Among Christians today there is a common view that the Jews that Jesus encountered two thousand years ago, even the disciples, were dull and ignorant of the Scriptures. But the Dead Sea Scrolls give explanation that many years prior there was a series of events that influenced this mindset that ultimately rejected Jesus Christ as Messiah. Could the Church today become susceptible to similar consequences?
It is comical for some, for others it is simply frustrating. Those that use an Apple smartphone versus those that use an Android smartphone; although they both have a lot in common, there are distinct differences in the operation of both platforms. Often you will see the users of one throw up their hands in frustration after trying to use the other brand. Once you learn a certain system “a” there is a distinct adjustment required to entertain a new system “b” and the adjustment can be challenging. As a result, surveys indicate once you adopt your favorite brand over another, you generally maintain your brand for the long term and reject the notion of ever adopting the other.
For the longest time there were the traditional accepted teachings of the patriarchs in Judaism, the system that gave interpretation of the Old Testament. However, during the 400 “silent years” after Malachi’s prophecy there slowly developed three main Jewish factions that were present during the Second Temple period into the New Testament era: the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes. They were all Jews, but they held very wide differences in their belief systems.
“He replied, ‘Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written:
‘“These people honour me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
They worship me in vain;
their teachings are merely human rules.”
You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions.’
And he continued, ‘You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions!” (Mark 7:6-9)
What did Jesus mean in this Mark passage by “traditions?”
During the Hasmonean Dynasty a bloody civil war broke out between the Pharisees and the Sadducees between 90-80 B.C. They fought primarily over whether the kings should combine both the duties of priests and kings under their authority. The Sadducees agreed with whatever the kings decreed, the Pharisees were emphatic that combining the duties was illegal and not aligned with the Law. “Parisee” in Hebrew means “to separate” and they became known as the Pharisees. Afterwards, the Pharisees invented a new form of teaching known as the “oral Law” (known today as the Talmud) and they rejected the teachings of the Patriarchs handed down over the ages. This is where rabbinic Judaism departed from Biblical Judaism and is precisely what Jesus was addressing as “traditions” in the passage above.
It would be analogous today to our promoting footnotes and commentaries as more authoritative than the literal Word of God in our Bibles! In effect, what the Pharisees had helped produce was an apostasy within Judaism just prior to the first Advent of Christ. As a result, this reinterpretation of the Old Testament confused several generations of people to the point they appeared ignorant or clueless in the season of their Messiah. How did this “reprogramming” all begin? By moving away from the literal Word of God.
“Now as He drew near, He saw the city and wept over it, saying, “If you had known, even you, especially in this your day, the things that make for your peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment around you, surround you and close you in on every side, and level you, and your children within you, to the ground; and they will not leave in you one stone upon another, because you did not know the time of your visitation.” (Luke 19:41-45)
However, there was a priestly sect of Jews in Israel known as the Essenes that were very expectant of the Messiah and they had separated themselves from the rest of Judaism. They took copies of the Bible (Old Testament) with them to the wilderness along with sectarian texts and ancient Jewish writings settling in the mountainous area along the coastline of the Dead Sea, known as the Judean Wilderness. Over the last 75 years over 1,000 of their scrolls have been discovered. Using both radiocarbon and paleographic testing, the majority of Dead Sea Scrolls are dated between 150-100 BC, with some fragments dating to 225 BC. All these writings were BEFORE the birth of Christ and therefore CANNOT BE early Christian writings.
The “Essenes” broke off from the Pharisees over this matter as they astutely upheld the teachings and prophetic writings of the Patriarchs. In their writings you will find that their theology agrees with New Testament theology: One Messiah with two comings, Messiah as God incarnate and who would die to pay for the penalty of sins. The Pharisees were looking for someone and something entirely different. It was due in part to this “apostasy” in the Temple priesthood that helped totally alter the Jewish mindset to reject Christ.
After the split occurred, the Essenes state in their sectarian writings that the Spirit of God told them to separate from both the Pharisees and Sadducees completely and have nothing to do with their corrupt priesthood. Moreover, they wrote that God told them to move to the Judean Wilderness and fulfill the Isaiah 40:3 prophecy, “A voice of one calling: ‘In the wilderness prepare the way for the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God.’” Thus, the Essenes moved to the harsh wilderness out of obedience to prepare for the coming of Messiah, Jesus Christ. There are many Bible scholars that cannot help but note that the theology of John the Baptist and his personal attributes were very similar to that of the Essenes and he baptized in the Jordan River very near Qumran. As a footnote, the Essenes disappeared shortly after the resurrection and ascension of Christ. Why? Because they accepted Christ as Messiah almost immediately once they heard the testimony. He was precisely who they were waiting for.
In Israel today there is general excitement on the one hand over the Dead Sea Scrolls for they serve to validate and legitimize Jewish claims to the Land based on historical evidence. But on the other hand, there is real awkwardness and discomfort with the fact that the Dead Sea Scrolls reflect New Testament theology with incredible accuracy. Thus, they write off the Essenes as a wacky, fringe group with strange beliefs. It simply does not fit their “system.”
How does this relate to the Church today?
We cannot help but acknowledge that we are now living in the Laodicean age. It is the seventh and final church age that is the “lukewarm” church. Unlike the first six churches, this church is not named precisely but Jesus describes it in Revelation 3:14 as “the church of the Laodiceans” as if the people exercised some claim on the church. In effect, it has come under the influence of the outside world and its values. It is “neither cold nor hot” and seemingly accepts any doctrine for the sake of compromise as it denies the verbal and literal interpretation of Scripture. This church believes it is rich and “in need of nothing” but the Lord says it is “wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked.”
Today, the Church has lost much of its identity as a transforming agent by allowing the influence of the world’s values to come inside. Once the Church stood strong on so many social and moral issues but today is frequently seen bowing to secular pressures. And finally, today the Church is losing its grip on the assured Word of God in its preaching and teaching. We live in a time when academic scholarship has seriously attacked the integrity of the Biblical text. No generation in history has been more skeptical of the notion that the Bible is nothing more than a construct of folklore and traditions. Biblical illiteracy is rampant in today’s churches. Many evangelicals would say the “apostasy” is well underway.
Certainly not all churches today are Laodicean, and there are many churches alive and well that might better resemble the more desirable attributes of the church at Philadelphia (Revelation 3:7-13). And our brothers and sisters in China, Iran, Egypt and North Korea might surely identify more with the persecuted church of Smyrna (Revelation 3:8-11). But the reality of this Laodicean age remains as a general condition.
If ever there was a time that the Church needed to be reminded not to move away from the literal Word of God, it is today.