At Synagogue With Jesus / Part 2

Note: In the previous post I mentioned the priest who enters and leads the congregation in the benedictory prayers. This would have been a member of the Levitical priesthood. In our service I had the priest also lead the congregation in the Shema, then being seated and replaced by Jairus who was the ruler of the synagogue of Capernaum in Jesus's day. Jairus, then, would have continued the service. However, according to some ancient sources, the priest may have only led the benedictory prayers and one of the rulers of the synagogue may have replaced him at that point to lead in the Shema and beyond.

Jairus ascends the platform as we watch. He walks now, not to the lectern to face the congregation, but rather toward the ark at the innermost part of the room. He faces it and begins pronouncing the eulogies. Here is the first:

"Blessed be the Lord our God and the God of our fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob; the great, the mighty, and the terrible God; the Most High God, who shows mercy and kindness, Who creates all things, Who remembers the gracious promises to the fathers, and brings a Savior to their children's children, for his own Name's sake, in love. O King, Helper, Savior, and Shield! Blessed are You, O Jehovah, the Shield of Abraham."

And all the people respond, "Amen." Then Jairus continues:

"You, O Lord, are mighty for ever; You, who make alive the dead, are mighty to save. In your mercy You preserve the living; You bring to life the dead; in Your abundant pity you bear up those who fall, and heal those who are diseased, and loose those who are bound, and fulfill your faithful word to those who sleep in the dust. Who is like unto You, Lord of strength, and who can be compared to You, Who kills and makes alive, and causes salvation to spring forth? And faithful are You to give life unto the dead. Blessed be You, Jehovah, Who brings the dead to life!"

Again, the congregation responds, "Amen." Jairus speaks again:

"You are holy, and Your Name is holy; and the holy ones praise You every day. Selah! Blessed are You, Jehovah God, the Holy One!"

The congregation again responds with an "amen."

Note:  At this point stop and consider the passage in Luke 4 where Jesus begins his public ministry in the synagogue at Nazareth where he grew up.  Luke records that the scrolls were brought to Jesus and that Jesus read a passage from Isaiah and then preached a sermon.  We are not yet that far into our service here, but Edersheim points out that often, when a guest reader and teacher (like Jesus would have been that day in Nazareth) was present, that many times he also would have been the one to pronounce the eulogies recorded above.  Luke 4 is just one instance in Jesus's ministry.  The gospels record that it was Jesus's practice to teach and preach in all the synagogues.  Now go back up to those three eulogies above and read them again, this time imagining that it is Jesus himself who is repeating them to the congregation.  He, himself, is the fulfillment of and answer to those prayers!  It's amazing when you think about it.  Only to have been there!

Now Jairus turns and faces the congregation and an invitation is extended for members of the congregation to come forward and offer their own prayers.  The respondents would only have been men who were properly clothed and it is unclear whether the prayers would have been pre-written or offered extemporaneously.  At any rate, this may have gone on awhile.  Note Jesus's warnings about the Pharisees in Mark 12 and other places when he mentions how for "a pretense (they) make long prayers."  This would have been the time for that.

When this is finished, Jairus steps forward again, faces the ark, and offers this:

"Take gracious pleasure, O Jehovah our God, in Your people Israel, and in their prayers.  Accept the burnt-offerings of Israel, and their prayers, with Your good pleasure; and may the services of Your people Israel be ever acceptable unto You. And oh that our eyes may see it, as You turn in mercy to Zion!  Blessed be You, O Jehovah, Who restores his Shechinah to Zion!"

And all the people respond, "Amen."  Then again:

"We praise You, because You are Jehovah our God, and the God of our fathers, for ever and ever.  You are the Rock of our life, the Shield of our salvation, from generation to generation.  We laud you, and declare Your praise for our lives which are kept within your hand, and for our souls which are committed unto You, and for Your wonders which are with us every day, and Your wondrous deeds and Your goodnesses, which are at all seasons--evening, morning, and mid-day.  You gracious One, Whose compassions never end; You pitying One, Whose grace never ceases--for ever do we put our trust in You!  And for all this Your Name, O our King, be blessed and extolled always, for ever and ever!  And all living bless You--Selah--and praise Your Name in truth, O God, our Salvation and our Help.  Blessed are You, Jehovah; Your Name is the gracious One, to whom praise is due."

