“Judeo-Christian Values” is the correct term for what is often derisively called “Slave Morality”.

It’s the aspect of Christianity that the Nazis hated because they correctly identified it as Jewish in origin. While everything they sometimes like about Christianity came from the later influence of Middle Platonism and Rome.

While it’s true the original popularizer of the “Slave Morality” v “Master Morality” dichotomy chose to classily Islam as also a “Slave Morality”, even he saw the aspects of Islam that didn’t really fit that, but not classifying it that way would contradict his thesis that “Slave Morality” was inseparable from Monotheism. Many Nazis were later able to openly praise Islam as the kind of Master Morality Warrior Religion they wish Germany had instead of Christianity, chiefly Hitler and Himmler, but also many SS officers flat out converted to Islam after the War.

The core Theological distinction between Islam and the older Abrahamic Religions is The Quran’s strong opposition to seeing Allah as a Father in any sense. And to me there is a natural psychological correlation between those things.

These values originate in Judaism but Christianity is the middle man in how they became world wide values that even many with no religion at all now share, values that even many Anime wind up sharing via indirect influence.

Debunking the term by pointing to every Jewish Value that Christians don’t share or visa versa misses the point, I don’t use the term where it doesn’t apply.

But it’s also interesting how Christians didn’t exactly only ever consult Judaism to guide their values in the 1st or 2nd Century. I recommend Eric Nelson’s Book The Hebrew Republic. 

Judeo-Christian

My use of Judeo-Christian as a term is usually when what I’m saying is applicable only to Judaism and Christianity, when it applies to all Abrahamic Religions I do say Abrahamic.  And a lot of times it's a term used just to acknowledge the Jewish origins of Christianity in opposition to all the Neo-Marcionites who want to deny or minimize it.

The Three Major Abrahamic Religions form a Venn Diagram, you can make any one of them seem the most different from the other two based on what you choose to Emphasize or De Emphasize.  And all three have in common not just what it academically means to be Abrahamic but also our expectation of a future Bodily Resurrection of the Dead, that is why I don't accuse Muslims of being Pagans.

Thing is Christianity’s common ground with either of the others is much more doctrinal, much more tied to the core definition of what being a Christian even is.  While the common ground between Judaism and Islam is much more cultural, a product of being more tied to the Near East and Semitic Languages.   And indeed Middle Eastern Semitic Speaking Christians seem a lot less different from Jews and Muslims on such things. 

I’ve talked before about how the core confessional beliefs of New Testament Christianity are that Jesus is both The Christ/Messiah and The Son of God.  Muslims agree that Jesus was The Messiah or Al-Maish.  Jews don’t believe Jesus was the Only Begotten Son of God but they do believe all Israelites are Children of God.

I identify with the label Judeo-Christian not because of what that tends to mean politically to American Conservatives who I loath, or because I want to deny that Islam is Abrahamic (which I don’t), or because of my sympathies with the Hebrew Roots movement, or even the Isaac connection I focused on in the Edom post.  It’s because what we have in common with Islam over Judaism is something nominal, something with minimal impact on how Islam, as it currently is, actually functions as a Religion while Judaism does still believe in the concept that they believe Jesus was not.

Islam rejects the concept of calling God Father at all, or any people even faithful Believers God’s Children.  That’s not an accusation thrown at them by Christian Polemicists, it’s something I’ve seen Islamic Apologists explain and defend.  Within Judaism there is dispute on if the Fatherhood of God applies to all of Humanity or only Israel (which has parallels within Christianity), I’ve seen Jewish Websites taking the more exclusivist position quote Rashi as agreeing with them, but today the more Universalist approach has become more popular.

The Fatherhood of God is vital to my Theology, to my Understanding of Universal Salvation.  Jesus' status as The Messiah, as a prophesied Savior figure, only has any meaning in the context of being the means by which The Father intends to Save His Children.

Of course there are Christians who’ve functionally removed the Fatherhood of God from how they view His character.  What I feel is wrong with Islam is largely what it has in common with Calvinism.

This is in my opinion also the key to how to solve the issue of the Quran and later Islamic Sources claiming the Jews claimed an Uzair (commonly mistranslated Ezra) to be the Son of God.  I think Sallam ibn Mishkam really condemned Muhammad for rejecting that Israel is God's Son as stated in Exodus 4:22-23 and Hosea 11:1. The Etymology of Uzair I can't be sure of but it could be Usayr ibn Zarim the leader of the Banu Nadir which was Sallam's clan and Muhammad chose to word his response like they were saying this of Usayr specifically.

