Jewish Objections to Christianity, Part 2
October 19, 2010 15 Comments
Elijah kills the prophets of Ba'al
Continuation.
By: Jay
1. The doctrine of a third Person was not clearly taught in the first few centuries. Indeed, even by Basil’s time, he expressed hesitation about declaring for sure that the Spirit was a third hypostasis in the godhead. The problem with this is that we must either admit a very extreme form of doctrinal development, which few are willing to admit, or we must say that in some way the fathers of the 1-3 centuries were utterly deficient in their doctrine of God. How did they carry on the apostolic Tradition, if many of them did not even grasp the divinity and Personhood of the Spirit? In fact, Justin Martyr posited a Dyad. Consider also the “development” of the notion from Athanasius that the Son is generated from the essence of God, to the Cappadocian idea that He is generated from the Father proper. Once you read Plotinus, though, it becomes clear how influential the Platonic tradition was on the Alexandrians and the Latins in their triadic formulations. But once we admit this, we have moved far from the Hebraic and Mosaic tradition, into what appears to be a Greek Hellenic mystery religion. Indeed, if you pay attention to Christian writers, notice how often when speaking of God, it is a singular Person, with a singular will acting. Yet when we come to Trinitarian theology and God acting, we are immediately caught in a whirlwind of explaining how three Persons act in different way, yet don’t. It’s a maze that ends up being miles away from the Shema. Peruse the 5th Ennead for yourself, which Augustine openly borrowed heavily from: http://classics.mit.edu/Plotinus/enneads.5.fifth.html
2. Can we pray impreccatory prayers now? C.S. Lewis found them offensive and demanded we cannot. Aquinas says we must in no wise despise our enemies. If no, this would be absurd, since it would mean God composed many prayers in the Psalms that are now useless. Although some might resort to lengthy explanations as to how we can pray them, this would run counter the tradition of many of the saints, who forbid such an idea. And based on a simple reading of the Sermon on the Mount, it would appear we cannot pray them. Other examples of how this is fuzzy would be something like martyrdom – does God want me to fight my opponents and possibly save the lives of others, or am I bound to martyrdom? When we look at the Church of the first few centuries, pacifism was almost the absolute law. Why such a radical change in God’s social rules?
3. The sexual views of the fathers of the first few centuries are generally somewhat bizarre. Sex is viewed in some form as evil, and even up to Maximus’ time, it is somehow dirty and base. It is not hard to see why this is when you read the 5th Ennead of Plotinus. Augustine borrowed from this in large chunks. This is the source of the idea that the Spirit is the glue between the One and it’s generated image. The generated nous returns the love to the One and this is a pure, “spiritual” love. Plotinus and Augustine and many fathers in the East too, conceive of love in an Eros or sexual way apart from purely procreative ends as evil. If you’ve ever wondered where the Church/Augustine got this, read the 5th Ennead. And I needn’t explain how different this view is from the Law and Prophets views on sexuality. This is why the Church has to “spiritualize” all the texts in the Law and wisdom texts about the importance of having sons. What God really wants is “spiritual” sons in the Church, since sex is lesser and base. No one can tell me this isn’t the case with the fathers, East and West, as top Eastern theologian Phillip Sherrard admits:
4. Related to that last issue, it now casts a new light on the matter of the rise in the position of women in Christianity, and this is concurrent with the place of the Virginal Queen of heaven, who over the centuries achieves a progressively higher place of veneration in the Church. It is not surprising, then, that this religion emasculates men, and has progressed to a point where large numbers of the priests in the Latin tradition are now homosexual. One can say that it was not always this way, but I suspect the sublimation of sexuality as dirty and in some form involving some degree of sin (as Augustine says), has lent great impetus to this being the end result. We can blame Masons all day long, but at a certain point, that is just a bunch of excuses. Stepping back and looking at the issues, it becomes apparent that a Latin tradition that exalts celibacy, derives its theism largely from Plotinus, raises women to the status of virtual goddess, and promotes monastic asceticism as the higher calling – that this tradition would eventually fall into mass homosexuality and perversion. Why shouldn’t it? It holds that the good things of nature – race, sex, beauty, are actually bad and despised by the God who purportedly gave them. God has chosen the base things of the world – the stupid, the inane, the poor, right? So why is it surprising that when I attend the local Novus Ordo, it’s a communistic, college girl led, fag fest? The Orthodox Christians may escape some of this, but they cannot even tell us whether God punishes or not, so I am not as thrilled about them as seeking Latin Catholics might be.