"Amen," from the congregation.  Then, finally:

"Oh bestow on Your people Israel great peace, for ever; for You are King and Lord of all peace, and it is good in Your eyes to bless Your people Israel with praise at all times and in every hour.  Blessed are You, Jehovah, Who blesses His people Israel with peace."

Again, the congregation agrees with an "amen."

Next comes the meat and potatoes of the service and we shall describe that in a subsequent post.  But before we do that, stop and consider how full of praise are the prayers and how God-centered the focus thus far has been.  Keep in mind that this is not Scripture.  In other words, in the synagogue service we do not find God's exact commands for how a worship service should be conducted.  We are simply observing how it was done by others who lived at a time of great tragedy and yet of expectancy.  Note how Messianic the prayers are.  How do our prayers compare?  How similar or how different is the focus?  Is that necessarily good or not?  Could our prayers and our worship be more pleasing to God?  Should we be open to that?

At Synagogue With Jesus / Part 1

(Note: my source for the prayers, Scripture, and order of service is Alfred Edersheim's Sketches of Jewish Social Life.) 

It is early morning on the Sabbath. For six days the family has labored, likely for twelve hours or more a day. Dad has worked outside the home, probably at a trade. We are in Capernaum on the sea shore of Galilee, so dad is likely a fisherman. Mom has worked at home just as hard, tending her house, educating her children, preparing the home each day for the return of the husband. He is a fisherman, so sometimes he toils all night.

But today is Sabbath and the family has risen and quietly eaten a breakfast prepared the day before. Now they have walked the short distance to the synagogue where others have gathered. It is a stone building, taller, more elegantly crafted than the other buildings in town. There are columns out front and a stone floor. Above the entrance is an intricate carving of the ancient pot of manna which the children of Israel had gathered and placed as a memorial inside the ark of the covenant ages ago. The stone carving is adorned also with an intricate design of vine leaves and clusters of grapes, representing the goodness and blessing of God.

Inside there is a foyer with two entrances, one on the left and the other on the right. Here the family divides with the women going in one door and the men the other. It is one single rectangular room with wooden benches. There is a partition in the middle dividing the men from the women. In the very back, in an isolated corner, there is a small section for Gentiles--strangers to the covenants of Israel. The tone is one of reverence. All seats face symbolically toward Jerusalem, and toward a central wooden platform called, then, the bima. On the platform, at the innermost part of the synagogue was an ark or chest in which were placed all the copies of the Law and the Prophets. In front of it was a wooden pulpit or lectern and next to that a seat. In front of the platform was a row of chairs facing the congregation. These chairs were the "chief seats" and were coveted for the air of importance derived from being one of the ones who sat in them. Mainly these were rabbis and scribes and members of the brotherhood of the Pharisees. As we arrive for the service these seats are already filled.

We take our places among the congregation. When everyone has arrived a priest steps onto the platform, walks to the lectern, and briefly faces the congregation until he has attained their attention. The congregation stands. Then the priest offers the first benediction:

"Blessed be You, O Lord, King of the world, Who forms the light and creates the darkness, Who makes peace and creates everything; Who, in mercy, gives light to the earth and to those who dwell upon it, and in Your goodness day by day and every day renew the works of creation. Blessed be the Lord our God for the glory of His handiwork and for the light-giving lights which He has made for His praise. Selah! Blessed be the Lord our God, Who has formed the lights."

The congregation then pronounces "Amen." The priest then offers this prayer:

"With great love have You loved us, O Lord our God, and with much overflowing pity have You pitied us, our Father and our King. For the sake of our Fathers who trusted in You, and You taught from the statutes of life, have mercy upon us and teach us. Enlighten our eyes in Your law; cause our hearts to cleave to your commandments; unite our hearts to love and fear Your name, and we shall not be put to shame, world without end. For You are a God Who prepares salvation, and us have You chosen from among all nations and tongues, and have in truth brought us near to Your great Name--Selah--that we may lovingly praise You and your Oneness. Blessed be the Lord Who in love chose His people Israel."