Sam Aronow is a Jewish History YouTuber who I view as the Modern Josephus in that his presentation of history is better the more recent it is.  He provides an invaluable breakdown of the History of Modern Zionism for example.  But every video on Ancient History is filled with glaring issues that to someone like me who’s into the primary sources for these subjects are very frustrating to listen to.  Saying the Zealots wanted to restore the Davidic Monarchy when they were actually Anarchists is a particular pet peeve of mine.

In his video on the birth of Islam he went on a rant about how he doesn’t like the term “Judeo-Christian” because he feels Judaism has more in common with Islam than Christianity, he’s barely concealing that what motivates this is annoyance at American Conservatives, he’s looking at it through the lens of two religions that are both marginalized minorities in the West and is looking for common ground because of that.  But the most recent episodes of his own series have shown how quick and easy it was for Arab Christians and Muslims to find solidarity with each other when they felt threatened by Zionism.  And there are now plenty of Fundamentalist Islamic states where it’s Jews and Christians who have a shared status of being oppressed by Islam.  I blame Western Imperialism for the current state of the Islamic world, but regardless that’s our reality. 

But what’s funny to me is how even though it's motivated by annoyance at political usage of Judeo-Christian in a mostly Protestant Country (Conservative American Jews do go along with it like Ben Shapiro), he’s clearly making his argument based on Catholicism.

Like on the “Central Authority” issue he’s definitely thinking of Catholicism.  Low Church Congregational Polity denominations are definitely way less central in their authority then either Judaism or Islam.

Judaism and Islam have a more Dogmatic Ritual Law system while Christianity was never intended to be an Organized Religion in that way.  But various strands of Christianity do have cultural practices we debate about, like the Foot Washing argument or when to observe the Eucharist, and of course Baptism.

The idea that in Christianity our Personal Relationship with God is influenced by Worldly Affairs just comes from nowhere, the Relationship with God is via The Spirit.  Christians also don’t believe we have any promise that nothing bad will happen to us.  The only Christians who believe anything close to that today are the Prosperity Theology heretics who are a unique product of 20th Century American Capitalism.

The concept of a Personal Relationship with God is one Christianity has that the other two don’t according to Aronow, which seems true but for different reasons.  For Judaism it’s a matter of where we are on the timeline, Hebrew Bible Prophecies that Christians view as more already Fulfilled then Jews do like the last verse of Ezekiel.  For Islam it’s about doubling down on the Platonist heresies of Divine Impassibility and Divine Immutability that they inherited from Greco-Roman Christianity. 

I know when you ask Google if Judaism teaches either of those things the first answer you’ll get from the AI Overview is yes because websites like Wikipedia can only interpret that question as asking if The Messiah can be God in The Flesh.  But The Hebrew Bible definitely teaches a God who is emotional and changes and Jewish Theologians recognize that, it's also why Augustine wanted to reject the "Old Testament" until Ambrose convinced him he could just allegorize it all away.

Sam Aronow also misunderstands why the Miaphysites (if he’s against calling people things they don’t like being called he should stop saying Monophysites) and Nestorians seemingly have more compatibility with early Islam then the followers of the Imperial Churches. They did not stress the Human Nature of Christ any more than the Chalcedonians did.  

A lot of it was being more culturally Semitic, but for Nestorians it was chiefly sharing the extreme view of Divine Impassibility.  It was actually only within Chalcedonianism there was ever any resistance to Divine Impassibility especially in the 6th Century when the Fifth Ecumenical Council explicitly affirmed The Theopaschite Formula.

There was no Council of Yavne/Jamnia, that’s a conjecture formed from a few vague Talmudic references to some discussion of the Canon happening there.  

Religion for Breakfast has a good video on how there was no one single moment that Judaism and Christianity split but rather many were to some degree getting along attending Synagogue and observing Jewish Feast Days together even into the Fifth Century.  The Greco-Roman Emperors and High Church Bishops tended to not like it but for the common people it was a different matter.   And this lack of full separation I suspect lasted longer among Semitic peoples and in part explains the origins of Islam.

In a way the belief in a very early clean break between Christianity and Judaism is tied to the popular misconception of Christian persecution under Rome.   The Neronian Persecution didn't happen, the persecution under Domitian was part of his persecution of Jews and the same likely applies to what little Roman in origin Christian Persecution happened under Trajan and Hadrian. Christian Persecution happened in select outbursts, originally mostly local. Only the Diocletian Persecution was as intense as popular fiction will present the entire Pre-Milvian Bridge Era. So no, Christians were not by default excluded from the legal protections granted to Jews by Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius, Septimius Severus and Caracalla. Tertullian talks about Severus being well disposed towards Christians so I get annoyed at him being labeled one of the 10 great Persecutors just because of things that happened during his reign, same goes for Marcus Aurelius.  Also no Caracalla did not massacre his own wedding to start a War with Parthia.

