Little Donkey Carry Mary.... Through Roadblocks and Tanks ---------------------------
The other day I ran by this article about trying to understand what Jesus' life might have been like in the 1st Century. The author went around trying to place himself in this context by consulting Palestinian "refugees" in Israel and attempting to understand how they felt crossing through all those checkpoints.
Dear webmaster, I am shocked at what I read in this article. http://www.cms-uk.org/news/2005/bethlehem_231205.htm
It has already been a propaganda ploy to equate the State of Israel with the Nazi regime. This "effort" has largely been lead by Palestinian propaganda outlets, eager to weaken Israel's integrity by attempting to demostrate that Israeli's (Jews) are guilty of doing to others what was done to them. Ironically, it is only when the propagandists need to compare Israel to Nazi Germany when they concede that the Holocaust did in fact occur. Other than that, they deem it an exaggeration or an all-out lie. Needless to say, the analogies are weak and improbable, to say the least. Your usage of "the suffering Palestinian" narrative, actually heeding the grievances of Fassed, to try to place yourself in the life and times of Jesus is quite grotesque. Jesus was a Jew, "Palestine" was his home, not the home of Muslim Arab invaders that came and snatched from it their hands generations later. In the name of historical accuracy, it would be more fitting to compare the oppressive and aggressive occupying Roman force to the Arab invaders of the 7th century, whom were the first Muslims. The Jews have regained some control of their rightful sovereignty in their homeland, Israel, which you call "Palestine," only to be obstructed by problem-ridden Arab countries whom wish to see Israel go away. If you realize the backwardness of this situation momentarily, you might start crying. Israel is the Jewish Holy Land, only holy to Islam as a means to garner political control. The Palestinians are not refugees in Israel, they are the remnants of invaders, belonging to Arab countries that didn't succeed in military attempts to destroy Israel (such as the 1948 and 1967 wars). Your analogy between Jesus and a Palestinian crossing through checkpoints is bizarre; Jesus was a Jew, not an Arab Muslim labeled a "Palestinian." It is a better analogy to compare it to a Jew whom is spit upon by Arabs as he walks through the "wrong parts" of Jerusalem, those parts dominated by Arabs. It takes a lot of chutzpah for an Arab to spit on a Jew while the Jew walks through the holiest site in his Land. The line of reasoning in this article justifies that chutzpah (audacity), turning Jesus, which Islam considers to be a prophet, into a suffering Palestinian figure, thereby confirming the entire "Palestine was invaded by Jews" myth. The Palestinians kill innocent people by blowing themselves up in cafe's, crowded streets, and clubs, the major reason for this restricted access. Jesus, the Jew, nor any of his family, tried to do this to any of the Romans. Had the Palestinians lived in 1st Century Israel, they would have most definitely resorted to the disgusting tactics applied on Israel today. Are you sure that you want to make this spiritual link between Jesus and Palestinian nationalism?
Yaniv...
His response:
Dear Yaniv
The CMS webmaster Alister McLeod has passed on your email. It's always helpful to get feedback so thanks for your comments. I haven't heard from you before. Do you read our website regularly?
On you comments:
1. I don't see any evidence for suggesting that this article compares Israel to Nazi Germany.
2. I don't think we are saying there is a spiritual link between Jesus and Palestinian nationalism. Jesus was not a 'nationalist' and that categorisation doesn't shed meaningful light on who he was or what he did.
3. It's plausible to suggest that the Holy Family might have encountered Roman checkpoints and this probably was not a comfortable experience. I'd suggest there's no military checkpoint anywhere that isn't somewhat intimidating and I know from first hand experience that the same is true of Israeli checkpoints.
4. We could discuss forever the historical details. I think history is important but I'm not sure it helps much with micro issues that arise when ordinary people, Israeli and Palestinian alike, get caught at the sharp end of wider circumstances and suffer as a result.
