Like devout Jews of His day, Jesus had been circumcised on the eighth day; went to synagogue; traveled to Jerusalem with his family to celebrate the pilgrim feasts at the Temple; learned Torah; gathered disciples and taught them as did other dedicated rabbis. While His human life was out of the ordinary, His faith was fully orthodox and Torah-observant (he did spar with rabbis over the traditions). His teachings are full of Jewish idioms. His self-described ministry was "to the Jews" (Matt 16:24). Jesus stated He had not come to cancel Torah, but to fill it full, so His followers could more fully live it (Matt 5:17). When He sent out the twelve, He told them to go only to the lost sheep of Israel (Matt 10:5-7). His words are only fully understandable if viewed from a Hebraic, or Jewish, perspective.
So it would be accurate to say that Jesus was not a Christian. He was not sent by God to start a new religion that replaced the Jews with more reliable types. He did not teach His disciples the Torah was cancelled. He didn't tell His followers to stop being Jewish. He called Himself the Son of Man repeatedly to indicate to them that He was the figure described in Daniel 7, co-equal with God. The Jews understood that's what He meant. The trail of outraged Pharisees that followed Him everywhere is evidence enough of that.
So it would be accurate to say that Jesus was not a Christian. He was not sent by God to start a new religion that replaced the Jews with more reliable types. He did not teach His disciples the Torah was cancelled. He didn't tell His followers to stop being Jewish. He called Himself the Son of Man repeatedly to indicate to them that He was the figure described in Daniel 7, co-equal with God. The Jews understood that's what He meant. The trail of outraged Pharisees that followed Him everywhere is evidence enough of that.
Well Paul then, Paul is the one who sorted through Jesus's teachings and brought clarity and a new focus and sent us into the Christian era on the right foot. Thank God for Paul. No, Paul too was a Jew. He was Saul of Tarsus, a brilliant, orthodox Jewish scholar. (Paul was his legal Roman name). By his own testimony he was of the tribe of Benjamin (Rom 11:1), circumcised, a Pharisee, likely a member of the Sanhedrin, zealously persecuting believers (Acts 22:1-4). He claimed he was 'blameless under the law," meaning that he lived according to it, repenting when he fell short (Phil 3:4-6). He too worshipped at the Temple and studied in synagogue. He said the law was good and perfect and that he delighted to meditate on it (Rom 7:12, 14, 22). When he was arrested, part of his defense was "I have done nothing against our people or the customs of our fathers" (i.e. He was Torah observant. Acts 28:17).
Everywhere he traveled he first went to the local synagogue and preached to the Jews, as Jesus had instructed. In Acts 18 he cut his hair as part of a Jewish vow. In Acts 21 he pays the expenses of four men associated with a vow in the Temple, in order to quash rumors that he was not observant and was teaching others they needn't be either.
In Paul's role as apostle to the Gentiles, he argued passionately that they had no need to convert to Judaism in order to be followers of the Jewish Messiah, Yeshua. This is not the same thing as arguing that Jesus's death and resurrection cancelled all of the promises God had made to the Jewish people and that Gentile Christianity constituted a new Israel, replacing God's covenant people.
So Paul can only be called a Christian if his self-identification is ignored and his teachings filtered through a Gentile grid. And if he truly was teaching something radically different than what Yeshua taught, why are we listening to him? On what grounds does Paul have authority to change what Jesus the Son of God taught? Selah.
So it appears that Paul did not convert and create a new religion. He was a Jew who'd discovered His Messiah and was learning how to walk out that revelation as a faithful Jew. He was working his brilliant brain through the mystery of the inclusion of the Gentiles, to whom he was called as an apostle. He recurringly admonished them they needn't be "Jewish" in their faith expression, but that doesn't mean that we Gentiles have nothing to learn from our Jewish brothers.
Take a fresh look at Jesus's and Paul's teachings, setting aside what you think you know. Check your Bible's translation for additions not in the original manuscripts. Take the POV that Jesus came as a Jewish man, to the Jewish people, bringing a Jewish message of the coming Kingdom. Understand Paul as a faithful Jew, learning how to follow Yeshua as his Messiah in that context. Invite the Holy Spirit to guide you. Ask Him to show you where traditional church thought or means of interpretation may have clouded what the Scripture is actually saying. Where might cultural norms have infiltrated your thinking? In what ways might antipathy toward the Jewish people caused Bible interpretation to become slanted away from its Jewish beginnings?
It's time to put Jesus, Paul and the earliest church back into their original Jewish context, that we might gain the fullness of what they taught. We are part of something much bigger and much older than we've known. As our mighty God draws human history to a close, let your eyes fill with the glory of the coming King. Maranatha!
Matthew 10:5-7 Yeshua sent out these twelve and ordered them, “Do not go to the Gentiles, and do not enter into any Samaritan town. But go instead to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. As you go, proclaim, ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near!’’ TLV
Acts 24:14 [Paul said,] "But this I confess to you, that according to the Way (which they call a sect), I worship the God of our fathers, believing everything written in the Torah and the Prophets. TLV
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A teeny Bibliography for further study:
The New Perspective on Paul, Grove Biblical Series, Michael Bruce Thompson, 2002
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