Response to Sectionalism: Jesus did not teach that Christianity was only for the Jews.

Author’s Note:

Fuckers in the iFunny comments telling me, always in the group chats
"Layne Archive ain't 'bout this, Layne ain't 'bout that"
My boy a OG on fucking Volt and them
He, he, they say that nigga don't be putting in no original content
Shut the fuck up, y'all niggas ain't know shit
All y'all motherfuckers talkin' about
"Layne Archive ain't no hitter, Layne_Staley ain't this, Layne a fake"
Shut the fuck up, y'all ain’t mutuals with that nigga
Y'all know that nigga got caught with a sheisty
Sscreenshottin' at the opps and shit
Nigga been on beef wit iRetards since fuckin' I don't know when
Motherfucker, stop fuckin' playin' him like that
Them niggas savages out there
If I catch another motherfucker talking sweet about Layne A Jackson
I'm fucking doxin' they ass, I'm not fucking playin' no more
Know them niggas roll with Lil Feti and them

I’m responding to this post that Mr. Sectionalism made, or really only the bottom half because the first half is mostly straightening some schizo youtuber out (and rightfully so).

This is a common issue on the right. You see it with antisemitism fairly commonly, like when people try and pull a ‘gotcha’ on the Jews by saying they were the majority of slaveowners in the South.

So true. Not even related to the rest of this post, just so true. I get really tired of Neo-Confederates acting like white plantation owners were innocent bystanders for slavery. The pro-white argument is not that we simply watched Jews facilitate slavery, its that slavery was not as bad as forces in today’s media want us to think.

Anyway..

For some reason Christians like to think that after the death of Christ all of the animosity other nations had towards Israel went from completely illegitimate to completely legitimate.

I think this might be true of “Far Right” Christians, but certainly not Christians as a whole. I would also consider Far Right Christians to be typically less educated than necessary to speak on topics like these while wearing the “Team Christ” jersey for the world to watch. You’ll see them say things like “Christianity is the most racist religion ever”, or how Jesus is more hateful to homosexuals than Wotan, other nonsense of that variety. Its a case of putting the cart before the horse (“I am racist before I am a Christian”) that tends to pop up in niche internet subcommunities.

I think the most mainstream opinion is that God used the Israelites because they were so consistently wicked and disloyal- proving that nobody is beyond redemption. This is exemplified by Old Testament books like Hosea. Even a cursory reading of the Old Testament shows how the actions of the Israelites can beget poor relations with their neighbors. Of course, sometimes this was justified as well.

The Romans, Greeks, Egyptians, and Persians (until Jewish Pussy had Xerxes acting strange) who hated the Jews were all just demon-worshipping maniacs! But after the death of Christ? It’s 109 countries this, 109 countries that. Maybe — just maybe! — Jews were always the way they are! If you’ve ever actually looked at the Talmud articles attacking Gentiles, they’re all justified with verses from the Old Testament.

This jives with what I just said, I think you really only find this half-baked zeal for Jew Hatred inside the online Far Right Christian communities. The Christian scholarly consensus is quite clear that the Jews have always been a rather nasty people, even from Ancient times:

Notice 1) the iFungus watermark 2) the Early Christian distinction between religious Jews and Christians.

Jewish activity during the Old Testament certainly reflects a great deal of hatred for Gentiles, but Christians accept this as righteous Jewish hatred for their pagan religious traditions.

I don’t think this a “one or the other” situation. The non-Jews of the Old Testament did have some repulsive “traditions”: mass orgies, child sacrifice, etc. People who practice such things should be smashed to pieces, at least in my opinion. When those nations are destroyed, so too are their innocuous “other traditions”. This is why I find it hard to lament the death of some of the pre-Christian European traditions, because they were practiced by people that also needed a good ass kicking. I don’t excuse things like smearing the guts of living people on the inside of temple walls because the people who did it had blue eyes. However, its equally wrong when the Israelites fell into similar vices.

Now, as for the question of Jews being the “chosen people”… I think, yes, even under the doctrine of Supersessionism, Jews are in some sense still the chosen people.

*Fursona crosses arms*

Look at the triceps on this mf

Their covenant from Sinai doesn’t go away and the conversion of the Jews is pretty much seen as being the primary mission of the entire biblical journey in the New Testament.

From Mathew 28’s “Great Commission”:

¹⁸ Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ¹⁹ Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

However, Sectionalism does bring up some more important verses:

Yes, the conversion of the world is seen as fundamentally good, but the conversion of the Jews has a sort of primacy even if it is clearly not going to happen for the time being. From Matthew 15:21–28:

Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. A Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him, crying out, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is demon-possessed and suffering terribly”. Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, “Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us”. He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel”. The woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said. He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs”. “Yes it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.” Then Jesus said to her, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.” And her daughter was healed at that moment.

