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The Big Split - Blessing Against Heretics

      Late in the first century the believers in Jesus were still worshiping in synagogues with the other Jews. The other Jews disliked them for the reasons mentioned previously, but since there was no way to identify which synagogue-worshipers were Jesus-believers, there was not much they could do.

      Then the rabbis devised a brilliant idea. They would add a phrase to the Eighteen Benedictions, the daily prayers which the worshipers all prayed together, that would curse the followers of Jesus. The reasoning was that Jesus-believers would refuse to recite this phrase, and could be identified. It worked; it wasn't long before the followers of Jesus stopped worshiping in the synagogues and met only with others like themselves. It was another step in the increasing divide between the synagogue and what was to become the church.

The Big Split - the Jewish Tax