The congregation again pronounces "Amen." The priest then begins the Shema which is quoted simultaneously by the congregation:

"Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

"And if you will indeed obey my commandments that I command you today, to love the LORD your God, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul, he will give the rain for your land in its season, the early rain and the later rain, that you may gather in your grain and your wine and your oil. And he will give grass in your fields for your livestock, and you shall eat and be full. Take care lest your heart be deceived, and you turn aside and serve other gods and worship them; then the anger of the LORD will be kindled against you, and he will shut up the heavens, so that there will be no rain, and the land will yield no fruit, and you will perish quickly off the good land that the LORD is giving you.

"You shall therefore lay up these words of mine in your heart and in your soul, and you shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall teach them to your children, talking of them when you are sitting in your house, and when you are walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates, that your days and the days of your children may be multiplied in the land that the LORD swore to your fathers to give them, as long as the heavens are above the earth.

"The LORD said to Moses, 'Speak to the people of Israel, and tell them to make tassels on the corners of their garments throughout their generations, and to put a cord of blue on the tassel of each corner. And it shall be a tassel for you to look at and remember all the commandments of the LORD, to do them, not to follow after your own heart and your own eyes, which you are inclined to whore after. So you shall remember and do all my commandments, and be holy to your God. I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to be your God: I am the LORD your God."

(Scripture references for the Shema are Deuteronomy 6:4-9; Deuteronomy 11:13-21; and Numbers 15:37-41. Every religious Jew knew these by heart and they were repeated twice daily by every Jewish male.)

After the repeating of the Shema another prayer is offered:

"True it is, that You are Jehovah our God and the God of our fathers, our King and the King of our fathers, our Savior and the Savior of our fathers, our Creator, the Rock of our salvation, our Help and our Deliverer. Your Name is from everlasting, and there is no God beside You. A new song did they that were delivered sing to thy Name by the seashore; together did all praise and own You King, and say, Jehovah shall reign world without end! Blessed be the Lord who saves Israel!"

Then the congregation is seated. The priest leaves the platform and is replaced by one of the leaders of the synagogue. In the case of the synagogue at Capernaum there may have been just the one, named Jairus in Mark 5:22. As Jairus ascends to the platform we take a break, but we will come back to the service at this point in the next post in this series.

Addendum: It is clear that it is to the Shema that James refers when he states in his epistle: "You say that you believe in one God. That's all fine. But know this, that even the demons believe that, but, unlike you, they tremble at the thought." (my paraphrase)

The Synagogue of Capernaum

(I originally wrote this a little over four years ago and according to blogger it has been seen over 700 times since then, which tells me it must have, somehow, shown up in searches at least for awhile. I re-post it now because I think it is still good information and helps to better set the scene in Luke 4.)

The city of Capernaum is now mainly an archeological site and attraction for tourists and pilgrims. Once it was the adopted home town of Jesus of Nazareth.

According to Matthew:

Matthew 4:[12] Now when he heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew into Galilee. [13] And leaving Nazareth he went and lived in Capernaum by the sea, in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali,

First century Capernaum was a sleepy little fishing village of about 1500 people. Houses would have been one-story structures made of basalt rock and thatched roofs. Walls would have been several feet thick with dirt floors and scant furnishings. The people would have eked out a meager existence from the village's main trade--fishing. From this town Jesus chose his first four disciples, Peter, Andrew, James, and John. It is very likely that Jesus lived in Peter's house while staying here.

The town had one synagogue, built by a Roman centurion. According to Luke:

Luke 7:[1] After he had finished all his sayings in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. [2] Now a centurion had a servant who was sick and at the point of death, who was highly valued by him. [3] When the centurion heard about Jesus, he sent to him elders of the Jews, asking him to come and heal his servant. [4] And when they came to Jesus, they pleaded with him earnestly, saying, “He is worthy to have you do this for him, [5] for he loves our nation, and he is the one who built us our synagogue.”

