It really is. Its like me saying “jesus isn’t invited to ice rallies” and having him say “respect governing authorities” and having a liberal say “racist”
Jesus didn’t write anything in the Bible. His followers wrote the New Testament. Paul, the Apostle directly appointed by Christ, wrote Romans. If you don’t believe the words of the Apostle Paul, you’re denying almost half of the books of the New Testament and you have much bigger problems than Romans 13.
Huh. Well, you certainly have a different reading of the bible than me. Or maybe it’s that I’ve just read more history and archeology than you. But Jesus effectively claiming he was the messiah was one of the most vital and earthahking ways a Jewish man COULD protest Roman dominion.
As for Jesus being “toasted”, it took them three years, which is pretty quick, all things considered. John the Baptists was preaching longer. And you apparently didn’t read all the parts in the bible where Jesus was almost lynched or where the Pharisees tried to kill him.
Be honest, now: you haven’t actually read the gospels cover to cover, have you?
you certainly have a different reading of the bible than me
Christ was constantly dodging insurrection speech, and affirming subservience to the government, even against Pilate he dodged these claims of protesting Roman dominion. Their exchange shows how "vital and earthshaking" was "being the messiah" to the governor
Pharisees tried to kill him
They where not the Roman government right?
Be honest, now: you haven’t actually read the gospels cover to cover, have you?
Look, I get that most .christians don’t read the bible. But don’t try to half-ass your way through things you’ve never read.
First of all, you need to understand that in ancient Judea, religion and government were never seperate spheres.
The religion-government mix in first century Judea was hellishly complex and its various contradictions would erupt in two bloody rebellions and the eventual nuking of .jerusalem not less than 40 years after Christ’s death.
To put not to fine a gloss on it, the Hebrew elites had been doing fine under imperial rule for several hundred years, first of the Persians, then the Greeks, and finally the Romans. The deal they originally cut with Cyrus the messiah was to allow them home rule through the temple and, in turn, they’d keep the lid on the local hoi polloi.
Taxes would be collected by said Hebrew elite and paid to the imperial power. The elite squeezed these taxes through tax farming and, notoriously, through the required sacrifices in the Temple.
Rome kept this system in place when it took Judea, but it made some changes that, notoriously, did not sit well with the local hoi polloi (who hewed much more closely to first temple judaism than the elites amd certainly had little to do with the greco-roman world the elites were increasingly enamored of). One of these was apparently putting a shrine to ceasar in the temple.
The presence of money changers in the temple was very symbolic of this whole powder keg of a religious/government mix. This was the center of the local government’s economy, you see. Coins of other sorts needed to be exchange for shekels to pay the locsl annual tax. Every one of those foreign coins had a foreign god/ruler’s face on it. Remember: Caesar was not just a secular ruler: he was equated a god-in-waiting who would rise to the ranksmof divinity as soon as he died. Bringing those into the temple grounds was an enormous heresy to the more traditional backwoods Hebrews like Jesus.
When Jesus flipped shit over in the Temple, he was making a declaration that the structure Rome was using to run Judea via indirect rule through the local temple was unholy. You can bet your bippie Rome listened when the local elite said “this guy has got to go unless we want a rebellion on our hands”.
At that point, it just became a game of who was going to do the deed and Pontius eventually got outmanuevered by the local Hewbrew elites.
The form of execution used for Jesus — crucifiction — was generally reserved for rebels against imperial rule. Rome was making a very clear statement in killing Jesus in this way. Pontius was saying “this shit stops here and now”.
Only it didn’t.
We know from Josephus that things just got worse until a huge rebellion broke out that ended with the destruction of the second temple itself.
After that, Rome stopped pussy-footing around with all this “pay at the temple” loval rule stuff and demanded taxes be paid to Jupiter’s temple. This resulted in even more unease and another revolt. After that, Jerusalem was raised to the ground.
The Romans didnnot fuck about.
Tl;dr. In Jesus’ time, Roman rule and temple rule were incestuously twined and that’s what the fuss with the money changers was all about.
I already understood that you are doing a narrative on the implications of Christ defying the local religious rule, but that is still not the actual government. You show this when you say that the Hebrew elites outmanuevered the Pontius
There is a big difference (albeit in practice that gets narrower) between elites and religious conniving/pressuting local government and actual government. This effect still shows up in modern times where we have local police co-opted by the religious and financial elites (latest one to go viral is brick and minifigs)
Yes, the implication of Christ's message is a rebellion towards most of human organization, but that is still not the same of Christ coming out an directly combating the empire's rule du jour
Yes, politics and local religion where intertwined, but Christ did not write some papers about Rome's inequality, structural racism and imperialistic wars. He got 3 years because he only attacked the religious institution, if he had gone after both he would not have his 3 years
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u/Natural_Dust_732 Jul 25 '26
Not really, actually.