Then the high priest
rose up,
And all those who
were with him
(which is the sect of
the Sadducees),
and they were filled
with indignation,
and laid their hands
on the apostles
and put them in the
common prison.
Acts 5:17-18
The above
Scripture might be confusing inasmuch as most of the time a more devotional
verse(s) are recited for admonition. I am attempting to recount history and how
history has played an important part in the world and for our culture. To
understand the events of the Christian Religion, its formation, its struggles,
persecutions, and eventual rise to prominence in the world. We must understand
its foundations that made cause for some changes to occur, changes that were at
times good and other times bad. When we read the Bible and come upon verses
that make mention of various men, i.e., Pharisees, Sadducees, Zealots, and
others as rulers, kings, tetrarchs, it is most important for full understanding
to know something about those men. The above verse gives us an important piece
of information: that the Sadducees were in the group of people who were with
the high priest. Why were they there? Who are they? Why was it important for
Luke to make mention of this group? Making note of the social, political, and
economic climate in which the Jewish people lived, worked, and at times
suffered will give us aid to know something of the feelings, attitudes, and
desires for independence, to be once again a nation separate from any control
by other nations. This was not to be the case for the Jewish nation. In history
we find that the Persian ruler, Cyrus, allowed the Jews to return to the
homeland, only to have the Greek Alexander the Great to overpower the Persians
and to become the ruler of all Syria, and other parts of the world. After the
death, as a young man, four generals divided the conquered Greek world into
four sections, then they warred with one another and Syria, and Egypt were
divided into two separate nations, the one, Egypt ruled by Ptolemy, the other
who ruled the Babylonian land, Seleucus. Judea stood between these two men who
warred with each other and had to travel to and fro across Judea and at one
time or the other Judea was a captured province for either man. This was to be
more than just unsettling to the Jewish people, they must have ill feelings for
this change of political tides, and of the taxes that either would charge on
them. Can you imagine never knowing to whom you owed monies too, and to whom
you should give at least some allegiance. Men arose to combat this problem,
some, the Pharisees, would maintain a pure allegiance to the Law of Moses and
added much more to control the people, and the Sadducees took a different view.
This I will explain further in this essay, as it was that religious group that
was mentioned being at the arrest and trial of the apostles recounted in the
opening Scripture.
The world has always had wars, struggles
between nations for power and control and in the Syrian peninsula to the land
of the Persians, the Jewish people were always affronted with each and every
change of political power. While the Jews struggled to maintain the religious
beliefs they had to deal with many pagan authorities who ruled over them. I
will begin to help us to understand how one such political power not only
subdued the nation of Israel, but also made it possible for the Christian
Religion to survive the many attacks and to become a prominent religion. It was
this change of power from the Grecian rulers to the rule of Rome by Julius
Caesar, and others just before him that laid the world climate in which our
Savior Jesus Christ was born, lived under and taught under, who had to teach
men and women who were desiring to be free from such control. Jesus would grow
up under these many political factions and the rulers that Rome would allow to
rule the Judean nation. Let us not become confused in this matter of the life
of Jesus and think that this world climate would determine His ministry.
Scripture is clear on this fact: Jesus is God, not an angel, not influenced by
this world and all its changes. Jesus is God and is man being born of the woman
Mary, therefore Jesus is both God and man. The reason Jesus came to earth, the
reason the God, the Father, would clothed His Wisdom in flesh was not to
overthrow some government, Jesus came for one reason and one reason only, to
die as the propitiation for sin. The justice of God that demands death to all
sinners was met in the death of Jesus Christ and Jesus entered the world at the
correct time for His death to occur and by His death at this time the Christian
Religion was founded. The world has never been the same since. God’s timing is
always perfect. The social and political climate made it the right time for God
to act and this He did by sending His Son Jesus Christ. No time previous would
be correct. The Romans who now controlled a large portion of the world, their
empire so large, and the improvements made by them enabling for easier travel,
and eventually for the Christian Religion to be accepted and not considered a
threat to the Roman Empire is so important for us to understand how the
Christian Religion was affected, and how the history of the Christian Religion,
it historicity has affect us today.
Many who
have written about history have written about Church history and kept their
writings which are so important to how Church history can explain the present.
This I will do but in a more expanded view as I add the culture of the various
time periods and how a culture affected the growth, theology, and philosophy of
many men and how these various elements have produced the many theological
viewpoints that are contentious among Christians today. There are many
different beliefs, liturgical practices that may seem confusing, and I must
admit they can be, especially if you do not know their history, yet we can come
to understand them in the light of past history. I will not attempt in this
blog to address the changes that came by the Roman dominance, but I will begin
to do so in the next blogs. This is history and it can be boring, so I will
attempt to not make it boring. I will attempt, not embellish, but to write
artistically so that you will enjoy this journey through history. The goal is
to help you grow in your faith and your sanctification by changing you from the
inside out, to develop an Authentic Biblical Faith.
Paul, a bondservant of Jesus Christ,
Called to
be an apostle,
Separated to the gospel of God which
He promised
before through
His prophets in Holy Scriptures,
Concerning His
Son Jesus Christ
Our Lord, who was born of the seed of David
According to
the flesh, and declared
To be the Son of God with power according
To the
Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection
Resurrection for the dead.
Romans 1:1-4
Prepare Now to Be An Ambassador of God
Richard L. Crumb
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