Did G-d Really Speak to the Jews at Mount Sinai

As the Jewish holiday of Shavuot approaches, I find myself thinking of one curious aspect of Judaism. One that I find impossible to reject. Intuition tells me it must be mistaken but the Kuzari Principle has a stubborn logic to it and I find myself asking: Did G-d really speak to the Jews?

Anyone can start a religion with the claim ‘G-d spoke to me and this is what he said…’. In this case you’ll never know whether they were telling the truth or not. Its easy to imagine how the claim of a charismatic cult leader might convince vulnerable individuals as a result of emotional need rather than intellectual conviction.

Indeed, when we look at how different religions begin we find a pattern common to almost all; one or two people claim that G-d has spoken to or appeared before them, they convince a few followers that they’re telling the truth and the religion (or cult) gets off the ground.

However, Judaism has a unique claim about its origin; at Mount Sinai G-d spoke to the whole Jewish nation, some three million people. Orthodox Jews claim that their faith is actually faithfulness; staying loyal to the message they received at Mount Sinai.

Okay, we know that Jews invented chutzpah but come now, all religions begin with one or two people and the Jews think they can claim that G-d spoke to all of them? How could the founder of Judaism possibly pull this off? Clearly this claim of mass revelation had to be fabricated but how did it originate? How was it possible for Moses to hoodwink a group of people into accepting that G-d had just spoken?

Even the sceptic must agree that whilst Moses as a charismatic leader might have been able to convince people that he had personally heard G-d speak, convincing others that they’d heard G-d when they hadn’t is stretching credibility. We know that people are gullible or stupid but surely not to the extent of accepting such an obvious fabrication? Had Moses claimed that G-d spoke when He hadn’t then Moses would have immediately revealed himself to be a charlatan. It seems impossible that Moses just convinced people if nothing at all happened.

Perhaps then, something happened which was understood by everyone present as G-d speaking? After all, people were much more primitive in Biblical times, when things occurred that they didn’t understand they simply put this down to G-d. Perhaps a public event such as the wind whistling through the mountain ridges, a volcanic eruption or a thunderstorm was interpreted by the people present as G-d speaking? Moses said something like “Did you just hear what G-d just said?” and Judaism was up and running.

AT first glance this seems a feasible explanation; primitive people with a primitive understanding of the world share a public experience and perceive it as G-d communicating with them. Yet there remains one over-riding problem. Whistling wind, volcanic eruption and thunderstorms are not rare events in human history; but claims of mass revelation are.

A fundamental idea is that natural events repeat themselves. If its natural for a group of people to hear whistling wind, a volcanic eruption or a thunderstorm and mistakenly believe they’ve experienced G-d speaking we should expect to have heard dozens if not hundreds of similar claims throughout history; yet, only the Jews claim G-d spoke to them as a nation.

Maybe it’s possible that there was no Moses, no exodus from Egypt and no Sinai event; the whole story was simply inserted into Judaism at a later time? Someone, lets say Ezra the Scribe comes along and tells existing Jews that “1,000 years ago our ancestors stood at the foot of a mountain, G-d spoke to them and this is what He said…”. This is the theory which most academics subscribe to, but is it any more reasonable?

If the story is a later invention, these claims must be made to an existing group of people, with their existing customs, traditions and national history. The first question they are likely to ask is “How come we don’t know about this?”. After all, the claim is not about some foreign nation but about these people’s own ancestors. So, explains Ezra, “it was forgotten over the course of history, 1,000 years is a long time…”. Yet is an event such as this is likely to be forgotten? G-d speaking in public could be described as the greatest event in history. In his essay ‘The Kuzari Principle” Rabbi Dovid Gottleib expresses it in the following way;

“This story describes an event that has never happened to anyone else, anywhere. No other nation even claims that its religion started with a public revelation. This story describes an event that would be absolutely unique in all human history. The fire, the shaking earth, and hearing the voice of G-d together are sure to make a deep impression. And the story says that the rules commanded by the voice became the foundation of a new religion. Such an event would radically change the life of the whole nation - its values, attitudes, perceptions, national organization and priorities. It would profoundly transform daily life. Surely there would be many records and memories of such an event. This is the story of a national unforgettable

Since it is a national unforgettable, it is not a story that can be made up. A deceiver will not succeed with a story like this. He will not succeed because the people whom he is trying to deceive will say: “If our ancestors really witnessed an event like that, our whole national life would show it. There would be holidays to celebrate the event, records of what the voice said, and a history of national decisions implementing the new rules. This is not the sort of event which a whole nation would forget.”

We’re left with only one option; maybe it did happen after all?

1st Page of the New Testament Proves That Jesus Can't Possibly be the Jewish Messiah

In many places the Hebrew Bible prophecies a future situation where the world will be perfected. A central role in this theme is assigned to a future king of Israel, who amongst other things, will be a continuation of the Davidic monarchy. In addition to describing the achievements of this future king- whom we refer to as the messiah- the Bible is clear that this future king must be a descendent of King David.

