye [of the offender]? Let this not enter your mind . . .
We speak of the effect of smiting implied in this text and the effect
of smiting implied in the other text: just as smiting mentioned in
the case of the beast refers to the payment of compensation, so
also does smiting in the case of a man refer to the payment of
compensation.
It would seem that Jesus stands in this tradition, at least as he is
presented in the Gospels as opposing violent retribution in direct
80
discussion of the eye for an eye principle: Do not resist an evildoer.
But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also
(Mt. 5.39; cf. Lk. 6.29).
Although the financial and compensatory view is the most common
according to the texts we have, there was another minority view (again,
at least according to the texts we have). Jubilees. 4.31, for instance,
comments as follows on the death of Cain and also has the idea of
using the same weapon which did the initial damage in revenge:
. . . his house fell on him, and he died inside it and was killed by
the stones of it; for with a stone he had killed Abel, and by a just
retribution he was killed by a stone himself. There is a rule about
this on the heavenly tablets, With the instrument with which one
kills another man, with the same instrument shall he be killed: if
he has done a particular injury to another man, the same injury
shall be done to him.
There are hints that Sadducees held such a literal reading (m. Mak. 1.6)
and the literal reading also found its way into the early rabbinic
movement, although it was emphatically deemed a minority view.
If we return to the later Babylonian Talmud text, Baba Qamma
83b84a, and the lengthy discussion of the validity of the financial
compensation in relation to Exod. 21.24, we find the one dissenting
voice in R. Eliezer (late first century CE) who was said to have
favoured the literal interpretation:
It was taught: R. Eliezer said: Eye for an eye literally refers to
the eye [of the offender]. Literally, you say? Could R. Eliezer be
against all those early rabbis [listed above]? (b. Baba Qamma
83b84a)
While it is certainly fair to stress the stark differences between the
two interpretations, we should add that the differences start to break
81
down when we think of punishment in the afterlife of those deemed
wrongdoers. This was a common enough view in early Judaism
and, of course, the New Testament itself, including the Gospel of
Matthew who not only includes Jesus rejection of a violent interpre-
tation of the eye for an eye principle but also sentiments such as
the following:
Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the king-
dom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in
heaven. On that day many will say to me, Lord, Lord, did we not
prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do
many deeds of power in your name? Then I will declare to them,
I never knew you; go away from me, you evildoers. (Mt. 7.2123;
cf. Mt. 6.1415)
The rejection of the violent interpretation of the eye for an eye prin-
ciple clearly applied to this life in the here and now, just as the
rejection of death for Sabbath breakers and adulterers was. Presum-
ably one eye was on societal cohesion and the prevention of killing
far too many people in society in the rejection of the violent interpre-
tation. It may be significant that the violent interpretation is associated
with the sectarian views of the book of Jubilees, a text associated
with the Dead Sea Scrolls.
OATHS AND VOWS
Following E. P. Sanders, we could use the following definition of the
distinction between oaths and vows: Oaths were important for soci-
ety because they guaranteed a word or action by appealing to God
and calling down his curse if it was broken . . . A vow is essentially a
promise, with a guarantee of divine sanction if it is not fulfilled.
7

However, in this section oaths and vows will be lumped together, not
least because they are so obviously similar categories. Oaths and
82
vows are also something of a legal grey area. They are certainly pres-
ent in biblical Law:
Or when any of you utter aloud a rash oath for a bad or a good
purpose, whatever people utter in an oath, and are unaware of it,
when you come to know it, you shall in any of these be guilty.
When you realize your guilt in any of these, you shall confess the
sin that you have committed. And you shall bring to the Lord, as
your penalty for the sin that you have committed, a female from
the flock, a sheep or a goat, as a sin-offering; and the priest shall
make atonement on your behalf for your sin. (Lev. 5.46)
If you make a vow to the Lord your God, do not postpone fulfilling
it; for the Lord your God will surely require it of you, and you
would incur guilt. (Deut. 23.21; cf. Num. 30)
However, unlike commandments to observe the Sabbath, these are
not commandments to undertake oaths any more than Deuteronomy
24 commands divorce. In other words, there is no commandment along
the lines of you shall (or shall not) make an oath or vow any more
than there is a commandment you shall divorce. Instead what we are
dealing with is how oaths and vows can be dealt with in practice.
Avoidance of oaths and vows was not against scripture; on the con-
trary avoidance was potentially a very good thing. For once made, if
the Law said they should be fulfilled then they should be fulfilled.
The Deuteronomy 23 passage cited above continues:
If you make a vow to the Lord your God, do not postpone fulfilling
it; for the Lord your God will surely require it of you, and you
would incur guilt. But if you refrain from vowing, you will not
incur guilt. Whatever your lips utter you must diligently perform,
just as you have freely vowed to the Lord with your own mouth.
(Deut. 23.2123)
83
The safest option, so to speak, of avoidance of oaths and vows was
certainly present by the time of the New Testament. As Philo put it,
Next to not swearing at all, the second best thing is to keep ones
oath; for by the mere fact of swearing at all, the swearer shows that
there is some suspicion of his not being trustworthy. (Decal. 84).
These sorts of sentiments were especially associated with the Essenes,
at least in the eyes of Josephus and Philo:
. . . whatever they [the Essenes] say also is firmer than an oath; but
swearing is avoided by them, and they esteem it worse than per-
jury; for they say that he who cannot be believed without [swearing
by] God is already condemned. (War 2.135)
Their love of God they show by a multitude of proofs, by religious
purity constant and unbroken throughout their lives, by abstinence
from oaths, by veracity, by their belief that the Godhead is the
cause of all good things and nothing bad . . . (Every Good Man is
Free 84)
Here we have something similar to Jesus words according to Matthew:
do not swear at all (Mt. 5.34). However, Jesus words do seem to
qualify this when he says, Let your word be Yes, Yes or No, No;
anything more than this comes from the evil one and this may bring
him in line with those said to be critical of people who made elabo-
rate oaths and vows (Mt. 5.37).
8
Similarly, if we follow the view that
the Essenes were the group behind the Dead Sea Scrolls, then the
descriptions given by Philo and Josephus of the Essenes view on
swearing oaths are also to be qualified by the Scrolls themselves.
Concerning an oath. What he said: You shall not do justice with
your (own) hand (1 Sam. 25.26): whoever forces the making of
an oath in the open field, not in the presence of judges or at their
command, has done justice for himself with his hand. Every lost
84
object about which it is was stolen its owner should make a
maledictory oath; whoever hears it, if he knows and does not say
it, is guilty . . . (CD 9.912)
Whoever enters the council of the Community enters the covenant
of God in the presence of all who freely volunteer. He shall swear
a binding oath to revert to the Law of Moses, according to all that
he commanded . . . (1QS 5.8)
If the logic of the laws and sentiments concerning the swearing of
oaths and vows is taken to its logical conclusion the less-than-safe
option, so to speak then this puts the swearer in a potentially diffi-
cult situation. One of the most gruesome examples of this is the story
of Jephthahs daughter in Judges 11.3040. Jephthah swears the fol-
lowing: If you will give the Ammonites into my hand, then whoever
comes out of the doors of my house to meet me when I return victori-
ous from the Ammonites, shall be the Lords, to be offered up by me
as a burnt offering (Judges 11.30). Jephthah got what he desired only
for his daughter to be the first person to walk through his door and so
the poor girl has to be sacrificed. Little wonder some people thought
it best to avoid swearing oaths and vows altogether. As Jesus put the
magnitude of the matter, whoever swears by the altar, swears by it
and by everything on it; and whoever swears by the sanctuary, swears
by it and by the one who dwells in it; and whoever swears by heaven,
swears by the throne of God and by the one who is seated upon it
(Mt. 23.2022). Indeed, the logic of avoiding oaths and vows because
they are in the name of God in order to prevent Gods name being
profaned may well be the same logic Mt. 5.3335 as a whole:
Again, you have heard that it was said to those of ancient times,
You shall not swear falsely, but carry out the vows you have made
to the Lord. But I say to you, Do not swear at all, either by heaven,
for it is the throne of God, or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or
by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King.
85
Avoid swearing and you avoid swearing falsely. Problem solved.
One such disaster in the New Testament is in the story of the
death of John the Baptist (Mk 6.1729). Once Herod Antipas has
been wooed by the dancing daughter, she gets an offer from Herod
Antipas she can hardly refuse: Ask me for whatever you wish, and
I will give it. And he solemnly swore to her, Whatever you ask me,
I will give you, even half of my kingdom (Mk 6.2223). By swear-
ing to carry out his promise Antipas was bound and predictably the
dancing daughter asks for the head of John the Baptist, a man who
was starting to impress Herod Antipas. Many scholars have noted that
the story of the death of John the Baptist has striking similarities with
the story of Esther (cf. Est. 5.3; 7.2) and so we might note that the
king in the Greek A version of the book of Est. 8.7 (based on the
Hebrew Est. 7.5) swore that she [Esther] should tell him who had
behaved so arrogantly as to do this, and with an oath he undertook to
do for her whatever she wished. Notice how in the Markan story
Herod Antipas could not get out of the situation once he had sworn:
The king was deeply grieved; yet out of regard for his oaths and for
the guests, he did not want to refuse her (6.26). The reference to the
guests combined with the oath may point to a broader social accep-
tance as well as direct witnesses of the significance of swearing
oaths. Indeed, according to Josephus, the Roman Emperor Gaius
Caligula had to carry out that which he swore in front of distinguished
guests. The context in Josephus is of the then political leader of the
Jews, Agrippa, audaciously asking Gaius Caligula not to put a statue
of himself in the Jerusalem Temple. Not unlike the dancing daughter,
Agrippa was smart enough to play on the importance of oaths in a
situation which could have cost him his life:
And thus did Agrippa venture to cast the die upon this occasion, so
great was the affair in his opinion, and in reality, though he knew
how dangerous a thing it was so to speak; for, had not Gaius
approved of it, it had tended to no less than the loss of his life. So
Gaius, who was mightily taken with Agrippas obliging behaviour,
86
and, on other accounts, thinking it a dishonourable thing to be guilty
of falsehood before so many witnesses . . . (Ant. 18.298299)
Issues relating to oaths and vows were, as ever, open to inter-
pretation and dispute. The tension between scripture and tradition is
mentioned in Mk 7.913 where Jesus is said to have criticized
Pharisees and scribes for rejecting the commandment of God in
favour of their tradition. The commandment of God is honouring
parents (Exod. 20.12/Deut. 5.16) and the tradition deemed to be
contrasting is described as follows: But you say that if anyone tells
father or mother, Whatever support you might have had from me is
Qorban (that is, an offering to God) then you no longer permit
doing anything for a father or mother . . . (Mk 7.1112). Precisely
what qorban would have meant at the time of Jesus is not entirely
clear but, thanks to Mark, we can at least say it was something like
a gift and from later rabbinic literature suggest that it was dedicated
in someway to God and/or the Temple through a vow or oath.
It seems as if the Jesus of Marks Gospel would, in the general
sense, have been supported by a broad spectrum of rabbinic opinion:
[If] he saw people eating figs [belonging to him] and said, Lo,
they are qorban to you! And they turned out to be his father and
brothers, and there were others with them the House of Shammai
say, They are permitted, and those with them are prohibited. And
the House of Hillel say, These and those [men] are permitted
[to eat the figs]. (m. Nedarim 3.2)
However, and even if not quite as extreme as the opponents
constructed in the polemic of the Markan Jesus, in certain cases dedi-
cations which involved parents were not to be overturned. Compare
the following:
There was someone from Beth Horon whose father was prohibited
by vow from deriving benefit from him. And he [the man from
Beth Horon] was marrying off his son, and he said to his fellow,
87
The courtyard and the banquet are given over to you as a gift. But
they are before you only so that father may come and eat with us
at the banquet. The other party said, Now if they really are mine,
then lo, they are consecrated to heaven! He said to him, You did
not give me whats yours except so that you and your father could
eat and drink and make friends again, and so the sin [for violating
the oath] could rest on his head! Now the case came before the
sages. They ruled, any act of donation which is not so [given] that,
if one sanctified it to Heaven, it is sanctified, is no act of donation.
(m. Nedarim 5.6)
Of course, this example involves the idea of a conditional gift and
ought not to be pushed in the direction of a strict interpretation in the
sense of the Markan Jesus polemics against Pharisees in Mk 7.913.