Jesus also acknowledges Jewish primacy in Romans 1:16.

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile.”

How can a Christian reconcile the implicit meaning of these verses?

Let’s start with Romans 1:16

The Jews already understood much of the Gospel

The verbiage of “first” here does not inherently mean something like “first in line” or “first place”. Strong's Greek Dictionary defines the Greek word (πρῶτον) translated to English as “first” to mean something like “before”, “formerly”. This is actually something that reinforces what I’ve already written about, that Christianity is NOT some offshoot of Judaism but rather the inverse some centuries later. Some Bagans have dismissed this as hairsplitting, but that perspective fails to understand the full implications of this concept. The (ethnic) Jews came pre-packaged with understanding of concepts like Mosaic Law, the Covenant, and even base elements of Christianity like Monotheism. The Gentiles (particularly the nearby Greeks) did not. This is a struggle for Paul, who has to chastise new Greek women converts to stop asking basic questions about Christianity in 1 Corinthians 14:35 :

“If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.”

Let’s plug in Strong’s Greek to the passage:

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: Formerly / Before to the Jew, then [Now] to the Gentile.”

Note that Strong says it can mean something like “first in line”, but that doesn’t jive with the context we know about Christian soteriology.

The Jews also share the burden of spreading the Gospel, and are expected to rely on their previous education to answer the questions of the Gentiles who do not intrinsically understand things like monotheism.

Peter (A Jew) writing to other Jews in 1 Peter 3:15 :

But in your hearts set Christ apart as holy [and acknowledge Him] as Lord. Always be ready to give a logical defense to anyone who asks you to account for the hope that is in you, but do it courteously and respectfully.

And Paul in one of my favorite biblical passages, Acts 17:2-3 :

² As was his custom, Paul went into the synagogue, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the Scriptures, ³ explaining and proving that the Messiah had to suffer and rise from the dead. “This Jesus I am proclaiming to you is the Messiah,” he said

The Jews are Guardians of Scripture and the bloodline Christ descends from.

This is a bigger deal than one might initially realize. Dragging a scroll across the finish line of Antiquity is immensely difficult, so difficult that the ancient Levites (the Israelite tribe tasked with stewardship) were really the only ones from Ancient History to accomplish this at scale. This is despite challenges like the prophet Jeremiah being forced to literally eat his own scroll and start all over.

Paul also acknowledges in Romans 9:5 that the Jews deserve some credit as the people God chose to bear the line of David, that would eventually produce Jesus Christ:

⁵ Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of the Messiah, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen

Jesus is the next in a line of Jewish Prophets to the Jewish people.

A pattern of the Old Testament goes something like this:

1. The Israelites cry out to God for help.

2. God sends a messenger.

3. The Israelites don’t listen and kill their messenger.

4. Punishment is delivered to them for their wicked deeds.

5. The Israelites cry out to God for help.

This happens over and over again. Jesus can be seen in this context, as the next messenger from God meant to deliver the Jewish people from wickedness. Let’s plug Him into this equation.

1. The Israelites cry out to God for Help.

   At the time of His birth, Israel (Judea) had been under the yoke of various oppressors for centuries. This time it was the Romans, and the Israelites were begging God for a warrior king to deliver them as He had done in the past. Last time, God’s consequence for failing to listen to Him for the gorrilionth time was the “period of Prophetic silence” where no prophets reach the Israelites for centuries.

2. God sends a Messenger.

   Jesus. Many of His parables directly confront the Jewish people in their current state. He rebukes the conditions that God’s promised people have created for themselves.

3. The Israelites don’t listen and kill their messenger.

   

4. Punishment is delivered to them for their wicked deeds.

   

5. ( You are here) The Israelites cry out to God for help.

So, Jesus is the next step in a tradition of God refusing to give up on His chosen people and trying again with a new messenger. Jesus addresses the Jews as a prophet, with Jew-specific condemnation. For example, it wasn’t the Phoenicians selling wares in the temple. The rest of the world/time benefited from the words of Jesus, but in His time and context He was addressing things He literally saw in that moment. For example, the parable of the Ox in the well directly contradicts the Jewish tradition of dancing around resting on Sundays by following the letter of the law while intentionally skirting around its intent. Sound familiar today?

The Gospel literally spread to the Jews first.