This strongly implies they had only one synagogue and the archeological evidence bears this out.

To the right is a photo of the remains of a later synagogue that was used in Capernaum, built on the same spot as the one that Jesus would have worshiped in in the first century.

Synagogue worship was both formal and informal. There was a dress code. There were strict rules of decorum. The congregation would have been seated, probably on benches, and always situated so as to be facing Jerusalem. Men were separated from women by a partition and separate entrances. Beyond the middle of the synagogue was a platform and upon the platform was a lectern made of wood. Scripture was read from behind the lectern and prayers were offered. According to Edersheim, readers stood, while preachers sat. In other words, a man would stand behind the lectern to read a passage, then sit down to explain it. Witness this passage which takes place in the synagogue at Nazareth at the very beginning of Jesus's ministry:

Luke 4:[16] And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and he stood up to read. [17] And the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written,

[18] “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives
and recovering of sight to the blind,
to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
[19] to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.”

[20] And he rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. [21] And he began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” [22] And all spoke well of him and marveled at the gracious words that were coming from his mouth.

Jesus stands to read a passage from the prophets, then sits to preach his sermon. "Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing" can be seen as a title or a summary of the sermon he preached.

Here I should point out that the reading of the Scripture was seen as something of primary importance in the synagogue. With no printing press and only hand-copied editions of the Scriptures available you can imagine that these were strictly cared for and handled by only a select few. Many of the people did not have the Scriptures in their homes. The synagogue was the place where the people went to hear them read aloud. The Torah was divided up into portions and read systematically over a period of time, probably three or three and a half years at the time of Christ. While one man would read the Scripture aloud in Hebrew, another individual would stand by and give a running translation into Aramaic--the language of the people. Following this was a reading of the Prophets and then a sermon as described in the passage above. I will give more details on this in my next post.

In fact, I think in my next post I will attempt to take us into a synagogue worship service and have us go through the entire liturgy to see what it would have been like to attend "church" with Jesus as a boy or young man in first century Galilee.

About Synagogues

About four years ago I did a series of blog posts on the first century synagogue. The impetus for these posts was my reading of Alfred Edersheim's Sketches of Jewish Social Life.

In the youth Sunday School class that I teach we have been traveling slowly through the life of Jesus and we find ourselves with him as he is entering his hometown of Nazareth for the first time since his baptism and initial entrance into itinerant ministry. Rabbi Yeshua has been making noise in other towns, performing miracles and stirring up the crowds down south in Jerusalem, preaching in synagogues in and around Galilee. Now he comes home to the town where he grew up.

What must it have been like to go to 'church' and have Jesus show up? What would he say? How would they react? In order for us to grasp what is going on in Luke 4 there is a lot of information we need. Edersheim supplies a lot of that information in his Sketches and also in his classic work The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah. I have gleaned from these sources and put together what I think is a pretty accurate picture of what first century Galilean synagogue worship was like and what it would have been like to 'go to church' with Jesus.

So here are, more or less those posts from four years ago, this being the first with three or four more to follow. I hope they will open the Scripture to you so that you will see Jesus more clearly than ever before. God bless.

_________________________________________________________________________________

 I wanted to wrap up my reading of Alfred Edersheim's Sketches of Jewish Social Life before delving into Isaiah very deeply. So last night I was attempting to scramble up those last three chapters and get to the top. That's when I realized it was just not going to be that easy--there's just too much enlightening information in those last chapters to pass over them so . . . lightly. I find myself compelled to go back and look at them more closely. These chapters, which deal with the first century Jewish synagogue, simply open up too many gospel passages to not stop and marvel for a bit. I don't know how many blog posts I will make out of it, but it's just too interesting to pass up.

No one knows for sure when the first synagogues came to be, but most scholars believe it must have been at or about the time of the Babylonian exile and dispersion. The English word "synagogue" is of Greek derivation and means "gathering together" for religious purposes. These synagogues probably started out in homes as rooms set aside for prayer. As public, corporate prayer was something to be encouraged, the people would have met in these places for that purpose--hence the name. By the time of Christ, these worship places had evolved into organized prayer and teaching centers for the Jewish faith.