Philo also gives us the reverse situation whereby a father can refrain
from giving to his son, in addition to his wife and in addition to
a ruler giving to subjects:
Each individual is master of his possessions unless he has solemnly
named the name of God over them declaring that he has given
them to God. And if he has merely made a chance verbal promise
of them he must not touch or handle them, but hold himself at once
debarred from them all . . . even with his own, I repeat, a chance
word of dedication spoken unawares deprives him of them all and
if he repents or denies his promise his life is forfeit also. The same
holds of any other persons over whom he has authority. If a man
has devoted his wifes sustenance to a sacred purpose he must
refrain from giving her that sustenance; so with a fathers gifts to
his son or a rulers to his subjects. The chief and most perfect way
of releasing dedicated property is by the priest refusing it, for he is
empowered by God to accept it or not . . . (Hypoth. 7.35)
Notice also that Philo adds that such practices in language which
can be classified as expansion and interpretation of the Law and
which Mark described as tradition in contrast to the biblical Law in
88
Mk 7.913: Besides these there is a host of other things which belong
to unwritten customs and institutions or are contained in the laws
themselves (Hypoth. 7.6).
SUMMARY
Ideally, divorce was deemed to be a necessary evil and marriage was
deemed to be a good thing. However, divorce was permitted in certain
circumstances thanks to the exception that if a husband finds some-
thing objectionable about his wife he can divorce her. By now it
should be no surprise that something objectionable needed further
definition. The definitions differed, from the strict view that divorce
is permissible in the case of something like adultery to the less
strict views such as a wife burning the food. It seems as if the
New Testament texts are more in line with the strict views. The New
Testament texts also seem as if they are in line with a view which
attacked divorce for the sake of remarriage. While there is a notable
emphasis on the agency of the husband in discussions of divorce
laws, the wife is not entirely neglected. There are some texts which
suggest wives were divorcing their husbands and certain rabbinic
texts suggest that a husband could be forced to divorce his wife.
In the case of an eye for an eye, biblical Law is ambiguous: it is
possible to interpret this principle as a literal case of violent retribu-
tion and a less literal case of financial (or equivalent) compensation.
However, from the evidence we have it seems as if the dominant view,
followed by New Testament texts, was that eye for an eye ought to
be read in terms of compensation and definitely not violent retribu-
tion. In the case of oaths and vows, there is no biblical law which
commands oaths and vows but there are discussions of what needs
to be done in carrying out oaths and vows. In fact, biblical Law gives
the chance to avoid oaths and vows and avoid breaking them and
some people were believed to have avoided them altogether, not least
because keeping them could lead to all sorts of problems. As ever,
there are debates over details but it seems that the New Testament
texts do nothing unknown in early Judaism.
89
CHAPTER 5
CIRCUMCISION, FAMILY AND INTERACTION
WITH GENTILES
While in sociological terms, ethnicity might refer to a specific social
group which might be deemed to have obvious ethnic characteris-
tics, with links to specific place of origin, biological connections,
specific customs and so on, these can break down on closer inspec-
tion. Outsider perceptions do not necessarily correspond to insider
perceptions (do some of the famous stereotypes about Arabs or
Scots really correspond to some truth or to Arab or Scottish self-
identities?) and insider perceptions may differ from one another.
In some ways, this questioning of hard and fast views corresponds
with the diversity of opinion this book has pointed out in relation to
Jewish legal debates. This chapter will now look at some of the issues
relating to Jewish ethnicity, largely from insider perspectives, in par-
ticular some of the more prominent discussions from the ancient
sources such as biological links and family, circumcision and becom-
ing a Jew, social interaction between Jews and Gentiles and Jewish
perceptions of Gentiles. I stress that this chapter will only cover
some of the issues relating to ethnicity. I will not cover, for instance,
the lively debate over whether geographical terms, such as Israelite
and Judean, are historically more suitable than Jew because, for
obvious reasons, I want to keep the focus of this book and this chapter
on legal and quasi-legal debates and related issues in the New
Testament.
1
90
IMPORTANCE OF FAMILY
Family was and is intricately linked in with issues of ethnicity and
what is deemed to make a Jew a Jew. Today we might often think of
the widespread idea of someones Jewish identity being dependent
on having a Jewish mother, a view developed in rabbinic literature
but which appears to have been unknown earlier in the times when
the New Testament documents were being written.
2
But whatever
views were present in the first century, the general issue of parental
links was, obviously, deemed to be of some importance in defining
someone as a Jew.
Indeed, it is one logical conclusion that if ethnicity was going to be
so important, then family and blood lineage would play an important
role in early Jewish thought. The Ten Commandments are fairly blunt
about this: Honour your father and your mother, so that your days
may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you
(Exod. 20.12; cf. Deut. 5.16). According to Mark, Jesus emphatically
endorsed this biblical commandment in contrast to the traditions of
his opponents: For Moses said, Honour your father and your
mother; and, Whoever speaks evil of father or mother must surely
die (Mk 7.10). In fact devotion to parents could be seen as one of the
most important commandments of them all. According to Josephus,
The law ordains also, that parents should be honoured immedi-
ately after God himself, and delivers that son who does not requite
them for the benefits he has received from them, but is deficient on
any such occasion, to be stoned. It also says, that the young men
should pay due respect to every elder, since God is the oldest of all
beings. (Apion 2.206)
Among the kinds of duties expected in honouring parents is as basic
as the burial of the dead parents. Unsurprisingly, then, we get the
following concerns brought up as in the following example from
Tobit 6.15: So now, since I am the only son my father has, I am
afraid that I may die and bring my fathers and mothers life down to
CIRCUMCISION, FAMILY AND GENTILES
91
their grave, grieving for me and they have no other son to bury them.
Similar sentiments are found on the lips of one would-be disciple,
who said, according to Matthew and Luke, Lord, first let me go and
bury my father (Mt. 8.21; Lk. 9.59).
There were exceptions in biblical Law to the burial of the father.
The High Priest is not allowed to come into contact with a dead body,
not even his father or mother (Lev. 21.11), while elsewhere in biblical
Law a special vow could be undertaken, the Nazirite vow, which,
among other things, entailed the avoidance of contact with a corpse,
including the corpse of a given close relative such as father, mother,
brother, and sister (Num. 6.6). Though it is common in scholarship to
believe these exceptions to have been weakened by the time of Jesus,
at least in relation to the burial of parents, in fact these exceptions
were, by Philo at least, reinforced with further explanation.
3
Of the
High Priest, Philo claimed:
. . . but the high priest he [Moses] absolutely forbade to mourn in
any case whatever; and may we not say that this was rightly done?
For as to the ministrations which belong to the other priests, one
individual can perform them instead of another, so that, even if
some be in mourning, still none of the usual observances need be
omitted; but there is no one besides the high priest himself, who
is permitted to perform his duties instead of him . . . and God com-
mands the high priest neither to rend his clothes over his very
nearest relations when they die, nor to take from his head the
ensign of the priesthood, nor in short to depart from the holy place
on any plea of mourning, that, showing proper respect to the place,
and to the sacred ornaments with which he himself is crowned, he
may show himself superior to pity, and pass the whole of his life
exempt from all sorrow. (Spec. Leg. 1.113115)
Of the Nazirite vow, Philo claimed:
. . . they are commanded to keep their body pure and undefiled, so
as not even to approach their parents if they are dead, nor their
92
brothers; piety overcoming the natural good will and affection
towards their relations and dearest friends, and it is both honour-
able and expedient that piety should at all times prevail. (Spec.
Leg. 1.250)
Significantly, when rabbis discussed the exceptions for the High
Priest and the Nazirite vow, they did not include parents:
A high priest and a Nazir do not contract corpse uncleanness on
account of [burying even] their close relatives. But they do con-
tract corpse uncleanness on account of a neglected corpse. [If]
they were going along the way and found a neglected corpse R.
Eliezer says, Let a high priest contract corpse uncleanness, but let
a Nazir not contract corpse uncleanness. And the Sages say, Let
a Nazir contract corpse uncleanness, but let a high priest not con-
tract corpse uncleanness. (m. Nazir 7.1)
We are back in the realm of the debates over what to do with an aban-
doned corpse and the avoidance impurity as seen previously in the
case of the parable of the Good Samaritan (see Chapter 3).
But on the exalting of family, there were qualifications made.
4

According to Josephus, Moses stressed that family must come a very
firm second behind the commandments: And let them be to you
venerable, and contended for more earnestly by you than your own
children and your own wives (Ant. 3.8688). Still, versions of this
sort of view could remain controversial for some if it affected procre-
ation, certainly according to at least one later rabbinic source. Simeon
b. Azzai got some abuse for downplaying family to the extent of not
getting married: The Sages: You [Simeon ben Azzai] preach well,
but do not practise your preaching. Said Simeon b. Azzai: My soul
is in love with the Torah. The world can be kept going by others
(b. Yeb. 63b). One logical outworking of a downplaying of family for
the study of the commandments would lead to a sort of fictive kin-
ship when carried out with others, as in the case of the Essenes who
93
seem to have come to a collective version of Simeon b. Azzais argu-
ment. The following ancient exercise in male bonding and paranoia
about women could lend itself to all sorts of interesting analyses:
Essenes . . . are Jews by birth, and seem to have a greater affection
for one another than the other sects have . . . They neglect wedlock,
but select other persons children, while they are pliable, and fit
for learning, and esteem them to be of their kindred, and form
them according to their own manners. They do not absolutely deny
the fitness of marriage, and the succession of mankind thereby
continued; but they guard against the lascivious behaviour of
women, and are persuaded that none of them preserve their fidelity
to one man . . . everyones possessions are intermingled with every-
ones possessions; and so there is, as it were, one patrimony among
all the brethren. (War 2.119122; see also Ant. 18.1822)
This tradition of fictive kinship was no doubt of some importance
for Paul when he had to deal bring together Jews and Gentiles and
where Jewish ethnicity may well have been fine for those born Jewish
(Rom. 911) but not for those who were not. Fictive kinship was
one way of emphasizing a united Christian movement (think of the
regular use of brothers).
Jesus apparently radical sayings on family as recorded in the
Gospels may well stand more in the tradition of fictive kinship
while also maintaining the importance of biological family links.
For instance, when Jesus mother and brothers wish to see him, he
responds, Who are my mother and my brothers? and then looks at
those sat around him, adding, Here are my mother and my brothers!
Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother
(Mk 3.3335). This is close in sentiment to the Essenes and perhaps
Simeon b. Azzai. Like both of those it seems as if Jesus still managed
to see family as a good thing; we should also not forget that Jesus in
the same Gospel emphatically criticized opponents for not caring for
parents and overriding the commandment to honour parents (Mk 7.10).
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Mark also looks forward to a time when those who have left house
or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields will
receive hundredfold now in this age houses, brothers and sisters,
mothers and children, and fields with persecutions and in the age to
come eternal life (Mk 10.2930).
Elsewhere, in Matthews Gospel, it seems as if the prioritizing
of family is brought to the fore, as in the following where the com-
parison presumably only works if family is regarded highly: Whoever
loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and who-
ever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me (Mt.
10.37). Lukes parallel version of this saying appears harsher: Who-
ever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and
children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my
disciple (Lk. 14.26). It is likely, however, that Luke is not too far
removed from Matthew here because the Greek verb hate is not
necessarily as strong as the English and is used to translate the Hebrew
(and Aramaic) equivalent where the sense is love-less (cf. Gen.
29.3135; Deut. 21.1517). It is possible that, as some have sug-
gested, Matthew and Luke have independently translated the weaker
Aramaic equivalent in their own different but equally valid ways.
5

And then there is Jesus response to the would-be disciple who
wants to bury his father, Let the dead bury their dead (Mt. 8.22/
Lk. 9.60). We should note from the start that the implication of this
saying is that the dead father would not be left unburied: others would
bury him. Again, this saying may well be in the realm of prioritizing
the role of family for what are deemed more pressing issues in the
here and now, or possibly something similar to the exception for the
Nazirite vow or (less likely) High Priest.
6
To use a slightly anachro-
nistic comparison, and reapplying the situation to one more overtly
concerning justice, Terry Eagleton, responding to Richard Dawkins,
implies that such views on family should not suggest kidnapping by
religious cults because such views do not see that movements for
justice cut across traditional blood ties, as well as across ethnic,
social, and national divisions. Justice is thicker than blood.
7
95
As Jesus was growing up, the urban centres of Sepphoris and
Tiberias were being rebuilt and built. As the typical economic pattern
in the ancient world was one of urban centres extracting the resources
from the surrounding villages (such as Nazareth), these building
projects would almost inevitably have led to changes in lifestyle.
