Hebrews and Hellenists

 Eighteenth Tuesday after Pentecost

Today we return to the Acts Bible study. Please read Acts 6:1-6.

One of Luke's tendencies is to smooth over conflicts. We will see this most clearly in Acts 15, where we have the same event narrated by Paul in Galatians. Paul shows a much fiercer conflict. Luke admits conflict but gets it quickly and happily resolved. My sense and that of most scholars is that the conflict between the Hebrews and the Hellenists was deeper and not so easily resolved as Luke would lead us to think. 

Acts 6:1 is one place where I think the translators of the Common English Bible do a better job than the NRSV translators. The word Hebrews, though a literal translation in the NRSV gives a misleading impression. Hebrews here refers to Aramaic speaking Jewish Christians. Hellenists refers to Greek speaking Jewish Christians. The CEB makes this clear. The "twelve" (disciples Jesus called along with Matthias, the replacement for Judas), were all Aramaic speakers. As we saw in Acts 4 the Jerusalem Christians shared property in common, including a daily food distribution, particularly to widows. 

At this point I think I need to make a digression on languages spoken in the Ancient Near East. Hebrew was the ancient Biblical language of the Jews, and the only language spoken by the Jews until the Babylonian Exile (586-538 BC). Aramaic was the language of the Babylonians. During the exile it became the predominant language of the Jews. When the bulk of the exiles returned to Jerusalem they continued to speak Aramaic. Hebrew was reserved as the language of the scriptures, the language to be used in Temple and synagogue. The two languages are both from the Semitic language family and are closely related. Aramaic was therefore the language that Jesus spoke. His reading of the scripture in the synagogue (Luke 4:16-20) indicates that he could read Hebrew. 

Meanwhile, many of the Jews escaped the Babylonian exile by fleeing to other parts of North Africa, Southern Europe, and Syria. Alexander the Great conquered all these lands in 333-323 BC. He brought with him the Greek language, which became the standard spoken language of most of these lands. The greatest concentration of diaspora Jews came in Egypt and especially the great metropolis of Alexandria.

By the time of Jesus Greek was the common language of Jews outside of Palestine. 

In the third and second centuries the Jewish scriptures (our Old Testament) were translated into Greek. The translation was called the Septuagint (abbreviated LXX). By the time of Jesus there were far more Jews worldwide who spoke Greek than Aramaic, although in Jerusalem Aramaic was more common. 

What we see in Acts 6:1 is a conflict not only over food distribution but also over language. The Day of Pentecost had emphasized Christian unity in which all languages were accepted and understood. That linguistic unity appears not to have lasted past the day of Pentecost.  We commonly use the phrase "language barrier." Language is a barrier to understanding. 

Although Luke does not specifically talk about this, the early Christians were in conflict over what would be the language of Christianity. If Christianity were to expand, it would have to move from Aramaic speaking to Greek speaking, Greek being the lingua franca of the Ancient Mediterranean world. That change came, likely within the first ten years after the resurrection of Jesus. 

The Christians already had their Bible, the OT in a Greek translation, the LXX. They used it. All of the New Testament writers wrote in Greek. When they quoted the OT, they quoted it in the LXX translation.

If the earliest Christians had not made this language change, Christianity would never have spread beyond the bounds of Palestine.

This language change is the earliest example of Christianity adapting to culture. This ability to adapt to new cultural contexts would make Christianity a world religion.

Faithfully,

Christian