The prophesied rise of the Romans comes on the heels of a vanquished Greek Empire and forces the overthrow of the Hasmonean Dynasty, which ruled Judea for a hundred years. With the arrival of the promised Messiah, the nation of Judah receives, and largely rejects, the Messianic message, leading to a shift in the movement and the creation of the leavened Christian religion.

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Shalom, and welcome to our history podcast. This is a production of Kingdom Preppers.org. I’m your host, Kingdom Prepper, and you’re listening to: Churchianity: Two Thousand Years of Leaven. We begin with our history.

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Part 1: Laying the Foundation

Long before the Crusades, the land of Palestine was the scene of strife and conflict between powerful nations that battled for its control. Positioned strategically at important crossroads that connected Egypt to Mesopotamia and Asia Minor to Arabia, Palestine was viewed as an important strip of land by envious onlookers over many centuries. The people who inhabited this region, therefore, had to suffer the brutality of war, invasion, bondage, and even exile, repeatedly.

Then, in the fourth century, BCE, with the entrance of Alexander the Great and his conquering Macedonian army, a new power controlled the region. But Alexander soon fell ill and died, leaving behind a vulnerable empire that quickly splintered. The rise of the Greek Empire was prophesied in the Book of Daniel of course, and in chapter 8, his vision of a ram and a goat coming to blows was interpreted by the heavenly messenger Gabriel as follows:

[20] The two-horned ram represents the kings of Media and Persia. [21] The shaggy male goat represents the king of Greece, and the large horn between its eyes represents the first king of the Greek Empire. [22] The four prominent horns that replaced the one large horn show that the Greek Empire will break into four sections, with four kings, none of them as great as the first.

—Daniel 8:20 – 22

Before all was said and done, however, Greek influence, mingled with pagan elements borrowed from conquered civilizations—a concoction widely known as Hellenism—swept through Palestine and its surrounding environs. At its core, Hellenism consisted of a belief in various deities derived from different nations and peoples. This ideology was largely rejected by the Hebrews of the day, but the Romans and many of the people they conquered, lived by it. So it was an evil the Hebrews had to struggle against on a daily basis. But after the Greek occupation, they eventually lost that struggle.

A rebellion broke out in the second century BCE when the Maccabees revolted against their Greek rulers. Their ultimate victory resulted in a century of independence under what became the Hasmonean dynasty, but the eventual successors of the victorious Maccabees gave in to the overwhelming sway of Hellenism. Many of the Hebrews who were strict observers of Torah protested against the Hellenistic rulers and were persecuted for their efforts.

This internal Hebrew strife was seen as weakness by the Romans, and, seizing on the moment, general Pompey marched in and conquered Palestine for Rome in 63 BCE, breaking the grip the last independent Maccabee, Aristobulus II, held over the region. When Aristobulus II was deposed by Pompey, this set in motion prophetic events that would leave Rome as the ruling power in Palestine at the time of the first coming of the long-awaited Messiah. For the next two millennia, Rome’s influence over the world would never wane, though the nation itself would eventually collapse, reemerge as something entirely different, and, over time, lose the immense power it once wielded.

So, with the stage firmly set for the Roman Empire, it is under its iron rule that a major set of prophecies regarding the Messiah find their fulfillment. As chapter two of the book of Luke opens, we are given details about the Roman power during the time of Yeshua’s birth. We learn who its current emperor was, and even the governor of one of its conquered states:

[1] At that time the Roman emperor, Augustus, decreed that a census should be taken throughout the Roman Empire. [2] (This was the first census taken when Quirinius was governor of Syria.)

—Luke 2:1 – 2

By the time Yeshua was full grown, on the cusp of his immersion by his cousin, John, we are given new details about the Roman powers of that day:

[1] It was now the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius, the Roman emperor. Pilate was governor over Judea; Herod Antipas was ruler over Galilee; his brother Philip was ruler over Iturea and Traconitis; Lysanias was ruler over Abilene.