Issues of relating to dislocation are mentioned by Josephus (Ant.
18.3638) and it may well be of some significance that there was a
full scale revolt against Rome (6670 CE) where hatred was levelled
at Sepphoris and Tiberias (Life 30, 39, 668, 99, 37484). At the very
least we can say that change was not welcomed by all and, as Halvor
Moxnes has shown, such economic changes would probably have
meant that changes for conventional households would have led to
many young men not heading households as would traditionally have
been expected of them.
8
As we have seen, the Gospels indicate that
there was some kind of fragmentation of household (e.g. Mk 3.2022,
3135; 10.2930; Mt. 8.22/Lk. 9.60; Mt. 10.3436/Lk. 12.5153/
Thom. 16.14; Mt. 10.37/Lk. 14.26), and the social context of Galilee
as Jesus was growing up, combined with traditions of putting family
in its place, may help explain the relatively intense concern for alter-
native family in the Gospels.
CIRCUMCISION AND DIFFERENCE
For men, circumcision was crucial in defining who might be a Jew:
You shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a
sign of the covenant between me and you (Gen. 17.11). On one level,
circumcision was relatively simple, assuming the person in case was
an eight-day-old baby boy (Gen. 17.12) where hopefully all would be
well. This was not so easy for an adult male wishing to become a Jew.
Circumcision would have been extremely painful to the extent of
life-threatening so it is no surprise that we find people taking on
Jewish ideas but with circumcision being a distinctive and perhaps
ultimate step. This seems to be implied in the following example
from Josephus: . . . thus were all these men barbarously murdered,
96
excepting Metilius; for when he entreated for mercy, and promised
that he would turn Jew, and be circumcised, they saved him alive
(War 2.454). The verb used here is literally to Judaize and notice
how it is in distinction from circumcision which appears to be some-
thing else needed to go the full way to becoming a Jew according
to this line of thought (LXX Esth. 8.17; War. 2.462463). It might be
significant that Paul uses the same verb to Judaize when he criti-
cizes Peter for withdrawing from eating with Gentile Christians after
previously he would eat with them: But when I saw that they were
not acting consistently with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas
before them all, If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like
a Jew, how can you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews (literally: to
Judaize)? (Gal. 2.14). Some scholars have argued that the use of
to Judaize is evidence that the dispute between Peter and Paul con-
cerned Jewish practices surrounding food laws and not circumcision.
9

That food laws and not circumcision was the issue is supported in the
light of Jewish sources which consistently describe food issues as a
potential problem for Jewish-Gentile interaction, as we will see later
in this chapter.
The issue of forced circumcision of households occasionally arises
when a Jew, for instance, gains slaves thereby implying that, for some,
conversion was required before technically becoming a Jew. There is
a scriptural example referring to the specific context of Passover
which could, and presumably was, read to apply to more general situ-
ations. According to Exod. 12.48, If an alien who resides with you
wants to celebrate the Passover to the Lord, all his males shall be
circumcised . . . he shall be regarded as a native of the land. In the
Palestinian Talmud we find the following theoretical example of
circumcising Gentile slaves if they belong to a Jewish slave owner:
R. Isaac bar Nahman in the name of R. Joshua b. Levi: A man once
bought a city of uncircumcised slaves from a Gentile on condition
that he would circumcise them, but they retracted (y. Yeb. 8, 8d).
Another different type of theoretical example is found in a rabbinic
retelling of the book of Jonah. The response of the Gentile sailors to
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Gods dramatic actions Jonah 1.1516 has what might be a problem
for an observant Jew: So they picked up Jonah, threw him into the
sea, and the sea stopped its raging. Then the men feared the LORD
greatly, and they offered a sacrifice to the LORD and made vows.
A sacrifice at sea might seem a little too pagan for some Jewish sen-
sibilities such as those underlying the rabbinic Pirqe de Rabbi Eliezer
and so sacrifices gets reinterpreted to mean circumcision and thus
everyone made vows to bring their children and all belonging to
him to the God of Jonah (Pirqe de Rabbi Eliezer 10).
While the above examples may have been theoretical it seems as if
on the ground there was circumcision of households occurring, hence
the following piece of Roman law which restricts circumcision to
Jewish sons only and thus assuming cases where Gentiles were being
circumcised by Jews:
MODESTINUS, Rules, book 6: By a rescript of the deified Pius
[Roman emperor Antoninus Pius, ruled 138161 CE] it is allowed
only to Jews to circumcise their own sons; a person not of that
religion who does so suffers the penalty of one carrying out a
castration. (Digesta 48.8.11)
Issues of circumcision unsurprisingly turn up when Josephus
discusses male converts to Judaism. The most prominent example is
Josephus[s] story of the conversion of Izates and the royal house of
Adiabene (Ant. 20.3448). Through the influence of a Jewish mer-
chant called Ananias, women at court worshipped the Jewish god
and they were in turn able to influence the male Izates. As Izates, who
would become king, took on more aspects of Jewish practice this
inevitably meant that the issue of circumcision would be raised. Izates
was of the opinion that he could not be thoroughly a Jew unless he
were circumcised, he was ready to have it done (Ant. 20.38). Izates
mother, herself interested in Jewish practices, disagreed for political
reasons arguing this thing would bring him into danger as it would
displease his subjects who would never bear to be ruled over by
98
a Jew (Ant. 20.39). Ananias agreed with Helena, not least because he
might get some of the blame, conveniently adding the argument that
Izates might worship God without being circumcised, even though
he did resolve to follow the Jewish law entirely, which worship of
God was of a superior nature to circumcision . . . God would forgive
him, though he did not perform the operation, while it was omitted
out of necessity, and for fear of his subjects (Ant. 20.41). A not
entirely convinced Izates initially accepted this ruling, before a strict
Galilean Jew called Eleazar urged circumcision based on a kind of
logic that it is too convenient to avoid the difficult bits, adding, How
long will you continue uncircumcised? But if you have not yet read
the law about circumcision, and do not know how great impiety you
are guilty of by neglecting it, read it now (Ant. 20.45). The surgeon
was then summoned and the job was done. A later rabbinic recalling
of the story of Izates conveys the problem well:
Once Monabaz and Izates, the sons of King Ptolemy, were sitting
and reading the book of Genesis. When they came to the verse,
And you shall be circumcised [Gen. 17.11] one turned his face
towards the wall and commenced to weep, and the other turned his
face to the wall and commenced to weep. Then each went and had
himself circumcised. (Gen. R. 46.10)
Clearly, then, social pressures could influence decisions on circum-
cision. No such difficulties for women, of course, and it is probably
significant in this respect that Josephus can speak of groups and large
numbers of (elite) women interested in, or converted to, Judaism. We
have just seen the example of women at the court of Izates. At the
beginning of the Jewish uprising against Rome (6670 CE), Josephus
describes how husbands in Damascus wanted to destroy Jewish
people yet their only fear was of their own wives who, with few
exceptions, had all become converts to the Jewish religion, and so
their efforts were mainly directed to keeping the secret from them
(War 2.560561). Women discussed by Josephus tend to be elite
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women (e.g. Ant. 18.8184) and this qualification provides further
reasons for the possibility of conversion. Death of the husband would
be one way but there are instances of elite women playing a more
active intellectual role in the household. The first century CE Roman
thinker Musonius Rufus argued that a woman trained in philosophy
is a better manager of a household (Musonius Rufus, frag. 3). With-
out the problematic circumcision, Judaism was one such option for
prominent women.
Similarly it might be the case that non-Jews who also practised
circumcision were able to convert to Judaism with the ease of people
who know they do not have to go through the operation as an adult.
Jewish writers were certainly familiar with non-Jews being circum-
cised. For example, Philo wrote of the different people circumcised
with a particularly interesting explanation:
But that here it was thought fit that man should be circumcised
out of a provident care for his mind without any previous infirmity
is plain, since not the Jews alone, but also the Egyptians, and
Arabians, and Ethiopians, and nearly all the nations who live in
the southern parts of the world, down to the torrid zone are
circumcised. (Ques. Gen. 3.48)
That the potential converts to Judaism from such places would not
need circumcision according to some Jews close to the time of the
New Testament is perhaps implied by the polemic of Jubilees:
And now I shall announce to you that the sons of Israel will deny
this ordinance [circumcision] and they will not circumcise their
sons according to all of this law because some of the flesh of their
circumcision they will leave in the circumcision of their sons. And
all the sons of Beliar will leave their sons without circumcising
just as they were born. (Jub. 15.33)
Clearly, then, circumcision must be done correctly and, from this per-
spective, it is unlikely that a non-Jewish circumcision would survive
100
such rigorous scrutiny. Yet we also get stories such as that of the
Arab Syllaeus who was due to marry into Jewish aristocracy but
would not convert because he would be stoned to death by his own
people (Ant. 16.225). As circumcision is not mentioned (and in con-
trast to the story of Izates), and as Syllaeus is described as an Arab,
a perfectly reasonable piece of speculation might be that this is
because Syllaeus would already have been circumcised.
10

But in light of what we have seen concerning non-Arab, non-
Egyptian and non-Ethiopian male converts to Judaism, it is perhaps
little surprise that circumcision became a flash point for earliest
Christianity when it started to attract Gentiles. In Galatians, Paul is
in fierce debate with those who believe Gentile Christians should
be circumcised to the extent he says, I wish those who unsettle
you would castrate themselves! (Gal. 5.12). In his later letter to the
Romans, Pauls tone may be more conciliatory but still the issue of
circumcision has to be discussed and Paul tries to work out a position
whereby circumcision is not required and attempts to argue for a lack
of logic in the position of stressing the importance of circumcision to
become (effectively) a Christian in a more radical form of argument
of those trying to dissuade Izates:
Circumcision indeed is of value if you obey the law; but if you
break the law, your circumcision has become uncircumcision. So,
if those who are uncircumcised keep the requirements of the law,
will not their uncircumcision be regarded as circumcision? Then
those who are physically uncircumcised but keep the law will con-
demn you that have the written code and circumcision but break
the law. For a person is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is true
circumcision something external and physical. Rather, a person is
a Jew who is one inwardly, and real circumcision is a matter of the
heart it is spiritual and not literal. (Rom. 2.2529)
We might compare the debate in Acts 15 where certain individuals
from Judea and Pharisees believed that Gentiles converting to the
101
new Christian movement needed to be circumcised, with the Pharisees
adding that the Law of Moses needed to be observed (Acts 15.1, 5).
In contrast, the decision taken at the meeting recorded in Acts 15 was
that circumcision and indeed much of the Law it would seem
was not required of Gentile converts. Here we might also compare
the position of those dismissed by Philo who allegorize circumcision
to the point of the physical being unnecessary, as discussed in
Chapter 1. That Philo has to react also says something of the contro-
versial nature of avoiding physical circumcision:
For there are some men, who, looking upon written laws as sym-
bols of things appreciable by the intellect . . . But now men living
solitarily by themselves as if they were in a desert, or else as if they
were mere souls unconnected with the body, and as if they had
no knowledge of any city, or village, or house, or in short of any
company of men whatever, overlook what appears to the many to
be true, and seek for plain naked truth by itself, whom the sacred
scripture teaches not to neglect a good reputation, and not to break
through any established customs which divine men of greater
wisdom than any in our time have enacted or established . . . nor
because the rite of circumcision is an emblem of the excision of
pleasures and of all the passions, and of the destruction of that
impious opinion, according to which the mind has imagined itself
to be by itself competent to produce offspring, does it follow that
we are to annul the law which has been enacted about circumci-
sion . . . (Mig. 89, 90, 92)
That people would feel so strongly about circumcision was not
simply because it was mentioned so emphatically in Genesis. One
of the most famous and retold aspects of Jewish history was the
Maccabean crisis (see Chapter 1) where circumcision became out-
lawed and perceived as a distinctive marker of who was a Jew and
where, in the build up to the crisis, the removal of the marks of
circumcision could be perceived to be a supreme act of disloyalty to
102
Judaism. Look at the shock in sources where Jews remove the marks
of circumcision and how it was seen by some as a key aspect of
identifying a Jew:
In those days certain renegades came out from Israel and misled
many, saying, Let us go and make a covenant with the Gentiles
around us, for since we separated from them many disasters have
come upon us. This proposal pleased them, and some of the peo-
ple eagerly went to the king, who authorised them to observe the
ordinances of the gentiles. So they built a gymnasium in Jerusalem,
according to gentile custom, and removed the mark of circumci-
sion, and they abandoned the holy covenant. They joined with the
gentiles and sold themselves to do evil. (1 Macc. 1.1115)
It is already clear that, for the writer of 1 Maccabees at least, the
removal of circumcision is the removal of something which makes a
person Jewish and an act which makes a person Gentile. This line of
thought, if anything, is further emphasized in Josephus retelling:
Therefore they desired his permission to build them a gymnasium
at Jerusalem. And when he had given them permission, they also
hid the circumcision of their genitals, that even when they were
naked they might appear to be Greeks. Accordingly, they aban-
doned all the customs that belonged to their own country, and
imitated the practices of the other nations. (Ant. 12.241)
This view of defining Jew and Gentile through circumcision is an
assumption which could be made in earliest Christianity, even when
the Jew Paul was writing for a largely Gentile audience in Galatia.
