nationalists and lovers of freedom who, in Josephus’s words, had ‘always resisted any hostile invasion’ and were ‘from infancy inured to war’,30 the Galileans according to rabbinic evidence were also quarrelsome and aggressive among themselves;31 though even their critics admitted that, in contrast to the Judeans who ‘cared for their wealth more than for their glory’, they preferred honour to financial gain.32
Galilee and the Gospels
Furnished with this largely contemporary information concerning Galilee and its inhabitants, it is now possible to see the extent to which the Jesus of the Gospels conforms to the specifically Galilean type. He is to begin with an appreciative child of the Galilean countryside. The metaphors placed in his mouth are mostly agricultural ones, as would be expected from a man who spent the major part of his life among farmers and peasants. For him the ultimate beauty is that of the lilies of the field, and the paradigm of wickedness the sowing of weeds in a cornfield, even in one belonging to an enemy.33 The city and its life occupy scarcely any place at all in his teaching. It is in fact remarkable that there is no mention whatever in the Gospels of any of the larger Galilean towns. Jesus for example is never seen in Sepphoris, the chief city and only four miles distant from Nazareth, or in other regional centres such as Gabara (Araba) or Tarichaeae.34 The Synoptic Gospels do not even refer to Tiberias, the new town built on the lake-side by Herod Antipas and quite close to the heart of Jesus’ ministry.35 By contrast, Jesus’ ‘own town’ Capernaum,36 the place which saw most of his activity, is definitely mentioned only once in the entire writings of Josephus; in an idyllic description of the rich district of Lake Gennesaret, he alludes to a ‘highly fertilizing spring, called by the inhabitants Capharnaum’!37 Nevertheless this place Capernaum, and the slightly better known, but not much more important, townlet of Bethsaida (Julias), and Corazin – unmentioned by Josephus – were the ‘cities’ of Jesus. At heart, he was a real campagnard. At home among the simple people of rural Galilee, he must have felt quite alien in Jerusalem.
It may have been Galilean chauvinism that was responsible for Jesus’ apparent antipathy towards Gentiles. For not only did he feel himself sent to the Jews alone;38 he qualified non-Jews, though no doubt with oratorical exaggeration, as ‘dogs’ and ‘swine’.39 When the man from Gerasa (one of the ten Trans-jordanian pagan cities) whom he had freed from demonic possession begged to be allowed into his fellowship, Jesus replied with a categorical refusal:
‘Go home to your own folk . . .’40
Moreover, the twelve apostles charged with proclaiming the Gospel were expressly forbidden to do so either to Gentiles or to Samaritans.41 The authenticity of these sayings must be well-nigh impregnable, taking into account their shocking inappropriateness in an internationally open Church. The attitude that inspired them was in any case clearly inherited by those disciples who, to start with, instinctively rejected the idea of accepting the Roman Cornelius among their ranks,42 and displayed continuing suspicion towards the supra-nationalist Paul. To quote a modern writer: ‘Had Jesus championed or evidenced a point of view where Jew and Gentile stood alike, it is extraordinarily difficult to understand how his followers could have proved so obtuse.’43 Be this as it may, a slant of such a kind in a man otherwise influenced by universal ideas, a teacher who encouraged his followers to love not only their friends but also their opponents in imitation of the God who causes the sun to rise on good and bad alike, and the rain to fall on the just and the unjust,44 requires some explanation.
Having confronted the facts and accepted a certain degree of xenophobia in Jesus, is it going too far to suggest that he might have been a Galilean revolutionary, a Zealot? This theory has recently been advanced systematically and with force;45 yet it still fails to convince. All that is known for sure is that his whole interest was centred on Jewish affairs and that he had no great opinion of the Gentiles, but can this have been equivalent to a serious political involvement?
Zealot or not, Jesus was certainly charged, prosecuted and sentenced as one, and that this was due to his country of origin, and that of his disciples, is more than likely. It appears that in the eyes of the authorities, whether Herodian or Roman, any person with a popular following in the Galilean tetrarchy was at least a potential rebel. Josephus’s account of the fate of John the Baptist is most apposite and illuminating. He is depicted as a ‘good man’ who ‘exhorted the Jews to lead righteous lives . . . and so doing join in baptism’. But when large crowds began to be moved by his sermons,
Herod became alarmed. Eloquence that had so great an effect on mankind might lead to some form of sedition, for it looked as though they would be guided by John in everything that they did. Herod decided therefore that it would be much better to strike first and be rid of him before his work led to an uprising.46
Far from losing his head because of his criticism of the tetrarch’s unorthodox marriage, as the Gospels assert, John owed his downfall to his powers of eloquence, which, it was suspected, might have been used by himself or others for political aims.47
It is hardly a coincidence that the Fourth Gospel ascribes an almost identical motive to the priestly plot against Jesus.
‘What action are we taking?’ they said. ‘This man is performing many signs. If we leave him alone like this the whole populace will believe in him. Then the Romans will come and sweep away our temple and our nation.’
Whereat the high priest, Caiaphas, remarks:
‘It is more to your interest that one man should die for the people, than that the whole nation should be destroyed.’48
The last saying anticipates, as it were, the controversial legal maxim that any Jew whose extradition on a political charge was demanded by Rome under the threat of an ultimatum was to be surrendered ‘lest the entire community should suffer on his account’.49
If it is permissible to read between the lines of Josephus’s account of Jesus, the famous Testimonium Flavianum,50 a text apparently enlarged in places and shortened in others by Christian copyists, it would seem in effect that during a period of riots in Jerusalem the unspecified charge levelled against Jesus by the civic leaders was that as a teacher he had won over many Jews. From the epithet ‘wise man’, applied by Josephus to Jesus, and from his use of the word ‘outrage’ in connection with the crucifixion, it would appear that the historian himself did not find Jesus guilty.51
Potential leadership of a revolutionary movement would have afforded sufficient grounds for adopting radical ‘preventive measures’, but some members of Jesus’ movement were bound to have compromised him even further. Among the apostles at least one, Simon the Zealot, bore an ominous political surname;52 but many of his other Galilean followers appear to have been imbued with a spirit of rebellion and to have expected him to convert his religious leadership into the political role reserved for the royal Messiah. When he entered Jerusalem they greeted him:
‘Hosanna! . . . Blessings on the coming kingdom of our father David!’53
As he approached the descent from the Mount of Olives, the whole company of his disciples . . . began to sing . . .: ‘Blessings on him who comes as king in the name of the Lord!’54
Moreover, the very last question put by Luke in the apostles’ mouths testifies to the survival of their political aspirations even in the ‘post-Easter’ period:
‘Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom of Israel?’55
It would also follow, as will be argued in a later chapter, that the first Jewish-Galilean version of Jesus’ life and teaching
