Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

§9.3 The Historical Context
ignore the Samaritans.' 12 Unfortunately their history in this period is obscure beyond
a few references, 113 and their own literature is too late to afford us much
help. The fact that at various times they called themselves 'Judeans/Jews' {Ant.
11.340), 'Hebrews' {Ant. 11.344) and 'Israelites' (in a inscription of 150-50 BCE
from Delos) 114 is a further reminder of how careful we have to be in our own use
of such descriptive titles. It is sufficiently clear, however, that there was already a
sharp breach between Samaria and the Judeans/Jews generally. 115 No doubt significant
factors in the breach were folk memories of Samaria's hostility to
Judea's reconstitution in the Persian era (Ezra 4-5; Nehemiah 4-6), and the
sense that Samaritans were a people whose ethnic and religious identity had been
gravely diluted. 116 But in the event, the breach came to focus much more sharply
and decisively on the question of the Temple and the correct place to worship
God (cf. John 4.20), with the Samaritan claim for Mount Gerizim backed up by
their own version of the Pentateuch. The hostility between Judea and Samaria
was inevitably deepened by John Hyrcanus's destruction of the Gerizim temple
in 128 BCE. 117
All this, of course, is of immediate relevance when we ask where Jesus
fits into such a spectrum, and whether his first followers were also reckoned, at
least initially, as belonging within Judaism. The fact that Luke could describe
Jesus' followers as a 'sect' (Acts 24.14; 28.22), 'the sect of the Nazarenes' (Acts
24.5), just as he speaks of the 'sect' of the Sadducees (5.17) and the 'sect of the
Pharisees' (15.5; 26.5), is certainly suggestive. Luke evidently wanted his readers
to understand that the 'Christians' (11.26) were a 'sect' within Judaism,
alongside the other Jewish 'sects'. There are larger questions here to which we
will have to return in volume 2. For the moment, it is sufficient to reaffirm that
Jesus himself should be regarded as standing foursquare within the diversity of
the Judaism of his day. The tensions and hostilities which emerged during his
mission should not be seen as tensions and hostility in regard to Judaism as
112. Schürer, History 2.16-20; R. T. Anderson, 'Samaritans', ABD 5.940-47; Grabbe,
Judaism 502-507; S. Isser, 'The Samaritans and Their Sects', in Horbury et al., eds., Judaism
3.569-95; bibliography in Meier, Marginal Jew 3.594.
113. Kg., Ant. 17.319, 342; 18.85-89; 20.118-36; Acts 8.
114. A. T. Kraabel in BA 47 (1984) 44-46; and further L. M. White, 'The Delos Synagogue
Revisited: Recent Fieldwork in the Graeco-Roman Diaspora', HTR 80 (1987) 133-60;
NDIEC 8.148-51.
115. As implied in Matt. 10.5; Luke 9.52-54; 10.30-37; John 4.9; 8.48.
116. 'Apostates from the Jewish nation' (Josephus, Ant. 11.340; contrast Ezra 9-10); Sir.
50.25-26; m. Sheb. 8.10.
117. See further F. Dexinger, 'Limits of Tolerance in Judaism: The Samaritan Example',
inE. P. Sanders et al., eds., Jewish and Christian Self-Definition. Vol. 2: Aspects of Judaism in
the Graeco-Roman Period (London: SCM, 1981) 88-114; J. D. Purvis, 'The Samaritans and Judaism'
in Kraft and Nickelsburg, Early Judaism 81-98.
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