Jewish Geneology: A Fraud?

[Aractus]

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jso...banot.html

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For the most part, the practice of sacrifice stopped in the year 70 C.E., when the Roman army destroyed the Second Temple in Jerusalem, the place where sacrifices were offered. The practice was briefly resumed during the Jewish War of 132-135 C.E., but was ended permanently after that war was lost. There were also a few communities that continued sacrifices for a while after that time.

Sacrifices were stopped after the Temple's destruction because the Torah specifically commands Jews not to offer sacrifices just anywhere; they are only permitted in the place that G-d has chosen for that purpose. It would be a sin to offer sacrifices in any other location.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origins_of...ic_Judaism

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The destruction of the Second Temple brought about a dramatic change in Judaism. Rabbinic Judaism built upon Jewish tradition while adjusting to new realities. Temple ritual was replaced with prayer service in synagogues which built upon practices of Jews in the Diaspora dating back to the Babylonian exile.

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The prime directive of the OT as written by the priests was designed to make sure that jews could only sacrifice AT THE TEMPLE which, not so coincidentally, was controlled by the priests.  Religion has always been a scam.

I didn't say they didn't practise it, just that their religion was based on the text of the Pentateuch and not on animal sacrifice which was quite a common custom at the time. At least they didn't practise human sacrifice as some other tribal cultures of the time did (Celtic Britons for example which were directly referenced in the Red Dwarf episode of "Lemons"). Rome had already outlawed human sacrfice in 97 BC, and there's no evidence that the Jews ever practised it. But animal sacrifice was a practise shared by virtually all ancient cultures, and those that didn't still had customs to do with thanking their deities for the life-force of the animal. It was just a social-norm of the ancient world.

Now true that until 70AD the Jews practised it exclusively in their Temple - but so what? That was just their way of deciding where to do it.

If you're arguing that animal sacrifice is barbaric and primitive then perhaps you'd prefer to defend Christians on that once since from the second century on we have clear evidence they refused to partake in animal sacrifice (and that probably goes all the way back to 50AD following the Jerusalem Council decision). But put it into perspective as well: it was against Roman law to behaving in such unruly and anti-social ways. So if Christians refused to attend public sacrificial ceremonies, and refused to sacrifice their own animals as well in public ceremonies then they could be charged with social misconduct - or whatever the specific charge was they were viewed as a threat to ongoing peace, as well as defying Roman law and customs. Most Roman authorities turned a blind eye to it though, Pliny the Younger's letter and Trajan's response is evidence of that. As Christians we believed that was evidence of direct persecution against the Christians, but in fact it is Trajan saying to Pliny "just let them be, if they are accused of a crime and are also a Christian then you may punish them, but don't seek them out, and don't allow anonymous accusations against them".

Refusing to participate in animal sacrifice though was one of the things that could get Christians executed in the second century. So let me ask you then Min, do you really think that practise was that bad if it was something that would protect you from being hanged on a cross, or beheaded? What would you have preferred as a ancient Roman resident? Participate in animal sacrifice or death?