Yes, Jesus was a Jew
In case it needs to be said, Jesus was of course Jewish.
Yet a small group called "British Israelites" some centuries ago began claiming that the British were the "twelve lost tribes of Israel". When this belief was brought to the U.S. in the 1920s the new adherents ran into the problem that not all Americans come from Britain. They decided that all Europeans were the twelve lost tribes of Israel, which had spread across the continent. They called themselves Christian Identity, CI. Most of those they approached considered this absurd, so the CI fall-back position was the claim that Jesus, at least, was White, not Jewish. Knowing that few nationalists would want to spend time and energy pointing out that Jesus is a Jew. (Though one could instead argue that the son of God, who is also the god of the entire universe, cannot be of any particular race.)
I will here present notes about history and the Bible to put this matter to rest.
All churches for two thousand years have known Jesus was a Jew, born in a Jewish country. This has never been debated. Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox churches all agree. This is expressed in hymns and sermons: ”Lord of Zion,” ”King of the Jews,” and so on.
There are churches named United Zion Church, Mt Zion Church, Zion Lutheran Church, Zion's church, Mount Zion Baptist Church, the New Zion Christian Church, and so on. Zion, in Hebrew spelled 𐤑𐤉𐤅𐤍, is a name deeply embedded in Judaism as the name for the land of Israel. It was originally a hill in Jerusalem, when the Jews led by King David conquered the city from the Jebusites. The word Zion appears 108 times in the Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible.
The New Testament refers to Jesus as King of the Jews (or Judeans, Ioudaios) both in the beginning of his life and at the end. In the Koine Greek of the New Testament, such as in John 19:3, this is written as Basileus ton Ioudaion. (βασιλεὺς τῶν Ἰουδαίων). In Matthew 2:2 the three Magi from the east call the newborn Jesus King of the Jews, which caused the Jewish king Herod the Great to start killing newborns, so that they wouldn't take his throne. In all four canonical gospels the title ”King of the Jews” leads to charges against Jesus. (Matthew 27:11, Mark 15:2, Luke 23:3, John 18:33.)
In Mark 15:2 Jesus confirms to Pilate that he is the king of the Jews and says nothing further. In John 18:34 he hints that Pilate's accusation originates with others, and in John 18:36 he adds that his kingdom is not of this world - but he does not deny being a Jew, or the king of Jews for that matter.
Jesus confirms that he is not one of ”the Gentiles,” the non-Jews, when he says he is the Son of Man in Torah prophecies, in Luke 18:31: ”See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written about
the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished. 32 For he will be
delivered over to the Gentiles and will be mocked and shamefully treated
and spit upon. 33 And after flogging him, they will kill him, and on
the third day he will rise.”
The Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke have widely divergent genealogies for Jesus, but both say he is a descendant of David, in Hebrew דָּוִד - the third king of the united Israel and Judah.
Paulus says Jesus was David's descendant: ”descended from David according to the flesh ... Jesus Christ our Lord.”
In Philippians 3:5, Paulus says of Jesus that he is ”of the people of Israel ... a Hebrew born of Hebrews,” which he also says of himself elsewhere. Paulus' real name was Saul of Tarsus, in Hebrew שאול התרסי, Sha'ūl.
Jesus’ followers preached alongside rabbis, in Jewish synagogues, swearing on the Torah. It was only gradually that they were considered a separate religion, with the final breach during the Roman siege of Jerusalem when they left the city. Jesus went around the country preaching in synagogues:
Matt 4:23: ”And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people.”
Jesus had been visiting synagogues for the Sabbath sermon his whole life. Luke 4:16: ”He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom.”
Matt 9:35: ”And Jesus went throughout all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction.”
He even told his disciples not to preach to non-Jews. Matt 10:5: ”These twelve Jesus sent out, instructing them, 'Go nowhere among the Gentiles and enter no town of the Samaritans, 6 but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.'”
However, there are stories of Jesus shocking his followers by showing how he cared for those from non-Jewish peoples. His universalist idea was that Yahweh cared about them too, which was heresy in the eyes of the rabbis.
John 4:9: ”Then said the woman of Samaria to him, How is it that you, being a Jew, asks drink of me, who am a woman of Samaria? For the Jews have no dealings with the Samarians.”
The rabbis also admonish Jesus because his followers pick some grains on the Sabbath. Jesus and his followers honor the Sabbath in the Gospels. Jesus gives an explanation for why they can still pick some food, and does not say they are non-Jews who the Sabbath wouldn't apply to.
