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II. Galilee and Jerusalem
Modern readers of the New Testament often know little about the geo-political
world of first-century Palestine. It is commonly assumed that “the Jews” were an
undifferentiated community living amicably together in the part of the world we
now call “the Holy Land,” united in their resentment of the political imposition
of Roman rule to which all were equally subject. One of the more significant
gains in recent New Testament studies has been the increasing recognition that
this is a gross distortion of the historical and cultural reality.¹¹ In particular it is
now widely recognized that Galilee was in the first century, as indeed it had been
ever since the death of Solomon, a distinct province with a history, political
status and culture which set it decisively apart from the southern province of
Judea, despite the fact that the latter contained the holy city of Jerusalem to
which all Jews felt a natural allegiance as the focus of the worship of the God of
Israel.
The situation in the time of Jesus may be drastically oversimplified as follows.
Racially the area of the former Northern Kingdom of Israel had had, ever since
the Assyrian conquest in the eighth century BC, a more mixed population, within
which more conservative Jewish areas (like Nazareth and Capernaum) stood in
close proximity to largely pagan cities, of which in the first century the new
Hellenistic centers of Tiberias and Sepphoris were the chief examples.
Geographically Galilee was separated from Judea by the non-Jewish territory of
Samaria, and from Perea in the south-east by the Hellenistic settlements of
Decapolis. Politically Galilee had been under separate administration from Judea
during almost all its history since the tenth century BC (apart from a period of
“reunification” under the Maccabees), and in the time of Jesus it was under a
(supposedly) native Herodian prince, while Judea and Samaria had since AD 6
been under the direct rule of a Roman prefect. Economically Galilee offered
better agricultural and fishing resources than the more mountainous territory of
Judea, making the wealth of some Galileans the envy of their southern
neighbors. Culturally Judeans despised their northern neighbors as country
cousins, their lack of Jewish sophistication being compounded by their greater
openness to Hellenistic influence. Linguistically Galileans spoke a distinctive
form of Aramaic whose slovenly consonants (they dropped their aitches!) were
the butt of Judean humor. Religiously the Judean opinion was that Galileans
were lax in their observance of proper ritual, and the problem was exacerbated
by the distance of Galilee from the temple and the theological leadership which
was focused in Jerusalem.
If, as I hope, this is not a complete caricature, it means that even an impeccably
Jewish Galilean in first-century Jerusalem was not among his own people; he
was as much a foreigner as an Irishman in London or a Texan in New York. His
accent would immediately mark him out as “not one of us,” and all the
communal prejudice of the supposedly superior culture of the capital city would
stand against his claim to be heard even as a prophet, let alone as the “Messiah,”
a title which as everyone knew belonged to Judea (cf. John 7:40–42).
To recognize the realities of the situation is to gain new insight into the obstacles
facing Jesus of Nazareth in gaining acceptance as a credible “Messiah” in the
southern province, despite (or even perhaps because of) the enthusiasm he had
excited in his own province. We shall note this element in the narrative
especially of Jesus’ first arrival outside the walls of Jerusalem in 21:1–11, and it
will be a constantly underlying element in the subsequent confrontation between
the Galilean prophet and the Jerusalem establishment.
It has long been recognized that the geographical framework of Mark’s gospel
accentuates this north-south divide, and many have argued that there is an
ideological, not merely an historical, basis for Mark’s decision to tell the story in
this way.¹² In Mark Jesus’ ministry in Galilee is in general a success story, with
enthusiastic crowds, copious miracles, and the open proclamation of the good
news; the only mentions of Jerusalem in this part of the story are as the source of
opposition and misunderstanding (Mark 3:22; 7:1). But from the moment Jesus,
in the far northern area of Caesarea Philippi, turns toward Jerusalem the shadow
of the cross falls across the story, and nothing but disaster is expected in
Jerusalem. And so it transpires: the southern capital rejects and kills the northern
prophet; hope for the future is found not in Jerusalem but in the declaration that
the risen Jesus will be restored to his scattered flock back home in Galilee (Mark
14:28; 16:7).
Matthew has not only endorsed this ideological divide by his adoption of Mark’s
outline for his narrative (see previous section), but he has also considerably
enhanced it. His chapter 2 focuses on the link between the Messiah’s birth in
Judea and his eventual domicile in Galilee, and the final prophetic motif that “he
should be called a Nazarene” (2:23) reflects the dismissive tone of a superior
Judean observer. Jesus’ decision to settle in Capernaum leads Matthew to insert a
substantial formula-quotation from Isaiah which identifies “Galilee of the
nations” as the place where the true light is to shine (4:13–16). When Jesus
arrives at Jerusalem it is only Matthew who comments on the reaction not only
of the accompanying crowds but also of the people of the city (21:10–11), and
the two rival “teams” of Galileans and Judeans are seen as starkly opposed in
their attitudes to the northern prophet. When Peter, as distinctive a northerner as
his master, is unmasked in the high priest’s courtyard it is, Matthew tells us, as a
companion of “Jesus the Galilean” (26:69). Above all, whereas Mark’s story (as
we have it) merely looks forward to a new start back in Galilee, Matthew gives
flesh to that hope in his magnificent Galilean climax in 28:16–20, and the
juxtaposition of the last two pericopae of the gospel forms a poignant contrast
between the desperate cover-up maneuvers of the defeated priests in Jerusalem
and the triumphant launch of the messianic mission in Galilee. In these ways,
distinctive to Matthew’s telling of the story, the Marcan Galilee/Jerusalem
schema is underlined. To read Matthew in blissful ignorance of first-century
Palestinian socio-politics is to miss his point. This is the story of Jesus of
Nazareth.
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