The Shaping of Judaism: A Primary Source Investigation

by fender7656 in History, April 13, 2009

How did the Jewish religion become what it is today?

What do we Gain through a Historical Interpretation of History?

While we gain a perspective on the thoughts, feelings, and culture of a particular group of people, the study of religion from a historical standpoint makes much of the literal bible-type teachings seem less significant. Each culture develops a system of beliefs based on their individual experiences and world-views. These beliefs can show us a lot about the cultural views of a religion. For instance, through the historical study of Judaism, we could clearly see how determined the Jewish people were to maintain their homeland, religious practices, and religious institutions. After the burning of a temple, and exile from their native land the determined Isralites never gave up; their beliefs actually became stronger and action was taken to practice those beliefs on a daily basis. By examining only the bible passages and taking into account history, we would gather that honesty, respect, and service are important to the religion, but we would not get to see that the time in which those values were being stressed, was the time that those values were not being shown to them. To the ancient cultures, meat was extremely expensive, to the point where the common man did not eat it. By viewing the sacrificial aspect of the religion, while knowing how expensive the sacrifice is, we can see that the Greeks as a people were grateful for what they had, and wanted to protect their interests. Viewing religion from a historical standpoint gives us insight into the values and culture of a group of people.

Although we can gain great knowledge by the examination of religion from a historical standpoint, faith-based teachings based solely on the literal translation of the bible, can seem to contradict themselves quite readily and are harder to justify. The book of Samuel has passages that are the word of God, such as “’Your house and your kingdom shall endure forever before me; your throne shall stand firm forever.’”. One of complete faith would take that to mean that for all eternity the house (first temple) and kingdom (Israel) would last indefinitely. Although this certainly was not the case, in later scripture the kingdom of Israel was going to be given to the people once again. This challenge of faith can be countered by saying that the house is the body, and kingdom is the world, which would mean that any place people think of God will last forever. This is a less literal interpretation, while still keeping faith in God. Therefore the literal interpretation of the bible as the definition of “faith” is harder to keep under historical scrutiny, but a general faith in the teachings of the bible is, and always will be, easy for others to maintain. Another large part of the question of faith comes with the person. Those who want to believe in a religion will (at any cost as seen by the Jewish people), and those who do not want to believe will scrutinize every literal aspect of the bible. Based on the subjective nature of religion, It is possible to believe in what the bible says, but disagree with the exact historical fact behind it. I would argue that the bible is just a moral guideline, and therefore does not have to be historically correct, just as a parable is not historically correct all the time.