The Christian Perspective
One of the problems that we run into, when studying the customs of Yeshua (Jesus), is that we don’t always end up with the picture we would expect to find. In the Forward to Dr. Brad Young’s book Jesus, the Jewish Theologian, Marvin Wilson writes:
Among many Christians, Jesus as a historic figure remains largely removed from Judaism and the first-century Jewish culture.
This point was ever so starkly brought to my attention several years ago through a piece of Sunday school literature, which came across my desk. It was written for grade school children and produced by a leading denominational publishing house. The part which caught my eye was a full-page drawing of Jesus. He was depicted as a boy and shown going up steps leading into a building. Underneath the drawing was this caption: “Jesus was a good Christian boy who went to church every Sunday.”
There is a major problem in trying to educate children about being a good Christian. The historical facts do not support our world-view of what Christianity is all about. Therefore, in order to continue supporting a perspective that has gone a little astray, it becomes necessary to alter history by changing a few items and just plain not telling the truth about others.
After all ... if you were to have printed the caption “Jesus was a good Jewish boy who went to Synagogue every Saturday,” it certainly would not really fit in our 21st century view of Christianity.