The Anti-Jewish Strand in the New Testament

Abstract

The anti-Jewish strand that we encounter in the New Testament has two manifestations: 1. Segments that contain language that disparages Jews, Judaism, or Jewish beliefs and traditions. The segments in this chapter include some of the best-known instances of anti-Jewish bias in the New Testament. The charts that follow are my summary of 233 segments identified by N. Beck as reflective of anti-Jewish textual bias 1; 44 segments are redundancies that originate in the Synoptic phenomenon. They do, however, contribute independently to the anti-Jewish impact of the texts. 2. Themes, motifs, and theological constructs that disparage Jews, Judaism, or Jewish beliefs and traditions. These will be introduced in the chapters ahead.