Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Early Conclusions About Jesus and Politics

Even though we know very little about John the Baptist's teaching, we know that he spoke out against Herod's adulteress affair. He also called Herod into question for other Law related issues about which we know nothing more; we only know that he said "many things about Herod", and I would therefore conclude he talked about his politics. From the writings we do have, I would conclude that John's sermons focused only on Herod's breaking of the Law of Moses. I also would dare to say that John did not talk about Herod's politics beyond his breaking of the Law of Moses.

Jesus was unusually silent about the political situation of his day. he did speak very strongly against the religious leaders who did represent Rome's dominion to some degree. They tried to keep the masses under Rome's control fearing their own positions which were held under the careful watch of Rome.

Jesus did teach about another kingdom and that may have seemed to be a political attack on Rome, (in fact, that argument was used against Jesus at his trial). On the surface this looks like Jesus was a political figure, but even though the charges were brought up against him at his trial, his judges (who did in fact represent Rome's interests) found nothing wrong with him. For some reason Jesus' teachings did not threaten Rome's position.

Not only do the Gospels present Jesus as one who posed no threat to Rome, the Gospels and history itself tells us that the disciples lived and ministered after Jesus was executed thus demonstrating that the rulers of Jesus' day did not see them as a threat.

If Jesus did have political aspirations, or if he did speak out against the political leaders of his day, the writers of his story kept it in the background of his works and his messages. At least that is what I see so far.

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