Jesus' disciple James was called ”Jesus' brother”. His real name was Ya'akov, spelled in Hebrew יעקב. We could go through all twelve disciples, but will settle for the two named Judas, יהודה, which in Hebrew means "God is thanked". It was a common name due to the Jewish priest Judas Maccabeus, who led the Jewish (Maccabean) revolt against the Seleucid Empire. No church has ever claimed that the disciples would not be Jews.
Jesus' parents took him to a Jewish temple when he was a child, where he debated with the rabbis. The family celebrated Jewish holidays like Sopot, Purim and Passover.
Jesus wore the tzitzit, in Hebrew שַׁבָּת, the knotted fringes on a rabbi's blue-white shawl, symbolizing purity. They also have the function of separating Jews from non-Jews. Only Jews can wear the tzitzit.
Jesus went to Jerusalem for the Jewish celebration of Passover, פֶּסַח, marking the exodus of Jews from Egypt. In Jerusalem he called the Jewish temple ”my father's temple”.
Jesus came from the tribe of Judah which is where we get the word Juif, Jude, Jew.
Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist, whose father was named Zechariah, זְכַרְיָה, a Hebrew and Persian name. Zechariah is named as a priest in the temple in Jerusalem. The Jewish King Herod enjoyed listening to John as he preached. He preached a messianic form of Judaism, and it was him Jesus asked for a baptism. John had foretold the coming of the Messiah, and when he met Jesus he said this was the one.
The Messiah, Hebrew ”mashiach,” מָשִׁיחַ, ”the anointed one,” is an important figure in Judaism. He is believed to unite the tribes of Israel, gather all Jews to an ”Eretz Israel” and bring on a golden age of prosperity for the Jews. In Jesus' time many preachers outside the established church, speaking before audiences for donations, would describe the Messiah coming to save them from Roman occupation and from corrupt rule, and from the sins of the people. This was the context in which John called Jesus the Messiah.
”But Jesus said the Jews were of the devil,” some say. That is a bad translation of John 8:44. The word ”Jew” didn’t exist, it is a stand-in in the text. What he said was that the group of Pharisees who were questioning his ideas were of the devil. If he thought the entire Jewish race was ”of the devil” it would have warranted more explanation than a brief curse thrown at his opponents in an argument.
Furthermore, right before that Jesus was arguing that the religious law of Moses, the founder of the Jewish Palestine and central to Judaism, should not be broken. John 7:21: ”Now if a
boy can be circumcized on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses may not
be broken, why are you angry with me for healing a man’s whole body on
the Sabbath?”
In the same scene, the Jews who listen clearly consider Jesus a Jew. John 7:35: ”The Jews ([the Pharisees] said to one
another, 'Where does this man intend to go that we cannot find him? Will
he go where our people live scattered among the Greeks, and teach the Greeks?'” This is one of countless examples where Jesus being a Jew was so obvious it didn't have to be stated outright.
In John 4:22, Jesus says: You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is of the Jews. (More precisely, he would have said the Judeans.)
Jesus and his followers spoke Aramaic, a Semitic language related to Hebrew. Some of the Hebrew words Jesus uses in the Bible are:
* Hosanna - הושיעה־נא, rescuer, savior
* Immanuel - עמנואל, God with us
* Sabbath - שַׁבָּת, or Shabbos, the day of rest in Judaism
* Yahweh - יהוה, YHVH, as Hebrew scripture doesn't have vowels. The word for the Jewish god.
* Rabbi - as Jesus was called, from Hebrew rav, my master
* Amen - אָמֵן, so be it. From Deuteronomy, the fifth book in the Jewish Torah.
* Messias - מָשִׁיחַ, savior
* Mar - מָר, lord
* And of course Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachtahani?, Jesus' mixed Aramaic-Hebrew cry when he was executed. ”My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”
Speaking of execution, being crucified was a specifically torturous form of execution that was reserved for non-Romans. Though the cross-shaped form was used in the northern Roman empire - the form used in the eastern Mediterranean, to execute Jews and other non-Romans, was T-shaped. For the first centuries the T-shaped cross was used by Christians.
Above Jesus' head, the Romans nailed a sign with the letters INRI, in Latin short for Iēsus Nazarēnus, Rēx Iūdaeōrum. Jesus the Nazarene, King of the Jews. John 19:20 says that these words were written in Hebrew, Latin and Greek. The three Magi, Pontius Pilate and the Roman soldiers had used the title for Jesus. INRI became the most prominent symbol for Christians, with a fish symbol added later.
