Judas the Circumciser

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Pazooka
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Judas the Circumciser

Post by Pazooka »

Judas Iscariot (or the Iscariot) has long puzzled etymologists but the appellation most likely refers to the fact that he was zealot or, what was called, a sicarii - which name comes from a type of knife used by these zealots. History has painted them as assassins and “dagger-men.” But it may be that this is a Greco-Roman smear or exaggeration. It very well could be that the sicarii, enthusiastic adherers to the law and the circumcision, were actually called by that name because that same knife is the blade used in the rite of circumcision. They were so zealous that it was said they would not abide to hear a man talk about the law unless he was circumcised.

I don’t question whether or not Judas betrayed Jesus to the Jewish authorities. But I do wonder if the way he’s been written up wasn’t meant to further polarize the people of the time. Was this Greco-Roman propaganda? Playing up the caricature of the circumcising Judaizer, zealous for the law?

How much of our disdain for “the law’ comes from this type of propaganda?

The New Testament is complicated.

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Pazooka
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Re: Judas the Circumciser

Post by Pazooka »

The texts that we have in the New Testament…appear to be a direct critical response to the Messianic, Torah-orthodox, militant, nationalist rebels who were responsible for the 1st and 2nd Jewish Wars. ~ James Valliant, interview https://youtu.be/k0l8J2vE-3s
How much of the history was paganized, politicized and polluted? What parts that were “plain and precious” did we get back in the publications of the Restoration? Or when Nephi beheld other books, which came forth…from the Gentiles that would establish the truth of the first (records) which are of the twelve apostles of the Lamb, and shall make known the plain and precious things which have been taken away from them (1 Nephi 13:39-40) - was this foreseeing the unearthing of the Dead Sea Scrolls and possibly other records that have and have yet to come forth?

Is our Gentileness about to take a turn toward more Israelness? After all…Malachi’s parting words, even quoted to Joseph Smith, are “Remember ye the law of Moses my servant…with the statutes and judgments. Behold I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers. These are not the “Christian fathers” but the patriarchs and prophets of the Old Testament. For some reason, we don’t ever include the “remember the law of Moses” part because I think we don’t know what to do with it.

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Niemand
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Re: Judas the Circumciser

Post by Niemand »

One of the common schools of thought was that Judas was a Jewish nationalist and felt Jesus' arrest may spur people into action

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