Personally I theorize that in the Revolt Against Constantius Gallus some Nicene Christians allied with the Jewish Rebels seeing the Arian Emperor as a common enemy, after all Athanasius was calling him a forerunner of The Antichrist.  Cyril of Jerusalem claims loyalty to The Emperor publicly in his surviving letters but I’m skeptical of that. Likewise during the reign of Valens I suspect some Near Eastern Jews may have allied with the Nicene Arab Queen Mawiya.  But our later Historians of these events didn’t wanna talk about that. 

Aronow’s discussion of Constantine takes at face value too much of what Eusebius says, Eusebius liked to make his fictionalized Constantine a mouthpiece for his own views.  The real reason for the desire to stop using the Jewish Calendar for determining the date of Pascha was because of the same issues going on within Judaism at the time, people didn’t like it falling too far from the Spring Equinox.  The Kariates came to a similar conclusion.

And Aelia Eudocia wasn’t a Pagan, she was a Christian who even got involved in an internal Christian dispute siding with the Miaphysites in their 452-3 revolt.  Another revolt that I speculate might have gotten Jewish support that the chroniclers ignored given Eudocia's friendly relations with the Jews.

I’m not making this post to tell anyone who they should and shouldn’t feel solidarity with.  I’m simply showing why it’s not nonsense to see Christianity and Judaism as more like each other than either is to Islam. 

Chie Oneesama, Personified Wisdom

The Book of Proverbs particularly Chapter 8, Matthew 11:19 and Luke 7:35 are the primary Biblical Basis for the concept of a Divine Personified Wisdom.  Both the Hebrew Chokmah and the Greek Sophia are grammatically Feminine hence personified Wisdom being often depicted as a Woman.

Proverbs 7:4 tells us to call Wisdom our Sister.  The two Jesus quotes refer to Believers as children of Wisdom which some use to instead make Sophia a Mother figure.  But the word for Children used there is not the standard Greek word for Son or Daughter or the word for Offspring used in Acts 17, it’s much more vague about the actual familial relationship being implied and often doesn’t inherently imply one at all being just the basic Greek word for child, but it does here due to the possessive pronouns.  It would not be inappropriate in my view for referring to the younger siblings of an older sister.

Chie is a grammatically Feminine Japanese word for Wisdom and Oneesama is the most prestigious of words one would use to address an older sister.  In Anime it’s most often used in a Class S context for not a biological relative but as a term of endearment for a Senpai you particularly admire.  Hence my Weebified title for this post.

The main internal debate within Christianity about Wisdom is if this title refers to The Holy Spirit or Jesus, Jesus eventually became the mainstream assumption hence bad Septuagint translations of certain Proverbs 8 verses being used to justify a Pre-Incarnate begetting of The Logos before the Creation of the Cosmos.  

But one of the first Extra-Biblical expressions of The Trinity was Theophilus of Antioch defining it as The Father, The Logos and Sophia.  Also both Theophilus and Irenaeus seem to identify the Holy Spirit with Sophia in how they interpret Psalm 33:6.

Previously on this Blog I strongly favored The Holy Spirit view, but I don’t think it actually matters that much and Theophilus of Antioch is someone I have mixed opinions on.  So I want to look into it deeper.

First I want to make clear that The Holy Spirit has a Feminine aspect whether they’re Wisdom or not The Hebrew word for Spirit is also Grammatically Feminine, the Greek word is technically Gender Neutral but by ending with an "A" sound it leans towards sounding Feminine especially to Semitic Language trained ears.  Luke 15:8-10 I think also uses a Woman as a type of The Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit's Feminine references are so well known that some some think She's only ever Feminine but the title of Parakletos is Masculine as is it's Hebrew original Menahem.

Jesus also has a Feminine side whether He is Wisdom or not.  Jesus is the Desire of Nations of Haggai 2:7 which is Feminine in the Hebrew.  Isaiah 53:7 confirmed to be about Jesus in Acts 8:32 also uses Grammatically Feminine language (in fact one of the words for Lamb/Sheep is identical to the name of Rachel).  The Sun of Righteousness of Malachi 4:2 is also a grammatically feminine title in the Hebrew.   Also Jesus is called The Image of God which Genesis 1:27 and 5:1-2 define as both Male and Female.  Also a prominent Biblical Hebrew word for Salvation is the Feminine form of the name Yeshua.  Luke 2:21 does clearly tell us Jesus’s Incarnate Body (Which He still has) was Assigned Male at Birth, but His Identity is both Male and Female.   And I have argued Shulamith is a type of Jesus not The Church in the Song of Songs.

