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The Hebrew Bible makes it clear innumerable times whether explicitly or implicitly that the covenant between God and Israel has relevance for the gentiles and is actually meant to provide the "nations of the world" access to God. "ונברכו בך כל משפחות האדמה" was literally the first message communicated to Abraham. I can bring you similar examples from practically every book of the Pentateuch, prophets and writings if you so desire.
So the concept of an additional covenant revealed hundreds of years after the last prophets were active to deliver such a message is very questionable. Never mind that this covenant was composed in Greek a second or third language at the time for Jews many years after Jesus' life and death. Also, Jesus presented himself as a messiah for the Jews first and foremost. The concept of salvation for gentiles was a later development of Paul and the status of Jesus as the son of God was an even later development. My point is that an indeterminate monotheism without a flesh and blood mediator would be more relevant for the modern Christian. Such a mediator has no basis in the covenants described in the Hebrew Bible and also is more compatible with science and logic.
I'm just trying to understand why Christians insist on Jesus as a mediator when he's clearly not necessary...
Are you Jewish? Your belief system certainly is.
By 30AD, God stopped accepting Jewish sacrifices. And since then, Jews have been forced to roam the earth as a diaspora and live as resident aliens in foreign nations.
This is not Christian interpretation, as it comes direct from the Talmudic testimony. It states that for 40 years before the destruction of the Temple (the destruction of the Temple happened in 70AD, so 40 years before exactly corresponds the crucifixion of Christ):
“The lot for the Lord did not come up in the right hand;
the crimson thread did not turn white;
the western lamp did not burn;
and the doors of the Hekhal opened by themselves.”
(Yoma 39b)
The animal sacrifices were no longer accepted, the thread of the scapegoat would no longer turn white, the outermost lamp would not light the temple, and its doors would not close. This then culminated with the actual physical destruction of the temple in 70AD. (its also quite telling that "the doors of the Hekhal" would not close, a clear symbol that the covenant of Christ, expanding God to all people was no longer controlled by ethnic Jews nor its priests).
It would seem that a sincere student of Judaism would recognize this situation, but its not permanent: You can accept Christ and be welcomed back by God. Otherwise you can "pick and choose" what parts of the Bible you want to read and remain a self-imposed orphan.
Correct 💯
And since then, Jews have been forced to roam the earth as a diaspora and live as resident aliens in foreign nations.
That's not true. There's an actual Jewish sovereign state today in the land of Israel. (As much as any modern nation state is sovereign.)
You omitted the continuation of that section in Yoma:
And the doors of the hekhal opened by themselves, until Rabban Yoḥanan ben Zakkai scolded them. He said to it: Hekhal, Hekhal, why do you frighten yourself? I know about you that you will ultimately be destroyed, and Zechariah, son of Ido, has already prophesied concerning you: “Open your doors, O Lebanon, that the fire may devour your cedars” (Zechariah 11:1)
There is clearly no connection to Jesus. And I'm pretty sure R Yohanan b zakkai had no interest in seeing the temple destroyed.
The Gemara in Sanhedrin 41a sheds light on the "40 years before the temple was destroyed" situation:
And it is taught in a baraita: Forty years before the destruction of the Second Temple, the Sanhedrin was exiled from the Chamber of Hewn Stone and sat in the store near the Temple Mount. And Rabbi Yitzḥak bar Avudimi says: The intent of the statement concerning the relocation of the Sanhedrin is to say that they no longer judged laws of fines. Does it enter your mind to say that they no longer judged laws of fines? It is known that the Sanhedrin would judge laws of fines for hundreds of years after the destruction of the Temple. Rather, he must have said that the Sanhedrin no longer judged cases of capital law. Once the Sanhedrin left the Chamber of Hewn Stone, the court’s power to judge capital cases was nullified.
Basically, Judean society was corrupted to the point where there were too many capital offenders for the judiciary to handle, as the Mishna in Sotah 47a remarks:
From the time when murderers proliferated, the ritual of the heifer whose neck is broken was nullified. From the time when Eliezer ben Dinai, who was also called Teḥina ben Perisha, came, they renamed him: Son of a murderer. (This is an example of a publicly known murderer.)
This corresponds to the time Judea became a Roman province and Rome significantly curtailed the authority of the Sanhedrin. As does the move from chamber of hewn stone to the area known as hanut/store. The relocation of the Sanhedrin wasn't a mundane matter but represented a change in the extent of its authority.
So the sources clearly show no connection between national events and a figure known as Jesus, because it was abundantly clear to the ancients that their traditional belief system was functioning as it was meant to function. Thus my question stands: Jesus is clearly an adhoc instrument for adapting monotheism to the gentile world. In that case, why is he indispensable as a god nonetheless? The design doesn't require him
Its a profound question and obviously from a Christian perspective the answer is going to be: Yes.
But the very brief summary of why is: God had a plan, part of the plan involved several different covenants he established with his people.
From a very high level view, those covenants each proceeded to include a larger and larger group. It started with Adam and the covenant was between God and one man, then it moved to Noah (a family), then Abraham (a family + all descendants), Moses (a people), David (a kingdom), etc.
The final covenant was offered to all mankind and this covenant was brokered by "his son" (a strange thing to say about a trinity, but our words lack the power to describe it any better)....the importance of the sacrifice of his son goes back to the original opening of the Bible.
God instructs Abraham to sacrifice his son Issac, which he agrees to (but God stops him and instead tells him to sacrifice a nearby lamb). The final covenant then bookends this offer, with God himself accepting to come as a human, suffer the trials of humanity, and have humanity abuse, torture, and kill him as a provable sign of Gods love for us.
So if you accept that: God has a plan that was meant to go A -> G and if you ask "Must I accept G"...well yes you kinda do. Furthermore, step G was the culmination of the entire Bible. Further if you accept that God loves you so much that as proof he offered to come be tortured on this earth so that you might have a provable role model to follow, then yes you must accept Jesus under this framework.