Kind regards
John Martin
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My response:
You're right, you made no comparisons between Israel and Nazi Germany, but you tried to understand Jesus' life through the scope of what some people call "the Palestinian struggle." This is rich in political implications. Not to mention, that "struggle" is one of the most vociferous, Jew-hating movements around; it seeks to undermind Jewish rights at their very core. Like I said, the roadblocks are there to keep Palestinians from entering "Israeli territory" (technically it's all Israeli territory) and blowing themselves up, something that the Jews of 1st Century Israel were not doing to the Romans. It seems that the Jewish and Muslim attitudes towards oppression are quite different. You didn't compare Israel to Nazi Germany, but you compared, in effect, Israel to the Roman occupying army, which is essentially the same thing if we view Rome as a Nazi-type power, which it was. Either way, you fell into the trap of equating Israel to its oppressor and comparing the Palestinians to the Jews. Why can't you compare Israel to Israel; Israel is a sovereign state right now, why can't you compare that to King David's reign over the Land of Israel?
Mrs. McLeod said:
Jesus was not a 'nationalist' and that categorisation doesn't shed meaningful light on who he was or what he did.
Agreed. So why make the comparison between Jesus and the attempt of Palestinians to get through Israeli roadblocks? The Palestinians are nationalists, and the "roadblock experience" is something they deem as part of their obstructed national aspirations. Can you not see the implications here?
As for the third point, that is true, but remember that it is Israeli land, it was not Roman land, and similarly it is not Arab land.
And you are correct about point four. However, it is specific macro issues that give rise to these micro issues. I don't expect a Palestinian child to look out his window, see Israeli soldiers, and love them; that's the micro. I also don't expect the Arabs known as Palestinians to understand that they are a part of a larger Arab predicament, incapable of dealing with internal societal problems and projecting those problems externally, and Israel is the target of that projection; that's the macro. It is not micro issues that give rise to the macro issues; you have the situation reversed. In your heart of hearts, how do you think that Jesus, were he alive today, would react to witnessing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? What would he think?
Thank you, Yaniv...
His response with mine intertwined:
I responded in the same manner you did, within the text, but I can't change the color of the text here so I made spaces between the responses.
You're right, you made no comparisons between Israel and Nazi Germany, but you tried to understand Jesus' life through the scope of what some people call "the Palestinian struggle." This is rich in political implications. Not to mention, that "struggle" is one of the most vociferous, Jew-hating movements around; it seeks to undermind Jewish rights at their very core. Like I said, the roadblocks are there to keep Palestinians from entering "Israeli territory" (technically it's all Israeli territory)
[John Martin] there are people who would debate with you on that point.
That’s fine, they are free to debate this, which can be done on a political basis. Religiously however, if you want to put it that way, the Torah says that Israel is the Land of the Jews.
and blowing themselves up, something that the Jews of 1st Century Israel were not doing to the Romans.
[John Martin] Yes, they had no explosives. But by the time you get the lead-up to the fall of the Temple and Masada from AD70, Jewish Zealots taking desperate (and usually futile) measures.
Great point. The only difference is that the Jewish Zealots killed themselves on Masada, rather than to surrender to Roman rule and become essential slaves and probably forced to worship idols. When it comes down to it, it is more noble to kill yourself for purposes of ideology, conviction, and suffering than to kill another. Technically, you don’t have the right to kill yourself either, but I would imagine that it is more “proper” to kill yourself than another, because the other might not want to die. Very generally, the Jewish concept of martyrdom is to kill yourself while the Muslim concept of martyrdom is to kill others (which could be accomplished by killing yourself). We need to keep in mind that the Muslim Arab practice of suicide bombing did not come into existence until this century. This coincides perfectly with the first time in history that the Arabs have fighting a battle from below rather than from a dominating position. This has directly led to the advent of suicide bombing, a play on the Muslim ideal of martyrdom but with a twist of bleakness rather than triumph, and wallah, suicide bombing. Those who simply label it “desperation” are missing large historical background information.