Paul recalls how he had been entrusted with the gospel for the uncir-
cumcised, just as Peter had been entrusted with the gospel for the
circumcised and how the leaders in Jerusalem agreed that Barnabas
and Paul should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised (Gal.
2.79). And just in case you were wondering, the following ancient
103
text kindly explains how to undo circumcision in what can be read on
its own as one of the most spectacular examples of understatement:
And, if the glans is bare and the man wishes for the look of the
thing to have it covered, that can be done; but more easily in a boy
than in a man; in one in whom the defect is natural, than in one in
whom after the custom of certain races has been circumcised . . .
Now the treatment for those in whom the defect is natural is as
follows . . . . But in one who has been circumcised the prepuce is
to be raised from the underlying penis around the circumference of
the glans by means of a scalpel. This is not so very painful, for
once the margin has been freed it can be stripped up by hand as far
back as the pubes, nor in so doing is there any bleeding. The pre-
puce thus freed is again stretched forwards beyond the glans; next
cold water affusions are freely used, and a plaster is applied . . .
And for the following days the patient is to fast until nearly over-
come by hunger lest satiety excite that part. (Celsus 7.25.1)
11
FOOD AND DIFFERENCE
Though not quite as dramatic as circumcision, food laws were one of
the ways in which Jews would differentiate themselves from Gentiles
and how various people would differentiate themselves from Jews
and mark Jews out as Jews in the ancient world. Biblical Law (Lev.
11; Deut. 14) mentions a variety of animals which may not be eaten
by the people of Israel and, most famously, these were to include pig
and shellfish. As with circumcision, the Maccabean crisis brought
this legal issue to the fore and one story remembered in 2 Maccabees
has one prominent Jew called Eleazar avoiding even pork-substitute.
The passage is worth quoting in some detail:
Eleazar, one of the scribes in high position, a man now advanced
in age and of noble presence, was being forced to open his mouth
to eat swines flesh. But he, welcoming death with honour rather
104
than life with pollution, went up to the rack of his own accord,
spitting out the flesh, as all ought to do who have the courage to
refuse things that it is not right to taste, even for the natural love of
life. Those who were in charge of that unlawful sacrifice took the
man aside because of their long acquaintance with him, and pri-
vately urged him to bring meat of his own providing, proper for
him to use, and pretend that he was eating the flesh of the sacri-
ficial meal that had been commanded by the king, so that by
doing this he might be saved from death . . . But making a high
resolve, worthy of his years and the dignity of his old age and the
grey hairs that he had reached with distinction and his excellent
life even from childhood, and moreover according to holy God-
given law, he declared himself quickly, telling them to send him
to Hades.
Such pretence is not worthy of our time of life, he said, for
many of the young might suppose that Eleazar in his ninetieth year
had gone over to an alien religion, and through my pretence, for
the sake of living a brief moment longer, they would be led astray
because of me, while I defile and disgrace my old age . . . There-
fore, by bravely giving up my life now, I will show myself worthy
of my old age and leave to the young a noble example of how to
die a good death willingly and nobly for the revered and holy
laws. (2 Macc. 6.1828)
Avoidance of pork, in particular, became one area of puzzlement
for Gentiles. When the Jewish philosopher Philo recalled an audience
with the Roman Emperor, Gaius Caligula, we find a clear example of
such puzzlement in Caligulas questioning:
. . . he then asked a very important and solemn question; why is it
that you abstain from eating pigs flesh? And then again at this
question such a violent laughter was raised by our adversaries,
partly because they were really delighted, and partly as they wished
to court the emperor out of flattery . . . (Legat. 361)
105
The Roman satirist, Juvenal, effectively claimed that Jews see no
difference between eating swines flesh, from which their father
abstained, and that of man (Juvenal, Satires 14.96). There are plenty
of general (and slightly confused) comments by non-Jewish authors
in the ancient world on the ways in which Jews would not eat with
non-Jews. The following from the historian Tacitus is fairly typical:
Jews are kind to one another but hostile to everyone else. They also
eat separately (Tacitus, introduction to Histories V). Notably, in Acts
1011.18 it is the removal of the need to observe the food laws which
is absolutely crucial in the spread of the movement in Jesus name to
include Gentiles as well as Jews.
It should probably come as no surprise, then, that the role of food
is crucial in the portrayal, at least, of interaction or non-interaction
between Jews and non-Jews. In general terms, the book of Tobit
highlights the difference centred on food: After I was carried away
captive to Assyria and came as a captive to Nineveh, everyone of my
kindred and my people ate the food of the Gentiles, but I kept myself
from eating the food of the Gentiles (Tob. 1.1011). Notice that the
issue is not eating with Gentiles because they are Gentiles but the
problem is emphatically the food of the Gentiles. In other words,
from this perspective, why should a Jew eat, say, pork? In the book of
Daniel there is a story (Dan. 1.317) of how Daniel and his compan-
ions would not eat the royal rations and would not drink wine and
so they instead ate vegetables (literally: seeds) so again food is the
issue in some way, though whether this involved avoiding food such
as pork or food dedicated to idols (or indeed both) is not entirely
clear.
A more precise example of food seeming to be the barrier for
Jewish-Gentile interaction, where idolatry certainly comes to the
fore, is found in text called Joseph and Aseneth. The text is based on
a simple problem for the writer which is found in Genesis: Pharaoh
gave Joseph the name Zaphenath-paneah; and he gave him Asenath
daughter of Potiphera, priest of On, as his wife. Thus Joseph gained
authority over the land of Egypt (Gen. 41.45). Does not this imply
106
that Joseph was a little too close to idolatry for comfort? According
to Joseph and Aseneth, the answer is an emphatic no:
Joseph said . . . It is not right for a man who worships God, who
with his mouth blesses the living God, and eats the blessed bread
of life, and drinks the blessed cup of immortality . . . to kiss a
strange woman, who with her mouth blesses dead and dumb idols,
and eats of their table the bread of strangulation, and drinks of
their libations the cup of treachery . . . it is not right for a woman
who worships God to kiss a strange man, because this is an abomi-
nation in Gods eyes . . . (Joseph and Aseneth 8.58)
Quite what the bread of strangulation might be is not clear but it is
clear that idolatry plays a role in the differentiation between Jew and
Gentile in this passage. The context of food and idolatry is further
evident in the word abomination (bdelugma) because it is associ-
ated not only with banned food in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament
but also frequently associated with fierce denunciations of idolatry.
Once again we see reasons given for non-association with Gentiles:
food and idolatry.
According to Acts, a blanket explanation for Jews not associating
and not eating with Gentiles is given by Peter: You yourselves know
that it is unlawful for a Jew to associate with or to visit a Gentile
(Acts 10.28). This is shortly followed up in Acts with related comments
aimed at Peter in Jerusalem: So when Peter went up to Jerusalem,
the circumcised believers criticized him, saying, Why did you go to
uncircumcised men and eat with them? (Acts 11.23). There are
similar sentiments found in early Judaism but once we look at such
texts, fierce as some of them may be, the more specific reasons relat-
ing to idolatry and food, and not simply because Gentiles are Gentile,
remain evident. A sectarian example comes from the book of Jubilees:
Keep yourself separate from the nations, and do not eat with them;
and do not imitate their rites, nor associate with them; for their
rites are unclean and their practices polluted, an abomination and
107
unclean. They offer sacrifices to the dead and worship demons
and they eat among the graves; yet all their rites are worthless and
to no purpose. (Jubilees 22.1617; cf. t. Abod. Zar. 4.6)
There were, however, differing views on Jewish association with
Gentiles and the seemingly strict views seem to be in the minority.
Idolatrous images were common enough and when Jews were pres-
ent in baths or a theatre then it was possible to rationalize this by
simply not giving the images any theological credence (m. AZ 3.4).
Of course, on the ground there would have been all sorts of interac-
tion between Jews and different non-Jewish groups, with various
levels of assimilation, as John Barclay has shown in detail. Philip
Harland has also shown how Jews, like other groups in ancient city
life, had dual or multiple affiliations to different groups, from the
synagogue to trade associations and thus providing a range of con-
tacts and social interactions.
12
The issue of food occurs regularly in discussions of Jews eating
with Gentiles, as we have already seen, but this was hardly insur-
mountable. If the circumstances were right, if things like idolatry were
avoided and food banned in the Torah removed from the meal table,
then there is no reason in the abstract why Jews could not eat with
non-Jews. In the early Jewish fiction, Judith, the heroine was a master
of both undermining the enemy and avoiding of over-assimilation in
the process:
So Holofernes said to her [Judith], Have a drink and be merry with
us! Judith said, I will gladly drink, my lord, because today is the
greatest day in my whole life. Then she took what her maid had
prepared and ate and drank before him. Holofernes was greatly
pleased with her, and drank a great quantity of wine, much more than
he had ever drunk in any one day since he was born. (Jdt. 12.1719)
Note here that it is made absolutely explicit that Judith the Jew ate
food already prepared for her and, despite the unusual circumstances,
this shows how table fellowship could be made possible by having
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food readily available in a not dissimilar way to observant Jews today
having kosher meals on aeroplanes, for instance. It seems as if similar
assumptions were read into the book of Esther. Esther was present at
a (Gentile) banquet and so steps were made to make it clear that
Esther was not behaving out of place. One Greek re-reading of the
text says, And your servant has not eaten at Hamans table, and
I have not honoured the kings feast or drunk the wine of libations
(Additions to Esther C 14.17). Notice here that the great worry is
about the avoidance of idolatry. In everyday situations, an alternative
solution to dealing with the problem of idolatrous food may simply
to have been to avoid asking about the origin of the meat, perhaps
following the logic of Paul:
If an unbeliever invites you to a meal and you are disposed to go,
eat whatever is set before you without raising any question on
the ground of conscience. But if someone says to you, This has
been offered in sacrifice, then do not eat it, out of consideration
for the one who informed you, and for the sake of conscience
I mean the others conscience, not your own. For why should my
liberty be subject to the judgment of someone elses conscience?
(1 Cor. 10.2729)
13
Probably the sweetest example of interaction between Jews and
Gentiles at the meal table comes from the early Jewish text, the Letter
of Aristeas:
Everything of which you partake, he [the Egyptian king] said, will
be served in compliance with your habits; it will be served to me as
well as to you. They expressed their pleasure and the king ordered
the finest apartments to be given to them near the citadel, and the
preparations for the banquet were made. (Letter of Aristeas 181)
It looks as if a not dissimilar kind of reasoning, though presumably
less cordial, was happening among the first Christians in Rome:
109
Some believe in eating anything, while the weak eat only vegeta-
bles. Those who eat must not despise those who abstain, and those
who abstain must not pass judgment on those who eat . . . Do not,
for the sake of food, destroy the work of God. Everything is indeed
clean, but it is wrong for you to make others fall by what you eat;
it is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that makes
your brother or sister stumble. (Rom. 14.23, 2021)
One obvious interpretation of this passage is that those eating vege-
tables were observing the food laws and were certain of doing so
by staying effectively vegetarian, a phenomenon paralleled in the
contemporary world in some contexts where observant Jews eat
with non-Jews. The avoidance of wine could possibly be linked
with Jewish avoidance of Gentile wine which we know from other
sources, even if it is not entirely clear precisely why it was avoided.
In general terms, Jewish avoidance of Gentile wine seems to have
been linked with idolatry, again an issue at the heart of table fellow-
ship between Jews and non-Jews. The avoidance of Gentile wine
on the assumption that it is idolatrous appears to be assumed in the
following example:
These things belonging to gentiles are prohibited, and the prohibi-
tion affecting them extends to deriving any benefit from them at
all: wine, vinegar of gentiles which to begin with was wine . . .
