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The documentary will deal with the early years of Christianity and examine how the first believers spread the gospel through the Roman empire while facing internal struggles over theological issues and Roman persecution.
The documentary will feature the discoveries of the University of Hartford’s excavations in Israel and interviews with Richard Freund. Professor Freund is the director of the University’s Maurice Greenberg Center for Judaic Studies and leader of the Bethsaida Excavations Project in Israel. Professor Freund also directed the expedition at Israel’s Cave of Letters.
Professor Freund has led many archaeological excavations in Israel. He has excavated at Bethsaida, a site located on the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee, at Qumran, the site where the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered, at Yavne, a site that became the focal point of Jewish life after the destruction of the Temple in 70 A.D., and at Nazareth.
In a recent interview with Judie Jacobson, published in Jewish Ledger, Professor Freund spoke about the Jewish roots of Christianity and the relationship between Christians and Jews in first century Palestine. What follows is an excerpt of that interview:
Q: Did Paul intend for Christianity to remain, then, a part of Judaism?
A: He did. Paul called this religion the New Israel. He really felt in his heart of hearts that what he was selling was authentic, post-Temple Judaism. He sold it as the idea that the messiah had come, the messiah that had been predicted by the Hebrew Bible, and that messiah was Jesus. He really thought that the whole universe was going to radically change. When he died in Rome in 65, 5 yrs before the temple was destroyed, he was living in a really chaotic time. Because he was living in the time of Nero, who put him to death. Nero was absolutely out of his mind. Half of Rome was burned down in a fire that we think started in the royal palace area and he must have thought that the entire world that he knew was coming to an end. He must have thought that the messianic kingdom that Jesus had initiated was going to be initiated in his own day. So when he died in prison in 65 I don’t think he had any doubt that what he was preaching was an apocalyptic end-time that had been predicted by the Hebrew Bible and that the New Israel was going to emerge with as many people as he was able to gather in. He succeeded immensely. I don’t think that he could have imagined that Christianity would move from a totally apocalyptic end-time religion to being a religion of a state, of a place, of a time, with bishops and churches and laws and regulations. I think that he thought that it was going to be just a new emerging kingdom.
The interview with Professor Freund is very educational. He discusses Jesus, Paul, early Christianity, and the various expressions of Judaism. His conclusion is that Christianity and Judaism separated as a result of the Bar Kochba revolt.
To read the interview with Professor Freund, click here.
Claude Mariottini
Professor of Old Testament
Northern Baptist Seminary
Tags: Richard Freund, Early Christianity, Bar Kochba, After Jesus
Dr. Claude Mariottini - Professor of Old Testament 