Accordingly, in championing the candidacy of Jesus of Nazareth, the New Testament’s opening 17 verses describe the genealogy of Jesus. Leaving for one moment the 30+ internal contradictions between the genealogy found in the gospel of Matthew and that found in Luke’s gospel. It seems that rather than confirming Jesus as a suitable candidate for the post of Jewish messiah, one need read only the opening 17 verses of the New Testament to conclude that Jesus is simply ineligible as a candidate. Rather than proving the case that Jesus is the messiah, the New Testament begins by informing us that Jesus is not even eligible for the role. How does that work?

What's Wrong with Matthew's Genealogy?

Matthew begins his gospel by telling us “these are the genealogies of Jesus Christ”. Bear in mind that Christ is simply the Greek for messiah. The New Testament begins by explicitly laying out the case for Jesus being the Jewish messiah and does so by attempting to link Jesus back to King David by detailing the ancestry of Joseph, the husband of Mary.

Before we investigate the genealogy itself its worth noting that immediately following Matthew’s account of the genealogical record we are told quite plainly that Joseph is not the biological father of Jesus, but rather that he was born of a virgin, impregnated by the holy spirit.

Clearly King David is not the great, great (and so on) grandfather of G-d and no Christian makes such a foolish claim but this in itself creates a problem; Jesus cannot be descended from King David regardless of the heritage of his adopted father. According to the Hebrew Bible, tribal affiliation is passed through the paternal line and according to the Hebrew Bible, all rightful kings of Israel must be from the tribe of Judah.

It would seem that if the New Testament is a truthful document then Jesus, having no human father, does not belong to the tribe of Judah (or any other). For this reason alone Jesus cannot be a king of Israel; a pre-requisite for candidacy as Jewish messiah. An argument given against this last point is that Joseph formally adopted Jesus, however, adoption does not in Judaism confer tribal affiliation and whatever else he may have been Jesus was a Jew. 

Unfortunately, even were adoption to allow for the passing of tribal affiliation, it gets slightly more complex when we return to the genealogy itself. To cut a long story short Matthew has Joseph descended from King David but lists one of his ancestors as Yechoyachin (Jaconius in Latin) whose wickedness led G-d to place a curse on him; none of his descendants would sit on the throne of Israel. Indeed when Yechoyachin died, the kingship passed to his brother and not one of his sons. If Jesus genuinely descended from Yechoyachin then he was ineligible to be king and therefore ineligible to be the messiah.

Is Luke's Genealogy Any Better?

What then of the genealogy handed down by Luke? Unfortunately for Christians this also leads to the conclusion that Jesus is ineligible for the role of messiah. Notwithstanding the 30+ contradictions between Luke’s genealogy and Matthew’s, or the standard attempt to reconcile these contradictions by claiming that Luke is giving the genealogy of Jesus through Mary, Luke’s genealogy also makes Jesus ineligible. 

First, if Luke’s genealogy is indeed documenting the maternal line (Mary is mentioned nowhere in the text), then in terms of tribal affiliation it is worthless. The Hebrew Bible is clear that the tribe you belong to is the preserve of the paternal line. Thus the problem of Jesus not having a human father and therefore not belonging to any tribe is unresolved. More importantly, the Hebrew Scriptures make it clear that the messiah must be descended from David, through his son Solomon and Luke’s genealogy has Jesus descended from David through Nathan. Which ever way you examine the question; Jesus is ineligible to be the Jewish messiah and consequently Jesus cannot possibly be who the various churches claim him to be.  

Those that claim the New Testament to be a reliable document insist that the New Testament lays out the evidence in favour of the conclusion that Jesus of Nazareth was the Jewish messiah, rejected in his time and scheduled to return to complete the job. This claim is problematic for numerous reasons (in addition to those documented here), yet perhaps the most convincing of these is that to uphold any notion of Jesus as Jewish messiah; one must first discard the New Testament because according to the very text Jesus is simply ineligible to be the Jewish messiah.

Either the New Testament genealogies of Jesus are false (and at least one of them must be), in which case one wonders what they are doing in a book supposedly inspired by G-d, or one of them is correct and Jesus is not eligible to be the messiah. One cannot have cake and eat it too, a position seemingly not lost on the previous Pope who when pressed on this very subject was unable to come up with any answer.

Conclusive Proof That Jesus Cannot be the Jewish Messiah

Faced with the evidence; contradictory genealogies both of which exclude Jesus from candidacy, coupled with the problem of tribal affiliation, an honest person must conclude that Jesus cannot possibly be the Jewish messiah. Thus either the New Testament contains unreliable information about Jesus in which case we have no reason to accept any of the other claims about him or the information may all be true but regardless of the miracles, and so on, Jesus is simply not eligible to be the Jewish messiah and thus we have no reason to accept any of the other claims made about him.