It seems that the Jewish and Muslim attitudes towards oppression are quite different.
[John Martin] This might be true. Of course, our main interest as CMS is with Arab Christians and I don't think on the whole they are associated with suicide bombings, etc. There is, moreover, a range of expressions and viewpoints.
And it is not Arab Christians killing Jews, but it is Arab Christians suffering from the acts of the Muslim Palestinians; there is no way to “filter” through Christians while the Muslims have to stay back, unless of course Israel forces them to wear some kind of physical symbol to be able to distinguish between them. Perhaps you should go to the problem at the root cause. The Palestinian Muslims sometimes treat the Christians horribly, as I have seen a documentary or two on this.
You didn't compare Israel to Nazi Germany, but you compared, in effect, Israel to the Roman occupying army, which is essentially the same thing if we view Rome as a Nazi-type power, which it was.
[John Martin] I'm not sure my point is the same as the original writer, but I wanted to suggest that wherever there is a military presence it is often intimidating for civilians even when miltiray duties are exercised with empathy and compassion.
And it is equally intimidating to know that you might die on the night out on the town with some friends or while taking a bus to school or work. Something had to be done about the suicide bombing, and up until the fence/wall was built, road blocks did the job. They were, perhaps, and inhumane response to an even more inhumane cause. Actually, I don’t believe that road blocks are inhumane; history shows that much worst things can be done to a group of people, and ironically, we can look back into Jewish history to find some example, and even more ironically, we have a hard time finding examples in Muslim and Arab history. Random chance has it that women will give birth and things like at the checkpoints, but no human has caused that to happen. Now you have people condemning the wall as apartheid – I guess the conclusion is that Israel does not have the right to defend itself and should just perish and/or be soaked into the larger Muslim population, the Umma.
Either way, you fell into the trap of equating Israel to its oppressor and comparing the Palestinians to the Jews. Why can't you compare Israel to Israel; Israel is a sovereign state right now, why can't you compare that to King David's reign over the Land of Israel?
[John Martin] That's an interesting line of thought. You would have more idea than me what the Israel to Israel might look like. I suspect from reading between the lines of 1 Samuel-2 Kings that the rule of the ancient kings at least sometimes had oppressive dimensions.
Yes, that is true as well, but the oppressive dimensions were from the Israelite/Judean king over his subjects, whom were largely Israelite/Judean as well, not over another population. There were, however, other peoples living in the Kingdoms, and that is exactly my point. The Palestinians can be those people, but they can’t revolt and rebel against the Kingdom; the Kingdom would have not tolerated it, but the State does, and might just be the State’s downfall (I’m no prophet). Similarly, to take a cue from Muslim history, Jewish subjects of Muslim societies and empires were expected to remain docile and appreciative, which in fact, usually was the case (those Jews are so much easier to get along with, no?). There is a correlation; they had a special (second class) status called “dhimmitude,” whereby they were afforded certain rights, along with a lower civil class. They didn’t rebel or complain, and everything was fine. If there was a civil law suit between Jew and Muslim, the Muslim would always win (this is not the case with the Israeli Supreme Court). They would also be required, like all subjects, to pay a special tax affording them the protection that a dhimmi received, called the “jizya tax,” which was sometimes collected in a harsh way, such as with slapping and pulling his beard, to remind the person of his submissive status in Muslim society. If he didn’t submit to Al-lah, then he would have to submit to the Muslim people. When Israel became a state, the Arab societies when bogus and expelled nearly 100% of their Jewish populations! Clearly, Israel does not treat its Palestinian subjects in this way, and much of the harsh treatment they receive is directly related to suicide bombing. Mind you, if Jews in Muslim lands had done anything remotely similar to what the Palestinians do today, they would have been either expelled immediately or killed. I sense a real passive-aggression on the part of the Palestinian people and Arab Muslims in general, and maybe Christians too; they don’t respect Israel because Israel doesn’t have the same values as they do, i.e., it lets them get away with things that the Muslim society would never dream of letting the Jews get away with. Truly, Israel is too nice to them, but does that mean that we have to be savages like them in order to get their respect? There is nothing that we can do that will get their respect; even giving them land doesn’t get their respect, they see it as a state-supported form of military plunder, while your liberal Israeli sees it as an attempt to make peace – it’s a joke. The truth is that none of this would have happened if Israel had expelled the Jordanians and Egyptians from Israel in 1967. It didn’t and they eventually became known as “Palestinians.”
