If Jesus didn't start Christianity, how did it separate from Judaism, and what role did Paul play in that process?

 

Paul did not separate Christianity from anything.

These types of questions are laden with misapprehensions. I find it amusing because these views are remarkably common, so they must have come from somewhere.

In the first century, there was basically no such thing as Judaism as we understand it today. The term Judaism is a Greek word only found in the Book of Maccabees which Jewish authorities did not accept as legitimate scripture. This book was composed in Greek about 150 years before Jesus. Aside from that reference, the Old Testament has no word of Judaism.

The term Christianity appears in the New Testament as a term that outsiders used to attack the religion. It’s often lambasted by critics for being a Greek word, but so is Judaism. It’s a silly criticism that disintegrates under its own contradictions.

Christianity is based off a Hebrew concept of Anointed One or Messiah. So it’s a Greek translation of a deep theological concept found across Hebrew scripture and is more theological than the term Judaism. Let’s not compete over semantics, but truth matters.

Whilst the term Christianity does appear in the New Testament, it later appears in the writings of Ignatius of Antioch during the early second century and gains traction. Before that, Christianity is often referred to as The Way which is another Hebrew concept.

Ironically, the term Judaism finds its most frequent, earliest usage in the New Testament and Jesus is the first person in recorded history to be called Rabbi. As a set of historical documents, the New Testament preserves many ideas from the Second Temple period. There is no other collection which rivals its sheer depth of information, especially for social analysis.

From a strictly historical perspective, Christianity and Judaism come from a shared source of Yahwism or Israelite monotheism. This ancient religion revolved around Temple worship in Jerusalem with priestly castes that ceased to exist after the first century. The whole administrative, authoritative and ceremonial structure of Yahwism literally terminated.

It’s difficult to conceptualise this destruction because the religion centered on the Temple. Even hypothetical comparisons with other religions can’t do it justice.

We could compare a hypothetical scenario to the Kaaba being destroyed in Islam and Mecca conquered or the Vatican being destroyed, but both religions can still be practiced. Yahwism required the Temple. The only time it had no Temple before Rome’s conquest was 70 years during the Babylonian exile. It has now been two thousand years since the Second Temple.

Yahwism concluded in the first century due to two reasons. The first reason was the Roman conquest of Israelite territory and the destruction of its Temple in 70AD. With the destruction of that Temple, the focal point of Israelite monotheism ended.

The Temple stored genealogical records for the priests. All of these were destroyed. There is no way to establish the Levite or Kohenite priesthood under any verifiable metric. These are required by the Torah. Following the Roman conquest, a large portion of Israelites were expelled. Sects like the Sadducees who ruled the Temple also came to an end.

The second event that concluded Yahwism was the movement created by Jesus of Nazareth. He had a following and multitudes of Israelites believed he fulfilled the real expectations they had for the Messiah in the Second Temple period, especially Galileans.

Estimating exact numbers is very difficult because Josephus records there were only 6,000 Pharisees by the end of the first century. What he regarded as actual Pharisees or Sadducees were those directly trained in those specific orders or groups.

Nobody is being trained in Christianity in the same way as Pharisees or Sadducees during this period. It doesn’t have functioning schools, so measuring its numerical strength is difficult. What historians do gather is that it was exceptionally influential because Nero launched persecutions against it, blaming them for the burning of Rome in 64AD. This attribution is evidenced by the Roman archives through Tacitus who served as a consul a little later.

So the fact there were thousands of dedicated followers of Jesus who spread his message, preached in cities, established churches and disrupted priestly authority is significant. There could have even been more core followers of Jesus than Pharisees. If judging a sect by its number of dedicated members, Christianity could have been the largest amongst Jews. This does not even touch upon its informal influence.

Jesus instigated a seismic movement that transformed the whole society. People would have heard of him and all sorts were drawn to his message, including trained Pharisee elites like Paul of Tarsus. It was also associated with John the Baptist and the Essenes who already challenged priestly authority and notions of ceremonial tradition.

After the destruction of the Temple in 70AD, followers of Jesus were still associated with Jews because most of them were ethnically Jewish. Christianity just means being a follower of the Messiah. Jesus represented a term that could be called Messianic Judaism.

One significant event that separated Messianic Jews from everybody else took place at the Council of Jamnia between 85–90AD. Rabbinical leaders who descended from the Pharisees made moves to prohibit and exclude Jesus followers from synagogues. They denounced them as heretics and demanded they recite a blessing that cursed Jewish Christians.

The Gospel of John was formalised in this period and some of these conflicts can be read within it. Pharisaic or Rabbinical authorities excluded Jewish believers of Jesus. Before that, Jesus followers shared the Temple before its destruction and went into synagogues. After all, these individuals grew up and attended synagogues all their lives.

When the Pharisees or Rabbinical inheritors barred Jesus followers from synagogues, this left them open to persecution by the Roman Empire. Major figures within the emerging Rabbinical movement therefore made moves for expulsion.

They initiated the formal separation with prohibitions. Synagogues were no longer places of worship or safety for Jesus followers. Whilst the Pharisaic movement still gained imperial protection, Christians now had none. They couldn’t even go into the synagogues where they once had access. Remember this all took place very long ago and nobody from that period is alive. Everybody is long dead and so we are treating this as an ancient event.

Now it’s in this late first century period that Paul first emerges in literature that is not directly written by him. This demonstrates that he had early authority which was recognised, but he was not the dominating figure people mistake him for today.

Paul was not even mentioned in any of Justin Martyr’s writings. Martyr was one of the most significant theologians during the first century. Nor is Paul mentioned in any surviving texts from Papias in the first century. This demonstrates that significant figures could write or debate about Christian belief without any reference to Paul.