—Luke 3:1

With this, we see that Roman rule was near absolute in Palestine, via tetrarchs based in Syria (particularly Abilene), client kings firmly established in Galilee in the north and Judea in the south, and other legates, puppet governors, and various and sundry government officials sprinkled here and there throughout that part of the empire. Roman culture infused everyday life for much of its citizens, and that culture was mixed with that of the recent empire it had conquered: Greece, creating a Greco-Roman ideology.

As stated, Roman influence would be carried well into the future, as we see governments throughout time, including many countries of our day, have based their civil laws on the ancient Roman law code, and structured their governing bodies on the pattern of the Roman senate (think parliament, Congress, etc.). But more than that, when we look at Rome’s army, culled from the Roman citizenry who made up the legions, and the auxiliary composed of non-Roman tribes, we see more similarities in our modern armies. Roman soldiers were the military police of the day, a constant presence throughout Rome’s vast territories, always on hand to quell disturbances and keep the peace, as it were. When they weren’t engaged in military campaigns, the Roman army was tasked with building roads and other public works, much like our Army Corps of Engineers today.

The official language of the Roman government, Latin, not only became the language of the church from the second century onward, but also of many so-called Christians of that era. The Romance languages of Europe and Central and South America descended from Latin; Latin is also the language built into the modern American judicial system, and is the basis for scientific names found in biology as well as many words in English. Since Rome built its culture on that of the Greeks, however, making for a Greco-Roman mixture, as stated, Greek language and customs were also prevalent in the realm.

Though Rome’s influence was widespread and its control nearly absolute, not all endured this quietly. The Hellenistic successors of the ruling Maccabees, those who adopted the name Herod, incited rebellion by pushing forth pagan policies and practices that upset Judahites who were devoted to upholding the Torah and the belief in the sole Creator, Yah. When Yeshua was still a child, history records one such uprising (though a failed one) against Herod’s son and successor, Archelaus. The only mention of Archelaus is found in the book of Matthew. After Heord’s death, Joseph has a dream while in Egypt and is told by a heavenly messenger to return to the land of Israel. So he got up and returned with Yeshua and his mother. Then Matthew records:

[22] But when he learned that the new ruler was Herod’s son Archelaus, he was afraid. . . .

—Matthew 2:22

Due to the Judahite revolt against him, Archelaus had to call in the Roman army to supress it, and the army ended up destroying a Galilean city and killing many Judahites, including their leader, Judas the Galilean. It is to this historic event that the Pharisee Gamaliel refers in cautioning the Sanhedrin to be tolerant of Yeshua’s emissaries.

[35] Then he addressed his colleagues as follows, “Men of Israel, take care what you are planning to do to these men! [36] Some time ago there was that fellow Theudas, who pretended to be someone great. About 400 others joined him, but he was killed, and his followers went their various ways. The whole movement came to nothing. [37] After him, at the time of the census, there was Judas of Galilee. He got some people to follow him, but he was killed, too, and all his followers were scattered.”

—Acts 5:35 – 37

Commenting on Acts 5:37, The Zondervan Illustrated Bible Dictionary has an entry under Judas the Galilean, which states that:

“The enrollment or assessment for tax purposes here in view was that under Quirinius during his governorship of Syria in A.D. 6 – 7. [. . .] Judas of Galilee [was] a founder of a fourth sect or school of philosophy among the [Judahites]. Those in this party agreed with the position of the Pharisees in all matters [. . .] except that they acknowledged [Elohim] alone to be their governor and [master] and were passionately devoted to liberty. With the support of a Pharisee named Saddok, Judas vigorously opposed the enrollment under Quirinius and engendered strife, violence, and bloodshed.”

This is the same Roman census and the same Syrian governor, Quirinius, mentioned earlier in Luke 2:1 – 2.