The main argument against Jesus being Wisdom would be those quotes I mentioned at the start where He refers to Wisdom in the third person.  But there are other times where He refers to a Title or Aspect of Himself in the Third Person, like all the Son of Man verses.

The verses cited to prove Jesus is Wisdom are 1 Corinthians 1:24 and 30 and 1 Corinthians 2:7 (or the entirety of 1 Corinthians 1:17-2:13) and Colossians 2:3, from what I've found so far at least.  However I don’t get the sense that the Proverbs 8 Personified Wisdom is the point of any of those, in context Paul is using the word Wisdom explicitly in relation to Greek Philosophy, which it may surprise you to learn didn’t really have a Divine Personified Wisdom concept yet, not in Platonism or Stoicism and certainly not Epicureanism, the Gnostics got that from their Judeo-Christian sources.

It’s also important to remember that the Incarnate Jesus was the Vessel of The Holy Spirit while he walked the Earth and is who sent the Comforter which Proceeds from The Father to us at Pentecost.  So aspects of The Holy Spirit can be said to come from Jesus or be manifested in Jesus.

A lot of my past argument for supporting the Holy Spirit view was verses from The Pentateuch and Isaiah 11:2 that speaks of there being a Spirit of Wisdom and making the Spirit of YHWH the source of Wisdom.  The Pentateuch verses are Exodus 28:3, 31:3, 35:31 and Deuteronomy 34:9. 

However it’s important to remember that God as a whole is Spirit (Spirit in 1st Century Greek and Biblical Hebrew did not mean Immaterial) as shown by John 4:24.  In fact Isaiah 11:2 can be interpreted as a Trinitarian Formula calling each person of The Trinity a Spirit of YHWH.  

But I do think The Spirit of YHWH with a Definite Article typically refers to the Third Person of the Trinity and Revelation 1:4 and 4:5 seem to imply The Holy Spirit has a further Sevenfold division which perhaps only three of which were singled out in Isaiah, and Isaiah 11:2 listed the Spirit of Wisdom and Understanding first rather than second or third.

So that leads me to still favoring the Holy Spirit view, but it is ultimately unclear. 

Logos Theology is Semitic in Origin

Neither Heraclitus, Plato or Aristotle uses the word Logos for an aspect of the Divine.  

Stoicism was the first school of Greek Philosophy to use the word Logos for an aspect of the Divine. 

The Stoic School was founded by Zeno of Citium who was a Phoenician, Chrysippus was also a Phoenician and some other notable early Stoics may have been as well. Phoenician was a term the Greeks used for all the native residents of the Mediterranean coastal regions of Lebanon and north western Israel, both Canaanites and Israelites with the Tribes of Asher and Dan both having particular ties to that region.

The first Platonist to use the word Logos in a Similar way was Philo of Alexandria who was Jewish. Aristobulus was an earlier Hellenistic Era Greek Speaking Jewish Philosopher but we don’t have his writings so can’t know if he used the word Logos or not.

The Biblical Hebrew Basis for Logos Theology arguably begins with God Creating the World by Speaking in Genesis 1.  

But mostly I think Greek speaking Jews like Philo and the Early Christians (who I believe were originally more Stoic then Platonist) mainly used Logos as a Greek translation of the Hebrew word Dabar, Strong’s Number 1697-1698.  Dabar first appears in Genesis 15 where the Dabar of God seems to be a very tangible manifestation of God.  We likewise see throughout The Prophets “The Word of YHWH came unto" a Prophet speaking a Prophecy that the Prophet then writes down.  Psalm 33 is also believed to be an important influence on the Fourth Gospel’s use of the word.

In Rabbinic Literature the Aramaic word Memra becomes a synonym for this same concept.

So no The Logos is not an example of Greek Philosophy influencing the Judeo-Christian Tradition, it’s the other way around.

Edom and Christianity

In Talmudic and Rabbinic Literature both Rome and Christianity are often identified with Edom.  The popular assumption is Rome was identified with Edom first then it was applied to Christianity after it became the dominant religion of Rome.  However both these identifications seem to start in the Fourth Century with Rhetoric from the Jewish Revolt against Constantius Gallus, so the identification going the other way is just as plausible.

