Matthew 5:17-20
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”
Read the ridiculously specific and (many of which) impractical laws of the Old Testament (all of which are followed by Orthodox Jews today—there are 613 of them) and decide whether Jesus thinks you will enter the kingdom of heaven:
“I should also note at this point the obvious false construction traditionally given to what Jesus said when he was asked if Jews ought to pay taxes to the Romans: ‘Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s and unto God that which is God’s.’ This could mean only one thing to the Galileans who had participated in Judas of Galilee’s tax revolt—namely, ‘Don’t pay.’ For Judas of Galilee had said that everything in Palestine belonged to God. But the authors of the Gospels and their readers probably knew nothing about Judas of Galilee, so they preserved Jesus’ highly provocative response on the mistaken assumption that it showed a genuinely conciliatory attitude toward the Roman government.” (Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches, Marvin Harris, 190-191)
If Jesus truly was “John of Gamala,” Judas of Galilee (Judas the Gaulonite) was his father.
An informed reader of the Gospels will discover something rather quickly: whoever wrote them knew very little about Judaism, very little about Palestine, and very little about the Old Testament (from which they lift quotes totally out of context for their “prophecies”):
http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/messianic.html
I am indebted, yet again, to Paul Tobin, who provides excellent analyses of these matters as well as scholarly quotes. We will sample some of these now:
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