I gave some guidelines about this paper. One of them was that you should demonstrate some knowledge of the complexity of Judaism. Here is how not to do so:


Then, behold, the veil of the Temple was torn in two from top to bottom; and the earth quaked...(Matt 27:51)

This veil separated people (only priests were allowed in the tabernacle chamber) from the Holy of Holies (only the High Priest was allowed to enter, and only on the Day of Atonement), so they would not die. Here, we see a great difference between early Christianity and Judaism: the belief that God is a personal God; that he is accessible to the believer at any time.

I do not dispute that the first Christians believed in a personal God who is accessible at all times. But where is the evidence that this was not a Jewish belief? No Jewish sources are quoted. Many scholars believe that the reason the Pharisees were so insistent on observing the law was to remind people that God is present in everyday life. The High Priest may have liked to promote the idea that only the High Priest, in the Holy of Holies, is truly in touch with God. Certainly many Jews may have been in awe of the High Priest, that remote, unwordly figure who they might have glimpsed from a distance, dressed in pure robes. The reason that the Pharisees encouraged everyone to maintain their purity, with ritual washing, was to make it clear that the whole nation is a priestly nation, and that everyone is always in the presence of God.

The underlying assumption is that all Jews shared the same concept of God, and that this concept was the opposite of the Christian one.

Here is another example:

Judaism and Christianity parted ways over the course of several centuries and while Judaism hs remained relatively the same, today's Christianity has evolved much since the actual times of Christ.

It is true that we have not had much opportunity to study the history of Judaism up until the present day, so I cannot blame students for lack of knowledge on this subject. However, if you haven't studied a subject, don't try to guess. A glance at the text-book would reveal that Judaism did undergo many changes - for example, the development of Kabbalah. Once again, the assumption is that what is true of Christianity - that is has changed over time - is not true of Judaism. Judaism is treated only as the opposite of Christianity, not as a religion to be studied in its own right.

But now, an example of good work:

John Lundquist, author of The Temple of Jerusalem: Past, Present and Future, states that "...the destruction had a paralyzing impact upon Judaism, it knocked the very center and foundation of Judaism out from under it." (Lundquist 131) ... The destruction of something so valuable brought loyal Jews together and allowed Christians to drift in the opposite direction. Whether the even truly "paralyzed" the Jewish community or not, one can see how the destruction of the temple lifted the religion to a new level as it prompted extensive religious writing. For one, the Jews composed the Mishnah, an invaluable set of texts to Judaism that sprang from this era, not completed until a century later. In contrast to the supposed "paralyzed" community, Jacob Neusner describes the time of the writing of the Mishnah as a "remarkable age of reconstruction and creativity in the history of Judaism" (Neusner, 99)

Lundquist, John. The Temple of Jerusalem: Past, Present and Future. Westport: Praeger Publishing, 2008.
Neusner, Jacob. Neusner on Judaism. Burlington: Ashgate Publishing, 2005.

Here we have an attempt to understand the impact of the destruction of the Temple on the history of Judaism itself. Also, we have a good example of how to use secondary sources. Lundquist is not simply reporting facts, he is offering a judgement: that Judaism was in  a state of paralysis. He is an expert, and so we should take his judgement seriously. However, taking his judgement seriously does not mean reporting it without comment, as if it were a straightforward fact. We have a rival judgement from another expert, no less than Rabbi Jacob Neusner (perhaps the world's greatest expert on this period of Jewish history), and Neusner's judgement is based on evidence, that is quoted. This is a good example of how to report on a debate between experts.

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