5. Thus the next issue – Lex talionis. God Himself operates on the “eye for an eye” principle in many texts in the Law and prophets and writings. Most Christians, however, have read Jesus’ sermon as a rejection of this approach. There have been many exegetes who explain and qualify this as meaning that we as individuals are forbidden to operate this way, but God still does. Well, who believes this anymore? If they did, they would execute homosexuals, since that is the requirement of the Law for this sin crying to heaven for vengeance, but no Catholic or Orthodox would dare have the balls to say this (aside for me and a friend or two). What this makes clear is that Christianity, for all its ad nauseam touting of its practicality cannot even get off the ground on basic moral issues. Indeed, after 2,000 years, we don’t know what to do with imrpeccatory prayers or the death penalty. Within the first few centuries, we ended up having to debate the very issues (such as “justified lying”) the rabbinate had already debated.
6. Why does the Church retain Pentecost as a feast, and not other feasts of the Law? Why do we retain “holy water” and not other aspects that are found in Numbers? It becomes clear this is ad hoc and arbitrary. I know the answer – that the Apostles, via their apostolic authority, confirmed these elements (supposedly – we don’t see holy water in the fathers), and not others. The problem is that we have no consistent hermeneutic for determining why we utilize these “ceremonial” elements, and reject other elements such as the priestly ephod, as fulfilled. This is why in the history of the church, you see new elements become incorporated that were formerly ceremonial (such as holy water or the “tabernacle’).
7. The early church for the firt 3 centuries was the persecuted, pilgrim church. After that period, it becomes the imperial church that begins to justify its notion of “Christendom” by saying that the kingdom is now united to the Empire. The kingdom becomes a step more worldly, and the notion of Christian Emperors arises, and ruling as a Christian king. The idea of persecuting heretics by the state is first justified by Ambrose and then Augustine. So the poor church becomes the state church, and Rome more adn more takes on the appearance of an alter-Israel. The texts are then read, not of “spiritual Israel,” but of the state church which can execute or banish heretics and wizards. So the typology of the heavenly Jerusalem becomes more earth-grounded, and Rome, by the time of the papal states, looks more and more like Israel, to the point where the church’s locus is identified with a city-state – Vatican City, replete with its own huge bank, etc. So we have a new church/state/nation, yet the Church was supposed to be the eternal, spiritual eschatological reality, and not another historical institution operating more and more like historical Israel over time. Indeed, the types of the loss of land in Leviticus apply to Israel, but somehow not the curses to the Church. Yet we turn around and end up using these texts for God’s judgments on the church at different points in history. The hermeneutic is again inconsistent. The textual arguments for the Messianic age uniformly tell us of an end to idolatry, yet the Church took numerous pagan elements that God in Deuteronomy 12 says are forbidden, and Christianizes them. In other words, the very things defined as idolatry in the Law and used by the fathers as proof of Christianity as the fulfillment of the covenant (the end of idolatry), become the norm in the Church and are somehow a “proof” of the spread of the messianic age!
Can you post a link to part one?
http://jaysanalysis.wordpress.com/2010/09/05/jewish-objections-to-christianity/
Hi Jay, I’m only going to comment on the Trinitarian part for now.
I’m fully willing to cop to the deficiency of the early fathers in dealing with the intellectual problem of the Trinity but we must remember, dogma is something that develops in response to questions we must pose. We must weigh passages of scripture against each other and against reason and tradition. While the complex Trinitarian formula that exists now is indeed a product of a later date, that doesn’t mean it is arbitrary, pagan or wrong.
People are forced to engage things, both the simple and the complicated, in the language available to them, if this is insufficient they must create or learn a new language to engage the issue. Likewise, we can assume God chooses to engage people in the language of their time and place. When he revealed himself to the prophets we assume he addressed them in ancient Hebrew not Middle English or Ebonics. If he chose to reveal himself to a bunch of inner city black kids in 1970′s New York, perhaps he might have spoken in Jive. This isn’t to say God is some kind of relativist, just that he recognizes that humans are limited by their cultural contexts. The language God employs may change but His message does not. When I say that He uses different language, I don’t just mean Hebrew v.s Greek, but, let’s say, Hebraic Poetic Language v.s Greek Philosophical Language.