Mrs. McLeod said:
Jesus was not a 'nationalist' and that categorisation doesn't shed meaningful light on who he was or what he did.
Agreed. So why make the comparison between Jesus and the attempt of Palestinians to get through Israeli roadblocks? The Palestinians are nationalists, and the "roadblock experience" is something they deem as part of their obstructed national aspirations. Can you not see the implications here?
[John Martin] You could be right. But at a less ideological level, what about the stresses on ordinary Arab people who for example need to cross a road block to get medical care, and find it takes hours?
As for the third point, that is true, but remember that it is Israeli land, it was not Roman land, and similarly it is not Arab land.
[John Martin] As I said, some people might debate that point. But to take a parallel to the point I think you are making from somewhere else: Is Australia a European land of should indigenous Australians have the right of sovereignty? If the answer is yes, what should happen to people who have settled there since 1788?
Well, the Jews were definitely the indigenous population at the time of the spread of Islam in the 7th Century when Muslim forces took control over the area and turned all (Jewish and Christian) sites into Muslim sites. The Jewish population has remained alive in Israel since, but as a super-minority (in its own land!). The Arabs should have made room for the Jews, for a variety of purposes, but clearly this is an irrational expectation. The result is war; sometimes you have to fight for what is right and for what is yours. Clearly, that is silly to say to a degree because people eventually get sick of fighting, but the Arabs show no sign of easing up, at least not the militants, and they control everybody.
And you are correct about point four. However, it is specific macro issues that give rise to these micro issues.
[John Martin] True.
I don't expect a Palestinian child to look out his window, see Israeli soldiers, and love them; that's the micro. I also don't expect the Arabs known as Palestinians to understand that they are a part of a larger Arab predicament, incapable of dealing with internal societal problems and projecting those problems externally, and Israel is the target of that projection; that's the macro. It is not micro issues that give rise to the macro issues; you have the situation reversed. In your heart of hearts, how do you think that Jesus, were he alive today, would react to witnessing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? What would he think?
[John Martin] That is a profoundly important question and those of us who follow Jesus have to work that out every day. I suggest: 1. Jesus would be interested in questions of justice and how this worked out in the micro. 2. Jesus would have been full of compassion, so he would take account of the Israeli national experience; and he would have been compassionate towards Arab individuals caught up in the accidents of history. 3. He would have raised the question of forgiveness, though I don't know how Jewish or Muslim mindsets would be able to apply this.
It is a profoundly important question but the answer is profoundly amalgable to one’s own presuppositions. It seems, from the text, that Jesus had an hostility towards the Romans, the civilians as well. I don’t know exactly, but when the Gentile woman went to Jesus to ask for a blessing, he replied to her by saying something along the lines of, “Why should I give the food to the dog and not the crumbs?” He had an “anti-Gentile” and “pro-Jewish” attitude. It might be fair to say that many Jews there had that attitude because of their treatment and because it was their land, but it is also fair to say that Jesus was a bit of a hateful figure. Then the text has him take a 180 in the other direction. I believe Jesus was a man, and even if I concede that he was a great man with some very great teachings, I still believe that his humanity would have revealed an end to his patience and compassion and he, like the prophets of the Torah, would have held some bitter resentment towards “the enemy.” In the end, he would have seen himself as one of his people, suffering under the yoke of the Romans as they were, he would not be so quick to “love the Palestinian” when all that the Palestinian is doing to the Israeli is hating and plundering him. I’m not sure how much of what is said about Jesus in the New Testament is a construction of a narrative rather than fact. You could say that this makes me a skeptic, but I am not, I am simply trying to understand the Jewish response to things by comparing them to real-life Jewish responses as I experience them, and the Jesus narrative just doesn’t add up.
