Jesus and Jerusalem

Throughout the reading of chapters 8, 9, and 10 I found myself referring back to, and engulfed by a concept presented at the beginning of chapter 8. While the city of Jerusalem was destroyed the holy cities concept continued on within Jewish and Christian tradition. Jerusalem was no longer a physical sacred place, but a psychological concept of redemption. For Christians this same redemption concept was found in a messiah, Jesus.

After the temple was destroyed the Jewish people turned to a psychological and mythological redemption.The theory that God sat among the people developed (Armstrong 156). The Mishnah, a jewish law code, explained that whenever people studied the Torah together God was with them (Armstrong 156). In this way the Temple while still desired was no longer needed to reach God. Rabbis also shifted their focus from preaching a physical sacrifice being made in the temple, to stressing acts of charity and compassion to “atone for Israel's sins” (Armstrong 156-157).

Rabbis emphasized the concept of Jerusalem rather than the physical place. While a physical place could be destroyed “heavenly Jerusalem was eternal” (Armstrong 158). Jewish people believed that once earthly Jerusalem was once again restored it would be “paradise” (Armstrong 158).

While Jewish people found salvation in the hopes of this new paradisiacal Jerusalem, Christians believed the same salvation would be achieved through Jesus. Christian mythology began to develop in Jerusalem (Armstrong 155). Mount Golgotha the place of Jesus’s crucifixion was now also considered to be Adam’s burial place (Armstrong 155). Christians had begun writing themselves into the holy land of Jerusalem.

The distinct variations in Christian and Jewish redemption stories affected the canonization of the Hebrew Bible and Old Testament. The Hebrew Bible is the Jewish canon, it ends with chronicles which is the story looking forward to the rebuilding of the first Temple (Spigel). Theologically this makes sense if a core value of the Jewish religion is the belief that once Jerusalem is restored a earthly paradise will take place. The placement of this story points Jews towards Jerusalem’s temple for their salvation. On the other hand The Old Testament, a Christian canonization, ends with the prophets and points toward the coming of Jesus (Spigel). These slight variations in order of biblical books cause very different theological identities.

Spigel, Chad. “What Is the Hebrew Bible/ Old Testament .” RELI-2354. Lecture, 22 Jan. 2019, San Antonio , Trinity University.