There is a poetry to associating Christianity with Edom from a Jewish POV that I think many overlook.  Christianity is an Abrahamic Religion but one that unlike Islam identifies itself with Isaac over Ishmael in Romans 9:7-9 and Galatian 4:28.  

The relationship between Edom and Israel in The Hebrew Bible is complicated, they are often enemies yet their shared kinship is never forgotten.  In Deuteronomy 23:7 God tells Israel to always welcome Edomites even though the then contemporary King of Edom refused to let the Israelites pass through their territory back in Numbers 20:14-21.  Esau himself was not ultimately a bad person and in fact plenty of Rabbis will acknowledge that he was partly in the right in his conflicts with Jacob.  And sometimes the worst aspects of Edom’s legacy is entirely placed on Amalek.  

One of the very few direct references to Esau in the New Testament is in Romans 9:10-13 where Paul quotes Malachi’s opening verses.  What Calvinists ignore is the role this plays in the greater context of this part of Romans going into chapter 10 and 11 where now those God “hated” before are being blessed and Israel is under temporary spiritual blindness.  So Paul himself is arguably poetically identifying Gentile Christianity with Edom, and doing so to specifically a Roman audience.  There’s also the interesting case of how James in Acts 15:15-17 quotes Amos 9:11-12.

I’m a Leftist, but one common opinion among Breadtubers I don’t like is the notion that "Judeo-Christian" is a problematic term that shouldn’t be used.  They say it from two angles, one of “how dare you suggest Jews and Christians ever have common ground”, but the other angle is that it’s offensive to exclude Muslims.  However this fact that Jews see Christianity as Edom itself proves that they do see the common Isaac based heritage and thus see Christianity as closer to them then Islam is in some senses at least.  However the name of Isaac does not phonetically lend itself to making a derivative term like “Abrahamic”.  I’m not one of those Christians who wants to deny Islam is Abrahamic, for better and for worse they are the true heirs of Ishmael, but there are contexts where it’s necessary to be more specific.

But now let’s also look specifically at the Fourth Century Context of Jews in The Roman Empire.  

The Empire was claiming to now worship the same God yet was still enforcing Hadrian’s ban on them entering their Holy City of Jerusalem.  Hadrian didn’t just forbid Jews entering Jerusalem but even living anywhere Jerusalem was visible from (according to Eusebius Church History Book IV Chapter 6 Section 3), Jerusalem is visible from Bethlehem even as far away as Tekoa.  Hadrian didn’t resettle the area primarily with expats from Italy, Rome didn't quite do Colonialism like that, no most of it was moving around nearby Gentiles.  

The Idumeans seemingly disappeared from history after AD 70.  I imagine some want to interpret Bible Prophecy so this is when they were wiped out, fulfilling many Hebrew Bible prophecies about Edom, but if The Jews survived this then the Idumeans who were even less centered around Jerusalem certainly did.  Maybe in time a good number became Christians, but some may have at first relapsed into Paganism.

The city of Eleutheropolis is an interesting case, also known as Bayt Jibrin and Baitogabra.  In Josephus it seems like the Idumeans of this town were completely wiped out or expelled in AD 68, but its references in the Midrash Rabba (Genesis Rabba, section 67) show Jews still saw it as Edomite well past that point.  The Roman Emperor Septimius Severus gave it the status of ius italicum meaning its citizens were all legally considered Roman Citizens.

Whether or not this city actually had a Pre Fourth Century Christian Community is hard to determine, tradition says Joseph Barsabas Justus of Acts 1:23 was its first Bishop but there are no historically confirmed Bishops till Macrinus who was at The Council of Nicaea, that could be just because they didn’t practice Episcopal Polity till Nicaea.  Acts 8:1 says after the martyrdom of Stephen the believers scattered all over Samaria and Judaea, this Idumea is part of what's Judah in Joshua 15 so that could be included here, and Mark 3:8 does refer to Idumaeans as among those having come to listen to Jesus.  In the Fourth Century Eleutheropolis is said to have the largest territory of any Bishopric in Palestina which is shocking considering that Province includes the very important Early Christian Bishoprics of Caesarea and Jerusalem.  I've seen some sources claim Eusebius of Caesarea lived in Eleutheropolis but I'm unsure I trust that claim.

Christian Rome also refused to let Jews live in Hebron, a city important in The Pentateuch but that had also become Idumean after the Babylonian Exile.