Uprisings became common among the Judahites following the Roman occupation. Many longed for the fulfillment of prophecies that promised deliverance from foreign rulers, who seemed to swoop in one after the other going back to Assyria and Babylon. But, failing to understand the timing of the prophecies, many were disillusioned by what seemed like a long delay in that deliverance coming about, so some Judahites decided to take matters into their own hands and force the fulfillment of those prophecies through open revolt. This led to the rise of the Zealots, a Judahite sect that violently opposed Roman domination. They were said to be the principle players in the great rebellion that broke out in 66 CE, which led to the destruction of Jerusalem four years later.

The oppressive occupations by various foreign powers did not only give rise to Judahite sects that fomented insurgencies, the suffering derived from those occupations also forced Judahites to splinter into factions that held widely varying views on Torah. This seemed to necessitate the creation of several official parties, therefore, such as the Pharisees and Sadducees, members of which formed much of the Sanhedrin, a Judahite council and powerful governing body that met in Jerusalem.

The Pharisees—who figured prominently in the life of Yeshua during his final years on earth—sprang out of the Babylonian exile. Following the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, and the subsequent exile of the nation of Judah, Judahite worship no longer centered around the temple. In fact, their worship setting was so radically altered by their captivity that it reshaped Judahite interpretation and application of Torah. What developed was a scribal movement, where the new focus was the preservation of both scripture and written oral tradition, as well as their strict, legal observance in an external sense, with new rites and ceremonies being introduced.

The Pharisees rose to become the primary teachers of the law among the first century Judahites. The name Pharisee is derived from an Aramaic word that means “separated ones,” which speaks to the attempt on their part to live a set apart life dedicated to Yah, via strict, legal observance of Torah according to their own interpretation. But they failed to see the spiritual aspects of the law and were blind to the prophecies that pointed to the Messiah, who often stood right before them. They also held to a unique but distorted oral tradition that pushed them further off the course of truth; a tradition that is honored in modern-day Judaism, which is practiced by descendants of the Khazarian Empire and is largely embodied in the Talmud.

The Sadducees, who rose to prominence a bit later, date back to the priestly aristocracy of the Hasmonean dynasty, when the descendants of the Maccabees ruled. Unlike the Pharisees, they rejected the oral tradition and adhered strictly to their interpretation of the Torah. Their beliefs, however, differed widely from that of the Pharisees and other Judahite sects. The Sadducees, who were part of the Judahite aristocracy, or ruling class, in Yeshua’s day, took charge of the temple in Jerusalem, with the backing of the Romans. And while the destruction of the temple and Jerusalem itself in 70 CE ended the line of the Sadducees, the Pharisees continued as a party long after.

Be reminded: of all the various sects that sprung up within Judah, the Pharisees and Sadducees are specifically singled out by the Messiah, who, when speaking of their false doctrine, cautioned his disciples to beware. Though the disciples mistook his comparison of leaven for what is found in bread, Yeshua bore with them and repeated his statement until they comprehended its full meaning:

[11] “How is it that you fail to understand that I did not speak about bread? Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.” [12] Then they understood that he did not tell them to beware of the leaven of bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees.

—Matthew 16:11 – 12

Those with spiritual discernment will take special note of this exchange, not missing the important prophetic implication. The Pharisees and Sadducees, by and large, were not to be trusted, yet their false teachings—and teachings akin to theirs—would spread like leaven throughout the earth for the next two millennia. We covered this topic in our enhanced scripture study video, The Pure Convocations, in the Feast of Weeks section.

We’ll be back with more exciting scriptural history . . . in a moment.

[MUSICAL INTERLUDE]

We now continue with our podcast.

The diaspora of the nation of Israel, which eventually impacted all twelve tribes, forced pockets of Hebrews to form communities wherever they went. And within the Roman Empire, this led to the establishment of various synagogues, which sat at the heart of many Israelite communities that had grown accustomed to worshipping away from a temple setting. This form of diaspora Israelite worship is integral to the history of Christianity, for it is through what became Judaism that Christianity, in its earliest form, was able to spread throughout the Roman Empire and beyond. Many Gentiles were drawn to the synagogues in those Israelite communities at the time of the emissaries; and it was the emissaries who provided them with an introduction to the Messiah. The book of Acts, chapters 10 and 11 illustrates this point.

