Jesus- Richard France

Christianity is founded on the worship of Jesus Christ (‘Jesus the Messiah’) as Son of God, the unique self-revelation of God to man. At the same time, it remembers this same Jesus as a real historical figure, a man of insignificant social standing who during his life was unknown outside the obscure corner of the Roman Empire where he lived and died.

Looking for Liberation

Born just before the death of Herod the Great, king of Judea, in 4 BC, Jesus lived for a little over thirty years, scarcely traveling outside Palestine throughout his life.

The Jews were a subject people, living either under local princes appointed by the Roman emperor, or under the direct rule of Rome itself. A priestly party, the Sadducees, accepted Roman rule, to which they owed their influence. The Pharisees, who later became the dominant party, were mostly less concerned with politics, and concentrated on the study and application of the Old Testament Law. Some stricter Jews, Essenes, opted out of Jewish society and set up isolated communities—such as Qumran—where they could devote themselves to preserving their religious purity. But there were many Jews who resented Roman rule, and from time to time revolts broke out, leading eventually to the disastrous ‘Jewish War’ of AD 66-73.

The Jews had long hoped for ‘the day of the Lord’, when God would act to save his people. There were several different hopes of a ‘Messiah’, a savior, whom God would send, and such hopes ran high at the time of Jesus. Some saw the Messiah in more spiritual terms, as a priestly or prophetic figure, but in popular expectation he was to be a political liberator, and there were occasional ‘messianic’ movements centered on popular leaders. Galilee was known as fertile ground for such movements.

Jesus was born at Bethlehem in Judea, but was brought up in Galilee, and most of his public activity was in that region. Judean Jews regarded Galilee as an uncultured, half-pagan area: Jesus’ distinct ‘northern accent’ would have been conspicuous in Jerusalem.

© "The World’s Religions" published by Lion Publishing plc, Sandy Lane West, Oxford, England. Reprinted with permission.

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