The worship of the Old Testament was typical and centered around, first, the tabernacle and, later, the temple in Jerusalem. Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon destroyed Jerusalem in 586 BC. Most of the people were then, or already had been carried away captive to Babylon.  Of those remaining, a large portion fled to Egypt.  Solomon's temple was razed and the vessels of the temple stolen and taken to Babylon as spoils of war.

Around what, now, would the Levitical priests attempt to organize their religion in a foreign land?  The answer, through natural social evolution, was the synagogue.

When the people began returning to their homeland it would take a while for a new temple to be built.  In the meantime, the people needed places to meet and pray and propagate their faith.  By the time a new temple was built, and desecrated, and re-built, the synagogue had established itself as a quintessential part of Jewish life.  Each had its rulers, its rules, and its daily litany.  By the time of Christ, nearly every town had several of them--cities had hundreds--and thousands dotted the countryside.

Witness the words of the Jerusalem council in Acts 15:

Acts 15: [21] For from ancient generations Moses has had in every city those who proclaim him, for he is read every Sabbath in the synagogues.”

According to the rabbinical sources, there were as many as 480 synagogues in Jerusalem at the time of its destruction in 70 AD.

In the next few days I will give some information about synagogue design and worship and tie it in to the gospel narrative, shedding light on some of the events of Jesus's ministry.

At Synagogue With Jesus / Part 3

First there were the benedictory prayers. Then there was the recitation of the Shema. Next came the eulogies of praise for God. Now for the reading of the Torah.

According to Edersheim, this would have been divided up into regular readings so that the entire Law would have been covered in a given time period. In Edersheim's day the custom was to read the entire five books aloud each year. However, in Jesus's day it was likely that it took three or three and a half years for an entire cycle to take place. This would only have amounted to a little more than a chapter a week.

A chosen individual, perhaps the ruler or one of the rulers of the synagogue, or maybe a member of the congregation, or even a guest would walk to the platform. The chosen scroll would be taken from the ark and handed to him. He would unroll it to the correct place and begin to read aloud . . . in Hebrew.

At the time of Christ Hebrew was no longer the spoken language of the Jews of Palestine. The language of the people was Aramaic--the language of the empire (Medio-Persian) they had served under during their captivity in Babylon. Although Aramaic was the spoken language (probably Jesus's first spoken words were in this language), the traditionalists of their ecclesiastical hierarchy were very slow to translate the Scriptures into it. Thus, the Law was still being read aloud in Hebrew and a translator would have been standing right beside the reader giving a running translation into the Aramaic.  Later, in the post-temple period following the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus in 70 AD, these translations were done in writing and made official.  They were known as targummim or the Targum. Our translator could have been an official or, in a small town like Capernaum, may have been just a layman or even a boy.  As long as he was capable of the task he was qualified.

One at a time they came forward and read their portion.  The translator would translate each.  Then would come the reading from the Prophets.  This would be less methodical.  Sometimes a portion might be chosen which was connected somehow with the Torah readings of the day.  Sometimes a synagogue might be engaged in the systematic reading of them similar to that of the Torah.  Sometimes, as in the case of Jesus at the synagogue of Nazareth in Luke 4, the teacher would choose whichever portion he wished and expound upon that.  Observe:

Luke 4:[16] And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and he stood up to read. [17] And the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written,

[18] “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives
and recovering of sight to the blind,
to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
[19] to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.”

[20] And he rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. [21] And he began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” 

That day Jesus was the one who stood up (on the platform) to read from the prophets. This would have been set up ahead of time, as Jesus was already an itinerant rabbi with a growing reputation. They brought him the Isaiah scroll and he reads his chosen portion. Observe that no translator is present. Reading from the Prophets was less formal than the reading of the Torah (influence of the Sadducees) so often the readers from the Prophets simply provided their own translation as they read, which is likely what Jesus did here. What we have, then, in our Lukan passage, is a translation into Greek of what Jesus had translated into Aramaic from what he was reading in Hebrew.

