I was writing a paper on Melchizedek when I came across a paper by Steven M. Donnelly, the Divine Rites and Rejection of the Priest King: Melchizedek on the Margins of Early Jewish and Christian Interpretation, a thesis, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem 2014, Dept. of Comparative Religion, posted at www.academia.edu.
I'm familiar with the book by Peter Schafer on the deprecation of Jesus in the Talmud, unfortunately I don't have it at hand but I thought it interesting to learn from this paper that Melchizedek was also deprecated in the Talmud.
Steven M. Donnelly writes:
"The literary depiction of Melchizedek is unequivocally held in high regard prior to the rabbinic period.
…An overt change in attitude toward the priestly status of Melchizedek becomes apparent among rabbinic sources.
…The endorsement of Christ within the Epistle to the Hebrews as a priest after the pre-Aaronic order of Melchizedek conceivably introduced a challenge to rabbinic religious hegemony.
“…The marginalizing of Melchizedek appears to comprise a rabbinic response, perhaps initiated by R. Ishmael, to claims of a Christological priesthood linked to the Melchizedekian order."
The deprecation of a Jesus in the Talmud alone may not be a strong indicator of Jesus' existence, but when it is coupled with a deprecation of Jesus' discipline of writing the Law on your heart (in Hebrews the author quotes Jeremiah 31:31-34) it seems to me that the negative critique of the man coupled with a negative critique of his discipline is a stronger indication of his existence, since a motive is indicated for both deprecations. We know that rabbinical Judaism does turn to portable Torah scrolls for each diaspora community rather than the difficult internalization of the written law which was claimed for Jesus.
Why deprecate both the man and his oral discipline while turning to the alternative: a written text on a scroll, if he did not exist? The Talmud could have ignored the man if he did not exist and just deprecated the oral discipline of Melchizedek, which they abandoned for Torah scrolls.
I was writing a paper on Melchizedek when I came across a paper by Steven M. Donnelly, the Divine Rites and Rejection of the Priest King: Melchizedek on the Margins of Early Jewish and Christian Interpretation, a thesis, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem 2014, Dept. of Comparative Religion, posted at www.academia.edu.
I'm familiar with the book by Peter Schafer on the deprecation of Jesus in the Talmud, unfortunately I don't have it at hand but I thought it interesting to learn from this paper that Melchizedek was also deprecated in the Talmud.
Steven M. Donnelly writes:
"The literary depiction of Melchizedek is unequivocally held in high regard prior to the rabbinic period.
…An overt change in attitude toward the priestly status of Melchizedek becomes apparent among rabbinic sources.
…The endorsement of Christ within the Epistle to the Hebrews as a priest after the pre-Aaronic order of Melchizedek conceivably introduced a challenge to rabbinic religious hegemony.
“…The marginalizing of Melchizedek appears to comprise a rabbinic response, perhaps initiated by R. Ishmael, to claims of a Christological priesthood linked to the Melchizedekian order."
The deprecation of a Jesus in the Talmud alone may not be a strong indicator of Jesus' existence, but when it is coupled with a deprecation of Jesus' discipline of writing the Law on your heart (in Hebrews the author quotes Jeremiah 31:31-34) it seems to me that the negative critique of the man coupled with a negative critique of his discipline is a stronger indication of his existence, since a motive is indicated for both deprecations. We know that rabbinical Judaism does turn to portable Torah scrolls for each diaspora community rather than the difficult internalization of the written law which was claimed for Jesus.
Why deprecate both the man and his oral discipline while turning to the alternative: a written text on a scroll, if he did not exist? The Talmud could have ignored the man if he did not exist and just deprecated the oral discipline of Melchizedek, which they abandoned for Torah scrolls.