In one of the greatest ironies of history, far from confirming that Jesus is the Jewish messiah- the starting point of Christian claims about the world- one need read only the first page of the New Testament to rule him out of contention altogether.

Is it really any wonder why Jews, those most intimately knowledgeable with the Hebrew Bible, have consistently rejected Christianity? Or why Christendom has spent the best part of its history trying to wipe the Jewish people from the face of the earth? 

גמר חטימה טובה

Why Jesus is not the promised Jewish Messiah (part 1)

In the dispute between Christians and Jews over whether Jesus ought be accorded some special status, its not uncommon to come across some fairly awful reasoning on the part of Christian apologists.

The over-riding objection with such reasoning might seem to be that they have already decided on the conclusion before beginning the argument but this in itself is not necessarily an objection so long as one argues cogently and coherently. However, one consequence of taking sides in advance is that the advocate often doesn't think critically enough about the arguments offered in defence of their pre-conceived notions.

Of course I may be subject to the same criticism so rather than begin with my conclusion, I point to my arguments. Rubbish those and I’ll have to admit that my conclusion doesn’t stand and in such circumstances I’ll be happy to do so…

In a recent discussion a Christian apologist presented the Jewish position as follows and attempts to show why the conclusion cannot be drawn from the premises;

1) The Messiah will fulfil prophecies x, y & z

2) Jesus did not fulfil prophecies x,y, & z

Conclusion: Jesus cannot be the messiah.

The critic attempts to show that premise 2 doesn’t stand because Jesus will come back and for the conclusion to stand the Jewish position must be amended to read “Jesus did not and will not fulfil prophecies x,y, & z. 

Essentially this is offering the notion of a second coming as refutation that Jesus is not the Jewish messiah. However the refutation of the objection is that it is not reasonable to believe that Jesus will return, because no evidence is presented to support such a notion. 

There are a number of problems with this reasoning.

1) The burden of proof is on the Christian’s shoulders, not that of the Jewish people. Since Judaism pre-dates Christianity, the burden of proof lies with those who are claiming new information, not with those who are saying nothing has changed. This is obvious. 

If you want to convince others that an apparently ordinary person who lived and died, actually has a special status, you need evidence to support this conclusion and yet none is offered that survives scrutiny.

2) Given that Jesus died prior to the fulfilment of the relevant prophecies and that this was 2000 odd years ago you would need a convincing explanation for why he will still be able to fulfil the prophecies. Mere possibility alone is foolish. After all its possible that tomorrow my dog will start talking or become a chess grand-master but no reasonable person expects either of these things to happen. If you are happy to base your decisions on probability then I am offering bets on my three-legged donkey winning the Grand National, any takers?

3) The “he’ll do it later” argument may convince those with a pre-existing belief that Jesus is a special person but it doesn’t provide any support to convince someone who doesn’t believe that Jesus is special.  If you’re not providing any evidence I have no obligation to accept your argument and you have no reason to accept it either. To the non-believer in Jesus this sounds like a classic case of cognitive dissonance.

4) Additionally, the notion of a second coming is entirely extra-textual to the Hebrew Bible, thus there is no basis for a believer in the authority of the Hebrew Scriptures to accept such a notion. Yet it gets worse, the text of the Hebrew Bible instructs believers to reject ideas which are not found in the text. Thus the only consistent position is to reject the notion of a second coming and claims made in respect of Jesus coming back to do x, y & z.  

5) A further related problem is that to uphold the “he’ll do it later” principle one also has to explain why you give preference to belief in Jesus over belief in other religious figures, such as, Muhammed, Joseph Smith or Reverend Moon. If the notion is not excusive to Jesus then it isn’t evidence that he’s special.

If possibility is sufficient, then believing in Muhammed, or Jospeh Smith is as reasonable as belief in Jesus but the Christian offers no grounds for choosing one over the other. Can’t these other figures also come back and do it later if G-d wills it such? If not you have to say why and have a reasoned argument that can not also be used to refute your own position. No such argument exists. 

For these reasons, an inconsistent position is taken somewhere along the line and a rational person (a category which ought to include Christians) has no reason to accept the conclusion that Jesus is special.

The Dirty Zionist - Six-Year Anniversary Special aka Relaunch!

When I look back over the last six years of the Dirty Zionist its almost strange that I haven’t written more about what’s been happening in my life, drama filled as it has been.

But its also true that I've had little to say to the world. Four posts (now removed), the paltry sum of my efforts over the last six years… It’s a pretty good metaphor for my life as I’ve spent these years reflecting and reorienting myself; more likely to be found lost in thought than actually getting round to writing anything down…

And so we come to the re-launch of the Dirty Zionist which I hope will be something at the very least more frequent, if not also more interesting and more useful than what came before. 

My inspiration comes from the simple words of Rabbi Yitchok Ziskind – the best piece of advice anyone has ever given me, “try to be a blessing to everyone you meet”. If only I’d listened to him…