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danieldwilliamI recently read excellent two posts about a Jewish person’s reaction to the term Judaeo-Christian. Both posts touched on the use of the Old Testament by Christianity and Christian theologians. This doesn’t do either of the interesting posts justice but they could be crudely summarised as “These are *our* stories” and “These are our stories and we’ve been thinking about them in a different way from you for a long time.”
At least, that’s partly what I took from them.
They didn’t feel like *my* stories.
And this got me thinking about whether I think I am part of the Judaeo-Christian culture. I’m not so sure I really am. I might have identified myself as part of that culture until recently but these two posts got me thinking about where my cultural roots really lie.
I’ve never read the Bible entire or the Torah in part. I’ve been to church perhaps a dozen times in my life – including weddings. I’ve never been to synagogue and I’ve been to one Jewish wedding (sort of). I don’t take a particular interest in Jewish history compared to the history of other peoples (except where they bump up against Rome or my mum). I don’t take a particular interest in the history of Christianity. In fact my interest in Roman history is pretty much bounded by the adoption of Christianity as a the state religion by Constantine.
I have spent years reading Roman law, Roman jurisprudence, Greek philosophy and jurisprudence and political philosophy grounded in Greek and Roman foundations. I’ve read more Greek and Roman theology than I have Christian. More Homer and Euripides, Cicero and Juvenal than Mathew, Mark, Luke or John.
I’m sure my meme pool is really awash with Jewish and Christian ideas but they don’t come alive for me the way Greek or Roman one’s do when I become aware of them.
These things are obviously really complicated and multi-layered and it’s very likely to be impossible to pick out the cultural influences in real time.
But if I had to chose to label myself at Judaeo-Christian or Greco-Roman I would pick Greco-Roman.
At least, that’s partly what I took from them.
They didn’t feel like *my* stories.
And this got me thinking about whether I think I am part of the Judaeo-Christian culture. I’m not so sure I really am. I might have identified myself as part of that culture until recently but these two posts got me thinking about where my cultural roots really lie.
I’ve never read the Bible entire or the Torah in part. I’ve been to church perhaps a dozen times in my life – including weddings. I’ve never been to synagogue and I’ve been to one Jewish wedding (sort of). I don’t take a particular interest in Jewish history compared to the history of other peoples (except where they bump up against Rome or my mum). I don’t take a particular interest in the history of Christianity. In fact my interest in Roman history is pretty much bounded by the adoption of Christianity as a the state religion by Constantine.
I have spent years reading Roman law, Roman jurisprudence, Greek philosophy and jurisprudence and political philosophy grounded in Greek and Roman foundations. I’ve read more Greek and Roman theology than I have Christian. More Homer and Euripides, Cicero and Juvenal than Mathew, Mark, Luke or John.
I’m sure my meme pool is really awash with Jewish and Christian ideas but they don’t come alive for me the way Greek or Roman one’s do when I become aware of them.
These things are obviously really complicated and multi-layered and it’s very likely to be impossible to pick out the cultural influences in real time.
But if I had to chose to label myself at Judaeo-Christian or Greco-Roman I would pick Greco-Roman.