Paul was undoubtedly an important figure in the early faith because he was formally a Pharisee and was highly educated unlike many Galileans. He also had immense energy in spreading the message of universal salvation to other peoples across the Roman Empire.

However, the moment when Paul gains extraordinary influence occurs after his death. This takes place with Marcion of Sinope who compiled the first New Testament in the early second century. Marcion was a heretic who believed in removing Old Testament scripture entirely and believed Paul was the only legitimate apostle.

Marcion was born in the first century into a Christian family. Some scholars like Adolf Harnack hypothesize that he likely came from a Jewish ethnic background connected to ship building in Sinope which is located in northern Turkey today.

Whilst the letters of Paul were already gaining authority in churches, Marcion controversially discarded Hebrew scriptures, but realised Christians still needed a compendium of holy texts. So he used a redacted version of Luke’s Gospel and placed it alongside one of his own writings with eleven of Paul’s letters.

Marcion’s compendium spread across Christian communities. It was useful because it combined a lot of documents and laid down a prototype for successive compendiums that could be copied. Christian texts were already circulating, but Marcion formalised it. This spread Paul everywhere and Christian communities could not ignore him.

Paul’s canonical authority was therefore long established after the major ideals of Christianity emerged, specifically its inclusion of Gentiles and its treatment of Mosaic Law. Paul changed nothing about Christianity, but repeatedly affirmed Hebrew texts as scripture and used major theological ideals from the Torah and Tanakh such as spiritual circumcision.

Deuteronomy 10:16

Circumcise your hearts, therefore, and do not be stiff-necked any longer.

Jeremiah 4:4

Circumcise yourselves to the Lord, circumcise your hearts, you people of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem, or my wrath will flare up and burn like fire because of the evil you have done—burn with no one to quench it.

Paul reaffirms this spiritual circumcision.

Colossians 2:11

In him you were also circumcised with a circumcision not performed by human hands.

Within the second century, Christian texts were largely formalised and a canon was created. This cemented the New Testament as scripture and was joined with what became the Old Testament. Christians made a decision to repudiate Marcion and retain Hebrew scriptures as canonical. Paul was included as part of this canon despite the Marcionite usage of him.

By contrast, the descendants of the Pharisees excluded Christians from the synagogues and left them without holy buildings. They formally separated themselves from associations with Jesus. Undoubtedly, this reaction against Christianity informed their religious development. These individuals later emerged into the Rabbinical movement which based itself around things that were largely alien to the Second Temple period.

This includes the use of the Oral Torah which the Sadducees rejected. Rabbis codified the Oral Torah into the Mishnah around 200AD. They used this as a supplement or rival to the Written Torah which is just called the Torah or first five books of the Old Testament. This Oral Torah is mentioned nowhere in Hebrew scriptures. Sadducees and Christians viewed it as an innovation. The Mishnah is therefore younger than the New Testament and less ancient.

The second major text of Rabbinical Judaism was codified about a century before Islam in 500AD. This is called the Talmud which are written commentaries on the Mishnah. Rabbinical Judaism therefore gains two new texts that are based around an Oral Law which was not accepted by the rulers of the Second Temple or find any mention in Hebrew scriptures.

Today, Rabbinical Judaism revolves around the Mishnah and Talmud in the same way Christianity revolves around the New Testament. Interestingly, Christianity was directly indigenous to Israelite society because the gospels almost entirely take place in the Levant. This is different to Rabbinical Judaism which was heavily influenced by diaspora concerns. The New Testament is therefore a reflection of the Second Temple period in ancient Israelite society itself.

I am not arguing whether Rabbinical Judaism is legitimate or not. Nor am I arguing about its texts. None of that is in my purview because I am a Christian and those texts do not concern me. We do not view them as scripture or having authority. What other religions do is not our concern. Muslims have their Qur’an and Hindus have a variety of interesting and wise texts. Everyone has a right to texts that mean a lot to them.

The wider point being made is that what later emerges as Judaism is the formalisation of the Pharisaic sect in a diaspora context without the Temple, Sadducees or verifiable genealogical records for priesthoods which are expected in the Torah.

Rabbinical Judaism organised itself around two texts which come after the New Testament and changed important laws like swapping patrilineal descent for matrilineal descent against the Torah’s instructions. That is not a judgement on Rabbinical Judaism, but an observation of historical fact.

None of this delegitimises Rabbinical Judaism or seeks to argue against it. I understand it means a lot to its followers and it has many great achievements and adherents. What this point is trying to establish is that Christianity did not come from something which it predated. That is simply impossible by the laws of time.

Paul did not therefore separate Christianity from anything. He merely utilised key theological ideals from scripture and understood them from his encounter with Jesus the Messiah. Paul was a Messianic Jew who believed in the Torah, Tanakh and Messiah.

Philippians 3:5-6

Circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless.

Those who attempt to say Paul created his own religion know absolutely nothing about the period. They are brainwashed by specific narratives in the public discourse that aim to delegitimise Christianity as something innovative and false.

Christianity is the most ancient descendant of Israelite monotheism today. Perhaps the only other group that competes with it are remnants of the Samaritans. By contrast, the religion ruled by a priestly caste in Jerusalem’s Second Temple has not existed for two thousand years. That religion concluded long ago and is vastly different to anything in the world today.

That doesn’t mean groups aren’t influenced or descended from that monotheism. There are important groups that share it as a common ancestor. Christianity is one of these groups and universalised the monotheism it proclaimed, especially around spiritual circumcision which Paul continually reinforces.

Christianity was started by Jesus the Messiah.

Acts 2:36

Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.