Meat which is being brought into an idol is permitted. But that
which comes out is prohibited, because it is like sacrifices of the
dead (Ps. 106.28), the words of R. Aqiba. Those who are going to
an idolatrous pilgrimage it is prohibited to do business with
them. (m. Abod. Zar. 2.3)
THE PROBLEM(S) WITH GENTILES
A common scholarly view, and one which is still found in scholarly
literature, was that Gentiles had a special kind of impurity and therefore
110
ought to be avoided in the same way impurity ought to be avoided.
14

The following was a key text:
A proselyte who converted on the eve of Passover [the fourteenth
of Nisan] the House of Shammai say, He immerses himself
and eats his Passover offering in the evening. The House of Hillel
say, He who takes his leave of the foreskin is as if he took his
leave of the grave [and must be sprinkled on the third and seventh
day after circumcision as if he had suffered corpse uncleanness.
(m. Pesah. 8.8)
Critics, however, have challenged the view of intrinsic Gentile impu-
rity and pointed out that Gentiles can be described in the language
of impurity in the sense of a simile, as if Gentiles were (say) impure
like a menstruating woman. Jonathan Klawans and Christine E. Hayes
have overthrown the scholarly idea that there was some kind of legal
category of an intrinsic Gentile impurity. As Hayes shows, two cru-
cial pieces of rabbinic evidence show just how problematic the idea
of an intrinsic Gentile impurity is. According to the following pas-
sage, Gentiles are allowed to handle priestly food (heave offering):
A gentile and a Samaritan that which they separate is [valid] heave
offering, and that which they take as tithes is [valid] tithes, and that
which they dedicate [to the Temple] is [validly] dedicated (m. Ter.
3.9). If Gentiles had intrinsic impurity then they would not be
allowed the handle priestly food because it needs to be kept pure (see
Chapter 3). For these reasons Gentiles should not be able to offer
sacrifices if they were intrinsically impure yet they are clearly allowed
to do so, as the following examples simply assume:
15

Said R. Simeon, Seven rules did the court ordain . . . (2) A gentile
who sent his burnt offering from overseas and sent drink offerings
with it they are offered from what he has sent (m. Sheq. 7.6)
These are [meal offerings which] require oil and frankincense: . . .
the meal offerings of gentiles . . . (m. Men. 5.3)
111
It is also notable that, as we have seen, in texts where Jewish and
Gentile social interaction is discussed there is no concern for issues
of impurity (cf. m. Ber. 7.1; m. AZ 5.5; and contrast rabbinic discus-
sions of the people of the land see Chapter 3).
Instead, as Klawans and Hayes argue, it seems that the problem
with Gentiles was they were deemed to be mired in idolatry and
morally impure. Intermarriage would therefore lead the righteous
astray. This is grounded in several biblical texts such as the following
not-so-subtle examples:
Thus the land became defiled; and I punished it for its iniquity, and
the land vomited out its inhabitants. But you shall keep my statutes
and my ordinances and commit none of these abominations, either
the citizen or the alien who resides among you (for the inhabitants
of the land, who were before you, committed all of these abomina-
tions, and the land became defiled) . . . (Lev. 18.2527)
When the Lord your God brings you into the land that you are
about to enter and occupy, and he clears away many nations before
you the Hittites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, the Canaanites,
the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations might-
ier and more numerous than you and when the Lord your God
gives them over to you and you defeat them, then you must utterly
destroy them. Make no covenant with them and show them no
mercy. Do not intermarry with them, giving your daughters to their
sons or taking their daughters for your sons, for that would turn
away your children from following me, to serve other gods. Then
the anger of the Lord would be kindled against you, and he would
destroy you quickly. (Deut. 7.14; cf. Lev. 18.26; 1 Kgs 11.12;
Ezra 9.13, 1012; Neh. 13.26)
These sorts of sentiment were taken up in early Jewish texts. From
the Dead Sea Scrolls we get the following: When he saw that the
peoples of [the ea]rth behaved abominably . . . all the earth [became]
112
impure defilement altogether (4Q381 frag. 69, 12; see also Jub.
22.1620, discussed above). In addition to idolatry, Gentiles were
liable to perform acts such as murder and sexual immorality. Again,
this was grounded in biblical texts and developed in early Jewish texts
(cf. Exod. 34.1516; Lev. 18.2430; Deut. 7.24, 16; 20.18; Jub.
9.15; Aristeas 152; Philo, Spec. Laws 1.51; Sib. Or. 3.492, 496500;
5.168; Tob. 14.6).
In addition to food, but in some ways related to food, what we
might call morality was another feature of Jewish-Gentile interaction.
One way the concern for Gentile behaviour would manifest itself was
in vice-lists such as the following example from a the first century
Jewish text, Wisdom of Solomon, as a record of the sorts of things
idolaters do:
. . . and all is a raging riot of blood and murder, theft and deceit,
corruption, faithlessness, tumult, perjury, confusion over what is
good, forgetfulness of favours, defiling of souls, sexual perversion,
disorder in marriages, adultery, and debauchery. (Wis. 14.2526)
Just as food issues found their way into early Christian dealings with
Gentiles, so did vice-lists and concern for Gentile behaviour. Paul
used vice lists when, for instance, describing the past lives of the
Corinthian Christians and a warning to their present and future
(1 Cor. 6.911) while 1 Peter explicitly makes reference to what is
deemed stereotypical Gentile behaviour:
You have already spent enough time in doing what the Gentiles
like to do, living in licentiousness, passions, drunkenness, revels,
carousing, and lawless idolatry. They are surprised that you no
longer join them in the same excesses of dissipation and so they
blaspheme you . . . (1 Pet. 4.35)
One possible way of interaction between Jews and Gentiles,
particularly for Jews less convinced about Gentile behaviour, was
113
through the so-called Noachide laws, given, of course, to humanity
and before the commandments at Sinai were given more specifically
to the Israelites. These laws were based on Gen. 9.36:
Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you; and just as
I gave you the green plants, I give you everything. Only, you shall
not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. For your own lifeblood
I will surely require a reckoning: from every animal I will require
it and from human beings, each one for the blood of another, I will
require a reckoning for human life. Whoever sheds the blood of a
human, by a human shall that persons blood be shed; for in his
own image God made humankind.
A key rabbinic passage relating to the Noachide laws is from the
Tosefta: Seven commandments were given to the children of Noah:
regarding the establishments of courts of justice, idolatry, blasphemy,
fornication, bloodshed, theft [and the torn limb] (t. Abodah Zarah
8.4). Later still, three Noachide concerns involve capital offences,
namely, fornication, bloodshed and blasphemy or idolatry, and then
become the minimum test case for allegiance to Judaism for Jews
(b. Sanh. 57a, 74a) and so we may be dealing with something like
a universal code for Jews and Gentiles.
16
Related concerns were
certainly found by the time of the writing of the New Testament texts.
According to Jubilees,
. . . in the twenty-eighth jubilee Noah began to command his
grandsons with ordinances and commandments and all of the judg-
ments which he knew. And he bore witness to his sons so that they
might do justice and cover the shame of their flesh and bless the
one who created them and honour father and mother, and each one
love his neighbour and preserve themselves from fornication and
pollution and from all injustice . . . And everyone sold himself in
order that he might do injustice and pour out much blood, and the
earth was full of much injustice . . . And they poured out much
114
blood upon the earth . . . For all who eat the blood of man and all
who eat the blood of any flesh will be blotted out, all of them . . .
And you shall not eat living flesh lest it be that your blood which
is your life be sought by the hand of all flesh which eats upon the
earth . . . (Jub. 7.20, 2324, 2833)
In Acts 15, something similar to the Noachide laws is used to deal
with the issue of Gentiles in the earliest Christian movement. The
conclusion is that Gentiles turning to God should be written to with
the following instructions: abstain only from things polluted by idols
and from fornication/porneia and from whatever has been strangled
and from blood (Acts 15.20; cf. 15.29). Related concerns also
come through several times in the book of Revelation (e.g. Rev. 2.14;
9.2021), a book deeply concerned about interactions with the Roman
world. For instance, there is polemic aimed at those who tolerate
that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophet and is teaching and
beguiling my servants to practice fornication and to eat food sacri-
ficed to idols (2.20) and where there is a brutal end for those who
do not adhere to laws clearly reminiscent of the Noachide laws: as
for the cowardly, the faithless, the polluted, the murderers, the forni-
cators, the sorcerers, the idolaters and all liars, their place will be in
the lake that burns with fire and sulphur, which is the second death
(Rev. 21.8).
SUMMARY
Views of family were important for some Jews in establishing who
was a Jew: having Jewish parents made it easier to identify as a Jew
with minimal controversy. New Testament scholars have rightly pointed
out that family and respect for parents can be very important but
too often at the expense of overlooking the prioritizing of family. For
instance, some people felt that commandments were more important
than family and we should not forget that at the time and in the
place of Jesus there were notable social upheavals whereby traditional
115
family models and roles were turned upside down. In terms of mark-
ing who was a male Jew, circumcision was obviously important
and doubly so since it became a symbol of Jewish loyalty in the
Maccabean crisis. However, circumcision also becomes the final
hurdle for conversion to Judaism (for men) and this was not always
attractive for interested Gentiles. This led to some debates over what
it took to become a Jew. It is no surprise that circumcision becomes
a flashpoint as the message spreads among Gentiles. Food and eating
habits were also ways in which Jewish identity was perceived and
constructed and, again, issues such as the avoidance of pork could
function as a symbol of Jewish loyalty in light of the Maccabean
crisis. Contrary to some scholarly views, Jews were able to eat with
Gentiles. In the texts available it seems that, if the problems of idola-
try and food banned in biblical law could be avoided by Jews,
then there should be no problem with Jewish-Gentile interaction. Not
everyone accepted this, at least not without significant qualification.
A more sectarian view involved still avoiding Gentiles at all costs.
Gentiles were, according to some stereotypical views, liable to be
involved in all sorts of immoral acts, from idolatry to murder. Indeed,
such moral issues were an issue, at least in the texts we have, in
issues of intermarriage. Some Jews also developed a series of basis
laws which would further allow basic Jewish-Gentile interaction.
Unsurprisingly, all the above issues come through in those New
Testament texts where Jewish-Gentile interaction is a crucial issue.
116
CONCLUDING REMARKS
We have seen, then, plenty of Jewish texts relating to legal, or
quasi-legal, issues in early Judaism. It ought to be clear by now that
there was a great deal of diversity and (sometimes violent) debate
over what was, for some, the source of Jewish identity in the ancient
world, the Torah. There is still much work to do on the detailed appli-
cation of Jewish legal texts to New Testament passages. In terms of
historical Jesus studies, the idea of Jesus and the Law continues to
be full of arguments whereby Jesus still has to override at least one
commandment in some way. This may be the case historically, but
given the range of legal views in early Judaism it should at least be
done after an exhaustive study of parallels in Jewish legal texts. That
said, some recent work is now showing that Jesus views on the Law
were all paralleled in early Judaism.
1
The appreciation of Jewish Law and legal texts still needs much
more work in the study of Christian origins in general, not least
because Christian identity would regularly manifest itself over against
practice of the Torah. In the scholarly study of Christian origins there
are still numerous caricatures of Jewish Law but I just want to give
the final example of recent developments in continental philosophy
where Paul has become an important intellectual figure. Following
Jacob Taubes lead, famous contemporary thinkers such as Alain
Badiou and Slavoj iek have seen Paul as an important revolutionary
and universalist thinker, a kind of proto-Marxist.
2
Jewish Law is an
important feature in this debate and some scholars are worried that
CONCLUDING REMARKS
117
the old model of a negative Judaism is being continued without aware-
ness of the history of New Testament scholarship. It must be stressed,
however, that Badiou and others certainly seem to be on to something
in certain cases. According to Badiou, Paul would not compromise
when it came to fidelity to his revolutionary principles of the new
movement. As for the Law, Badiou adds, Paul is not opposed to it as
such but he is indifferent (Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumci-
sion is nothing 1 Cor. 7.19), though Badiou believes that indifference
is worse. This is because the new universality, unlike the Torah, bears
no privileged relation to the Jewish community.
3
This, as we saw in
Chapter 5, does echo Pauls view of food laws in Romans.