A bit of semantics mayhaps, but it is true that the Jews would’ve literally been the first people to physically hear the words of Jesus. As in, the ball got rolling in the immediate proximity of His ministry while taking years (sometimes decades) to reach other parts of the world. As we discussed above, the Jews are expected to be the “shock troopers” of the Gospel, doing logical battle with unbelievers as seasoned veterans of Jewish education.

The stakes are much higher for the Jews.

Romans 2:9-10 explains that because the Jews have been given the first opportunity to accept Christ, the punishment for their failure to do so will be much greater. As in, “not only do you know better, but you’ve had the most time”. This sword cuts both ways. Jews are bestowed the unique gift of bearing the Messiah because of God’s covenant with Abraham (the glory and honor). Their failure to universally accept Christ brings trouble and distress.

There will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile; but glory, honor and peace for everyone who does good: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.

Addressing Mathew 15:21-28

I’m finna quote it again so you don’t have to scroll up:

This passage has a lot of meaning that is not accessible when viewing it at a surface level. Watdo?

Jesus’ ministry is focused on the Jews so there is no doubt that He is the Messiah.

Remember, Jesus is not just “the savior” in a generic, Marvel movie sense. He was to fulfill a specific role, THE MESSIAH of the JEWISH PEOPLE. This title comes with its own set of responsibilities and roles. Jesus must allow the Israelites the first chance to repent (as seen above). This is also why He forbids the disciples from preaching to the Gentiles just yet in Mathew 10:5

These twelve Jesus sent out, instructing them, “Go nowhere among the Gentiles and enter no town of the Samaritans,

As in, Jesus cannot make it any more crystal clear that He is the coming messiah FOR THE JEWS ALONE. As in, no excuses, you cannot possibly confuse Jesus with someone else or ever claim that Jesus did not fulfill His role appointed to the Jews.

St. Jerome says of this verse, “He says that He is not sent to the Gentiles, but that He is sent first to Israel, so that when they would not receive the Gospel, the passing over to the Gentiles might have just cause.”

When the Jews betray Him, they blow their chance to retain the title of God’s chosen. God allows anyone to be His chosen after the crucifixion because of how the Jews squandered their gift. While Christ was alive, He spoke daily with Jewish leaders, beasted in debates in the Temples, directly addressed the Jewish masses (blasphemous to the Jewish scholarly caste btw), and otherwise made it explicit that He was the prophesied Messiah.

In the same way that God sent prophets only to other people groups of the Old Testament, Jesus’ earthly ministry was a “last chance” for the Israelites to turn from their evil ways before they lost their birthright. Jesus is the Good Shepherd begging His sheep (the Israelites) to return to Him. When they don’t, He finds more sheep in the Gentiles.

The Israelites to God after seeing their actions have consequences.

The Jews did have an exclusive relationship with God, but chose time and time again to neglect it. Jesus’ ministry is the last chance of last chances to turn from this.

John confirms in the opening lines of his gospel in John 1:11-12

¹¹ He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. ¹² Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—

Note that Jesus makes an exception for the woman (A Canaanite) after He tells the disciples to minister only to the Jews. This harmonizes with His promise to be faithful to those who cry out to him. His questioning of the woman ensures she is a true believer (in spite of her Le Trad Canaanite indigenous religion) as He would not heal someone who simply wanted to abuse His “magic powers”. This later became known as Simony.

Moving on with more passages from the Sec article:

The idea that the “new covenant” makes the old covenant inactive in the first place is dubious at best. If any Christians want to explain that, go ahead.

Not quite. The Old Covenant had been fulfilled. Jesus came to fulfill the Law, not to destroy it or render it inert. As He famously says in Mathew 5:17-18

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.

What’s the difference? Jesus tells us again and again during His ministry how He intends to fulfill the Law. We see this when the curtain in the Temple is torn, for instance. Because Jesus has paid the price for sin, access to God is available to anyone by simply asking for it. Compare this to the prior Jewish tradition of only entering the Holy of Holies once a year (in an event that was sometimes lethal).

Much has been made of how Jesus fulfilled the law, and I won’t repeat alldat.

Christians will bring up instances of Christians doing bad to Jews, but the truth is that the literal wordcels in the Church have always come in to protect the Jews at times when the peasantry and gentry wanted to destroy them. Also, Christian leaders have treated Jews better than their pagan kinsmen many times,

Christian attitudes towards the Jews have kind of oscillated throughout the centuries from “we like you because you were the stewards of the Gospel” to “we hate you because you killed Christ and have opposed Christian civilization at every turn”.

For every “Charlemagne kept Jews at his court”, there’s an expulsion from a Christian nation under penalty of death. Its hard to pin one exact relationship between Christian rulers and Jews.

