(July 22, 2024 at 12:12 pm)BrianSoddingBoru4 Wrote: It’s not a literal sword. Jesus was pointing out the religions are, by their very nature, divisive, and faith in Jesus is very likely to divide families. He clearly wasn’t wrong.
Boru
This is correct.
The clear expectation in C1 Israel was that God would act to free His people. This was generally interpreted that through force of arms the Jews would boot the Romans out, God would return with forgiveness for Israel, and a forever golden age would begin in which Israel would be 'a light to the Gentiles'.
So branch of Judaism appears which claimed that Gentiles were to be freely admitted to the People of God, the God-given Torah was optional and the person who was supposed to free Israel (the Messiah) was in fact crucified. Israel would remain ruled by Rome, and Judaism rebuilt around a dead failure.
This was inevitably going to make the believer extremely unpopular amongst friends and family for effectively betraying country, race and religion. Violence was a likely result. Removal from the family WhatsApp was probable.
Don't forget this was a people of very strong religious beliefs backed up by violence , where groups with identical agendas could be murderously at each others throats (such as the People's Front of Judea vs the Judean People's Front).
The OP may need a new favourite quote.
