The Separation of Judaism and Christianity in Jesus Renewal Movement Becomes Christianity

The Separation of Judaism and Christianity in Jesus Renewal Movement Becomes Christianity

As I have previously mentioned in previous essays, before this class I really had little to no knowledge of Judaism and Christianity and their relationship with one another. After reading Part 3 of Mary Boys? book, Has God Only One Blessing? I realized that there was a lot of information and knowledge that I got out of it. So, for this paper, I decided that I would just concentrate on one section of the chapters that we were assigned to read. The particular section that I chose to concentrate on was the section entitled: ?Jesus? Renewal Movement? Becomes ?Christianity.? Hopefully through this essay, I will demonstrate to you the knowledge that I have gained through reading this particular section.

Basically what this chapter in the book deals with is the start of the separation of Judaism and Christianity into their own separate religions. As the book states, ?The quotation marks that clutter the title of this chapter hint at the difficulty of answering the seemingly simple question of how the Jewish renewal movement Jesus led became Christianity.? (Page 138) Sometime in the history of the religion of Judaism, a separate group of people started to emerge. They may not have all agreed with the teachings of Judaism and they began to start a new group, which they decided to call Christianity. Before taking this course, I didn?t know that at one time Judaism and Christianity was at one time the same thing. But through the readings, I discovered that they were in fact the same and through some disagreements, they divided into two separate religions. This quote taken from the book, backs up the fact that the two religions were at one time

connected, but through these disagreements emerged a new leader and a new practice to follow. ?As many Gentiles, however, became followers of the Jesus, the religious practices that had maintained the community?s boundaries ? circumcision, dietary laws, the role of the Temple ? were passionately disputed among the believers-in-Jesus.? (Page 139) Another quote taken from the book emphasizes this point even further. ?The communities that eventually became ?Christianity? separated neither rapidly nor painlessly from Judaism and continued to have strained relations with Rome, including periods of persecution.? (Page 139)

Jumping a little ahead, another fact that emphasizes the point that Judaism and Christianity were soon to split is the fact that Raymond Brown and John Meier argue that there should be a spectrum of positions, with at least four basic types of ?