erudition and the republic of letters 1 (2016) 13-42 © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2016 | doi 10.1163/24055069-00101002 brill.com/erl Christianity’s Jewish Origins Rediscovered: The Roles of Comparison in Early Modern Ecclesiastical Scholarship Anthony Grafton Department of History, Princeton University, 129 Dickinson Hall, Princeton, nj 08544, usa grafton@princeton.edu Abstract The history of early Christianity began in comparison: comparison of Christian prac- tices with what was known about the practices of ancient Roman priests, and with what was known — or thought to be known — about the practices of Jews in the Second Temple. These comparisons helped to inspire the larger enterprise of compara- tive study of religion in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. But they also helped to inspire ecclesiastical historians to look directly and seriously at the Jewish world in which Jesus lived and worked. As knowledge of rabbinical Judaism grew, comparison also led to a growing awareness that Christianity grew from Jewish roots, and that it had incorporated into its core practices many elements of Jewish worship. Keywords comparative study of religion – antiquarianism – Christian Hebraism – Mishnah – Passover – Last Supper 1 Introduction In 1742, J.C. Schöttgen did his best to shock the world of learning. He argued that Jesus, when he came as the Messiah, had done so as a rabbi. The circumstantial evidence, he insisted, was clear. Those who heard Jesus preach called him ‘rabbi’ (Joh 1:38, 1:50). He dressed as the rabbis did. The ‘coat without seams’ (Joh 19:23) that the soldiers divided after they crucified Jesus was identical to