However, there is some evidence that old negative views concern-
ing Jewish Law are difficult to leave behind. Terry Eagleton, whose
work we have seen in passing in this book, is both a fan of Badious
work on Paul and recent defender of Christianity and religion
against its critics, makes uncomfortable claims concerning the Law:
It is this overturning of the Satanic or super-egoic image of God in
Jesus that offers to unlock the lethal deadlock between Law and
desire, or what Jacques Lacan calls the Real. It is a condition in
which we come to fall morbidly in love with the Law itself, and
with the oppressed, unhappy state to which it reduces us, desiring
nothing more than to punish ourselves for our guilt even unto
death. This is why Saint Paul describes the Law as cursed. It is this
urge to do away with ourselves as so much waste and garbage to
which Freud gives the name of the death drive, the opposite of
which is an unconditionally accepting love. As Paul writes, the
Law, and the sin or guilt which it generates, is what brings death
into the world. The choice is between a life liberated from this
pathological deadlock, which is known to the Gospel as eternal
life, and that grisly caricature of eternal life which is the ghastly
pseudo-immortality of the death drive. It is a state in which we
prevent ourselves from dying for real by clinging desperately to
our morbid pleasure in death as a way of affirming that we are
118
alive . . . This is the hell . . . of those who are stuck fast in their
masochistic delight in the Law, and spit in the face of those who
offer to relieve them of this torture . . . To be unburdened of their
guilt is to be deprived of the very sickness which keeps them going.
This, one might claim, is the primary masochism known as
religion.
4
Given the details of the Law given in this book, from Sabbath obser-
vance to circumcision, has not this quotation from Eagleton got some
highly unfair implications? Arent such views concerning Jewish
Law worth testing with direct reference to Jewish Law . . .?
119
NOTES
INTRODUCTION
1
I have analysed the historical and cultural reasons underlying the shifts in
scholarly rhetoric concerning the role of Jewish Law in J. G. Crossley, Jesus
in an Age of Terror: Scholarly Projects for a New American Century (London
and Oakville: Equinox, 2008), Chapters 56.
2
N. T. Wright, Jesus and the Victory of God (London: SPCK, 1996),
pp. 399402.
CHAPTER 1
1
Indeed, for full discussion of what follows see H. G. M. Williamson, Ezra,
Nehemiah: Word Biblical Commentary 16 (Waco: Word, 1985).
2
E.g. J. Neusner, Rabbinic Traditions about the Pharisees before 70 (3 vols;
Leiden: Brill, 1971); D. Instone-Brewer, Traditions of the Rabbis from the
Era of the New Testament, vol. 1 Prayer and Agriculture (Grand Rapids:
Eerdmans, 2004).
3
M. Hengel and R. Deines, E. P. Sanders Common Judaism, Jesus, and the
Pharisees, JTS 46 (1995), pp. 170.
4
E. P. Sanders, Jewish Law from Jesus to the Mishnah: Five Studies (London:
SCM, 1990), p. 273.
5
J. M. G. Barclay, Jews in the Mediterranean Diaspora from Alexander to
Trajan (323 BCE117 CE) (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1996).
6
M. Casey, From Jewish Prophet to Gentile God: The Origins and Develop-
ment of New Testament Christology (Louisville: Westminster John Knox;
Cambridge: James Clarke, 1991), p. 19.
7
See further J. G. Crossley, The Damned Rich (Mk 10.1731), ExpT 116
(2005), pp. 397401; J. G. Crossley, Why Christianity Happened: A Socio-
historical Explanation of Christian Origins 2650 CE (Louisville: WJK,
2006), Chapter 2.
8
See further e.g. R. J. Bauckham, Rich Man and Lazarus: The Parable and the
Parallels, NTS 37 (1991), pp. 22546.
NOTES
120
CHAPTER 2
1
T. Eagleton, Reason, Faith, and Revolution: Reflections on the God Debate
(New Haven and London: Yale University Press. 2009), pp. 1011.
2
A. Cowley (ed.), Aramaic Papyri of the Fifth Century B.C. (Oxford: Clarendon,
1923).
3
E. P. Sanders, Jewish Law from Jesus to the Mishnah: Five Studies (London:
SCM, 1990), p. 20.
4
M. Casey, Aramaic Sources of Marks Gospel (Cambridge: CUP, 1998),
pp. 17392.
CHAPTER 3
1
See J. Neusner, The Idea of Purity in Ancient Judaism (Leiden: Brill, 1973).
2
It is perhaps worth citing a lengthier bibliography than normal given the highly
controversial nature of the debate over purity. For a selection see e.g.
J. Neusner, Rabbinic Traditions about the Pharisees before 70 (3 vols; Leiden:
Brill, 1971); E. P. Sanders, Jewish Law From the Bible to the Mishnah
(London: SCM, 1990), pp. 131254; J. D. G. Dunn, Jesus Paul and the
Law: Studies in Mark and Galatians (London: SPCK, 1990), pp. 6188;
H. K. Harrington, Did Pharisees Eat Ordinary Food in a State of Ritual
Purity?, JSJ 26 (1995), pp. 4254; B. Chilton, E. P. Sanders and the Ques-
tion of Purity, in B. Chilton and C. A. Evans (eds), Jesus in Context: Temple,
Purity, and Restoration (Leiden: Brill, 1997), pp. 22130; E. Regev, Pure
Individualism: The Idea of Non-Priestly Purity in Ancient Judaism, JSJ
31(2000), pp. 176202; J. C. Poirier, Purity beyond the Temple in the Second
Temple Era,
JBL
122 (2003), pp. 24765.
3
See further R. P. Booth, Jesus and the Laws of Purity: Tradition and Legal
History in Mark 7 (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1986); J. G. Crossley, The Date of
Marks Gospel: Insights from the Law in Earliest Christianity (London and
New York: T&T Clark/Continuum, 2004), Chapter 7.
4
J. C. Poirier, Why did the Pharisees Wash their Hands?, JJS 47 (1996),
pp. 21733.
5
J. G. Crossley, Halakah and Mark 7.4: . . and beds, JSNT 25 (2003),
pp. 43347.
6
For a full discussion with bibliography see J. G. Crossley, Why Christianity
Happened: A Sociohistorical Account of Christian Origins 2650 CE
(Louisville: WJK, 2006), Chapter 4.
CHAPTER 4
1
For more on the issue of adultery and punishment in Jewish Law see D.
Instone-Brewer, Divorce and Remarriage in the Bible: The Social and Liter-
ary Context (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002).
2
M. Bockmuehl, Jewish Law in the Gentile Churches: Halakah and the Begin-
ning of Christian Public Ethics (T&T Clark: Edinburgh, 2000), pp. 1721.
3
Instone-Brewer, Divorce and Remarriage in the Bible, pp. 1456.
NOTES
121
4
See T. Holmn, Divorce in CD 4.205.2 and in 11Q 57.1718: Some Remarks
on the Pertinence of the Question, RevQ 18 (1998), pp. 397408; D. Instone-
Brewer, Nomological Exegesis in Qumran Divorce Texts, RevQ 18 (1998),
pp. 56179.
5
A. Cowley (ed.), Aramaic Papyri of the Fifth Century B.C. (Oxford: Clarendon,
1923), pp. 4450, Papyrus 15, line 23.
6
D. Instone-Brewer, Jewish Women Divorcing Their Husbands in Early Judaism:
The Background to Papyrus Seelim 13, HTR 92 (1999), pp. 34957. For
different interpretations see T. Ilan, Notes and Observations on a Newly
Published Divorce Bill from the Judean Desert, HTR 89 (1996), pp. 195202;
A. Schremer, Divorce in Papyrus Seelim 13 Once Again: A Reply to Tal Ilan,
HTR 91 (1998), pp. 193202. For the text see A. Yardeni, in H. M. Cotton and
A. Yardeni (eds), Discoveries in the Judean Desert XXVII. Aramaic, Hebrew
and Greek Documentary Texts from Nahal Hever and Other Sites (Oxford:
Clarendon, 1997), pp. 6570.
7
Sanders, Jewish Law, pp. 512.
8
G. Vermes, The Religion of Jesus the Jew (London: SCM, 1993), pp. 3536.
CHAPTER 5
1
On the controversial debates over the historical usefulness of the term Jew
see e.g. B. J. Malina and R. L. Rohrbaugh, Social-Science Commentary on the
Gospel of John (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998), pp. 4445; J. H. Elliott,
Jesus the Israelite was Neither a Jew nor a Christian: On Correcting
Misleading Nomenclature, JSHJ 5 (2007), pp. 11954; P. F. Esler, Conflict
and Identity in Romans: The Social Setting of Pauls Letter (Minneapolis:
Fortress, 2003); S. Mason, Jews, Judeans, Judaizing, Judaism: Problems of
Categorization in Ancient History, JSJ 38 (2007), pp. 457512. For ideolo-
gical questions raised see A. J. Levine, The Misunderstood Jew: The Church
and the Scandal of the Jewish Jesus (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 2006);
J. G. Crossley, Jesus the Jew since 1967, in H. Moxnes, W. Blanton, and
J. G. Crossley (eds), Jesus beyond Nationalism: Constructing the Historical
Jesus in a Period of Cultural Complexity (London and Oakville: Equinox,
2009), pp. 11129.
2
S. J. D. Cohen, The Beginnings of Jewishness: Boundaries, Varieties, Uncer-
tainties (Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of California Press,
1999), pp. 263307. On the tricky question of Timothys Jewishness and his
parents see pp. 36377.
3
See further, M. Bockmuehl, Let the Dead Bury their Dead (Mt. 8.22/
Lk. 9.60): Jesus and the Halakah, JTS 49 (1998), pp. 55381.
4
See further S. C. Barton, Discipleship and Family Ties in Mark and Matthew
(Cambridge: CUP, 1995).
5
T. W. Manson, The Sayings of Jesus (London: SCM, 1957), p. 131; Barton,
Family, pp. 16970.
6
Bockmuehl, Let the Dead Bury their Dead; M. Bockmuehl, Leave the
Dead to Bury their own Dead: A Brief Clarification in Reply to Crispin H. T.
Fletcher-Louis, JSNT 26 (2003), pp. 24142.
NOTES
122
7
(New Haven and London: Yale University Press), p. 31.
8
H. Moxnes, Putting Jesus in His Place: A Radical Vision of Household and
Kingdom (Louisville: WJK, 2003), pp. 46107.
9
J. D. G. Dunn, Jesus Paul and the Law: Studies in Mark and Galatians
(London: SPCK, 1990), pp. 129182.
10
Cf. Cohen, Beginnings of Jewishness, p. 227.
11
L. L. Grabbe, Judaism from Cyrus to Hadrian (London: SCM, 1992).
12
J. M. G. Barclay, Jews in the Mediterranean Diaspora from Alexander to
Trajan (323 BCE117 CE) (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1996); P. A. Harland,
Social Networks and Connections with the Elites in the World of the Early
Christians, in A. J. Blasi, P.-A. Turcotte and J. Duhaime (eds), Handbook of
Early Christianity and the Social Sciences (Walnut Creek: AltaMira, 2002),
pp. 385408; P. A. Harland, Associations, Synagogues, and Congregations:
Claiming a Place in Ancient Mediterranean Society (Minneapolis: Fortress,
2003), pp. 336, 177264.
13
See further Sanders, Jewish Law, pp. 27283.
14
The classic and most learned exposition of this view is G. Alon, The Levitical
Uncleanness of Gentiles, in Jews, Judaism and the Classical World: Studies
in Jewish History in the Times of the Second Temple and Talmud (Jerusalem:
Magnes, 1977), pp. 14689.
15
C. E. Hayes, Gentile Impurities and Jewish Identities: Intermarriage and
Conversion from the Bible to the Talmud (Oxford: OUP, 2002), pp. 10744,
199221.
16
Bockmuehl, Jewish Law, pp. 14573, esp. 161.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
1
Cf. e.g. G. Vermes, The Religion of Jesus the Jew (London: SCM, 1993);
J. G. Crossley, The Date of Marks Gospel: Insights from the Law in Earliest
Christianity (London & New York: T&T Clark/Continuum, 2004), Chapters
4, 6 and 7; D. Catchpole, Jesus People: The Historical Jesus and the Begin-
nings of Community (London: Darton, Longman and Todd; Grand Rapids:
Baker, 2006); M. Casey, Jesus of Nazareth: An Independent Historians
Account of his Life and Teachings (London and New York: T&T Clark/
Continuum, 2010).