After he reads his portion he sits down in the seat next to the podium. Recall that all Scripture was read while standing, but teaching was always done from a sitting position. So Jesus sat and began to teach. Sermons would have been an exposition of any or even all of the passages that had been read that day with an application into everyday life. Jesus chooses to expound upon his own text from Isaiah. Observe that the teaching was perhaps a bit less formal than what we might think, for Jesus responds to some questions and remarks from the congregation.

So how does our service end? Perhaps we should end it in the way the service ended that day in Nazareth. The congregation, being offended by the words of Christ (not his manner, but his truth), left the service abruptly, carrying him out to the edge of a hill to be thrown off. They were attempting to stone him for pointing out that in previous times in the biblical narrative, when the Hebrews were in rebellion to God, God had shown grace to Gentiles. They did not want to hear this.

And so official Judaism rejected her Messiah. But true Judaism lives on, not in bloom, but in full flower, and those who are the children of Abraham by faith, both Jews and Gentiles, are among her congregants--including our friend Mr. Alfred Edersheim. And witness Paul's words in Romans 11:

11:[1] I ask, then, has God rejected his people? By no means! For I myself am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin. [2] God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew. Do you not know what the Scripture says of Elijah, how he appeals to God against Israel? [3] “Lord, they have killed your prophets, they have demolished your altars, and I alone am left, and they seek my life.” [4] But what is God's reply to him? “I have kept for myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.” [5] So too at the present time there is a remnant, chosen by grace.

A Note on Pharisees and Sadducees

Don't think of the Pharisees as a religious sect so much as a religious party. Protestant Christianity has divided itself into so many little splinter groups that when we get to the New Testament and start reading about the Pharisees and Sadducees we start thinking of them like Methodists and Baptists--as if they were different Jewish denominations. But this is the wrong way to think about them. It makes more sense and comes a lot closer to reality to look at them as two separate political parties within a legislature. They differ on particulars but both alike support the institution. The majority party rules and gets to make more decisions, but the minority party still has a say and influence. In this respect the Pharisees are the majority party and the Sadducees the minority while the Jewish faith is the institution in which they vie for supremacy.

Now let's look at each a little bit more closely.

The Pharisees obsessed over purity and outward conformity to the Law. Theirs was a brotherhood zealous of the traditions of their fathers. There was no law they could not improve, expound, and expand upon. Because theirs was the majority position, their opinion was official. Therefore the synagogue worship service is strongly Pharisaical in its design and emphasis. We also see this in Jesus's words to his disciples concerning them:

Matthew 23:[1] Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples, [2] “The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses' seat, [3] so practice and observe whatever they tell you—but not what they do. For they preach, but do not practice.

Jesus is pointing out that because they were the majority position on ecclesiastical matters they were in charge of the worship and religious judgment of Israel and as such they were the law. This is why Jesus tells the crowd they must submit to the Pharisees's opinions on religious observance. But then he goes on to expose them for what they really were.

Matthew 23:[4] They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people's shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger. [5] They do all their deeds to be seen by others. For they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long, [6] and they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues [7] and greetings in the marketplaces and being called rabbi by others.

He expounds further, but this quotation will suffice for our purposes.

Now, about those Sadducees. The Sadducees were a brotherhood also, in some respects more liberal, and some more conservative than the Pharisees. While a Sadducee might roll his eyes at the pretense of the Pharisees, we might note that he had his own foibles. The Sadducee did not accept the Prophets to be as authoritative in spiritual matters as the Torah (the Law). To them, the Torah, (what we know of as the Pentateuch or the books of Moses) was the only certain source of spiritual knowledge and the rest of what we know of as the Old Testament were considered companion writings. For this reason they were either agnostic about or did not believe at all in an afterlife or a resurrection. These things could not be found in the Torah. Did you notice in our synagogue worship service that there is much to be said about the resurrection and a future life with God and those who have gone on and are now living with God? This is by design and a Pharisee would have emphasized it not just for the reason that he would have considered it an important point of worship, but also to let the Sadducees know whose opinion was supreme.