Thank you, Yaniv...
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That’s fine, they are free to debate this, which can be done on a political basis. Religiously however, if you want to put it that way, the Torah says that Israel is the Land of the Jews.
[John Martin] Yes, the Torah makes that promise but on my reading the granting of the land was conditional on keeping the Covenant, refraining from idol worship etc.
And it is not Arab Christians killing Jews, but it is Arab Christians suffering from the acts of the Muslim Palestinians; there is no way to “filter” through Christians while the Muslims have to stay back, unless of course Israel forces them to wear some kind of physical symbol to be able to distinguish between them. Perhaps you should go to the problem at the root cause. The Palestinian Muslims sometimes treat the Christians horribly, as I have seen a documentary or two on this.
[John Martin]
I think we have some common ground here, though not all Arab Christians avoid nationalist rhetoric. Maybe they don't appreciate how tough life would be under a radical Muslim state.
And it is equally intimidating to know that you might die on the night out on the town with some friends or while taking a bus to school or work.
[John Martin]
Agree
Something had to be done about the suicide bombing, and up until the fence/wall was built, road blocks did the job. They were, perhaps, and inhumane response to an even more inhumane cause. Actually, I don’t believe that road blocks are inhumane; history shows that much worst things can be done to a group of people, and ironically, we can look back into Jewish history to find some example, and even more ironically, we have a hard time finding examples in Muslim and Arab history.
[John Martin]
True
Random chance has it that women will give birth and things like at the checkpoints, but no human has caused that to happen.
[John Martin]
But if this is not handled humanely it's a bad propaganda loss to those who staff the roadblocks, etc
Now you have people condemning the wall as apartheid – I guess the conclusion is that Israel does not have the right to defend itself and should just perish and/or be soaked into the larger Muslim population, the Umma.
[John Martin]
I'm not sure if I'd label the wall apartheid, but I'm not yet convinced that it's a strategy that will achieve the hopes attached to it.
Well, the Jews were definitely the indigenous population at the time of the spread of Islam in the 7th Century when Muslim forces took control over the area and turned all (Jewish and Christian) sites into Muslim sites. The Jewish population has remained alive in Israel since, but as a super-minority (in its own land!). The Arabs should have made room for the Jews, for a variety of purposes, but clearly this is an irrational expectation. The result is war; sometimes you have to fight for what is right and for what is yours. Clearly, that is silly to say to a degree because people eventually get sick of fighting, but the Arabs show no sign of easing up, at least not the militants, and they control everybody.
[John Martin]
This is very complex. I agree that the Arabs have done wrong and even stupid things but I'm not sure they are without grievances which won't be able to be addressed until hostilities end.
You could say that this makes me a skeptic, but I am not, I am simply trying to understand the Jewish response to things by comparing them to real-life Jewish responses as I experience them, and the Jesus narrative just doesn’t add up.
[John Martin] I'm glad you present a reasonably consistent position on Jesus. I don't think its very helpful for a Jewish person to say Jesus was a great teacher because his vision for the Jewish faith and its future sits very uncomfortably with mainstream expressions of the Jewish faith. Putting that aside, I would suggest: (a) he was a Jew and his worldview was informed by his Jewishness. He believed himself to be David's son and that somehow his death would be the route that ushered in the rule of God and a new era for the Jewish people (this is a standard Christian interpretation of the Prophecies of Isaiah) . (b) By comparison with the Zealots he could look as if he was bordering on being pro-Roman (eg the saying "render unto Caesar the things that are Caesars and to God the things which are God's". (c) In the end his real problem was with the religious parties of his day and both the Pharisees and Sadducees in the end combined in opposition to him and negotiated his death with the Romans. (d) It's interesting that Christian narrators were willing to preserve the story of Jesus and the woman you mention. It's one of the strengths of the Christian (and also the Jewish) traditions over against Muslims resist the temptation to massage a point where Jesus found himself shifting ground once the inconsistency of his original statement dawned on him.
