Status Updates From The Jewish Annotated New Te...

Revelation's references to a "synagogue of satan" have inspired reams of anti-Jewish bile over the centuries. But in context, John is scorning gentile (Pauline?) Jesus-followers who have assumed a Judaic identity but practice what John views as a watered-down halakhah. For him, salvation is not effected by repentance or even by Christ per se, but only by a strict, quasi-Qumranic priestly, filial, and sexual purity.

"Let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God."

James 1:19-20


Wisdom for our time.

Sleeper, awake!
Rise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you.

Eph. 5:14: Possibly quoting an early Christian hymn adapted from Isaiah (51:17, 60:1, etc.)

"Christ" is the state of being infused with and deified by God, who is spirit (Jn 4:24). The spirit anointed ("christened") the prophets, kings, and judges of old, but Jesus is the first mortal to have been transformed and immortalized by it, gaining intercessory power to spiritualize the rest of us. Even the lordship of Jesus is to be shared by the saints, who will judge the world and the angels (1Cor 6:2-3).

Paul envisions a radical co-equality between Jesus and the saints. The spirit of God which raised Jesus into the heavens is the same "spirit of adoption" which makes the saints into children and "joint heirs" of God with Jesus (Rom 8:14-15, 17). Jesus is "firstborn among many brothers [and sisters]" (Rom. 8:29): he's our big brother in God's spiritual family.

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