Neither Jesus' followers in the Gospels, nor any church after that, have argued against the ”King of the Jews” part on the grounds that Jesus wouldn't be a Jew. Instead they proudly display these letters.
Before his execution, the Roman governor Pontius Pilate sent Jesus to be judged by the Jewish king Herod, as Jesus was one of his subjects. But the king feared unrest from Jesus' followers if he sentenced him and sent him back, which surprised Pilate. Had Jesus been a Roman he would never have been sent to Herod.
After his death Jesus was buried in a tomb. The man who asked for his body for burial was Joseph of Arimatea, a voting member of the Sanhedrin, סַנְהֶדְרִין. The Sanhedrin were councils of Jewish judges; the Great Sanhedrin met in the temple in Jerusalem. The Sanhedrin were made up of Jews, for Jews. Medieval speculation about Joseph's genealogy raised claims that Joseph was the uncle of Jesus' mother.
The burial had to be speedy, ”because the Sabbath was drawing on”.
Luke 4:16 about Jesus in Nazareth: ”...on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. Jews are of course the ones who go to the synagogue on the Sabbath.
”Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.” So said Jesus according to Matthew 5:17. Jesus is not talking about secular laws but the Commandents and religion. The Torah was referred to as the Law.
Worshiping Yahweh was Judaism, Yahweh being the god in the Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible. ”Israelites” were a conglomerate of Semitic tribes, who first had a pantheon of gods, but later came to worship only one of them - a change we call Yahwism. Other peoples still celebrated many gods. Monotheism was for the Jews only. They then expanded their tribal god Yahweh to be the only god, and the god of the entire world, with the other tribal gods in the region, like Ba'al, being demons.
The structure of lessons in the Gospels follow the rabbinic tradition where a person asks the rabbi a question, and he answers by often overturning the presumptions in the question. This is what we see in the stories about Jesus, and it would be a well-known pattern for the audience.
The Gospels have Jesus being the prophet Yahweh had told Moses would come. Deuteronomy 18:15-22, ”will raise up for them a prophet like me from among you”. John 1:17, ”the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ”. Moses' name is actually the Hebrew Moishe, spelled משה. His mother was Jochebed, daughter of Levi - all known entirely from Jewish scripture.
Jesus probably never heard the word ”Jesus” in his whole life. His actual name was the Hebrew Yeshua, spelled
ישוע. It was later changed by Paulus to make him more palatable to Romans with a name ending in -us.
The Jewish name Yeshua, older form Yehoshua, occurs throughout Jewish history before and after Jesus lived. It was the name of the first high priest of the reconstructed Temple of Jerusalem, after the return from Babylonian captivity. It is also the name of the leader of the Jews after Moses.
Paulus, or Saul of Tarsus, was the man who would spread Christianity through the Roman empire more than anyone else. He was the one who said ”be all things to all people”. When you speak to those ”not of the Book” (non-Jews, Gentiles) you should sound like you are one of them, and when you speak to those ”of the Book” (Jews) you should sound like you are one of them. It was this strategy that made him take a Roman-sounding name. Saul was originally an agent of the Jewish authorities and had sidelined ”Jesus' brother,” James. That Saul, and James and the apostles, were Jews, has never been questioned.
In Acts 21:39 Saul tells a group of Roman soldiers: ”I am a Jew, from Tarsus in Cilica, a citizen of no ordinary city.” Before that he and others fear that he will be turned over ”to the Gentiles,” non-Jews.
Saul in the Gospels expresses his desire to preach to the Gentiles. Acts 13:46, ”turn to the Gentiles”. As until then the followers of Jesus had been preaching only to Jews, as Jesus commanded.
We have numerous writings by Saul (or ”Paul”), though also a large number of forgeries to make religious or political points throughout history. There are no writings by Yeshua/Jesus, so we learn of him entirely from the writings of Saul and others, such as Mark. Mark wrote his gospel after talking to Petrus, real name Simon, Jesus' disciple and a fisherman from the Jewish town of Bethsaida, בית צידה.
The rise of Christianity primarily among the slaves, servants and freedmen in the Roman empire coincides with the era when the emperors came to be referred to as gods. Mimicking this, the followers of Saul's teachings then began to refer to Jesus as a god as well. But they never said he wasn't a Jew.