The terminologies of Platonic Philosophy should not be seen as a pagan religion but rather as an analytical framework employed as a tool for engaging philosophical, theological and metaphysical issues. True, this language was employed by Greek and Egyptian pagans, Alexandrian Jews and weird syncretists and each of them reached various conclusions, often based on their respective cultural traditions. When postulating the necessity of a intermediary (or logos) between absolute transcendence and the physical world, it was good enough for a Greek pagan, for example, to say, “Ah yes, this must be Hermes, messenger of the gods.” It was of little consequence to any of the Platonic polytheists that philosophical theories about hypostatic emanations not be allowed to undermine the inherit unity of the revealed biblical God. That is where, then and now, Jewish and Christian theologians must tread carefully.
Even prior to Christians engaging scriptural questions through this framework, we have the likes of Philo but even he teeters on polytheistic heresy as do many of the early Church fathers when they try to engage the nature of God. They often made theological mistakes. So what? They, like us, were only human. People make mistakes now too. No one said the quest for truth would be easy. Dealing with the academic and complicated aspects of theology during the first few centuries of persecution wasn’t exactly top priority for the fathers. They could take shots at theology on their own from their understanding of scriptures and philosophical analysis or rely on what their masters had taught them but it would take time before they could form councils and consider everything against scripture and establish and agree on what dogma best complimented scriptural tradition. One of the reasons it took so long to get things right is the agreement as to what scripture was canonical was also still forming. In this climate, there is little wonder that many of the fathers fell into heresy and even gnosticism.
Regarding the pros and cons of Platonism: Plato’s theories are quite useful to all the Abrahamic religions in proving the existence of a supreme transcendent creator God and the fact that these conclusions were arrived at by a pagan polytheist, independent of any any Hebraic influence, only seems to further strengthen our contention as monotheists, that God has placed a certain knowledge of His existence inside the hearts and minds of all people. However, there are certain errors in Plato that do not mesh well with Judaism or Christianity. Many Christian fathers fell prey to some of these errors and these mistakes had to be expunged for Christianity to move forward. I’m speaking of errors like the reincarnation of the soul, the innate evil of matter, the idea that physical substance is coeval with God, emanationism instead of ex-nihilo creationism, pantheism, etc. Jews too have often fallen prey to these errors as is clear from much of the Kabbalah.
However, barring any errors that were made in early attempts at Christian theology, I think it is safe to say, when we return to the bedrock of scripture, we are essentially forced to come to the conclusion of Trinitarianism. In the Gospel of Matthew (perhaps the most Jewish of the synoptic gospels), Christ tells the apostles to go forth and baptize the world in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The Gospel of John tell us that the Logos is both with God and God himself. John also tells us that the Word became flesh, ie: that Jesus was this same Word that was God. Jesus also says in John “I and the Father are one.” In the messianic prophesy of Isiah, we are told the savior will be called “mighty God,” which would be blasphemous from a Hebrew monotheistic tradition, unless the Messiah was the monotheistic God manifest. Both the Spirit of God and Word of God make frequent appearances throughout the O.T. Scripture prohibits us from falling into polytheism since it would violate the monotheistic mandate of Abrahamic religion itself. “Here oh, Israel: The Lord your God is one!” So is Jesus a blasphemer for saying “I and the Father are one?” Is John a Hellenized heretic for proclaiming the Logos to be God? Would it be wrong to assume the Spirit of God is God? Hardly.
The Hebrew word for “one” employed in the monotheistic dictum is “echad” which implies oneness as “unity” as opposed to the Hebrew word “yachid,” which implies oneness as absolute numeric singularity. For example “enchad” is also used in Genesis 2:24 “the two shall become one [echad] flesh.” Note that a human child, the offspring of a mother and father, is one distinct unified being and is in fact one flesh, but composed of both the unity of “flesh” (material makeup) of his/her mother and father, hence, we would be wrong to interpret the use of “enchad” as an excuse to make the Lord a “married” union of 3 separate Gods, rather we assume he is one God of 3 Persons. Persons is of course a problematic term, especially since we have a tendency in English to think of the word person as implying an independent separate being. This, of course can lead to problems, but for now, Person is the best term available to us.
If we need more evidence of Trinitarianism, we have God’s use of the first person plural when he says “Let US make man in OUR image.” Some will say this was God addressing the heavenly host of Angelic beings but the problem with this is Man isn’t made in the image of Angels, he’s made in the image of God. The O.T is quite clear about this. Some higher critic might say “This then, clearly shows Genesis 1 to be a leave over from earlier polytheistic traditions,” however if this were the case it is entirely ludicrous to assume that some monotheistic scribe wouldn’t have “redacted” the passage to suit his agenda, changing first person plural to singular. After all the higher critics insist this kind of selective editing was done all the time. It is nonsense to assume something so egregiously polytheistic would find its way through generations of transcription at the hands of dyed in the wool Jewish monotheists.