The Bishop of the Christian Community in Rome when the Edict of Milan was issued was named Militades, a Greek name that comes from a Greek word for Red that more specifically means “Red Earth”.  Edom is a Hebrew word for the color Red deliberately spelled the same as Adam which means Earth/Ground/Dirt.  

So the logic behind seeing Christianity as the symbolic heirs of Edom in the Fourth Century both locally in Palestine and in the heart of the Empire is sound.

Update 2026: And then there is what I observed in this more recent post on my Eschatology Blog.

https://materialisteschatology.blogspot.com/2025/09/christian-exodus-from-jerusalem-in-ad-70.html

The Sects of First Century Judaism

This is what Josephus has to say in Antiquities of the Jews Book 18 Chapter 1.

2. The Jews had, for a great while, had three sects of philosophy peculiar to themselves. The sect of the Essens; and the sect of the Sadducees; and the third sort of opinions was that of those called Pharisees. Of which sects although I have already spoken in the second book of the Jewish war;¹ yet will I a little touch upon them now.

3. Now for the Pharisees, they live meanly, and despise delicacies in diet; and they follow the contract of reason: and what that prescribes to them as good for them they do: and they think they ought earnestly to strive to observe reason’s dictates for practice. They also pay a respect to such as are in years: nor are they so bold as to contradict them in any thing which they have introduced. And when they determine that all things are done by fate,² they do not take away the freedom from men of acting as they think fit: since their notion is, that it hath pleased God to make a temperament; whereby what he wills is done; but so that the will of man can act virtuously or viciously. They also believe that souls have an immortal vigour in them: and that under the earth there will be rewards, or punishments; according as they have lived virtuously or viciously in this life: and the latter are to be detained in an everlasting prison; but that the former shall have power to revive and live again. On account of which doctrines they are able greatly to persuade the body of the people: and whatsoever they do about divine worship, prayers, and sacrifices, they perform them according to their direction. Insomuch, that the cities give great attestations to them, on account of their intire virtuous conduct, both in the actions of their lives, and their discourses also.

4. But the doctrine of the Sadducees is this; that souls die with the bodies. Nor do they regard the observation of any thing besides what the law enjoins them. For they think it an instance of virtue to dispute with those teachers of philosophy whom they frequent. But this doctrine is received but by a few: yet by those still of the greatest dignity. But they are able to do almost nothing of themselves. For when they become magistrates; as they are unwillingly and by force sometimes obliged to be; they addict themselves to the notions of the Pharisees: because the multitude would not otherwise bear them.

5. The doctrine of the Essens is this; that all things are best ascribed to God. They teach the immortality of souls: and esteem that the rewards of righteousness are to be earnestly striven for. And when they send what they have dedicated to God into the temple, they do not offer sacrifices: (3) because they have more pure lustrations of their own. On which account they are excluded from the common court of the temple: but offer their sacrifices themselves. Yet is their course of life better than that of other men; and they intirely addict themselves to husbandry. It also deserves our admiration, how much they exceed all other men that addict themselves to virtue, and this in righteousness: and indeed to such a degree, that as it hath never appeared among any other men, neither Greeks nor Barbarians, no not for a little time: so hath it endured a long while among them. This is demonstrated by that institution of theirs, which will not suffer any thing to hinder them from having all things in common: so that a rich man enjoys no more of his own wealth, than he who hath nothing at all. There are about four thousand men that live in this way: and neither marry wives, nor are desirous to keep servants: as thinking the latter tempts men to be unjust; and the former gives the handle to domestick quarrels. But as they live by themselves, they minister one to another. They also appoint certain stewards to receive the incomes of their revenues, and of the fruits of the ground; such as are good men, and priests: who are to get their corn, and their food ready for them. They none of them differ from others of the Essens in their way of living: but do the most resemble those Dacæ, who are called Polistæ. [Dwellers in cities.] (4)

6. But of the fourth sect of Jewish philosophy, Judas the Galilean was the author. These men agree in all other things with the Pharisaick notions; but they have an inviolable attachment to liberty; and say that God is to be their only ruler and lord. They also do not value dying any kinds of death; nor indeed do they heed the deaths of their relations and friends: nor can any such fear make them call any man lord. And since this immoveable resolution of theirs is well known to a great many, I shall speak no farther about that matter. Nor am I afraid that any thing I have said of them should be disbelieved: but rather fear that what I have said is beneath the resolution they shew when they undergo pain. And it was in Gessius Florus’s time that the nation began to grow mad with this distemper; who was our procurator; and who occasioned the Jews to go wild with it, by the abuse of his authority; and to make them revolt from the Romans. And these are the sects of Jewish philosophy.