But the Sadducees still had their influence. We will see that the reading of the Torah was divided up and completed in a cycle covering a certain time period. At the time of Christ it is believed that this would have been once every three or three and a half years. The reading of the prophets, however, was more random and not systematic at all. Chalk one up for the Sadducees.

As for that question of the resurrection, Jesus answered them fully and finally during his last week on earth when all his enemies sought to trip him up and find occasion to have him arrested. Recall that the Sadducees came to him with a question about the resurrection:

Matthew 22:[23] The same day Sadducees came to him, who say that there is no resurrection, and they asked him a question, [24] saying, “Teacher, Moses said, ‘If a man dies having no children, his brother must marry the widow and raise up children for his brother.’ [25] Now there were seven brothers among us. The first married and died, and having no children left his wife to his brother. [26] So too the second and third, down to the seventh. [27] After them all, the woman died. [28] In the resurrection, therefore, of the seven, whose wife will she be? For they all had her.”

Looks as if they clearly thought they had cornered him and asked him the question that showed the fallacy of his ways. But they were wrong. Note Jesus's response:

[29] But Jesus answered them, “You are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God. [30] For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. [31] And as for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was said to you by God: [32] ‘I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not God of the dead, but of the living.” [33] And when the crowd heard it, they were astonished at his teaching.

Jesus takes them to the Torah and shows them that God speaks to Moses about Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the present tense. He proved them wrong on their own turf, from their own texts.

Anyway, just thought I would point out a few things that might help you understand the New Testament a little better. Back to our synagogue service shortly.

In the Year That King Uzziah Died . . .

Introductory Notes to the Study of Isaiah.

Around the year 1050 BC a Semitic tribal community in and around the area of the world now known as Palestine developed into a monarchy. The new kingdom--Israel. Her first king--Saul. Saul reigned in this tiny kingdom for forty years, but his sons did not reign after him. Instead, the scepter fell to a shepherd/warrior/musician named David. David started a dynasty.

King David reigned over Israel from 1010-970 BC. When he died, the throne went to one of his youngest sons, Solomon. Solomon's famous reign ended in 930 or 931 BC. At this time the northern tribes of Israel rebelled and formed their own kingdom, but the southern kingdom went on with Solomon's son, Rehoboam, sitting on his father's diminished throne.

The eighth king to sit on the throne of Judah after the split was Amaziah. This would be some one hundred twenty years after the death of Solomon. Amaziah had a brother named Amoz and Amoz had a son named Isaiah. This is the Isaiah of Scripture--the prophet whom God used to pen the biblical book by the same name.

When Amaziah died, his son Ahaziah took the throne. Ahaziah was distinguished in several ways as a king in Judah. For one, he was known by two different names. The books of the Kings refer to him as Ahaziah, but in the priestly Chronicles he is Uzziah. Henceforth I will refer to him as Uzziah as well.

When Uzziah became king the kingdom was in shambles. War with Israel and Syria to the north had left it weak and nearly defenseless. The Jerusalem wall had been breached. Things were looking down. But Uzziah was an effective ruler and during his reign the kingdom strengthened tremendously. This brings us to what would ultimately become Uzziah's downfall--his pride.

At the height of Uzziah's success he attempted to unite the Jewish priesthood with its monarchy. In other words, as king he attempted to usurp high priestly duties. In spite of the warnings of dire consequences by the priesthood, Uzziah would not be deterred. He went into the holy place to offer incense and was stricken with the dreaded leprosy for his affront.

Uzziah's reign lasted fifty-two years. During his reign Rome was founded. In Greece, the first Olympiad was held. The world's first empires were forming and Palestine was becoming a thoroughfare for traveling conquerors. The world was growing up, so to speak. Times were good for the people of both Israel and Judah as well. Prosperity was wide-spread, but with it came decadence and spiritual lapse.

Into this mix God sent a young prophet named Isaiah, cousin to the king, younger than the king, destined to have much more impact than any earthly monarch. He is the first of the major prophets. His message affected his culture and society, and went on to transcend it as he pointed the people's eyes and hearts first inward, and then upward. Isaiah is the prophet of the Messiah.

"In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw also the LORD high and lifted up . . ."