Jesus of Nazareth
Wherever Jesus, in his humanity, ‘got it from’, it was certainly not the Temple priests in Jerusalem with whom he had virtually no contact.
Nor was it the remnant of the legitimate priesthood who, as we saw last week, had taken themselves off to the desert, but who would have come across as too ‘separate’, too anti-Gentile, and too bent on the restoration of Israel by force of arms to be at all appealing to Jesus.
While he may have been inspired by his relative John the Baptist, who came across as a reincarnation of the prophet Elijah, essentially Jesus was inspired by the Holy Scriptures, especially the later texts of Isaiah which, as we have seen, envisaged an overthrow of the existing order and a “new creation”.
This is revealed by the event which we usually call Jesus’ “cleansing of the Temple”. But it was not really a cleansing; it was more a sign, for those who would see, that the Temple and all its systems were destined to pass away completely.
During Jesus’ lifetime, King Herod, to curry favour with the Jewish people, was embarking on a massive rebuilding programme for the Temple. Huge stone blocks were hewn for it, some being ten times larger than the stones of Stonehenge. We hear in Mark 13:1 of a disciple pointing these out in amazement to Jesus. Jesus was not impressed. It was all doomed.
Jesus did not adopt any of the manners of a priest. It is true that we usually call his prayer at the Last Supper in John 17 his ‘priestly prayer’, but that is a very loose use of the term. At the Last Supper Jesus “consecrated himself” (his own words, John 17:19); he offered his life for love of the world. This free offering was dear to his Father.
Reflecting on who Jesus was, some 50 years after the Resurrection, the author of the Letter to the Hebrews – more an essay than a letter – sees Jesus as the perfect “high priest”, totally supplanting the inadequacies of the old system in one perfect sacrifice. Jesus, he says, certainly couldn’t be a priest in the old style, because those were all of the tribe of Levi and Jesus was of the tribe of Judah. Those who were nostalgic for the old ways were urged to look to the new; Jesus had brought in a new creation.
In which case, we may now ask ourselves, why do we have a Christian priesthood?