Hi, I only want to respond to your second and last points.
The Covenant is eternal. In Christian thought, I am aware that there is a particular line of thought which explains how an eternal Covenant can be abrogated. As far what I've heard, it goes like this: G-d made an eternal Covenant, the Jews broke it time after time, G-d, perhaps realizing that it was impossible to keep, abrogated, or as Christian thought says, "added" on a section to it that would complete it. Somehow, this addition was manifested as an omission, or taking out of large sections of the Law that were originally there. Now, we both speak English, and we both know that the concepts of "add" and "omit" are actually opposites; unless we fudge the facts can we find a way to reconcile these two opposite concepts. What I mean is, we have to go through a series of unlikely loopholes in order to align such concepts. That is why I am of the opinion that the writings of the Christian texts, which seek to show how these two inherently different concepts are the same, are a product of human ingenuity, yes ingenuity, but not Divine revelation in the sense of the revelation of the Law. What this would mean then is, the Jews can break the Covenant over and over and over again, but it cannot be broken, i.e., from G-d's side, He won't break it. Now, unless we want to believe that the Covenant had a "dormant" manifestation hidden within it, set to emerge forth only a certain time, and did, according to your belief, with Jesus, there is absolutely no intonation of that "hidden" covenant in the text of the Tanakh. I am aware that there are many verses in the Tanakh that Christians take to be allusions to it, but many of them have a separate "Jewish interpretation" that renders an entirely separate conclusion. It might be accurate to say that these interpretations precede the Christian interpretations. Having said that, if the Covenant cannot be broken, then neither can the Land aspect of it.
However, we see time and time again that G-d's wrath was turned against the Jews and that they were removed from their Land. This is not to mean that the Covenant had been abrogated because we also see their return upon certain points in history; do we ascertain from this that the Covenant was "re-cast" and then broken again? This seems like a sadistically playful G-d, not to mention, confused. It doesn't matter very much, I mean, the point is moot and doens't need evidence because of the declaration upon G-d's making the Covenant with the Jews that it was eternal. Since He said that, there is not much of a need for logical evidence to show that the Covenant doesn't change. It is a matter of faith, but moreover, knowledge, because it was told.
Did you know that Islam shares the same exact line of reasoning as Christianity as far as the removal of the Jews from the Land is concerned? It is actually that same line of reasoning that has removed the Christians from the grace of G-d and has replaced them with Islam. I'm not saying you're doing this, but it would be difficult to say that G-d made that type of change one time but that He didn't make it again, yet the belief that He did that opens up the path for saying that He can do it again and again and again. Today, the procession goes as follows; Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Seikhism, and B'hai (and I think others), all of which declare the same thing, that they are the new covenant between G-d and humanity. Why not, maybe they're right?
