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Stephen's Interpretation Of The Jewish Scripture

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During the days of Jesus, Palestine never lacked for loyalties. It was a crossroads of culture and peoples. Its 2,000,000 or more people ruled by Rome were divided by region, religion and politics (Shelley, p. 4). Jesus was a Jew, but that did not stop them from separating everyone into the categories of different religions. The Jews, who represented only half the population, despised their foreign overlords and deeply resented the signs of pagan culture in their ancient homeland (Shelley, p. 3-5). The answer lies in Stephen’s confrontation with the Jewish authorities. It centered upon the interpretation of the Old Testament. It was not a question of what the Jewish Scriptures said, but what they meant (Shelley, p. 14). The interpretation

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