2
E.g. J. Taubes, The Political Theology of Paul (Stanford: Stanford University
Press, 2004); A. Badiou, Saint Paul: The Foundation of Universalism
(Stanford: California, 2003); S. iek, The Puppet and the Dwarf: The
Perverse Core of Christianity (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2003).
3
Badiou, Saint Paul, p. 23.
4
(New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2009), pp. 2122.
123
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USEFUL PRIMARY SOURCES
Aberbach, M. and Grossfeld, B. (eds), Targum Onkelos to Genesis (New York:
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Charlesworth, J. H. (ed.), The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (2 vols; New York:
Doubleday, 198385).
Clarke, E. G. (ed.), Targum Pseudo-Jonathan of the Pentateuch (Hoboken: Ktav,
1984).
Colson, F. H., et al. (eds), Philos Works (12 vols; London: Heinemann,
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Cowley, A. (ed.), Aramaic Papyri of the Fifth Century BC (Oxford: Clarendon
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Danby, H. (ed.), The Mishnah (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1933).
Drazin, I. (ed.), Targum Onkelos to Deuteronomy (New York: Ktav, 1981).
(ed.), Targum Onkelos to Exodus (Denver: Ktav, 1990).
(ed.), Targum Onkelos to Leviticus (Denver: Ktav, 1994).
Epstein, I. (ed.), The HebrewEnglish Edition of the Babylonian Talmud
(36 vols; London: Soncino, 196090).
Grossfeld, B. (ed.), The Targum Onqelos to Leviticus and the Targum Onqelos to
Numbers (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1988).
Lauterbach, J. Z. (ed.), Mekilta de-Rabbi Ishmael (3 vols; Philadelphia: Jewish
Publication Society of America, 1949).
Martnez, F. G. and Tigchelaar, E. J. C. (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition
(2 vols; Leiden: Brill, 199798).
Neusner, J., The Mishnah: A New Translation (Yale: Yale University Press, 1988).
et al. (eds), The Tosefta (6 vols; New York: Ktav, 197786).
et al. (eds), The Talmud of the Land of Israel (35 vols; Chicago: University
of Chicago Press, 198294).
Stern, M. (ed.), Greek and Latin Authors on Jews and Judaism (3 vols; Jerusalem:
Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1974).
Thackeray, H. St. J. et al. (eds), Josephus Works (9 vols; London: Heinemann,
192953).
Vermes, G. (ed.), The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English (London: Penguin,
1997).
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Alon, G., Jews, Judaism and the Classical World: Studies in Jewish History in
the Times of the Second Temple and Talmud (Jerusalem: Magnes, 1977).
Badiou, A., Saint Paul: The Foundation of Universalism (Stanford: California,
2003).
Barclay, J. M. G., Jews in the Mediterranean Diaspora from Alexander to Trajan
(323 BCE117 CE) (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1996).
Bauckham, R. J., Rich Man and Lazarus: The Parable and the Parallels, NTS 37
(1991), pp. 22546.
Bockmuehl, M., Jewish Law in the Gentile Churches: Halakah and the Beginning
of Christian Public Ethics (T&T Clark: Edinburgh, 2000).
Booth, R. P., Jesus and the Laws of Purity: Tradition and Legal History in Mark
7 (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1986).
Casey, M., From Jewish Prophet to Gentile God: The Origins and Development
of New Testament Christology (Louisville: Westminster John Knox; Cambridge:
James Clarke, 1991).
Aramaic Sources of Marks Gospel (Cambridge: CUP, 1998).
Jesus of Nazareth: An Independent Historians Account of his Life and Teach-
ings (London and New York: T&T Clark/Continuum, 2010).
Catchpole, D., Jesus People: The Historical Jesus and the Beginnings of Com-
munity (London: Darton, Longman and Todd; Grand Rapids: Baker, 2006).
Chilton, B., E. P. Sanders and the Question of Purity, in B. Chilton and
C. A. Evans (eds), Jesus in Context: Temple, Purity, and Restoration (Leiden:
Brill, 1997), pp. 22130.
Crossley, J. G., Halakah and Mark 7.4: . . . and beds, JSNT 25 (2003),
pp. 43347.
The Date of Marks Gospel: Insights from the Law in Earliest Christianity
(London and New York: T&T Clark/Continuum, 2004).
The Damned Rich (Mark 10.1731), ExpT 116 (2005), pp. 397401.
Why Christianity Happened: A Sociohistorical Explanation of Christian
Origins 2650 CE (Louisville: WJK, 2006).
Jesus in an Age of Terror: Scholarly Projects for a New American Century
(London and Oakville: Equinox, 2008).
Jesus the Jew since 1967, in H. Moxnes, W. Blanton and J. G. Crossley (eds),
Jesus beyond Nationalism: Constructing the Historical Jesus in a Period of
Cultural Complexity (London and Oakville: Equinox, 2009), pp. 11129.
Dunn, J. D. G., Jesus Paul and the Law: Studies in Mark and Galatians (London:
SPCK, 1990).
Eagleton, T., Reason, Faith, and Revolution: Reflections on the God Debate
(New Haven and London: Yale University Press. 2009).
Elliott, J. H., Jesus the Israelite Was Neither a Jew nor a Christian: On
Correcting Misleading Nomenclature, JSHJ 5 (2007), pp. 11954.
Esler, P. F., Conflict and Identity in Romans: The Social Setting of Pauls Letter
(Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003).
Grabbe, L. L., Judaism from Cyrus to Hadrian (London: SCM, 1992).
Harland, P. A., Social Networks and Connections with the Elites in the World
of the Early Christians, in A. J. Blasi, P.-A. Turcotte and J. Duhaime (eds),
BIBLIOGRAPHY
125
Handbook of Early Christianity and the Social Sciences (Walnut Creek:
AltaMira, 2002), pp. 385408.
Associations, Synagogues, and Congregations: Claiming a Place in Ancient
Mediterranean Society (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003).
Harrington, H. K., Did Pharisees Eat Ordinary Food in a State of Ritual Purity?,
JSJ 26 (1995), pp. 4254.
Hayes, C. E., Gentile Impurities and Jewish Identities: Intermarriage and
Conversion from the Bible to the Talmud (Oxford: OUP, 2002).
Hengel, M. and Deines, R., E. P. Sanders Common Judaism, Jesus, and the
Pharisees, JTS 46 (1995), pp. 170.
Holmn, T., Divorce in CD 4:205:2 and in 11Q 57.1718: Some Remarks on
the Pertinence of the Question, RevQ 18 (1998), pp. 397408.
Ilan, T., Notes and Observations on a Newly Published Divorce Bill from the
Judean Desert, HTR 89 (1996), pp. 195202.
InstoneBrewer, D., Nomological Exegesis in Qumran Divorce Texts, RevQ
18 (1998), pp. 56179.
Jewish Women Divorcing Their Husbands in Early Judaism: The Background
to Papyrus Seelim 13, HTR 92 (1999), pp. 34957.
Divorce and Remarriage in the Bible: The Social and Literary Context (Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002).
Traditions of the Rabbis from the Era of the New Testament, vol.1 Prayer and
Agriculture (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004).
Levine, A. J., The Misunderstood Jew: The Church and the Scandal of the Jewish
Jesus (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 2006).
Malina, B. J., and Rohrbaugh, R. L., SocialScience Commentary on the Gospel
of John (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998).
Mason, S., Jews, Judeans, Judaizing, Judaism: Problems of Categorization in
Ancient History, JSJ 38 (2007), pp. 457512.
Neusner, J., Rabbinic Traditions about the Pharisees before 70 (3 vols; Leiden:
Brill, 1971).
The Idea of Purity in Ancient Judaism (Leiden: Brill, 1973).
Poirier, J. C.,Why did the Pharisees Wash their Hands?, JJS 47 (1996), pp. 21733.
Purity beyond the Temple in the Second Temple Era, JBL 122 (2003),
pp. 24765.
Regev, E., Pure Individualism: The Idea of NonPriestly Purity in Ancient
Judaism, JSJ 31 (2000), pp. 176202.
Sanders, E. P., Jewish Law from Jesus to the Mishnah: Five Studies (London:
SCM, 1990).
Schremer, A., Divorce in Papyrus Seelim 13 Once Again: A Reply to Tal Ilan,
HTR 91 (1998), pp. 193202.
Taubes, J., The Political Theology of Paul (Stanford: Stanford University Press,
2004).
Williamson, H. G. M., Ezra, Nehemiah: Word Biblical Commentary 16 (Waco:
Word, 1985).
Wright, N. T., Jesus and the Victory of God (London: SPCK, 1996).
Vermes, G., The Religion of Jesus the Jew (London: SCM, 1993).
iek, S., The Puppet and the Dwarf: The Perverse Core of Christianity
(Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2003).
BIBLIOGRAPHY
126
SOME (AND ONLY SOME) FURTHER GENERAL READING ON
THE LAW AND THE NEW TESTAMENT
Allison, D. C., Resurrecting Jesus: The Earliest Christian Tradition and Its
Interpreters (London: T&T Clark, 2005).
Banks, R., Jesus and the Law in the Synoptic Tradition (Cambridge: CUP,
1975).
Barton, S. C., Discipleship and Family Ties in Mark and Matthew (Cambridge:
CUP, 1995).
Betz, H. D., The Sermon on the Mount (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995).
Boyarin, D., A Radical Jew: Paul and the Politics of Identity (Berkeley and Los
Angeles: University of California Press, 1994).
Holmn, T., Jesus and Jewish Covenantal Thinking (Leiden: Brill, 2001).
Jackson, B. S., Essays on Halakhah in the New Testament (Leiden: Brill, 2008).
Kazen, T., Jesus and Purity Halakhah: Was Jesus Indifferent to Impurity?
(Stockholm : Almqvist & Wiksell International, 2002).
Loader, W. R. G., Jesus Attitude towards the Law (Tbingen: Mohr Siebeck,
1997).
Meier, J. P., A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus. Law and Love
(New York: Doubleday, 2009).
Neusner, J., Chilton, B. D., and Levine, B. A., Torah Revealed, Torah Fulfilled:
Scriptural Laws in Formative Judaism and Earliest Christianity (London and
New York: T&T Clark/Continuum, 2008).
Sanders, E. P., Paul and Palestinian Judaism: A Comparison of Patterns of
Religion (London: SCM, 1977).
Jesus and Judaism (London: SCM, 1985).
Tomson, P. J., Paul and the Jewish Law: Halakah in the Letters of the Apostle to
the Gentiles (Fortress Press: Minneapolis, 1990).
Westerholm, S., Jesus and Scribal Authority, (Lund: Gleerup, 1978).