Based on the Metaphysics it's clear that the sect of Judaism to which the Early Christians at least nominally belonged was basically the Pharisees.  That can be difficult for a moderner to wrap their head around given how much the word "Pharisee" is colloquially treated as synonymous with being the "Bad Guys" of the Gospels.

Often people who clearly qualify as Christians but exist outside the mainstream will simply refer to what they oppose as "Christianity", I personally try not to do that even though I have greater disagreement with the mainstream Church then some who do, but it is a thing.  

Josephus also tells us here that most of the common people were basically with the Pharisees, so those mass crowds of people Jesus attracted must have been made up of lots of Pharisees. And then Josephus suggests a lot of people in positions of power were really Sadducees merely pretending to follow the popular religion.

There are hints in The Gospel narrative itself that Jesus' criticisms of the Pharisees are really criticisms from within directed at their leadership.  

In the first three verses of Matthew 23 Jesus tells us two things about the leaders of the Pharisees.  The seat they sit in makes them legitimate heirs of Moses, this to me confirms that the Sanhedrin of the Greco-Roman period as an institution does have unbroken continuity with the Council of Seventy Elders ordained in Numbers 11:16-25.  

The other appears to be that what they preach is correct, they simply don't practice what they preach.  Other things Jesus says about them may seem inconsistent with that, seem absolutely about what they teach.  But I think "from a certain point of view" how you practice what you preach can include how you teach it and interpret it.  The point is Jesus couldn't have said that if He disagreed with the core definition of being a Pharisee.

Luke 7:36-50 features a Pharisee named Simon who Jesus is on pretty good terms with.

In Acts 23:6 Paul identifies himself as still a Pharisee on simply the grounds that He believes in The Resurrection of The Dead.  So likewise all of Christianity can claim the same.

According to the timeline that can be inferred from The Talmud, Shammai was head of the Sanhedrin from about 20-30 AD.  Some have observed similarities between the teachings of Jesus and Hillel the Elder, the head of the School that Shammai opposed.  This particular internal disagreement within the Pharisees doesn't come up in Josephus, possibly because in his time the Shammai school was already mostly defunct.  But the time period I and many others place the ministry of Jesus is at the height of Shammai's influence, so the Pharisees who are the bad guys of the Gospels could be mainly him and his followers.  I do think certain people online overstate the similarities between Jesus teachings and Hillel's to suit various misguided agendas of their own.  But it's interesting because modern Rabbinic Judaism also descends not only from the Pharisees but specifically Hillel's school.  Perhaps Shammai should have filled the role of the made up Zerah (played by Ian Holm) in the 70s Jesus of Nazareth miniseries.

However even in Josephus's brief description of the Pharisees there is at least one apparent disagreement with The New Testament view of The Resurrection, and that's how it seems ONLY the "Righteous" will be Resurrected.  1 Corinthians 15,  Acts 24:15, Revelation 20 and Jesus in John 5:28-29 are all clear that everyone no exceptions will rise again., and The Hebrew Bible agrees with the NT on this in Daniel 12.  Now as a proponent of Universal Salvation I disagree with most mainstream Christians on exactly what it means that the unjust will face "Judgment" after their Resurrection, but we do all still agree that they will also rise again to a literal bodily Resurrection.

And that last point is key to why I wanted to discus the Doctrine of the Resurrection in the context of 1st Century Judaism.  Some people try really hard to abuse certain details of 1 Corinthians 15 and 2 Corinthians 5 to suggest Paul and other NT writers must mean by "Resurrection" something that is actually functionally the same as what either the Essenes (we live forever as immortal souls without a body) or Sadducees (no real after life at all) believed.  However we see here that people who believed those kinds of things in first century Judaism didn't use the language of Resurrection, so it's silly to think Paul or Peter or Jesus would if that's what they meant.

Another interesting observation I can make from Josephus's description is how there was a familiar debate about Human Free Will vs Divine Sovereignty.  With the Essenes being like Augustine and the Calvinists, while the Sadducees were more like Pelegius or the Arminians.  The Pharisees however have a more nuanced take on that tension that again I feel is closer to what The New Testament is actually saying, but could also be compared to the Stoic position on Free Will vs Fate in Greek Philosophy.  I also feel like the Sadducees are functionally Deists, what we today call Deism began in Greek Philosophy with Aristotle and then the Epicureans.