Ironically, the Hebrew culture provided one of the most important assets for nascent Christianity: the Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures. The need for a Greek version of Scripture came with the expulsion of the Israelites from their homeland. Assimilation into various nations led to the loss of their native language, and since the Greeks left their stamp on societies within the borders of what became the Roman Empire, that left new generations of Israelites with little choice but to learn Greek. East of that territory, Aramaic was adopted by other Israelites in the diaspora, and therefore a translation of Scripture was called for in that language.

The Greek Scriptures were known as the Septuagint, or Version of the Seventy, named for the seventy-two Israelite scholars tasked with its translation in the third century BCE. It was widely used by early Christians in their missionary efforts, many of them Gentiles who began to outnumber the Israelites in this new belief. The word Christian itself, which originated from the Greek, would soon embody a set of beliefs and practices that looked far different from its Hebraic root, which the original twelve emissaries, and Yeshua himself, taught. Christianity, therefore, developed and spread throughout the Greco-Roman world as a result of Gentiles, irrespective of its origins within a sect of Judahites. And its spread was so broad and thorough that by the fourth century CE, the Roman Empire adopted it as its own religion.

Thereafter, Christianity evolved yet again, and was eventually dispensed to the wider world in various forms during the Papal Empire and following the Protestant Reformation. But, according to Yah’s perfect order, Scripture reveals that the nation of Israel was to be a light for the other nations. The Israelites were to bring the message of salvation to the world:

[6] He says: “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel; I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”

—Isaiah 49:6

This passage has yet to be fulfilled, absent the taint of doctrinal leaven brought on by Christianity and other religions. After Yeshua’s death, resurrection, and ascension, it fell to the emissaries to preach the good news of the Kingdom and proclaim the truth about Yeshua being the promised Messiah. They were to awaken and gather more Judahites to their numbers along with sleeping Hebrews from the other “lost” tribes who had since assimilated into other nations. This went well in the first few years that followed the ascension, and the emissaries held to their Hebraic faith while embracing the new turn of events, that being the Messianic element.

We also see this illustrated in early chapters of the book of Acts, where circumcision was still an important covenant practice, as well as the observance of Torah-ordained convocations such as Unleavened Bread. These and other Hebraic elements would live on in the early assemblies, perfectly enfolded with the Messianic truth. But the subsequent execution and forced removal of the original emissaries and other prominent figures such as Stephen—left a vacuum of power that was quickly filled by others who did not share the view that all, Hebrews and Gentiles, were to fully live their lives by the precepts of Torah, as commanded by Yah himself.

[15] For the assembly, there shall be one statute for you and for the stranger who sojourns with you, a statute forever throughout your generations. . . . [29] You shall have one law for him who does anything unintentionally, for him who is native among the people of Israel and for the stranger who sojourns among them.

—Numbers 15:15, 29

There were two major assemblies established during the work of the emissaries: one in Jerusalem and the other in Antioch. Many of the believers in Jerusalem who held to the new Messianic faith were scattered following the persecution that was unleashed after the stoning of Stephen. This left the assembly in Antioch as the other main base of operation, where Hellenized Hebrews and Gentiles alike fellowshipped under the new name, “Christians.”

[26] (It was there at Antioch that the believers were first called Christians.)

—Acts: 11:26

With so many Hebrews and Gentiles from varying parts of the realm attracted to the Messianic message, disputes erupted concerning several Torah principles that had long been held as cemented truths. Circumcision was one item; foods sacrificed to idols was another. Encountering the vast number of uncircumcised Gentiles and Hebrews who had lost their way in the diaspora, forced some of the leadership to call these principles into question. Disputes like these caused certain allowances to be made concerning the law, wherein Gentiles were afforded a different, more relaxed set of rules to live by.

