The objective isn't merely to alter people's political ideologies but to shift their fundamental worldview. The transformation of metaphysical concepts, influencing ideology and subsequently politics, is a gradual process.
It is rather absurd to me to think of Paul as basically the most genius philosopher of all time, capable of shifting the entire worldview of the West forever, and then at the same time say 'well he did it because he really hated the Romans and wanted to destroy them'.
Notions such as original sin and the idea that the less fortunate are less sinful than the prosperous will bring about societal changes at a slow pace. The transition from glorifying strength and the power to dominate to celebrating meekness and the willingness to serve seems, to me, detrimental for the existing Roman empire.
Original Sin didn't come about in Christian doctrine until the 4th Century. So either Paul was such a genius as to think 'in a few hundred years people will take my letters to various Greek churches and take specific phrases out to justify a doctrine that will eventually destroy them,' when it is equally likely that later generations simply misinterpreted what Paul was saying. This is also removing any religious significance/divine inspiration from his writings. Assuming that Christianity is false, the underpinnings of Original Sin are writings in Genesis, and 2 sentences from Paul? And somehow he had enough precognition to know that this teaching would be potentially damaging to the Romans?
Also, it is not as if humbleness, and public service were foreign to the Romans and their philosophy. Not just the Stoics, but there are plenty of stories of Greeks and Romans who were heralded for their public service, honesty, and willingness to set aside ultimate power for the sake of their country (Cincinnatus and Sulla are obvious examples).
The shift from perceiving nature as beautiful and true to regarding it as sinful and deceptive is one such example.
Where exactly is nature perceived as bad in Christianity? The most I will grant you is that nature as it currently is today is 'fallen' from before Adam and Eve were expelled from the Garden, but that doesn't mean Christianity perceives it as bad. Arguably the largest and most influential system of theology for Christianity is Natural Theology, basically the idea that you can arrive at God purely through human reason and the observation of nature. I don't think nature is considered deceitful at all until you get to later European philosphical systems that start to question empiricism and start to truly develop the idea that our senses lie to us about the nature of reality. I mean, unless I am just wildly mistaken, Christianity depends on the underlying REALITY of nature of the universe, rather than some skepticism of reality.
Under Christian norms, the admirable qualities in a leader no longer revolve around justice, strength, wisdom, civic virtue and nationalism. Instead, leaders are esteemed for their devotion to the faith, adherence to the Christian ethical principles, defense and propagation of Christendom, acts of charity like supporting the impoverished and tolerance like showing compassion to foreigners, and the demonstration of pious conduct. The magnitude of these transformative shifts suggests that their impact cannot be minor; in fact, it would be nothing short of miraculous if they did not significantly alter the societal fabric and the destiny of the Empire.
I think it is a gross mischaracterization to say that Christian leaders weren't valued for justice, strength, wisdom, etc, and also that Roman leaders weren't admired for charitable acts and pious conduct. To claim that Christianity alone has some claim to valuing devotion to faith and acts of charity is just wrong, across all of history and disparate cultures. And the idea that Christian rulers weren't admired for justice, strength, civic virtue, etc. is also baffling considering most if not all of the great Christian leaders were valued for most of those things in addition to their piousness.
However, the veneration of Jesus, the Trinity, or Mother Mary prohibits a Jew from praying in a church.
Veneration of Jesus would have been a problem because Jews don't believe he is the Son of God or their Messiah. But they would venerate their Messiah on a level of Jesus if he were to come. Veneration of Mary wasn't widely accepted until centuries after Jesus died, and wasn't an immediate development.
Jews did not like Christian Rome but most definitely preferred it over pagan Rome.
Seems like a justification of Christianity over Roman Paganism, which seems silly since it was after Jesus (and Paul) died that Rome destroyed the Jews and their temple. So why would the subversive Rabbis promoted a cult that would be 'better' than Roman Paganism, when they were allowed to practice their religion under Rome, and it wasn't until the Jews rebelled multiple times that this changed.
It is likely that both Paul and Rabbi Gamaliel anticipated Christianity causing more immediate turmoil in Rome, providing an opportunity for Jews to reclaim Jerusalem before their diaspora settled into new lives. From their perspective, assimilation was a concern, and they might have hoped for a quicker upheaval.
This assumption is grounded in the early Christians' expectation of an imminent apocalypse. However, the reality turned out to be a gradual process, requiring subsequent Rabbis to adapt to the unfolding circumstances.
Hindsight from 2000 years in the future sure is a crazy thing huh? If the subversive Rabbis were so powerful and foresighted, why didn't they make the Maccabees wait an additional hundred years for the Messianic cult to cause more internal damage before they revolted?
It seems like you are also claiming that they were concerned about Jews assimilating into the Empire. This had happened many times in the past, for example in Persia and Babylon. So I don't know why they would be concerned about Jews losing their identity when they had survived much worse in the past, even if many of their traditions and beliefs had adapted to Babylonian and Persian beliefs.
However, the ultimate consequence of principles like "love your neighbor" and the equality of all humans under God is the gradual erosion of Roman nationalism. Initiatives such as assisting the sick and the poor, establishing welfare programs, ultimately result in the expansion of a dependent lower class relying on assistance.
You can't possibly be saying that Christians were the only ones in Rome who cared about helping the sick and poor are you? Or that welfare programs (bread and circuses) were the result of Christian influences?
Expressing absolute certainty is challenging, but several actions undertaken by Christianity in today's world, such as advocating for immigration and opposing nationalism and ethnic cohesion, would certainly have occurred in ancient Roman times.
I don't want to be the guy to call for a source on everything, but it is absurd to take modern Evangelical Christian ideas (when those things are ahistorical to Christianity generally, and many of those things are not popular at all among Christians) and retroactively apply them to ancient peoples 2000 years ago and claim that is why Rome failed. 'Ethnic cohesion'? Rome was famous for exporting its culture to conquered peoples in order to assimilate them into their broader culture, and that had nothing to do with Christianity at all. Modern sensibilities of 'ethnicity' didn't even exist then, how can you claim Romans would care about that, when those ideas didn't even exist then?
