Established 1970

One measure of the ill-feeling that was felt by early Christians towards Judaism of that time is to list texts in the New Testament that accuse Jews or the Jewish religious leaders of violent intentions or physical violence against Jesus or his followers:

Matthew 12:9-14, 16:21, 20:17-19, 21:33-46, 26:1-5, 14-16, 47-50, 26:57, 66, 27:1-2, 19-26.

Mark 3:1-6, 8:31, 10:33-34, 12:1-12, 14:1-2, 10-11, 43-49, 64, 15:1, 8-15.

Luke 9:22, 20:9-26, 22:1-6, 52-53, 22:26, 23:5, 23:13-25.

John 5:15-18, 7:1, 10-13, 19-20, 28-34, 8:20, 37-40, 57-59, 10:30-39, 11:45-57, 12:9-11, 18:3-14, 19-24, 28-32, 19:6-7, 12-16. Acts 2:22-23, 3:13, 4:22, 5:17-42, 6:8-15, 7:50-60, 8:1-3, 9:1-2, 9:21, 13:28-29, 50, 14:1-6, 19, 17:5-9, 20:19, 21:11, 22:22-23, 23:2-3, 10, 12-15, 20-21, 27, 24:1-9.

2 Corinthians 11:24.

1 Thessalonians 2:15-15.

Jesus made scathing attacks on the Jewish religious leaders of his day and their teachings. (Matthew 15:12-14, 16:5-12, 21:12-13, and chapter 23, Mark 11:15-17, 12:38-40, Luke 12:1-3, 16:14-15). His condemnation of those who rejected his message was savage. (Matthew 10:11-15, 11:20-24, Luke 10:13-15). One of the earliest controversies in the church was whether circumcision and Old Testament food taboos applied to non-Jewish converts to Christianity. (Acts 15, 21:17-26, Galatians 2:3-6). One of Paul's letters warns about "unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, specially those of the circumcision: whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not, for filthy lucre's sake". (Titus 1:10-11).

The Acts of the Apostles shows how much the early Christian missionaries depended on the synagogues to preach and reach potential converts. (Acts 13:14-16, 14:1, 17:1-4, 18:1-4). Indeed in Rome, the Jewish leaders visited him when he came there as a prisoner (Acts 28:16-17, 21-25), and seemed to give him a very fair hearing.

In the Book of Revelations, however, feelings against the Jews were much nastier:

...I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan. Revelation 2:9.

Behold I will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which say they are Jews, and are not, but do lie; behold, I will make them to come and worship before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee. Revelation 3:9.

Add to this the description of Paul:

...the Jews; who both killed the Lord Jesus, and their own prophets, and have persecuted us; and they please not God, and are contrary to all men: forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved, to fill up their sins alway: for the wrath is come upon them to the uttermost. 1 Thessalonians 2:14-16.

Which echo the words of Jesus himself about the Jewish Scribes and pharisees:

Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes ... that upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias ... All these things shall come upon this generation. Matthew 23:34-36.

And

Woe unto you! for ye build the sepulchres of the prophets, and your fathers killed them. Truly ye bear witness that ye allow the deeds of your fathers: for they indeed killed them, and ye build their sepulchres. Therefore also said the wisdom of God, I will send them prophets and apostles, and some of them they shall slay and persecute: that the blood of all the prophets, which shed from the foundation of the world, may be required of this generation ... verily I say unto you, It shall be required of this generation. Luke 11:47-50, 51.

Finally, top that off with the words attributed to the crowd just before Jesus' crucifixion:

Then answered all the people, and said, His blood be on us, and on our children. Matthew 27:25.

The horror and suffering that came upon innocent people because of these verses almost defies description. And no wonder. Jesus himself is quoted as saying that all the righteous blood that was ever shed shall come upon these Jews!

Thomas Paine said of the Bible:

...it would be more consistent that we call it the word of a demon than the word of God. It is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind...

Certainly that judgment applies to these verses, at least.

Of course there's another side to it in the Bible. Paul warns Gentile believers not to be boastful because some of the original branches of the olive tree (the Jews) had been broken off to graft them in:

For it thou wert cut out of the olive tree which wild by nature, and wert graffed contrary to nature into a good olive tree: how much more shall these, which be the natural branches, be graffed into their own olive tree? Romans 11:24.

And Jesus himself said to the Samaritan woman, "Salvation is of the Jews." (John 4:22).

But the evidence goes further than this. Matthew's gospel records an incident where a Gentile woman begged him to save her daughter from being possessed by a devil...

...But he answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, saying, Send her away; for she crieth after us. But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me. But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs. And she said, Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their master's table. Matthew 15:23-27.

Only when the woman likened herself to a dog snatching crumbs did Jesus relent. Matthew 15:28, (also Mark 7:24-30).

No-one else in the gospels had to struggle in this way to get Jesus to relieve human suffering, but with one exception, all the others appear to be Jewish. The exception was judged 'worthy' as he loved the Jews and had built a synagogue for them. (Luke 7:4-5). Despite comments of the like of Matthew 8:10-12, perhaps Jesus' fundamental attitude towards the Gentiles was to be summed up in the Sermon on the Mount:

Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you. Matthew 7:6.