Origins of Christianity - Emergence of Rabbinic Judaism and Christianity

Emergence of Rabbinic Judaism and Christianity

Main article: Split of early Christianity and Judaism

The split between Rabbinic Judaism (the period of the Tannaim) and Early Christianity is commonly attributed to the rejection of Jesus in his hometown c.30, the Council of Jerusalem c.50, the Destruction of the Second Temple in 70, the postulated Council of Jamnia c.90 and/or the Bar Kokhba revolt of 132–135. However, rather than a sudden split, there was a slowly growing chasm between Christians and Jews in the 1st centuries. Even though it is commonly thought that Paul established a Gentile church, it took centuries for a complete break to manifest. However, certain events are perceived as pivotal in the growing rift between Christianity and Judaism.

Robert Goldenberg asserts that it is increasingly accepted among scholars that "at the end of the 1st century CE there were not yet two separate religions called "Judaism" and "Christianity".

Historians continue to debate the precise moment when Christianity established itself as a new religion, apart and distinct from Judaism. Some scholars view Christians and Pharisees as being competing movements within Judaism that decisively broke only after the Bar Kokhba revolt, when the successors of the Pharisees claimed hegemony over all Judaism, and Christianity emerged as a new religion.

According to historian Shaye Cohen the separation of Christianity from Judaism was a process, not an event. The essential part of this process was that the church was becoming more and more gentile, and less and less Jewish, but the separation manifested itself in different ways in each local community where Jews and Christians dwelt together. In some places, the Jews expelled the Christians; in other, the Christians left of their own accord. According to Cohen, this process ended in 70 CE, after the great revolt, when various Jewish sects disappeared and Pharisaic Judaism evolved into Rabbinic Judaism and Christianity emerged as a distinct religion.