Jewish Believers in Jesus: The Early Centuries

• Hardcover

Jewish Believers in Jesus: The Early Centuries examines the formative first five centuries of Christian history as experienced by individuals who were ethnically Jewish, but who professed faith in Jesus Christ as the Messiah. Offering the work of an impressive international team of scholars, this unique study examines the first five centuries of texts thought to have been authored or edited by Jewish Christians, including the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, the New Testament Apocrypha, and some patristic works. Also considered are statements within patristic literature about Jewish believers and uses of oral traditions from Jewish Christians. Furthermore, the evidence in Jewish, mainly rabbinic, literature is examined, and room is made for a judicious sifting of the archaeological evidence. The final two chapters are devoted to an enlightening synthesis of the material with subsequent conclusions regarding Jewish believers in antiquity.

“This is a first-rate contribution by top scholars to our understanding of Jews who believed in Jesus during the first few centuries of Christianity. Not only does the volume address in depth the many complexities of the historical, social, literary, and religious aspects of Jewish believers in Jesus, it also admirably engages the very construction of scholarship on the topic. This is a comprehensive work of meticulous and careful scholarship that should be the standard reference on the subject for years to come.”
—Jeffrey S. Siker, PhD, Professor and Chair, Department of Theological Studies, Loyola Marymount University

“For a long time, the accepted view on the early Jewish Christian community has been that after the Jewish war against the Romans that ended in 70 AD with the destruction of Jerusalem, the Jewish Christian community became a marginal phenomenon and soon disappeared in the Gentile Christian church. The contributions to the present book on Jewish believers in Jesus result in a fundamental revision of this picture. It shows that more or less close relations between Jewish believers in Jesus Christ and Judaism continued at least into the Constantinian period (4th century) in spite of the endeavors of leaders on both sides to get their view of a fundamental opposition between Judaism and Christianity generally accepted. I consider the accumulated evidence for the revision of this picture very persuasive. It amounts to a strong suggestion that for a long period the disagreements concerning the person of Jesus did not prevent a continuing awareness of the fact that Jewish believers in Jesus and even Christians from the Gentiles could feel to believe in the same God as the Jews did. This view of the relationship should also have an impact on contemporary Jewish-Christian dialogue.”
—Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Wolfhart Pannenberg DD (mult.) FBA, Emeritus Professor of Systematic Theology at the University of Munich