There is a lot of prejudice around today, and it was the same in Jesus' time.

Authors Avatar

RE Coursework – Prejudice                        Chris Russell

        There is a lot of prejudice around today, and it was the same in Jesus’ time. The meaning of prejudice is “judgement or opinion reached prematurely or on insufficient basis”. This can be in the form of forming an opinion of someone before you know him or her, on the basis of their race, religion or any other beliefs.

        There was a lot of prejudice around in Jesus’ day that he had to try to change people’s minds about. For example the Jews did not like the Romans being in control of their homeland. The Romans charged heavy taxes, didn’t respect the Jewish religion and many other offensive and insulting things. I think that this was wrong of the Romans. A group of Jews called the Zealots used violence to try and rid Palestine of Romans. Although the Jews were badly treated I don’t think that they should have used violence. Another form of prejudice in Jesus’ day was against the sick, especially lepers. The people thought that sickness was a punishment from God so sick people must be sinners. People didn’t try to help the lepers because it was thought to be very contagious so they were sent out of their town to roam about.

        A specific example of prejudice is the story of Zacchaeus. He was a short, rich man who was a tax collector in the town of Jericho. One day when Jesus was going through Jericho Zacchaeus went out to try and see him. However, there was a big crowd and he couldn’t get a good view. Zacchaeus decided to climb a tree to see if he could see Jesus. When Jesus came by the tree he told Zacchaeus to come down, because he wanted to stay with him. All of the people in the crowd thought this was wrong because Zacchaeus was very dishonest and cheated people out of money. They said “This man has gone as a guest to the home of a sinner!” (People thought of tax collectors as dishonest and all sinners.) Then, Zacchaeus repented and said he would give half of his belongings to the poor and anyone he had cheated out of money he would repay four times as much. Jesus said “Salvation has come to this house today, for this man, also, is a descendant of Abraham. The son of man came to seek and to save the lost.” Jesus was a descendant of Abraham so if Zacchaeus was, he was worthy of Jesus’ forgiveness.

Join now!

        This story showed prejudice because although Zacchaeus was dishonest, no one gave him a chance to change his ways. Jesus was the helping hand that Zacchaeus needed to become a good person and repent. The people themselves were sinners for being prejudiced against Zacchaeus, not just him. It is fortunate that there are people in the world today, as well as in Jesus’ day, who can look beyond prejudice at what a person is really like.

        Another example of prejudice is when Jesus healed a blind man on his way to Jericho. This blind man heard the crowd moving and ...

This is a preview of the whole essay