Jesus the Rabbi

 In the specific time frame in which Jesus lived, “Rabbi” was simply a term given to a teacher who had both mastered the Torah and who had disciples or followers. Jesus’ personal method of teaching has the learner engage and think rationally rather than be told. For that reason he was very against the religious systems of the time that promoted temple hierarchy and lowman exclusion. He honored tradition but relentlessly called out injustice. He calls his followers to grow up from the “well I was taught,” and to follow our own path. When you read about Jesus you get the sense that he’s made peace that many won’t follow his narrow path. In Mark, Jesus tells a rich man to sell his possessions. The man doesn’t want to and walks away, and Jesus doesn’t chase after him. He knows that even some who wish or intend to follow his way may not actually walk it: “Some are ever-seeing but not perceiving, some hear but don’t understand” [Matthew 13:13]. His way is such a contrast from the way of the ruling world, especially in his time but even now. Even his closest followers OFTEN did not see his meanings. One example: The religion of the time had very careful rules about what could and could not be eaten and when, to which Jesus preached “It is not what you put into your mouth that defiles you, but what comes out of your mouth” [Matthew 15:11]. His disciples asked, “Did you know you offended the Pharisees when you said that?!?” [Matthew 15:12]. Jesus responds by saying that Laws that aren’t of God are weeds to be uprooted and should be dismissed [Matthew 15:13], saying of the complaining Pharisees “Leave them alone. They are blind guides, of blind people. And if a person who is blind guides another person who is blind, both will fall into a pit” [Matthew 15:14].

In the Gospel, the followers of Jesus ask that he teaches them to pray. At that time and place, a Rabbi teaching how to pray was a way of teaching their “yoke” or their interpretation of the Torah and how to practice it. One Rabbi’s yoke might be nurturing the poor, another Rabbi’s yoke might be rigorous study of the texts. Here’s what Jesus provided when asked, in context:

Source & Keeper of the House of Earth
Who dwells where things are as they should be,
Sacred & Good is Your Nature.
Your kingdom come, Your Will be done
Here on Earth as in the highest Ideal. 
Give us today our daily bread
And forgive us our debts
As we forgive our debtors
And lead us not into temptation
But deliver us from evil.

Jesus was knowingly using kingdom as a loaded political term to throw in the face of the empire that they are doing it all wrong. The desire is that the earthly ways meet the ideal or “heavenly” ways, here and now. There was no middle class at this time - it was the ruling empire and everyone else struggling to get food in their stomachs each day. After calling out the lack of good in the world and our mission to move it closer to the ideal, Jesus goes on to make very blunt, urgent demands. Every person's basic needs must be met. “Give us today our daily bread” is a reference to Proverbs 30 which Jesus and those listening were familiar with: “Give me neither poverty nor riches but give me only my daily bread - otherwise I may have too much, disown you, and say ‘who is the Lord?’” He then demands we receive grace and that we extend the grace we’ve received. The next demand is to keep focused such that we aren’t tempted to act like the darkness we are up against. The audience to which Jesus was demonstrating this prayer had the boot of the Roman empire on their necks, with some estimations of taxation in the Galilee region at this time being as high as 90%. Men listening may have faced the shame of losing their family land just to sign up for the day’s job and end up working on the vineyard they once owned. And Jesus is telling these people not to fight back with the same violence they’ve received, but take the humble and hard path. Ultimately, the message Jesus outlined is that we have an urgent and present power to bring either heaven/good/light or hell/evil/darkness to the world we find ourselves in, and it starts in the way we run our own households each and every day. Yeshua (Jesus) is referred to as “the Light of the world.”