In creating a compendium of Jewish law (halakhah) and folklore (aggadah), the authors of the Talmud inevitably responded to the emergence of the new sect of Judeo-Christians taking place in Roman Palestine and their evolution into a distinct religious group, Christianity, especially as these events paralleled the evolution of the Mishnah, the earliest recorded Talmudic text. As such, one would expect to find considerable discussion of the person of Jesus Christ in the Talmud as part of an effort to understand the events of the time. Furthermore, one would expect that the text would refer to Jesus and his followers from a legalistic perspective, as well as from a folkloric perspective: the former would govern relations between adherents of "normative" Judaism and the new religion; the latter would provide insights into the attitudes of the Jewish leadership and commonfolk toward the new religion and its founder.
Based on a perusal of the Talmud, this is not the case. Standardized volumes of the Talmud make no mention of Jesus per se, and little mention of the early Christians. There are several reasons for this:
- Perhaps the most important reason is censorship. During the medieval period in Europe, Jewish texts were often placed on the Index of Forbidden Books and passages deemed insulting to the Church were expurgated as of 1263. In fact, the entire Talmud was placed on the Index by Pope Paul IV in 1559. Since modern print editions of the Talmud date from later than that, these passages do not appear.
- Nevertheless, even if these passages were restored, there would still not be as many of them as would be expected. One reason for this is that the Mishnah, which forms the skeleton of the Talmud, was written at a time when Christianity was first emerging, and it was just one of many sects with which the authors of the Mishnah contended (others included Sadducees, Samaritans, and Gnostics). At that time, there was little indication of the success that Christianity would have in dominating the religious beliefs of the Roman Empire.
- This reasoning can be extended to the final redaction of the primary version of the Talmud used today, the Babylonian Talmud, which took place in Babylonia. Although there was certainly a Christian presence in the country, the religion did not have the same impact there as it did in the Mediterranean Basin: it was just one of several religious traditions that generally lived together in a spirit of mutual respect and tolerance. Christianity was not perceived as the same threat to Judaism as it was elsewhere.
- Although it is generally comprehensive, the Talmud is also prone to instances of self-censorship, particularly in response to controversial Jewish factionalism. For example, the holiday of Hanukkah is only mentioned in passing in the Mishnah and receives just a few lines in the Gemara (the explication of the Mishnah--together the two constitute the Talmud) because of the holiday's connection with the Hasmonean dynasty, whose legitimacy was challenged by the Pharisees and later exponents of "normative" Judaism. It is possible that a similar attitude was adopted by the redactors of the Talmud in response to the Judeo-Christians and their descendants, the Christians.
- Jesus and Christianity are mentioned, albeit in coded terms. The most common of these is probably min (מין, literally "heretic"), though this term can (and does) also refer to various other sectarian groups, as mentioned above. Similarly, Tractate Yoma reports a debate between ש "Sadducee" and the Rabbis over whether the destruction of the Temple indicated that God had rejected the Jewish people. In this case, the term Sadducee was obviously a reference to the Church. (In terms of labeling Christians as "heretics," it is important to note the adage of Rav Nahman in the name of Rava bar Avuha in Tractate Hulin 13b: אין מינין באומות עובדי כוכבים, "There are no heretics among the gentiles," i.e., the appelation could only be applied to Jews who forsook their faith, but not to converts to Christianity from other religions.
- On the eve of Passover Jesus was hanged. For forty days before the execution took place, a herald went forth and cried, “He is going forth to be stoned because he has practiced sorcery and enticed Israel to apostasy. Anyone who can say anything in his favor let him come forward and plead on his behalf.” But since nothing was brought forward in his favor, he was hanged on the eve of Passover. Ulla retorted: Do you suppose he was one for whom a defense could be made? Was he not an "enticer," concerning whom Scripture says, ”Neither shall thou spare nor shall thou conceal him?” With Jesus, however, it was different, for he was connected with the government. Sanhedrin 43a
The text appears in the context of a legal discussion of the procedures leading up to the implementation of the death penalty: Jewish law requires that forty days lapse between the ruling of the court and the actual execution so that additional defenses can be offered on behalf of the condemned. While this ruling does not apply in the case of someone who leads others into sin (such as Jesus was perceived to be), it did apply in his case because of his connections with the government.
Although it was written some 300 years after the Crucifixion and does not appear in most editions of the Talmud, the passage is interesting because it provides insight into how Jesus was perceived by Jews c. 300-400 A.D., at the time the Church was gaining sway over the Roman Empire (though the authors, living in Babylonia, were not directly affected by this). According to this, Jesus was guilty of two offenses punishable by death: sorcery, and enticing others to apostasy.
Another expunged text (Sanhedrin 107a) claims that while Jesus did engage in sorcery and enticed others to sin, at least some of the blame should be placed on a noted sage, Yehoshua ben Perachiah, one of the authors of the Mishnah. Accordng to this text, Jesus was a sage who fled to Egypt with Yehoshua ben Perachiah to escape persecution under the Hasmonean King Alexander Jannai (see above for the relationship between the Hasmoneans and the sages of the Talmud). While there, he fell in love with a beautiful woman, for which he was scolded by Yehoshua ben Perachia. When he came to repent, Yehoshua ben Perachiah was about to recite the Shema Yisrael prayer and was covering his eyes (a ritual to enhance concentration), but Jesus misinterpreted this as a sign of rejection, and went and seduced the woman. He also hung a brick, and bowed down to it. When he next came before Yehoshua ben Perachiah, he explained that he had learned from Yehoshua ben Perachiah that anyone who sins and leads others to sin is incapable of repenting. In this context, the Talmud castigates Yehoshua ben Perachiah for not being more forgiving.
Although it is clearly anachronistic (Alexander Jannai lived about 80 BCE), this latter story is interesting because it highlights the importance of forgiveness and seems to criticize the Jewish leadership for failing to be as forgiving as the Christians (personified by Jesus). Failure to forgive seems to have led to the schism between the early Church and the Jews.
Nevertheless, both stories conclude that Jesus was executed after undergoing due process by Jewish law. Whatever the cause, it argues that Jesus had committed acts that fell outside the scope of Jewish law and deserved to be punished for that. Such a statement, made from distant Babylonia, would not be considered inflammatory, nor would it endanger the local Jewish community.
Still, there remains a certain ambiguity in the texts. Jesus received a punishment he deserved, but at the same time he was also in some way a victim of a certain Jewish intransigence. In that sense, it can be argued that the Jewish critique of Jesus as it appears in the Talmud is a reflection of Jewish self-criticism and a call for greater leniency in the fulfilment of the Law.
Summing up, there are many quotes which deal with false messiahs named Yeshu or Yeshuva; interestingly, in the Talmud the name "Yeshua" became a stand-in for many people considered to be false Jewish messiahs in early rabbinic Judaism, both real people and legendary. Many of the stories are far removed from anything writtem in the New Testament; many scholars are convinced that some of these people, often identified as "Jesus", cannot be about the Christian Jesus. Instead, they are a conflation of views about early Christianity, views of previous Jewish messiah claimiants, and legend.