127
Abodah Zarah 113
Acts 100, 101, 105, 106, 114
Adiabene, royal house of 97
adultery 68, 70, 71, 72, 88, 112
see also divorce
Amorites 7, 111
Ananias 97, 98
antitheses 67
Apollonius (Antiochus
commander) 38
Azzai, Simeon ben 92, 93
Baba Qamma 79, 80
Babylonian Talmud 15, 54, 62,
79, 80
Barclay, J. 107
Barnabas 102
Ben Sirah 71
biological family links,
importance of 93
blasphemy 113
bloodshed 113
Bockmuehl, M. 2, 70
book of
Daniel 105
Esther 108
Genesis 98
Jonah 96
Judith 50, 107
Revelation 114
Bultmann, R. 3
Caligula, Gaius (Roman
Emperor) 21, 85, 104
Canaanites 7, 111
capital offences 113
Cephas 96
Christianity 1, 3, 35, 67, 100,
102, 112
Christian theology 2
circumcision 95
converts to Judaism 99, 100
defining Jew and Gentile
through 102
forced circumcision 95
Gentile sailors 96, 97
Gentiles converting to new
Christian movement 101
Gentile slaves, circumcising 96
influence of social pressures 98
male converts to Judaism 97
non-Jews 99
clothes 46, 47, 91
Colossians 36
Community Rule 49
converts to Judaism 97, 99, 100
see also circumcision
Corinthian Christians 112
covenantal nomism 1, 2
Damascus Document 11, 32, 34, 37
Daniel, book of 105
Dawkins, R. 94
INDEX
INDEX
128
Dead Sea Scrolls 10, 11, 13, 22,
26, 32, 34, 40, 42, 49, 55,
56, 65, 68, 70, 73, 74, 81,
83, 111
death
drive 117
of husband 99
life-after- 10
penalty 41, 42, 43, 68
punishment of 29
stoning to 36, 100
Deuteronomy (excerpts) 5, 6, 7, 8,
12, 17, 23, 26, 27, 29, 68,
69, 71, 73, 74, 77, 82, 86,
90, 94, 103, 111, 112
divorce 67
adulterous wife 70
for adultery 68, 71
drunken wife 72
gender imbalance 74
ground of porneia 72, 73
Hillel/Aqiba view of divorce 71
prohibition 73
Sabbath punishments 68
Samaritan woman 76
something objectionable with wife
not-so-strict House of
Hillel 69
strict House of Shammai 69
stricter view of divorce 72
taking two wives 73
validity of (or possibility of) 74
women divorcing men 74, 75
petition for divorce 76
Eagleton, T. 26, 94, 117, 118
Elephantine 31, 75
Erubin 32, 40
Essenes 10, 11, 33, 48, 49, 83,
92, 93
Esther, book of 108
ethnicity 3, 89, 90, 93
exemptions, prohibition of
work 36
healing by default 39
plucking of grain, dispute 37
principle of saving life 29, 33,
38, 39, 40, 41, 43
tying and untying of knots 32, 40
exilic period (587/586 BCE
538/537 BCE) 5
Exodus (excerpts) 5, 6, 7, 23, 27,
29, 30, 41, 76, 77, 78, 79,
80, 86, 90, 96, 112
eye for an eye 76
financial compensation, principle
of 78, 79
interpretation
rejection of violent 81
two views of 78
using same weapon 80
Ezra 3, 6, 7, 8, 9, 13, 14, 25, 111
family 90
biological family links 93
burial of father (biblical Law) 91
devotion to parents 90
duties of honouring parents
86, 90
exceptions, High Priest and
Nazirite vow 92
fictive kinship 92, 93
issues of dislocation 95
male bonding 93
Matthews Gospel, prioritizing of
family 94
Nazirite vow 91
paranoia about women 93
would-be disciple on burying
his father 94
INDEX
129
father of impurity 51, 52
fictive kinship, tradition of 92, 93
food 103
avoidance of pork 104
avoidance of wine 109
avoiding food dedicated to
idols 105
barrier for Jewish-Gentile
interaction 105
first Christians in Rome 108
food of Gentiles 105
forbidden varieties of animals
from eating 103
idolatrous food 108
Jews and Gentiles at meal
table 108
laws 15, 17, 18, 96, 103, 105,
109, 117
non association of Jews with
Gentiles (Peter) 106
forced circumcision
see circumcision
fornication 68, 73, 113, 114
Gaius Caligula (Roman Emperor)
21, 85, 105
Genesis Apocryphon 70
Genesis (excerpts) 5, 6, 7, 8, 23,
67, 68, 70, 73, 77, 94, 95,
98, 99, 101, 105, 113
Gentile audience in Galatia 102
Gentile Christians 96, 100
Gentiles, problem(s) with 109
Acts 15 114
book of Revelation 114
impurity associated with 110
intermarriage 111
Jewish and Gentile social
interaction 111
morality 112
murder and sexual immorality,
acts of 112
Noachide laws 113, 114
stereotypical behaviour 112
vice-lists 112
Gentile wine, avoidance of 109
Girgashites 8, 111
Gittin (Mishnah tractate) 69
Gospel
Johns 31, 43, 68
Marks 50, 59, 86
Matthews 67, 69, 72, 81, 94
Synoptic tradition 43
hands, washing see washing hands
Harland, P. 107
Hayes, C. E. 110, 111
Helena 98
Hellenistic period (33263 BCE) 7
Herod Antipas 63, 85
High Priest 91
exceptions 91, 92
Hittites 7, 8, 111
Hivites 111
Holocaust 1
House of Hillel 16, 35, 53, 60, 61,
69, 71, 86, 110
House of Shammai 16, 35, 53, 60,
61, 69, 86, 110
idolatrous food 108
idolatrous images 107, 108, 109
idolatry 105, 106, 107, 108, 109,
111, 112, 113, 115
impurity 45
contact with woman/man with
discharge 46, 58, 64
corpse impurity 46, 47, 56, 64,
65, 91
abandoned 47, 91
INDEX
130
impurity (Contd)
eating food in state of purity 50
anything from market 51
on return from market 51
immersion pools for removal of
impurity (Palestine) 50
laws of purity and impurity 45
leprosy 46, 47
object upon which man with
discharge sat 46
priests in Temple 37, 48
pure priestly community 49
purity laws, practice of
Essenes 48
ways of contracting 46
Instone-Brewer, D. 2, 15, 71, 75
intrinsic Gentile impurity 110
Isaiah 28
Israelite 89
Izates 97, 98, 100
Jackson, B. 2
Jebusites 7, 111
Jeremiah 30, 31
Jerusalem Talmud 42
Jewish-Gentile interaction 96, 105,
112, 115 see also Gentiles,
problem(s) with
Jewish Law from Jesus to the
Mishnah 1, 2
Jewish uprising against Rome
(6670 CE) 98
Johns Gospel 31, 43, 68
Jonah, book of 96
Joseph and Aseneth 105, 106
Josephus 13, 14, 20, 21, 28, 33, 37,
39, 42, 48, 63, 75, 78, 83,
85, 90, 92, 95, 97, 98, 102
Jubilees 13, 16, 28, 31, 33, 34, 37,
80, 81, 99, 106, 107, 113
Judean 6, 75, 89
Judith, book of 50, 51, 107
Juvenal (Roman satirist) 18, 28, 105
Klawans, J. 110, 111
kosher meals 108
law and earliest interpreters 5
biblical Law 6
interpretation or expansion
of 6
Law or Torah 5
Pentateuch 5, 6, 7, 8, 30, 70
pork, avoidance of eating 6
Sabbath, avoidance of working
on 6
two-fold distinction 6
law(s)
food 15, 17, 18, 96, 103, 105,
109, 117
of Moses 50, 84, 101
Noachide 113, 114
of purity and impurity 45
purity, practice of Essenes 48
Roman 97
of water 65
leprosy 46, 47, 52
Letter of Aristeas 17, 108
Leviticus 5, 8, 37, 45, 46, 47, 50,
57, 59
liquids see also washing hands
foodstuffs containing 55
haber on importance of 64, 65
on outer surface of cup 60,
61, 62
poured from impure to pure
vessel 56
Qumran on impurity of 55
range of liquids which defile 54
role of 55
INDEX
131
tebul yom 56
transmission of impurity 53, 54
Lords Day 35
Maccabean crisis 9, 10, 11, 20, 25,
38, 101, 103, 115
Maccabees (1) 102
Maccabees (2) 10, 103
Maccabeus, J. 10, 38
Marks Gospel 50, 59, 86
marriage 67, 68, 70, 71, 74, 88
forbidden 8
intermarriage 111, 115
mixed 7, 8, 25
remarriage 72
Matthews Gospel 67, 69, 72,
81, 94
Miqwaoth 50
Mishnah 15, 32, 38, 51, 53, 56, 58,
59, 60, 65, 79
monogamy 73
Moses 6, 14, 16, 17, 18, 19, 21, 24,
25, 27, 45, 49, 50, 84, 90,
91, 92, 101
Moxnes, H. 95
Nazareth 95
Nazi Germany 1
nega see Leprosy
Nehemiah 6, 7, 9, 13, 14, 25, 30, 31
Neusner, J. 2, 15
Noachide laws 113, 114
no one should touch, principle of 34
Numbers (excerpts) 5, 6, 7, 36, 41,
46, 82, 91, 98
oaths and vows 81
commandments 82
death of John the Baptist 85
Deuteronomy (23) 82
expansion and interpretation of
Law 87
idea of conditional gift 87
importance of oaths
(Agrippa) 85
laws and sentiments concerning
swearing 84
presence during
New Testament 82
tension between scripture and
tradition 86
the commandment of God 86
Palestinian Talmud 15, 61, 65, 96
parable of good Samaritan 45, 47,
48, 92
parallelism 30
Paul 1, 14, 35, 36, 44, 67, 74, 93,
96, 100, 102, 108, 112,
116, 117
Paul and Palestinian Judaism 1
penalties for Sabbath-breaking 41
violations in rabbinic
literature 42
warning 42
Pentateuch 5, 6, 7, 8, 30, 70
people of the land
building of Tiberias in Galilee 63
impurity of clothes of person 64
transmission of impurity 64
Perizzites 7, 111
Persian period (538332 BCE) 5, 7
Peter 96, 102, 106, 112
Pharisees 3, 10, 13, 15, 16, 17, 20,
32, 33, 34, 40, 41
Philo 17, 18, 19, 20, 27, 34, 43, 46,
70, 83, 87, 91, 99, 101, 104,
112, 116
Pirqe de Rabbi Eliezer 97
Poirier, J. 56
INDEX
132
polygamy 73, 74
prohibition(s)
divorce 73
on eating/drinking 34
in Jubilees 34
rabbinic 39 32
of work, exemptions see
exemptions, prohibition of
work
purity and impurity, laws of 45
qorban 86
rabbinic literature 5, 15, 16, 29, 33,
34, 35, 39, 42, 51, 53, 54,
57, 58, 59, 60, 62, 64, 70,
75, 78, 86, 90
Rabbis 29, 35, 54, 55, 59, 79,
80, 92
Rab Judah 54
R. Aqiba 52, 54, 55, 60, 69, 71, 109
R. Eleazar 35, 73, 98, 103, 104
R. Eliezer 47, 80, 92
Revelation, book of 114
R. Hiyya b. Abba 29
R. Idi b. Abin 54
R. Isaac bar Nahman 96
R. Isaac b. Ashian 54
R. Joshua b. Levi 96
R. Mattiah b. Harash 38
R. Meir 58, 60, 61, 63
Roman law on circumcision 97
R. Simeon b. Menasya 29
R. Tarfon 60
Rufus, Musonius 99
R. Yose 60, 61
Sabbath, day of rest from work
see also work, definition
Aramaic documents 31
avoidance of carrying burden out
of a house 31
biblical Law 27, 29
commandment to Israelites at
Sinai/Horeb 27
Philo on 27
relationship between God and
Israel 27
Sadducees 10, 13, 14, 32, 56, 80
Samaritan 48, 70, 76, 92, 110
Sanders, E. P. 1, 17, 81
Second Temple Judaism 42, 58
self-preservation of the Jewish
people 3
Sepphoris 95
Shabbat 35
son of man (Aramaic idiom) 30
story
of Abram and Sarai 70
of the death of John the
Baptist 85
of Jephthahs daughter 84
Syllaeus 100
Synoptic Gospel tradition 43
Tacitus (historian) 105
Talmud
Babylonian 15, 54, 62, 79, 80
Jerusalem 42
Palestinian 15, 61, 65, 96
tebul yom see also food; impurity
dispute between Jesus and
Pharisees 57
in rabbinic literature 57
second degree impure 57
and washing hands 56, 57
Ten Commandments 6, 23, 27, 90
theft 112, 113
Tiberias (Galilean city) 63, 95
to Judaize 96
INDEX
133
Torah 5, 10, 13, 17, 18, 20, 21, 24,
25, 54, 92, 107, 116, 117
Tosefta 15, 35, 53, 60, 113
tradition of elders 6, 114
Tyrians 30
Uriah 31
utensils, immersion/wiping 58
see also food; impurity
earthenware 58
immersion of beds or dining
couches 59
inner 58, 59
insides and outsides of cups 60,
61, 62
reason for immersion 59
Second Temple Judaism 42, 58
stone vessels 58, 59
Yose and House of Shammai 61
Vermes, Geza 2
vice-lists 112
washing hands 51
communal meals at Qumran 55
concept of water (rabbinic
tractate Makshirin) 53
liquid see also liquids
poured from impure to pure
vessel 56
before non-priestly food 54
before ordinary food 51
second degree impurity 53
stains of oil 56
transmission of impurity 53, 54
wet crops 55
water see also liquids
concept of 53
law of 64
Williamson, H. 7
woman/wife see divorce; family
work, definition 32 see also
Sabbath, day of rest from
work
avoid selling (merchants) 30
Damascus Document 32
House of Shammai vs House of
Hillel 35
Mishnah rulings 32
m. Pesahim 4.8 33, 35
Nehemiah 13 30
ploughing and harvest time
(biblical Law) 30
prohibition on eating/
drinking 34
prohibitions in Jubilees 34
rabbinic 39 prohibitions 32
Sabbath practices of Essenes 33
subject of animals 33
Wright, N. T. 3

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