History of the Jews (Vol. 1-6). Graetz Heinrich
teachings of Judaism among the heathen. Not a few felt disgust at the mythological stories of the gods and the deification of human beings. The remembrance was yet fresh in their memories how all nations of the Roman kingdom, with unexampled abjectness, had dedicated altars to the monster Caligula, and had recognized and worshiped him as a god. Despairing and pure spirits sought a God to whom they might elevate themselves, but they did not find him. Now Paul had come and brought them this God, surrounded, it is true, with wonderful stories, which, however, pleased them, on account of the mythological strain in them. The heathen nations could better comprehend the "Son of God" than the "Messianic Redeemer." The wide-spread disease of immorality, which was rife throughout the Roman empire, rendered the Judæan teachings acceptable and proper. Paul's orations, delivered with the fire of enthusiasm, and uttered by one who threw his whole soul into his words, could not fail to make an impression on the better-disposed and purer-minded heathens. To this was added the fear of the approach of the end of the world, which Paul, through his firm belief in the resurrection and reappearance of Jesus, had transformed into the hope that the dead would arise, in refulgent form, at the trumpet-call, and that the living would be carried up into heaven in a cloud.
Thus Paul appealed to the imagination of many heathens in his apostolic wanderings from Jerusalem to Illyria. At first he aroused only people of the lower classes, slaves, and especially women, by his glad tidings. To the cultivated Greeks the Christianity which Paul preached, based on the so-called resurrection of Jesus, appeared as a ridiculous absurdity. The Judæans were naturally displeased with him. Paul's chief topics, on which he dilated to the heathens whom he wished to convert, were the Judæan nation, Judæan writings, and the Judæan Law; without these his preaching about a Messiah or salvation had no foundation. The Greeks must have been told about Israel and Jerusalem, or his words would have fallen on deaf ears. He, therefore, could only resort to those towns where Judæan communities dwelt, from whom the heathen nations had received some faint notion of the history and doctrines of Judaism.
Paul's efforts were directly aimed at destroying the bonds which connected the teachings of Christ with those of Judaism. He therefore inveighed against the Law, as it proved a hindrance to the reception of heathen proselytes. He asserted that it was detrimental to the pursuit of a higher spiritual life and to following the way of truth. Paul not only disapproved of the so-called ceremonial laws of Judaism, but also of those relating to morality. He affirmed that without laws men would not have given way to their evil desires. "Thou shalt not covet" had first aroused covetousness; thus through the Law the knowledge of sin had arisen. Man is sensual and inclined to sin, for flesh is weak and inclined to resist the Law. Paul set up a new teaching. He maintained that man had only become sensual, weak and sinful because the first man had sinned. Adam's fall had given birth to an inextinguishable hereditary sin, and by this means death had come upon humanity. The Law was not able to overcome this hereditary sin. In order to destroy sin and death, God had made a special dispensation. He had given up the Messiah, His son, to death, and again re-animated him, and he had become the second Adam, who was to obliterate hereditary sin, to conquer death, and establish everlasting life. Thus the Redeemer, instead of bringing about the redemption of nations from the yoke imposed on them, had redeemed them from sin.
Paul therefore conceived Christianity to be the very opposite of Judaism. The one was founded on law and compulsion, the other owed its origin to freedom and grace. Jesus or Christianity had brought about the holy state foretold by the prophets. The ancient times had departed, and a new state of things had arisen; the old covenant (Testament) must yield to the new one; Abraham himself had not been judged as just through the Law, but through faith. Thus Paul sophistically explained the Scriptures. From the Law it is to be inferred that whosoever does not abide by it, and refuses wholly and entirely to comply with its precepts, stands under a curse. The great service which Jesus had rendered was that he had delivered all men from this curse, for through his means the Law had been set aside. How could the Judæans submit to this open desecration of the Law of Sinai for which their forefathers had suffered death, and for which, but a short time since, under Caligula, they had determined to sacrifice their lives? It is not to be wondered at that they rose against the man who despised the Law, and persecuted him. They, however, contented themselves with flogging Paul when he fell into their hands, but they left his life unharmed; five times, as he himself relates, he was chastised with thirty-nine strokes. Not only the Judæans but also the Nazarenes, or Judæan Christians, were incensed against Paul for his attack on the Law, and by this means dissension and schisms arose in the midst of young Christianity. Peter, or Kephas, who came as a messenger to the Judæans, taught a Christianity which differed from that of Paul, and that of the other Apostles who sought to make converts amongst the heathen; whilst Apollos from Alexandria, and a certain Chrestus preached another version.
The Judaic Christians saw with terror the fruits of the ceremonial freedom preached by Paul in the communities founded by him in Corinth and Ephesus, where every species of vice and immorality was rife. Other Apostles, therefore, followed Paul, and proclaimed his teachings full of error and misrepresentation, and maintained that the Law of Judaism was binding on Christians, as it was only by this Law that the lower passions could be held in check. In Antioch a violent quarrel arose between Paul and the Judaic-Christian Apostle. Peter, who till then had disregarded the dietary laws and eaten at one table with the heathens, was censured by the leaders of the severe party of the Apostle James, and was now obliged to acknowledge his fault, and to speak openly against Paul's contempt of the Law. Paul, on the other hand, reproached him with hypocrisy. The influence of the severe, Law-loving Judaic Christians was, however, so great that all the Judæan Christians of Antioch gave up eating at the tables of the heathen, and their example was even followed by Barnabas, the disciple of Paul.
Racial feelings also helped to widen the breach between the two parties. The Greek Christians despised the Judaic Christians in the same way as the Hellenes had looked down upon the Judæans. Paul sent out violent epistles against the adherents of the Law, and laid a curse on those who preached salvation in a manner differing from his own. These did not spare him either, and related how he had loved the daughter of a high priest; how, on being despised by her, he had in disgust written against circumcision, the Sabbath, and the Law. Thus, within barely thirty years after the death of its founder, Christianity was split into two parties, namely, a Judaic-Christian and a heathen-Christian sect. The Judaic Christians remained attached to the foundations of Judaism, compelled their converts to adhere to the Law, and clung to Jerusalem, where they awaited the return of the Messiah. The heathen Christians, on the other hand, separated themselves more and more from Judaism, and took up an inimical position towards it.
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