Many people want to connect the Essenes to the origins of Christianity based on their practicing a voluntary communalism similar to the Early Church in Acts.  But they did it for a different reason, they had inherited a Pythagorean notion of the Immortality of The Soul, and indeed Classical Pagan Pythagoreans also practiced a sort of Voluntary Communalism, but for both it was about viewing the physical world as a Prison they seek liberation from.  Early Christians lived this way to be a light within the world and salt of the earth.  The Early Christians were true Communists, the Pythagoreans were more like Strasserists or NazBols, they were in bed with totalitarian governments in Samos and Crotone, and likewise I have argued that those Josephus called Essenes were those Matthew 22 called Herodians.  Philo's description of the Essenes also repeats that they had the support of many "Great Kings".  I've also talked about the Pythagorean role in the origins of Puritanical Sexual Morality, and the Essenes seem to have been the same way on that too, as well as their Misogyny, I think the Essenes were basically Herod's Proud Boys.  The Zealots were the Revolutionary Anarchists, and they were also originally a sect of the Pharisees.

Update: Of course much Confusion about the Essenes exists because of how they are conflated with the Dead Sea Scrolls.  Many have questioned that connection for reasons that have little to do with why I'm skeptical of it.

I partly reject it, I don't think the Scrolls all have a common origin.  Even if they did all come from that one settlement called Qumran, maybe the assumption everyone living there was all of the same sect is wrong.  Some Scrolls do seem fairly consistent with how Josephus described the Essenes, but other Scrolls mention the Resurrection, and also clearly have an interest in Eschatology and The Messiah.

Roman A. Montero in All Things In Common says the Pythagoreans weren't like the Essenes or Early Christians because they weren't Messianic or Apocalyptic.  But the thing is from what Josephus tells us, Eschatology was inherently the purview of the Pharisees, people with Essene or Sadducee views on the After Life would be just as uninterested in the Future as most Pagan Greeks were.  He also mentions how the Pythagoreans were a purely upper class phenomena, and again based on the Herodian connection I think the real Essenes were too.  It's possible at Qumran the Essenes were the Bourgeoisie who owned the place while the Pharisees were the Proletariat.

Update: "Everlasting Prison".

The "everlasting prison" in the above translation of Josephus's description of the After Life view of the Pharisees might in some other translations read "eternal prison".  In this case Eternal/Everlasting is Aidios which in a real sense does mean that, not Aionios which never actually means that.

Some of my Universal Salvation allies make much out of the Pharisees here using different language then Jesus who used Aionios and not that particular word for "prison" either, saying Jesus would have used the same word if He also meant a punishment with no end.  But I feel we overstate our case on that one a bit.

First of all Jesus was not speaking in Greek, and what ever main doctrinal statements the Pharisees had that Josephus got this from probably weren't in Greek either, they were either Hebrew or Aramaic. I am also with those who believe Matthew's Gospel was originally written in one of those languages not Greek.  The possibility that Josephus and the New Testament are sometimes translating the same Semitic expression into Greek differently can't be ruled out.

However even the Greek words in question can have nuance to how they are used.  Jude used "Aidios chains" to describe an imprisonment that is clearly defined as having an end.  And in my view those Angels are not Supernatural Angels but those who were swallowed up by the earth with Korah and Dathan.  So the Prison in the Pharisees eschatology could be Aidios in the same way Jude's chains are.

Maybe my prior assumption that Josephus or the Pharisees he got that from were absolutely precluding the Unrighteous from future Resurrection was mistaken.  Maybe the contrasting language there is like those Bible Verses that seemingly contrast "Life" and "Judgment" at the Resurrection. The Pharisees Jesus was most often in conflict with certainly seem like the kinds of people who wouldn't like Universal Salvation.  But I doubt the very idea was inherently unheard of in Pharisee circles.

In Josephus's description of the Zealots when he says they refuse to "call any man lord" for God is their only Lord, I do think that is a different Greek translation of the same sentiment Jesus expressed in Matthew 23:8-10, one says "Master" the other says "Lord" but the gist of meaning is the same.  

Usually when someone suggests Jesus and the Early Christians were Zealots it goes hand in hand with saying the Pacifist parts of His teachings were a later Romanized white washing.  However I have come to see the Zealot movement as like the Anabaptists of the 16th Century and Secular Anarchists of modern history (and Petr Chelčický could be considered the Pacifist Taborite), they included Violent Rebels like Thomas Muntzer, absolute Pacifist Separatists like those the Mennonites, Hutterites and Amish descend from, and many gradients in-between.  With the reputation of the violent rebels often used to justify not believing the pacifists when they claim to be non-violent.