This study explores the historical development of orthodoxy and heresy within early Judaism and Christianity, challenging the notion of a natural "parting of the ways." The author argues that the division was an imposed partitioning, much like political borders, with heresiologists acting as "customs inspectors" who defined boundaries and declared certain ideas and practices as "contraband." This process involved both Christian writers like Justin Martyr constructing an independent Christianity, partly by labeling Logos theology as distinctly Christian, and Rabbis simultaneously defining Jewish identity by rejecting binitarian ideas, effectively "crucifying the Memra." In Aramaic, "memra" (מִמְרָא) translates to "word" or "speech.” Ultimately, the sources suggest that the very efforts to create distinct religious identities inadvertently led to the mutual development of heresiological discourse and the concept of "religion" itself as a category separate from ethnic or genealogical identity.
Jewish Christian Border Lines: Introduction
Justin's Dialogue with the Jews: The Beginnings of Orthodoxy
Naturalizing the Border: Apostolic Succession in the Mishna
The Intertextual Birth of the Logos: The Prologue to John as a Jewish Midrash
The Jewish Life of the Logos: Logos Theology in Pre- and Pararabbinic Judaism
The Crucifixion of the Memra: How the Logos Became Christian
The Yavneh Legend of the Stammaim: On the Invention of the Rabbis in the Sixth Century
"When the Kingdom Turned to Minut": The Christian Empire and the Rabbinic Refusal of Religion