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cost of living in Judea, for example, was five times that of Galilee because of Judea's relative
scarcity of good soil and crops (Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, vol. i, pp. 224, 225).
However, if we allow Judea to also have had about 240 cities and villages as did Galilee (al-
though there were probably less), then we arrive at about 500 cities and villages in all of Palestine
that could have had a synagogue. This would represent about 500 synagogues. But, if we allow
some of the cities to have had two or more synagogues, the number could be raised to about 1,000
synagogues. That is, if every city and village did have a synagogue.

If there were, being extremely liberal, about 1,000 synagogues scattered throughout Pales-
tine out of a population of 3,000,000 people, this would mean one synagogue for every 3,000 peo-
ple. The sizes of the synagogues were from the very small, held in the home (ibid., vol. i, p. 433),
to the size of the Capernaum synagogue with as many as 500. There were certainly none which
could hold 3,000, nor even a third of that amount. And the majority were small synagogues not
much bigger than the one in Nazareth.

That there could hardly be more than 2,000 synagogues throughout Palestine is obvious in
another respect, too, when we consider that there were only 6,000 Pharisees to minister in these
synagogues. THE PHARISEES WERE THE SYNAGOGUE RULERS (Herford, Judaism in the
New Testament Period, p. 134). However, not all Pharisees were religious leaders in the syna-
gogues. For example, Josephus, the Jewish historian, was a Pharisee but was not a ruler or syna-
gogue official. In fact, a good percentage of Pharisees were not a part of the synagogue
government.

And besides this, there were several offices to be filled in each synagogue (ISBE, vol. v,
pp. 2878, 2879). The limited number of Pharisees available could hardly have filled the necessary
posts for more than 1,000 separate synagogues.

With about 3,000 Jews for each synagogue in Palestine, and the synagogues ranging in size
from around 75 members (even 10 if held in a home, as was sometimes allowed) to around 500
people, it can easily be seen that a good number of the Common People DID NOT ATTEND.

Popular Judaism Like Popular Churchianity

The religious condition of the Jews during the days of Christ can be compared with our
own society. Today, there are about 750 million people who claim to be Christians, but how many
of these are fervent in their beliefs? How many are consistent church goers? How many are zeal-
ously interested in their church? How many put their church above anything else in their lives?
How many really know God?

Even the major Protestant and Catholic leaders are appalled at the seeming lack of real in-
terest expressed by so many of their members. It is a known fact that the majority of people today
just aren't interested in real, heart-felt religion at all -- even though most claim to be Christians.

Should we then be amazed that over 95% of the Jews of Christ's time were no more relig-
ious than our own people? Of course not! People were the same then as they are today.

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