It is also worthy to note that when Jesus reiterates Deut 6:4, “your God is one.” The Greek word used is “Hen,” which implies unity and not the Greek “Mono,” signifying absolute oneness, the equivalent of the Hebrew “yachid.”
With all this in mind, my attitude is this; though it was a rocky road finding the right expression, I don’t think orthodox Christianity was wrong in deciding on the dogma of the Trinity. True the language bears the marks of Plontinus, but that was the language and methodology best suited to engage the problem. Had Christianity sprung up in China instead, we might have found ourselves employing a Confucian or Taoist framework instead. However, this would no more make these hypothetical Christians, Chinese pagans then post Nicene Christianity is Greco-Roman paganism.
Further regarding the supposed Plontinian origin of Trinitarianism, Tatian, who died in AD 180, taught a Trinitarian doctrine so similar to that of Plontinus’ three Hypostasis that we may well assume the Plontinian Doctrine was lifted from it. Plontinus wouldn’t be born for another 24 years after Tatian’s death. Tatian taught that there was One supreme God from whom sprang the Logos. He also portrays the Holy Spirit as an all permeating World Soul. Though he decayed into heresy and his Trinitarianism was imperfect to say the least, his work, nonetheless, shows that a philosophical model for the Trinity was being attempted by Christians at least a century before the publication of Plontinus’ Enneads and that that (albeit flawed) philosophical model might have indeed inspired Plontinus rather than the other way around. This wouldn’t be unusual since Plontinus borrowed from many religious traditions. Despite this, I readily admit, as do most people, that Augustine was influenced by Plontinus. I also admit that Tatian was developing his theology within a Platonic milieu, as is evidenced from his erroneous condemnation of matter.
It is also worthy to note that Plotinus’ teacher Ammonius Saccas might have also been a Christian. This is according to Plotinus’ pagan student Porphyry, who claimed Ammonius later rejected his parent’s religion of Christianity. There was also Numenius of Apamea who was roughly contemporary with Tatian, who himself might have been Jewish, Christian, Pagan or Syncretist and taught similar quasi-trinitarian doctrines, with The Platonic Good, The Demiurge and the World Soul.
All this can be traced back, ultimately, to Plato himself, and we must again check his assertions against the litmus test of scripture before we accept or reject them. We know we are alright in accepting his notion of a supreme transcendent God who preceded and made the world but what of the theory of divine exemplars? This seems to fit with the idea that Man is made in God’s image and that God made the world through his Word. The World Soul is some what more contentious. If we concede too much to Plato here, we sink into Pantheism and other Platonic errors but if we allow that Plato was close but not entirely right, then this would seem to fit with the scriptural Holy Spirit of God that is active in the world but not IN the world in a pantheistic sense.
Now, some of the scripture I’ve used to justify Trintarianism is New Testament, and obviously this won’t fly with Jews since they don’t believe Jesus to be who He said He was. I accept such statements as “I and the Father are one.” since I believe Jesus is the messiah. With this in mind, it is first necessary that someone comes to believe Jesus was the fulfillment of O.T prophesy before they come to believe in the Trinitarian picture of God. I’m not going to bother making a case for that here but I think that is evident from the way the story of Christ so perfectly seems to tie together much of what is otherwise problematic or dis unified in the O.T.
Anyway, considering all the above, I see why it was in some ways difficult for Jews to accept a lot of Christian doctrine during the first few centuries but ultimately speaking I still think they’re wrong and we’re right. Who knows I might find out different when I die or (if atheism is right) I won’t find out anything because I’ll just cease to be, if so, no big deal since I’ll just come back again sixty zillion years later because of the theory eternal return. It’ll be a lot like a guy with Alzheimer’s watching reruns of old sit-coms on Nick at Night.
Thorough response! When I finish this paper on alchemy in Ben Johnson and John Donne, I’ll get back to you…Im not avoiding it…
Jay, I would like to give you some “fatherly” advice if you will allow me. It seems that your soul is very much troubled from trying to find all the “right” answers to all your questions. This is good, I know you work very hard at it. I have also struggled for many years at this as well.
However, all the Truth cannot be arrived at from man’s reason alone and purely secular means. That’s just the way it is. The Holy Orthodox Church is where you will find peace and the answers for all your questions- it will be the Holy Spirit of Truth, God Himself that will help you and He will give you the confirmation and peace that your soul longs for. But, we cannot find out these answers from “outside” the Church which Jesus Christ built. That’s what the Church has always been there for and all the fullness you seek will be there. Our reason alone will never and could never save us. Humility, hard work and lots and lots of prayer and practice is absolutely essential to lead us to all the Truth, who is Christ Jesus Himself.
