Vocabulary: ReligiousMessiah ..................... A Hebrew word meaning "Anointed One".
Jesus was anointed, (given special abilities), by God's Holy Spirit, to be "King of the Jews". He was also anointed as the High Priest, and Prophet of God's people. For, "He is a priest forever, after the order of Melchizedec." (Psalm 110:4 & Hebrews 5:6) And God had said, "I will raise them up a Prophet from among them." (Deuteronomy 18:18) Note that I have capitalized the words "High Priest" and "Prophet." Jesus was the High Priest of God (see Hebrews 3:1), and the Prophet that was to come.
Christ ......................... The Greek word for "Messiah".
Jesus .......................... Savior
Disciple ...................... A learner. One who learns by close relationship with his teacher.
Jesus chose twelve men to be his disciples. Later on they became apostles.
Apostle ....................... "One who is sent".
Jesus first called his disciples "apostles" in Matthew chapter 10 when he sent them out to preach and to heal. Before that they were known as "learners", or (disciples).
Tax Collector ............. A Jew who collected taxes for Rome.
Matthew was a tax collector before he met Jesus.
Publican ...................... Another word for tax collector.
Zealot ......................... A patriot Jew in favor of the violent overthrow of Roman rule.
Just before Jesus was born, a group of zealots had revolted against Rome, and had been crushed. Simon, another one of Jesus' disciples, had been a zealot before he met Christ.
Pharisee ...................... A student, or a graduate of one of the rabbinical schools
teaching strict obedience to all the laws of Moses, and the
traditions added by men!
Scribe .......................... A person who made copies of the Old Testament,
... especially the first Five Books of Moses, (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy), otherwise known as "the books of the law." The Jewish people called these five books of the law the "Torah". Copies had to be made by hand, and were therefore quite expensive, and highly prized. There were many scribes in Jesus' day because copying these books by hand took a long time, and every family wanted a Torah. Every community had a synagogue, and every Synagogue had a copy of the Old Testament, or at least the Torah. Most Scribes were very well paid* and were of the priestly class. They were also influential as religious leaders, and consulted as experts on the Law.
*(A copy of the Torah cost a year's wages It took that long to make it.)
Rabbi .......................... A religious teacher, especially one who teaches the Torah, (the first five books of the Bible). Although the Torah declared that the Levites were supposed to be the rabbis (teachers) of Israel, most of the Rabbis were in Jesus' day were Pharisees, and most of the Pharisees were from the tribe of Judah, not Levi.
Sadducee .....................The Chief Priest and other priests related to him were Sadducees. They did not believe in the
resurrection of the dead. They did not believe in heaven or hell, or in angels or demons either.
But the Pharisees did believe in all of these things, so the Sadducees were against them.
The Sadducees were able to use their wealth to buy the High Priesthood from the
Romans. The Sadducees controlled the Sanhedrin - the religious court of the Jews.
Levite ..........................A male of the tribe of Levi, (one of Israel's 12 tribes).
The Levites had the service of the temple. 210 of them guarded the doors, (to make sure no unclean person could come in). Other Levites cleaned the temple after the sacrifices, washed the vessels, and sang as a choir. Historians say there were over 10,000 temple guards in Jesus' day. All the guards were Levites.
Priest .......................... Only Levite males descended from Aaron, (Moses' brother) could be priests.
A priest was one who offered sacrifices for the people. In Jesus' day there were 24 groups of priests who took turns offering the sacrifices of the temple.
High Priest ................. "Chief Priest" A priest of the family of Aaron, of the tribe of Levi, chosen to be High Priest.
The High Priests of Jesus' day were corrupt because of their love for money. They had bought the position from the Romans - and they probably were not of the family of Aaron.
Synagogue .................. Jewish house of worship.
Many Synagogues also taught reading and writing, the Torah, and Jewish ceremonial law, (the laws pertaining to the Temple and its sacrifices.)
Temple ........................ The center of Jewish life, and faith, it was located in Jerusalem.
It had an outer "court of the Gentiles, the "inner court", the Holy Place, and the Holy of Holies. The sacrifices for sin took place in the temple. All good Jews came to the temple at least once a year, for the Passover. (diagram)
Passover .................... A feast to remember the Israelite's flight from Egypt, when they
escaped from the Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, under the leadership
of Moses, by God's power.
Gentile ........................Anyone who was not a Jew. Gentiles were not allowed in the
temple except in the outer court. For that reason the outer
court was called "The Court of the Gentiles."
Discussion Question:
As you can see from this list, there were many groups in the land of Palestine during the time of Christ. All of the groups were opposed to each other, and fought with each other all the time. But there was a baby boy, named Jesus, born in Bethlehem who could change all of that. How would he do it? Eventually he had followers from each of these groups. How did that happen? What can we learn from this? How can we be like Christ?
Memory verse: "You will call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins."
Matthew 1:21