Jesus, an Adolescent in the Jewish Culture

The Introduction to Chapters 6 and 7 for free subscribers

It’s easy for us modern Americans to forget that Jesus was a Jew and would have grown up heavily involved in that culture. In the following chapters, we explore what it was like to be a Jewish young person, with all the various aspects of Judaism we might not expect.

For one thing we tend to think of Jews as celebrating their faith just as Christians do, with attendance at the synagogue on the Sabbath being the prime focus of worship. This is not the case. In fact, worship at a synagogue is considered by many scholars to have been a relatively late development in the early history of the Jewish faith, and it did not replace the prime focus of Jewish worship done in the home. The father taught the children and lead the family in worship on the evening of the Sabbath (the beginning of their seventh day), following the end of the sixth day.

Their days actually started in the evening as one can see in the story of the creation: “and the evening and the morning were the first day," Genesis 1:5. Each day in the creation uses that same expression of a completed day. Having the evening to be the start of the new day seems strange to us, because we are not used to it and our calendar days start with the morning. The Jewish 7th day of the week started at sundown, when the 6th day ended.

In my book, you will see many other interesting aspects of the Jewish culture. As just mentioned, Sabbath worship was conducted by the father in the home, in the evening. Jews in Jesus time did indeed go to the synagogue the following morning, but it was not considered to be the major focus of the Jewish religion. Nor were rabbis completely analogous to today's Christian pastors/ministers. Rabbis possibly taught short lessons on the Sabbath in the synagogue, but did not necessarily provide long sermons. There was a synagogue ruler who ran what happened. I share more about the synagogue in the book.

The rabbis were primarily teachers. Priests were in charge of major sacrifices which were performed in Jerusalem. Some major feast days were celebrated in the homes. The rabbis were also available to teach the fathers the correct way to conduct feast days, which were set up in the Law of Moses. Rabbis also trained aspiring rabbis.

In Chapter 6, we look at Jesus' life after age 13: Jews in the first century did not think of the years following age 13 to be a separate cultural experience such as our concepts of the teenage years. The had no separate term for young people in those years. Boys, at age 13 and girls at age 12 were technically considered to be adults, although boys were treated more as fledgling adults. Girls were more likely to marry during these early years than did boys, with most girls getting engaged between ages 13 and 15 and marrying between ages 14 and 16.

Although turning 13 had some special significance, the tradition of having a highly celebrated bar Mitzvah was not established until the 13th century, AD, and even later for the bat Mitzvah for girls. In practical terms, during Jesus' lifetime, a boy turning 13 mostly meant that the father would increase the time that he spent teaching his son his view of what constituted manhood, including learning a trade, and preparing for marriage. However, many fathers, like Joseph, would have already been teaching their sons the rudiments of their trade well before age 13. It would just be an increase in time and emphasis after age 13, but with most young men marrying after age 20, with the exception of the very rich who usually married before that age.

As just mentioned, included in the preparation for adulthood was the preparation for marriage. Parents in Jesus day had a lot of final say concerning decisions of marriage for their sons and daughters, because marriages were arranged by parents. You will learn more about the details of marriage preparation in my book.

Classes with the local rabbi for boys, ages 6 - 12 would end at age 13. These classes had been initiated by the Jewish high priest around the beginning of the First Century, to teach boys more thoroughly the elementary aspects of Jewish law. The level of academic work involving reading is not known. It is thought that a rudimentary level of reading would have been taught so that men could read enough to do business in the business world. The classes would also include aspects of the most important parts of Jewish family worship, especially regarding feast days, which were also being taught in the home through weekly example.

Some scholars think that most Jewish men would have known the Greek language, since it was the most prevalent business language in the "civilized" world of the Roman Empire. It might have been comparable to the current knowledge of English throughout the more developed nations of Europe and Asia. People speak their native language and learn English as well. Knowing some Greek could be the reason James and Peter were able to write epistles, although it would have been possible for both to have dictated the epistles to scribes, as the Apostle Paul sometimes did, even though he was quite literate, being a Roman citizen, as well as being a scholarly Pharisee before his conversion.

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