These disputes eventually led to a split between those who labored in the field to awaken new believers, and thus, going forward, the focus of the missionaries was forever divided. By the end of the first century, many of what used to be Hebrew assemblies became Christian churches, which were dominated by Gentiles who relished the idea that the church leadership did not require them to observe the whole of Torah.

As a result of the split, as well as infiltration by leaders and congregants who were staunch adherents to Hellenism, variant false teachings sprang up in the assemblies and pagan practices were introduced to the worship. We see evidence of this in the first few chapters of Revelation, where Yeshua, by means of a prophetic vision, has John write a series of letters to several established assemblies rebuking its members for their immorality and pagan practices, and essentially for losing their way, as it were. The work of the doctrinal leaven was now fully underway, and its effects would not be reversed, nor its progress slowed, for the next two millennia, fulfilling the representation of the two leavened loaves at the heart of the Feast of Weeks.

The death knell to the Hebraic roots of the Christian movement, however, came with the martyrdom of the last leading emissaries, and, finally, the destruction of the temple and Jerusalem itself, in 70 CE. Hebrews were also banished from Jerusalem altogether following the Bar Kokhba revolt in 135 CE, thus ending the reign of Jerusalem as the geographical center of the Messianic movement. Thereafter, Christianity would be severed nearly entirely from its Hebraic root and would cease to resemble the body of beliefs and practices that stemmed directly from Torah, which the emissaries and Yeshua himself, originally intended.

At some point, just prior to the close of the first century, many non-Messianic Judahite synagogues excluded Messianic believers from their membership. This left the few remaining Messianic Judahites barred both from traditional Judahite circles as well as the new Christian movement, which had since distinguished itself from Judahite practices while still claiming the Hebraic Scriptures as their own. With the expulsion of Judahites from Jerusalem by the Romans after 135 CE, the assembly in Palestine also became mostly Gentile. The last three strands of Judahite Messianism known to us, therefore, are these:

The Elkesaites, the Ebionites, and the Nazoraeans.

The Elkesaites, quite different from any other group, were Gnostic in the extreme. They owe their name to a supposed prophet who figured prominently in a Gnostic book of revelation that originated around the second century CE. The Elkesaites inspired future groups that preserved Gnostic thought and practices, which are also a result of the doctrinal leaven Yeshua spoke of.

The Ebionites were Judahites who were not fully Messianic, though they held that Gentile converts had to submit to Torah. They believed some truths concerning Yeshua and held him to be the Messiah, but they rejected certain aspects of his birth, life, and pre-existence. They also ate no meat and performed ritual washings. They cherished the book of Matthew, but also produced their own Messianic accounts and Acts of the Emissaries.

The Nazoraeans, on the other hand, while strict adherents to Torah themselves, accepted Gentile converts without requiring them to submit to the same Law. Despite the compromise, the Nazoraeans also vanished from history.

Aside from fragments that shed some light on the preceding, little of the history of Judahite Messianism remains. Hebrews who embraced the Messiah in those early years soon faded from the scene entirely, being overshadowed by the new Christian movement that was largely Gentile. And it would be Gentiles who would carry its message to the world, either by point of the sword or more peaceful missionary efforts. But the message that was carried was loaded with leaven.

That wraps it up for this episode of Churchianity: Two Thousand Years of Leaven. A production of Kingdom Preppers.org, this episode was written, produced, and hosted by yours truly, Kingdom Prepper. All praise, honor, and glory are due to my boss, Yah Elohim, and to his right hand, Yahushua HaMashiach. You can access the transcript for this episode on our website. Yah willing, our history will continue in the next podcast. Shalom.

Keywords: diaspora, Maccabee, Khazarian Empire, Hasmonean dynasty, Aristobulus II, Archelaus, Pharisee, Sadducee, Sanhedrin, Elkesaites, Ebionites, Nazoraeans, Bar Kokhba, churchianity, two thousand years of leaven, history of Christianity, church history, Hebrew history, kingdom preppers, kp