As far as for the last point, we have to understand what mainstream Judaism is, or what it says. There is some room to see the similarities between elements of mainstream Judaism and things Jesus was saying, or at least some of them. One example that goes unexamined by many (Christians and sometimes Jews) is what Jesus said about 'it's not what goes in, but what goes out." There is a specified teaching in the Talmud, the Jewish Oral Law, explaining the high importance of proper speech, and it is one of the fundamental things taught to Jewish children to this day. Now if you ask me, Jesus was making an allusion to that, i.e., he was drawing from the large body of Jewish Oral Law, or in other words, bringing attention to a very well-known matter of Jewish principle. It was the Pharisees, not the Sadducees, that recognized the validity of the Jewish Oral Law, and so Jesus was "siding" with the Pharisees. There is reason to believe that Jesus was quite close to "mainstream" Judaism. If you ask me, he was saying that, in accordance with the teaching, that one must not neglect proper speech when he is keeping the Law. "Kashrut," keeping kosher, is such a basic part of the Law that it can serve as a basic symbol of it, that to make a reference to it is to make a reference to the letter of the Law. Again, my thought here, he was saying that the spirit of the Law cannot be abandoned just because the letter of the Law is observed. I don't believe that he actually was telling people not to keep kosher, or that G-d somehow changed His mind, but that it is one of the elements of the human ingenuity which found reason in changing the religion. As a Jewish emphasis, it is not that radical, and it is found in mainstream text. Mind you, this occurred under the auspices of Rome and by relatively Rome-friendly individuals and religionists. Therefore, I don't think that it was intended to be a "grafting" on to Judaism, but a movement set against Judaism and which had nothing to do with it. In other words, I don't believe that Jesus said those words, as no Jew, no matter how radical (and if you want to see radical check out Jeremiah), ever said anything along the lines of removing Kashrut from the Covenant. Even Jeremiah, with his "famous" quote about the new covenant, actually makes reference to statutes and decrees in reference to the Covenant in the same way that the other prophets also made reference to statutes and decrees – what statutes and decrees?. The Jewish interpretation is that G-d will again make the Covenant with the Jews in End Times, and that that time they will accept it (again). It is "not like the Covenant I made with your fathers in Egypt" because maybe it won't come with fanfare and splitting seas and a huge exodus, but it will be made and understood. It will be "written on their hearts," they will have an internal understanding of what G-d wants from them, adherence to Torah. If the Christian interpretation makes sense, then the Jewish one also makes sense, maybe more.
If he was G-d, then he had no worldview, because he was G-d. Only humans have worldviews. Maybe "render unto Ceasar's" means "let man take care of manly things," or "let political leaders take care of political things and let religious people take care of G-dly matters." Maybe it was a reference to separate religious authority from state authority, maybe. Do you know to whom he directed that statement? Were there Caesar's in his time?
Maybe there is reason to believe that the Pharisees and Sadduccees, who couldn't stand each other and almost considered each other heretics, found unity in resenting one Jew so much that they bent to Roman rule and asked them to kill that Jew. That would be like two opposing Jewish "sects" in the camps, upon seeing a Jew being tortured by the Nazi's, a Jew who was perhaps disliked, viciously turn him over to the Nazi's to be hanged on the gallows. Maybe the analogy of the camps and the Romans aren't exactly perfect, but it makes sense still. And then, according to the way Pontius Pilate reacts in the text, to imagine the S.S. solider publicly expressing remorse about having to kill a vermin. It makes no sense, but it's what the text wants us to believe. They should, G-d forbid, be destroyed just for that. The prophets also were tortured at times, but most likely, as the text says, it was against the will of the Jews and according to the will of whomever was ruling.
Hmm, wow, that's very interesting what you said about Jesus changing his mind and that being preserved in the text and being one of its strengths. I'm not exactly sure if that's the reason that it was kept, and if it wasn't, then why was it? I would actually like to find out, could you find out for me? It could be the reason though, I wouldn't know. But Jesus was supposed to be G-d, so it wouldn't make sense that he made a mistake and then corrected it. That seems like a human trait, not the trait of G-d. I could see a man troubled by his surroundings, believing that he had something to offer, going through an ideological development, but only a human. Maybe, like you said, they kept in the text on purpose to show that development, as a way to convince readers. However, if Jesus was G-d, he knew that he was G-d and trial and error wouldn't really be realistic. It's almost as if to say that Jesus was a man whom discovered that he was G-d, but that just doesn't make sense, for what would be G-d’s role in that?.