The Truth in all it’s fullness has always been within the Body of Christ.
I know this may sound too simple, but complicated questions sometimes have very simple answers. Please give this some thought, my brother.
James, thank you for your kind words and concerns. I wholeheartedly agree that human reason is not the source of fulfillment. However, it becomes quite a catch 22, since it was reason and Scripture and Tradition that led me out of Protestantism. Must I then reject the thing that led me to where I am now (and I have examined and experienced Eastern Orthdoxy at length)? I am concerned for what is true, no matter where it leads.
After I read your answer, I realized that my previous post was not stated concisely enough to make my intended point. Please forgive my lack of eloquence, brother.
Reason, Scripture and Tradition will undoubtably lead us away from Protestant denominations, as they were from the beginning, blatantly, inherently gnostic, that is, based on man’s “reasoning alone”(<this should have been included in their "group of solas" as well). Of course you are already aware of this.
However, in the end Roman Catholicism will also have be rejected on the same basis as well, scholasticism and therefore humanistic tendencies started working its influences from very early in the Roman Patriarchate, probably back as early as Blessed Augustine, and the Protestants directly inherited these tendencies as well. Rome was their "mother" so to speak and their starting point, so how, pray tell, could they bring a "reformation" to the church, with this starting point?
Man's scholasticism, reason, philosophy are all humanistic and only capable of "truth" within worldly, fleshly boundaries, but fail miserably when it comes to Ultimate Truth. Divine Truth had to and must condescend to man and teach us as "little children". We all still need to be taught it as well. Why? Because in matters of God, we are busted, and still busted and can't "do" theology without being taught first, and by the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit only resides in the Church.
We cannot "possess" the Truth, because it's un-posess-able and not static, it cannot be contained within us because it is the Living God-Man, Christ Jesus, the Lion of Judah, the King. You can't reason Him out or "arrive" at Him, He can't be reasoned with, or bargained with, or possessed. We need His direct intervention and it's whenever and wherever and to whomever He decides. He is the Beginning and the End of it all, and that's why He ordained His Church.
That's why there are only a very few officially recognized "Theologians" in the Orthodox Church. Only genuinely Spiritual Theologians can "do" Theology, as you already know what happens when self-proclaimed, un-spiritual "theologians" try. And this is why the Church is never going to "make sense" or be reducible to man's rational, nor will we arrive at it from the "outside" with pure logic only. We need Spiritual help. We will never fathom the true "fullness" of the Scriptures and have them revealed to us without the Holy Spirit and His Church.
Of course, you probably already know all this, as I realize you are very well read, and definitely beyond my simple capabilities to try "help". Just please read this once, I hope it says something finally, and if you are already aware of all this please don't post it.
I genuinely hope and pray for your peace, my brother. If we practice humility in our life and pray always He will help us.
Cool, no rush. Is the Johnson, Donne paper for a class? Weirdly my brother wrote his thesis on pansophia in Renaissance Lit and it included a analysis of alchemy in the masks of Johnson.
Regarding the Eros thing, don’t forget the Eros drive (as opposed to the Christian Agape) is quite important in classic Platonism, where a philosopher’s desire towards Wisdom is compared to the erotic lust of a male lover towards a young boy, as such Eros alone doesn’t necessarily mean a validation of the normal heterosexual sex drive. Christianity maintains the O.T condemnation of homosexuality and prevents women from becoming Priest. Remember also that Augustine was married (twice).
Yes, for class. Yes, eros is not porneia. Augustine had a girlfriend for many years who was an imperial concubine, but had no other wife, to my knowledge.
Oh, sorry, my bad. Just checked it out. After breaking off his first relationship he was engaged to a second concubine but eventually broke that engagement too. Or so says wikipedia anyway. I remember once watching a documentary and I thought I remember it saying he was married twice. Guess either the doc was wrong or (more likely) my memory is bad. Good luck with the paper anyway.
Hey Jay. This is Jacob A. I used to have the Tsar Lazar site. I’ve been dealing with some Orthodox apologists (I never converted to Orthodoxy, btw). While I still remain in the Christian tradition, by my own confession at least, I am appreciating more and more these two papers on Objections. They are helping me work through my own understanding of Christianity, while giving good responses to a lot of Orthodox apologetics mantras.
Hey Jacob. Sorry about your books, I’ve been moving recently. Thanks for the compliments and I hope my thoughts can be of positive influence.
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