Firstly, under Theodosius, Pagan institutions were largely destroyed and engagement in Pagan rituals began to be persecuted on the individual level. Late in Theodosius’s reign, he banned all pagan rituals, even private ones.

A king is responsible for the spiritual custodianship of his people. Why let your kinsmen continue in folly? If Christianity is factually true in the way 2+2=4 is factually true, are you serving your constituents by allowing them to hold that 2+2=3 because their trvd ancestors thought so?

Note that the argument that Christianity can be rejected because it is foreign to Europe can be fatally critiqued by mentioning all the other stuff Europeans embraced that was not native to Europe. Methinks the Pagan peoples of Europe would have no qualms embracing gunpowder weapons, for example. Only Verc cries out, yearning for the return of the Claymore sword.

It should also be noted that Christian persecution of paganism never approached even a third of what Nero and other early Romans did to the Early Church.

[Charlemagne] famously destroyed and looted the site of Irminsul, an important holy site of the Saxons, in 772

Isn’t this exactly in the spirit of Germanic paganism tho? Pointless destruction of culturally significant sites and objects is par for the course for warrior religions. In fact, it is a prerequisite of the Nietzschean Super-Man. If you have an issue with this and not, say, the Roman sacking of Jerusalem in 70AD, I think that’s a double standard. Either its always wrong (as I am inclined to believe) or never wrong. It’s not ok solely because white people are the beneficiaries.

Also, Germanic pagans did this to early Christian outposts all the time (Lindisfarne, anyone?), including killing early missionaries by the dozen. I can see how Charlemagne thought that Irminsul was a “graven image” to promote Old Testament “idol worship”, but I’d rather that the site was carefully preserved for posterity (as in, a museum) instead of just nuked off the face of the earth. Ditto for the Donar Oak St. Boniface chopped down.

If Christianity and Islam did not exist, I’m somewhat skeptical if Jews would still have any prominence, or even exist at all.

I think the Jews are notable for being the “only ancient race to survive antiquity”. We probably all know one or two Jewish people. How many Acheuleans or Mousterians do you know?

Also, ancient Jewish civilization punched well above its weight for things like literacy, medical knowledge, and even prowess in battle. For example, the first medical texts written in Arabic were actually produced by “dhimmi” Jews (during Le Golden Age that never happened btw). There were times in history where the Jews were the good guys, and they had an outsized impact on ancient history regardless of other Abrahamic faiths.

Finally, Paul makes explicit the relationship of the Jews to Christianity.

Paul’s letter to the Romans explains much of the context the Romans would not have had about the Jews. As onlookers, we can also glean understanding.

What does he say?

Romans 11:28-29

²⁸ As far as the gospel is concerned, they are enemies for your sake; but as far as election is concerned, they are loved on account of the patriarchs, ²⁹ for God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable.

Romans 11:17-24 is probably the most enlightening as it explains how Gentiles become the adopted sons of God. In effect, this passage confirms that the status of “God’s chosen” has been delivered from the Jews to anyone who accepts His gift.

¹⁷ If some of the branches have been broken off, and you, though a wild olive shoot, have been grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing sap from the olive root, ¹⁸ do not consider yourself to be superior to those other branches. If you do, consider this: You do not support the root, but the root supports you. ¹⁹ You will say then, “Branches were broken off so that I could be grafted in.” ²⁰ Granted. But they were broken off because of unbelief, and you stand by faith. Do not be arrogant, but tremble. ²¹ For if God did not spare the natural branches, he will not spare you either.

²² Consider therefore the kindness and sternness of God: sternness to those who fell, but kindness to you, provided that you continue in his kindness. Otherwise, you also will be cut off. ²³ And if they do not persist in unbelief, they will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. ²⁴ After all, if you were cut out of an olive tree that is wild by nature, and contrary to nature were grafted into a cultivated olive tree, how much more readily will these, the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree!

Romans 11:25 explains that the Gentiles will now receive the gift the Israelites failed to appreciate.

I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers and sisters, so that you may not be conceited: Israel has experienced a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in,

And in Acts 18:28, you can see where the ideological lines are already being drawn. Note that the author makes a distinction between Paul (a Jew) and his “Jewish” interlocutors. Not possible in the Bagan world where Christianity is an off-shoot of Judaism. Instead, Judaism is a “one issue party” that exists solely to oppose the concept of Jesus as Jewish Messiah.

For he vigorously refuted his Jewish opponents in public debate, proving from the Scriptures that Jesus was the Messiah.

Conclusion:

idk I hate conclusion paragraphs. Either read what I said or don’t. BRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAP