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Who Are We in Christ, Part 3

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Dear Rabbi,

If G-d is a mystery to us, beyond human reason and logic, then how can we relate to Him?

Answer:

You’re right, G-d is essentially unknowable. Yes, He makes Himself known to us through His miracles, His prophets, His Torah, and by the very act of creating and sustaining our world and our very existence. But none of that can really provide information that defines who He is. Because He cannot be defined. In the language of the Kabbalists, He is infinite, even beyond “the beginning that cannot be known.”

So how can we pray or have any relationship with a being so unknowable, so undefinable, He can hardly be called a being?

The answer is because our relationship with G-d is not measured by our capacity to understand Him, nor by heightened consciousness or any sublime ecstasy we claim to have from the experience of His presence. Our relationship to G-d is measured by what we do, by our firm adherence to the morals that He has established for us and by our integrity in our dealings with others.

One who claims he has one G-d, but cheats his fellow, has in fact two gods. One who claims he is godless, but believes in a fixed and immutable moral law is in fact a believer. Ultimately, G-d is in your life when you act G-dly—consistently following His ways in all you do. That is why He has given us His Torah, so that by following these instructions, we can bond with Him in our daily lives.

G-d is not an idea that can be grasped with the mind. G-d is real, and reality is grasped by real deeds.

-Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
“How Can I Relate to an Unknowable G-d?”
Learning and Values
Chabad.org

I know it seems strange to begin a blog post about “who we are in Christ” by quoting a question to and answer from a Chabad Rabbi, but bear with me. It’s relevant.

I wasn’t going to write a part 3 to this series (if you haven’t done so already, see part 1 and part 2 before continuing here), but I received a rather tongue-in-cheek request to do so:

Your gonna have to write a part 3 cause all the Christians are gonna be wondering what the hell your talking about Jew and gentile identity and why you aren’t talking about the spiritual blessings in the heavenlies and the freedom from condemnation and having the miraculous signs and authority to cast out demons and living forever etc. how does all the chiristian good stuff fit in here?

I’m only kinda joking. When I hear “in Christ” it makes me think of the time I spent in church!

OK, not much to build on from those statements, but it did make me realize that I didn’t provide much of a resolution to the question. On the other hand, there may not be much of a resolution to the question. That’s disappointing to hear, but that’s the nature of a relationship with God. We don’t get all the answers, at least in an intellectual fashion. To paraphrase Rabbi Freeman (and quote James T. Kirk), “We learn by doing.”

But what do we do?

For some Christians, the answer is, “we don’t have to do anything. We’re saved by grace.”

That’s true, but it’s hardly the end of the story…well, it is for some.

One of the criminals who were hanged railed at him, saying, “Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us!” But the other rebuked him, saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.” And he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” And he said to him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.” –Luke 23:39-43 (ESV)

For some Christians, this is the quintessential picture of salvation by grace. The thief on the cross, dying by inches with Jesus, had no time or ability to do anything except believe and confess his faith…and then expire by slow torture. He couldn’t sing praises (he would have been lucky to even catch his breath enough to make a whisper) to God, give to the poor, visit the sick, or anything else in response to his faith. He came to faith, confessed, and shortly thereafter, died.

And I suppose there’s nothing wrong with that, even if you come to faith at age 20 and then wait with your faith until age 80 or so to die.

But is who we are in the Messiah just realization of his reality, coming to faith, confessing, and then patiently waiting for the bus to Heaven?

OK, OK. You go to church on Sunday, listen to a sermon, sing hymns, give money when they pass around the plate, go to a Bible class, have coffee and donuts, and then go home. Maybe you go to a dinner and Bible study at your church on Wednesday nights, too. You celebrate Christmas. You get really worked up for Easter.

But is that it?

An observant Jew, who lives out religious details in a day-to-day manner, performing the mitzvot and following halachah might commit more “acts of righteousness” in a week than you will in an entire year.

Yes, I’m being unfair, but how many Christians out there believe that all there is to their faith is being saved by grace, going to church, and getting by until they finally die and go to Heaven to be with Jesus?

broken-crossProbably quite a few. More’s the pity.

That’s why it’s important to ask questions like, “who are we in Christ” and then start pursuing the answer with all available energy and concern. Some Christians won’t get this only because it doesn’t affect their salvation. But what if it’s not just all about salvation? What if “being saved” is only the beginning of the journey, not the conclusion?

Jonathan Stone recently wrote a blog post called Pilgrim’s Progress in which he discussed the matter of spiritual growth (or lack thereof, in my opinion). Stone says in part:

All around us the world is falling apart. We are overwhelmed with constant news of economic collapse, natural disasters, genocides, political wars, all sorts of crimes, starvation, extreme poverty and the sort. All of which reminds me of this, but you get the point. It is NOT the call of the pilgrim to stand idly by while people’s lives are shattered. However, it is the pilgrim’s call to continue on the path. And that path is a path that gets brighter and brighter as one progresses along.

This is a call to actually do something with your life of faith!

Wow! Really? What? What makes the path “get brighter?”

“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left. Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’ –Matthew 25:31-40 (ESV)

You know, if you continue reading verses 41-46, you sort of get the idea that what you actually do for other people does affect your salvation. If you don’t feed the hungry, visit the sick and people in prison, and so on, you can expect an answer from Jesus like,“Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.”

If you claim to love God and still cheat someone or steal from someone, you have two gods.

Oh wow!

So, let’s go over this again. You get saved and then what are you supposed to do (assuming you aren’t nailed to a cross by big, metal spikes and getting ready to die)?

Feed the hungry.

Give water to the thirsty.

Welcome the stranger.

Clothe the unclothed.

Visit the sick and those in prison.

Don’t take that as a hard and fast “religious formula” whereby you perform exactly those deeds and because of that are promised a life in the world to come. Consider those behaviors as fitting into this general category:

And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. –Matthew 22:39 (ESV)

ReflectionA day or so ago, I was talking about love; how we are to love each other and how Jesus loves all of us. Paul described this kind of love in Ephesians 5:25-32 when he compared a husband’s love for his wife to Christ’s love for the church. Paul called it “a profound mystery.”

Here’s another one:

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” –John 13:34-35 (ESV)

Add to the list, someone who makes peace with fellow Christians and who loves them.

So who are we in Christ?

We are people who love those who are like us and those who are unlike us. We treat everyone the way we want to be treated as human beings. If someone has needs like food, water, or companionship, we do our best to provide for those needs, not just because the other person needs them, but for the sake of our love for God and His love for us. When we show this kind of love, we’re telling people this is how God loves all human beings. Our actions are our witness and speak much, much louder than all the sermons ever spoken and all the religious tracts and pamphlets ever shoved into undesiring hands.

Now compare what the Bible says you’re supposed to be to that person you see in the bathroom mirror every morning. We know what Jesus says about who you’re supposed to be in Christ. Are you that person?

You should be able to answer that question now.

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Who Are We in Christ, Part 2

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The task for defining the identity of Gentile converts was largely left to the Apostle Paul, the self-described “apostle to the Gentiles.” Modern social-scientific studies on the Bible have called Paul an “entrepreneur of identity” or a “social entrepreneur” who was engaged in forming the identity of his Gentile converts, creating for them a definition of who they were and mapping their relationships with other social groups. To do this, Paul used some metaphors that were drawn from the Old Testament and others that were drawn from Roman society. Taken together, they help give substance and definition to the identity of Gentile believers in Jesus. We will find that even though they do not become Jewish, neither do they remain an undifferentiated part of their pagan society. Paul “invents” a new identity for them and uses variegated imagery to describe that identity. Romans 4:16–17 and Galatians 3:7–9 contain one of Paul’s most powerful metaphors for describing Gentile identity. Paul claims that believing Gentiles are children of the forefather of the Jewish people, Abraham himself! His argument is that since Abraham believed when he was uncircumcised, he is not only the father of the Jews, his biological descendants, but also of all those throughout history who have had “the faith of Abraham.”

It is worthwhile to note that Paul leaves out the other two forefathers of the Jewish people, Isaac and Jacob. By limiting Gentile identity to children of Abraham, he makes it clear that these Gentiles are not part of “Israel” – a name reserved for Jacob’s descendants. However, God promised that Abraham would become the father of many nations, as recorded in Genesis 17:4. Paul sees the believing Gentiles as a fulfillment of that promise. They are still members of the “nations” (Gr. ethnē, Heb. goyim) but their new identity allows them to be simultaneously children of Abraham (and therefore heirs to the promise of Abraham) and members of the nations.

Paul takes great pains to emphasize that the covenant of promise which helps define Gentile identity in Christ is the Abrahamic covenant and not the Sinai covenant. His repeated contrast of these two covenants, especially in Galatians, is meant to drive home the point that though the Gentile converts are children of Abraham, they are not children of Israel, nor did they stand at the foot of Mount Sinai and receive the Torah.

Despite their shared ancestry in Abraham and their shared inheritance in the promise to Abraham, believing Gentiles and Jews have differing obligations to God. Paul also includes his Gentile converts as citizens of a kingdom. Variously described as the “kingdom of God” (1 Corinthians 6:9–10; Galatians 5:19–21), the “kingdom of light” (Colossians 1:12), and the “kingdom of the Son” (Colossians 1:13), Paul uses “kingdom” to indicate the Gentile believer’s eschatological political situation. In other words, who is the Gentile believer’s ultimate authority? Is he still nothing more than a subject of the Roman emperor, while the Jewish people have an eschatological King to look forward to? Paul’s answer is that Gentile believers, like their Jewish brethren, are included in the reign of Jesus Christ. He is their King, and they are his citizens. They have transferred their allegiance from the reign of Caesar to the reign of Christ, a reign that will come into its fullness at his return. This metaphor may underlie the language of citizenship in a commonwealth in Ephesians 2, discussed below. Paul used the imagery of slavery and freedom as well. He regarded Gentile idolaters as “slaves to sin” (Romans 6:20–21) and to “the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world” (Galatians 4:9). Typical of Jewish attitudes toward idolatry, Paul associated it with all kinds of immoral behavior—behavior that led naturally from idolatry, and that was in some way an involuntary consequence of idolatry, dictated by God (Romans 1:18–32). This status of slavery has been removed through obedience to Christ (Romans 6:17–18). The Gentile believers are now free from sin and slaves to obedience (v. 16), to righteousness (v. 19), and to God (v. 22). Paul describes this process as redemption (apolytrosis), a word normally used to describe the ransom, or buying back, of prisoners of war or captive slaves. Paul envisions his Gentile converts as more than just freed slaves; they are adopted children, brought into God’s family (Galatians 4:5).

Another metaphor Paul uses is the term “in Christ” (Romans 8:1; 1 Corinthians 1:30; 2 Corinthians 5:17). In contrast to those who are “in Adam” (1 Corinthians 15:22), those who are in Christ “belong to the new aeon with its freedom and life.” Gentile believers are no longer identified with the old way of life that characterizes sinful humanity; “in Christ” they participate in the eschatological community that Christ inaugurated, the community that foreshadows the ultimate redemptive era, the World to Come.

“Salvation” or the idea of being “saved” is very common in the Pauline corpus and is probably the most popular term used today to describe the action that brings someone into the community of faith—and rightly so. Believers are saved, or rescued, from this world, just as the Jewish people were saved from slavery in Egypt or the captivity in Babylon.

-Also from the book I’m reading that I can’t talk about yet

Updated! See the end of this blog post for details.

I couldn’t resist a “part 2” since these concepts and this discussion won’t leave me alone right now. I suppose it’s an issue that is really at the core of most of Christianity. Who are we in Christ? What does a Christian identity mean to me? What does it mean for a non-Jewish person to accept discipleship under the Jewish Messiah and King?

More plainly put, just who in the heck do we think we are?

Actually, that last question is really part of the problem. There’s (in all likelihood) a difference (probably a whopping big one) between who God thinks we are in Christ and who we think we are in Christ/Messiah (depending on our particular denominational orientation). It’s kind of interesting to think that Paul was the one to actually figure out (or make up) an answer to “the Gentile question.” I mentioned this in yesterday’s part 1 of Who Are We in Christ and decided I should allow the “other shoe to drop,” so to speak.

For the sake of some folks in the Hebrew Roots movement, I thought I should include what should be (but isn’t) obvious, in that if we claim a connection to Israel through Abraham, as our mysterious author tells us, “Paul leaves out the other two forefathers of the Jewish people, Isaac and Jacob.” Interesting, eh? If Abraham is “the father of many nations,” then he is father to more than just Israel. Islam also claims him, and because of Paul, so does Christianity. I seriously doubt most Christians (or any Hebrew Roots folks) would seriously consider Islam to be part of Israel through Abraham, so how can we justify Christianity being synonymous with Israel?

Or can we?

The Christian church hasn’t had to struggle with its identity for a long time. For many centuries, it (we) have been secure in the knowledge that we were the spiritual inheritors of all of the covenant promises because the Law (and the Jewish people along with it) was nailed to the cross of Christ and we were adopted by God’s grace to supplant the descendents of Sinai.

Except that isn’t so clear anymore.

Periodically, I become aware of articles that describe a general exodus from the church, especially by young singles and families who feel their needs are not being met. Some of those needs are spiritual, and the church in the early 21st century, appears to be leaning toward a kind of “entertainment” model to bring in and keep parishioners. Except that may not be what they really want or rather, what they (we) really need.

Some of those disaffected Christians make their way into the Hebrew Roots movement, hoping to find a deeper understanding of their faith and a richer and more robust God than the one they left behind in the Christian Bible class. We all have a tremendous need to feel close to God and sometimes we do that by asking questions and posing puzzles the church (or most of it) doesn’t want to deal with. Hebrew Roots, on the surface, seems to offer those kinds of answers, but it’s sort of an illusion. For a lot of people, “different” means “better” and it takes them a long time to realize that such may not be the case. Also the “stuff” that goes along with Judaism (Messianic and otherwise) is very compelling.

Wearing fringes makes you closer to God. Avoiding ham sandwiches makes you closer to God. Wearing a “beanie” makes you closer to God. It’s really cool stuff. But is it your stuff, or are the Gentiles entering Hebrew Roots merely attracted to playing with someone else’s toys because the toys look brand new, are from different toy stores, and are really cool?

I suppose that’s kind of a mean statement, but I think that fits some Hebrew Roots Gentiles.

For the rest, I think you’re like me. You really do feel there’s a larger reality to who you are and who God is than you’ve been presented with so far. However, I exited traditional Christianity, entered, and then (eventually) existed One Law because it didn’t satisfy what I was looking for either. Ultimately, I had to conclude that “doing Jewish” wasn’t who I really am and that whoever the first century Gentile disciples were, their identity wasn’t “doing Jewish” either.

There’s a mystery that needs to be solved and I think there’s an answer available. Maybe it’s not the final answer, but it beats settling for someone else’s identity because it’s not easy to find your (our) own. If the identity of the Gentile disciple of the Jewish Messiah isn’t in your local Baptist, Lutheran, or non-denominational church, and it’s not in assuming a Jewish identity with all the “bells and whistles” (minus Talmud which tends to put most Hebrew Roots people off), then we may need to start digging a little deeper.

I think enlisting the aid of some reliable Hebrew Roots and Messianic Jewish teachers is a good way to start. If folks, such as my (presently) anonymous author, are taking the time to tell us who Gentiles aren’t in the world of the Jewish King, I think they’ll be more than happy to help us discover who we really are in Christ.

Stay tuned. My commentary on this week’s Torah portion speaks more to this issue and greatly expands upon it. Please give it a read and let me know what you think.

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My Beloved Profound Mystery

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And that is what the Zohar says on the verse: “My soul, I desire You at night.” “One should love G-d with a love of the soul and the spirit, as they are attached to the body and the body loves them….” This is the interpretation of the verse: “My soul, I desire You,” which means, “Since you, G-d, are my true soul and life, therefore do I desire You.” That is to say, “I long and yearn for You like a man who craves the life of his soul, and when he is weak and exhausted he longs and yearns for his soul to revive in him (lit., ‘to return to him’).

“Likewise when he goes to sleep, he longs and yearns for his soul to be restored to him when he awakens from his sleep. So do I long and yearn to draw within me the infinite light of the blessed Ein Sof, the Life of true life, through engaging in the [study of the] Torah when I awaken during the night from my sleep”; for the Torah and the Holy One, blessed be He, are one and the same.

Today’s Tanya Lesson (Listen online)
Likutei Amarim, beginning of Chapter 44
By Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi (1745-1812)
founder of Chabad Chassidism
Elucidated by Rabbi Yosef Wineberg
Translated from Yiddish by Rabbi Levy Wineberg and Rabbi Sholom B. Wineberg
Edited by Uri Kaploun

Beloved of the soul, source of compassion,
Shape your servant to your will.
Then your servant will run like a deer to bow before you.
Your love will be sweeter than the honeycomb.
Majestic, beautiful, light of the universe,
My soul is lovesick for you;
I implore you, God, heal her
Be revealing to her your pleasant radiance;
Then she will be strengthened and healed
And will have eternal joy.
Timeless One, be compassionate
And have mercy on the one you love,
For this is my deepest desire:
To see your magnificent splendor.
This is what my heart longs for;
Have mercy and do not conceal yourself.
Reveal yourself, my Beloved,
And spread the shelter of your peace over me;
Light up the world with your glory;
We will celebrate you in joy.
Hurry, Beloved, the time has come,
And grant us grace, as in days of old.

“Yedid Nefesh”
-by Eleazer Ben Moses Azikri
A sixteenth-century Kabbalist
Quoted from easwaran.org

I think it’s safe to say that God loves you more than you love God. I don’t say that to be mean or to minimize your capacity to love God, only that God is infinite and His love is infinite. We are finite and mortal and frail. And yet in reading the excerpt I quoted from the Zohar and the beautiful and classic words of Yedid Nefesh, I can see that at our best, when we are able to touch the hem of the garment of God, our ability to love exceeds mere flesh and bone and blood and the soul of God becomes one with the soul of man.

I wonder if Paul’s commentary in his letter to the church at Ephesius is a “midrash” of such a love between humanity and the Divine?

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. –Ephesians 5:25-32 (ESV)

It is a profound mystery indeed.

You are altogether beautiful, my love;
there is no flaw in you. –Song of Solomon 4:7 (ESV)

Is this the soul of God speaking to man or the soul of man speaking to God?

Or both, intertwined in a graceful yet ephemeral dance?

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Who Are We in Christ?

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Being caught up in the fresh wind of God’s activity among the Gentiles, none of the apostles or the other Jewish believers immediately attempted to formulate a theology of Gentile identity. They just rejoiced. As we seek to formulate—or perhaps more accurately, to rediscover—that same theology today, we must remember to keep our priorities straight. We must praise God that his activity is universal and that he gives the same Holy Spirit to all who believe. But our questions still haven’t been answered, and neither had the questions of the believing Jews in Jerusalem. Before too long, two elements emerged. One group, mostly Pharisees who had accepted Christ, did not recognize the eschatological significance of the miraculous conversion of Cornelius. They argued that these Gentile believers must proselytize; they must convert to Judaism. Others, though, dissented. One of them was Sha’ul, also known as Paul, who had just come back from a mission trip to Asia Minor (known today as Turkey). He, like Peter, had witnessed God working in the lives of Gentiles. He reported that many Gentiles had come to faith in Jesus. We know from Paul’s epistles that he immediately forbade these Gentile converts from worshipping idols. They could no longer be identified as pagans. So how were they to be identified?

While the “circumcision faction” —probably a majority— answered this question by requiring conversion to Judaism, Paul refused this answer to the Gentile problem. This conflict was resolved in Acts 15 at what is now called the Jerusalem Council. First, Paul’s opponents made their case. Then Peter got up and told his story. Then Paul and Barnabas told theirs. They didn’t give a theological reason for their position. They just told their stories. For them, that was enough. They had seen firsthand how God had miraculously changed the hearts of the Gentiles who had attached themselves to Jesus. It was clear enough to Peter, Paul, and Barnabas that the Gentiles didn’t need another status change. They had been accepted just as they were.

It was James, Jesus’ brother, who gave a theological voice to the position of Peter and Paul. He quoted Amos 9:11–12: “‘After this I will return and rebuild David’s fallen tent. Its ruins I will rebuild, and I will restore it, that the rest of mankind may seek the Lord, even all the Gentiles who bear my name,’ says the Lord, who does these things, things known from long ago.” James reasoned that the wave of Gentiles who were coming to faith were a fulfillment of biblical prophecy. At this juncture, with James’s ruling, it became halachah — law — within the early church that Gentiles did not have to become Jews. Not only that, but their identity was just as valid and as valuable as that of the Jews. They too had an eschatological significance, they too were a fulfillment of prophecy, and they too were called by God to be part of the body of believers, just as the Jews were.

At the Jerusalem Council, then, one aspect of the identity of the Gentile believers had been confirmed. They weren’t Jews, and since the term “Jew” and “Israelite” had been synonymous since the Captivity, they couldn’t be called “Israelites” either. They were still Gentiles. But in the first century, the terms “Gentile” and “pagan” were synonymous.

Knowing this, many Two-House proponents are offended at being called “Gentiles.” To them, the terms “Gentile” and “pagan” are still synonymous today. They believe that Israel constitutes the only people of God. The negative connotation of the word goy in rabbinic literature only serves to confirm this sentiment. Yet the New Testament is clear that believing Gentiles are still called Gentiles. They remained members of the ethnē, the nations, and the apostles addressed them as such.

Yet non-idol-worshipping Gentiles were virtually unheard of. There was no precedent. New words and concepts had to be created to explain this new phenomenon, or else familiar concepts had to be adapted. The latter route is the one the New Testament authors took in identifying the Gentile converts, their place in God’s plan, and their obligations to God and to the Jewish people.

-From an unpublished book I can’t talk about yet

Receiving the SpiritIn my various roles as an author, editor, and reviewer, I occasionally receive advance copies of books that I really can’t discuss until they are published or near their publication dates. Nevertheless, as I was reading this one, I came across the above quoted section of a particular chapter and was rather taken by the content. The viewpoint of the author (who must remain nameless for now) is very much like mine, and what is written speaks to not only what I understand to be true for me, but also answers a number of my questions about who the Gentile disciples of the Master were in the first century…and maybe who they…who we really are today.

We don’t really think about it much now from a “church” point of view, but just how did the original Jewish Apostles of the Jewish Messiah see the newly-minted Gentile disciples? What sort of plan was there (if any) to integrate them into the larger Jewish faith in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? When a first century idol worshiper accepted being a disciple of Jesus of Nazereth, did they stop being a “Gentile” and turn into something else? If so, what did they turn into…a Jew?

Paul says no, otherwise, he wouldn’t have had any objections to Gentiles (males, that is) becoming circumcised (see Galatians 2) and actually converting to Judaism, but if the Gentiles weren’t “spiritual Jews,” what were they? More to the point, who are we now?

(I know you’re thinking “we’re Christians,” but that term didn’t exist back then, at least not as it’s defined today. Who the new, non-Jewish disciples were was a completely unsettled matter in the beginning. So who were they, and who are we?)

That, as they used to say, is the $64,000 question. But why am I even bothering to ask it, especially right now?

Another round of the “One Law” vs. “Bilateral Ecclesiology” debate has reared its ugly head, this time starting in Derek Leman’s blog post We’re Not All the Same and then continuing in Comfort, Agitation, Breakthrough (I say “raised its ugly head” not to disparage Derek’s writing or choice of themes, but just to describe the rather repetitive nature of said-discussions and their lack of concrete resolution). The comments sections of Derek’s blog posts were fresh in my mind as I was reading the text from the above-quoted book and I couldn’t let the matter go, much as I’d like to.

Besides my usual stance that non-Jews claiming obligation to a Jewish lifestyle that (apart from disdaining Mishnah, Gemara, and Talmud) mirrors actual Jewish observance dilutes and threatens to eliminate Jewish distinction from the nations, I realized there was another serious matter going on.

Consider this.

When a Gentile Christian with an attraction to Jewish observance concludes that the same 613 commandments that the Creator gave to the Israelites at Sinai are also assigned to any non-Jew who has accepted discipleship under the Jewish Messiah, then they are saying that every Christian is obligated to a Torah lifestyle. That means, astonishingly enough, that any Christian who does not observe the entire “yoke of Torah” is sinning!

And yet, the vast majority of Christians in the church have absolutely the opposite understanding of their obligations to God.

It’s one thing for a “Messianic Gentile” to say that, as a matter of conscience and personal commitment, they have taken on board behaviors such as refraining from eating Leviticus 11 “treif,” praying with a siddur, and wearing tzitzit, but it’s another thing entirely to say that, according to their own understanding of the Bible, they declare that all believers, Gentile and Jew, must perform the same mitzvot!

That’s rather cheeky.

Particularly when, based on the rather lengthy block of text I quoted at the start of this blog post, the Jewish disciples were still trying to figure out what to do with the Gentile disciples back when all this first got started. Full Torah obligation for all non-Jewish believers certainly wasn’t the obvious conclusion at which the Jewish Apostles arrived. In fact, James said that it seemed not only good to the Council, but to the Holy Spirit as well (Acts 15:28), that the full Torah lifestyle not be dumped upon the Gentiles as a whole. Further, the non-Jewish disciples not only didn’t mind not being obligated to the weight of Torah, they were actually happy about it.

So when they were sent off, they went down to Antioch, and having gathered the congregation together, they delivered the letter. And when they had read it, they rejoiced because of its encouragement. And Judas and Silas, who were themselves prophets, encouraged and strengthened the brothers with many words. –Acts 15:30-32 (ESV)

PaulMaybe the movement to bring the Gentiles into discipleship with the Jewish Messiah never reached a point where matters of identity and practice were resolved before the destruction of the Temple and the final, tragic exile of the majority of Jews from their homeland. Those events paved the way for a “Gentile takeover” of this Messianic Jewish sect (which would eventually evolve into what we call “Christianity” today), such that theology and history would be re-written to remove Judaism and Jews from devotion to Jesus as the Jewish Messiah.

For twenty centuries, the original vision of Paul and Peter was lost or at least significantly distorted, and only in the last few decades has their been a modern attempt at restoration.

But now we have a new problem. Originally, it was up to the Jewish sect administered by James from Jerusalem to apply a set of standards to the non-Jewish disciples, defining identity and limits to their religious practice. Today, the cart has come before the horse, so to speak. The non-Jewish disciples are doing their own defining and identifying, and to that end, summarily ignoring or disagreeing with how Jews define themselves, their participation in the Messiah, and the mechanism for practice of non-Jewish attachment to the God of Israel.

It was Paul who attempted to resolve the “Gentile identity problem” by bringing Abraham into the picture, but that story exceeds the scope of this “extra meditation”. I only want to point out that we haven’t come to the point where we fully understand how a non-Jewish person is supposed to relate to Jewish disciples of the Jewish Messiah, or for that matter, how (or if) our religious practice relates to Judaism. I certainly think that mainstream Christianity has missed a few things along the way, but I think that many non-Jews in the Hebrew Roots movement have “over-corrected” by jumping from a “no-Law” position to a “the Torah is totally mine” stance.

Who are we among the nations who have our identity in Christ? The Bible has a lot to say about the answer, but it doesn’t say everything, at least in a language we can understand. Once the book that has inspired this missive is available to be discussed openly, I hope to write more about this topic.

Until then, let us conclude that each of us is making personal decisions about how we choose to practice our faith relative to how “Jewish” we behave. We just don’t know how or if those decisions mesh with the intentions and desires of God for the people of the nations of the world. We certainly don’t know enough to walk into a church and condemn everyone present for not wearing kippot and tallitot.

I wrote a Part 2 to this article. I hope you’ll read it.

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God is in the Simple Places

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If we were truly humble, we would not be forever searching higher paths on the mountain tops. We would look in the simple places, in the practical things that need to be done.

True, these are places in a world of falsehood. If the world only had a little more light, none of this would be necessary.

But the soul that knows its place knows that the great and lofty G-d is not found at the summit of mountains, but in the simple act of lending a hand or a comforting word in a world of falsehood and delusions.

-Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
“The Path of the Humble”
Based on letters and talks of the Rebbe
Rabbi M. M. Schneerson
Chabad.org

Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

–Philippians 2:3-11 (ESV)

The New Testament is full of lessons on and examples of humility. The idea is that we put God first in our minds and our hearts and our actions, and not seek to exalt ourselves. And yet as we see from the lesson of the Rebbe, even in seeking God on the highest mountain tops and even into the highest Heavens, we are not truly humble.

I suppose there’s a dichotomy involved. We have our feet on earth, yet our eyes gaze upward toward Heaven. The Divine spark within us is trapped in earthly flesh but seeks to return to its fiery Source. How can we really be humble once we realize that we have been made in the Holy image of the Creator of the Universe?

This can be a problem.

The problem is that we have a tendency to elevate ourselves in relation to those around us who do not realize that they too have been created in God’s image. God peppered the Bible with many lessons on remaining humble, and yet we seem to ignore them all.

Now he told a parable to those who were invited, when he noticed how they chose the places of honor, saying to them, “When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in a place of honor, lest someone more distinguished than you be invited by him, and he who invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give your place to this person,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.” –Luke 14:7-11 (ESV)

Human nature tells us not to pass up an opportunity because it may never come again. If there is an open seat in a place of honor, our impulse is to sit in it. Sure, we know the parable I just quoted above, but this is real life, right? Parables and religious lessons are fine, but how much do they really apply to the day to day world? If we wait for God to raise us up to a place of honor, it may never happen.

And if it doesn’t, so what?

I mean, did God really say that you have to be so important or exalted among your peers?

Let’s change our point of view a bit.

The Alter Rebbe now explains that there are also two general levels in the love of G-d. The higher level is called ahavah rabbah (“great love”). It is a gift from above, granted to an individual after he has attained the level of yirah ila‘ah. This love is so lofty that one cannot hope to achieve it unaided.

The second and lower level of love is attained by contemplating G-d’s greatness. It is called ahavat olam (“eternal love,” and more literally, “love of the world”), because it emanates from one’s comprehension of the world, i.e., from one’s appreciation of the G-dly life-force that animates the world.

Today’s Tanya Lesson (Listen online)
Likutei Amarim, middle of Chapter 43
By Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi (1745-1812)
founder of Chabad Chassidism
Elucidated by Rabbi Yosef Wineberg
Translated from Yiddish by Rabbi Levy Wineberg
and Rabbi Sholom B. Wineberg
Edited by Uri Kaploun

But for most of us, there’s something that has to happen before we can learn to love God in any capacity.

It has previously been noted that the higher level of love can come about only after one’s fear of G-d is total.

Today’s Tanya Lesson (Listen online)
Likutei Amarim, end of Chapter 43

AweFear. In Jewish mysticism, there is a lower level of fear (yirah tata’ah) that we experience when we realize the truly awesome nature of God and understand the terrible consequences we have earned for our sins. It is said that fear comes before wisdom. It is also said that wisdom comes before fear of God, which seems a contradiction, but it’s not. Yirah tata’ah comes before wisdom, but there is a different sort of fear and awe that requires us to already be wise.

The explanation is as follows: The Mishnah refers to the two above-mentioned levels of fear. The first statement — “If there is no fear, there is no wisdom” — refers to the lower level of fear, yirah tata‘ah. Without this level of fear, it is impossible to attain wisdom, i.e., the performance of Torah and mitzvot. (This is deemed wisdom, since the ultimate purpose of wisdom is repentance and good deeds.) The second statement — “If there is no wisdom, there is no fear” — refers to the higher level of fear, yirah ila’ah. This level of fear must be preceded by wisdom, i.e., the performance of Torah and mitzvot. Only thus is one able to attain the higher level of fear.

Today’s Tanya Lesson (Listen online)
Likutei Amarim, beginning of Chapter 43

But what does this have to do with humility and setting aside our natural human inclination to seek honors for ourselves, even as we say we seek to honor God? How can we truly value and even desire humility? There are two ways.

The first is to make ourselves refrain from taking the seat of honor out of fear that, if we are discovered not to belong there, we will be publicly shamed and removed from the banquet. This is sufficient I suppose, but hardly desirable. How can we serve God out of a sort of “peer pressure” to conform, even as everything else we are in our hearts and minds screams the opposite?

The second way is to wisely realize that if we love God, we will obey Him and that His desires are always best for us, regardless of how we may or may not be seen in the eyes of people around us. The seat of humility may not be in the spotlight, but it might be very comfortable and even very instructive.

Ben Zoma says:
Who is wise?
The one who learns from every person…

-from Pirkei Avot 4:1
SimpleToRemember.com

Most secular people avoid a life of holiness, in part, because they fear that their own needs and desires will be completely dismissed, and that they’ll be compelled to live a life of self-denial and frankly, boredom. However I’m sure that you, as a true person of faith, if you took the time to review the events of your life and the gifts of God, would realize that the benefits, even in a temporal sense, far outweigh the sacrifices. You may never become rich or famous or exalted in seats of honor in this life, but if you first learned to fear God and then to love Him, you know that what God has provided has been much more than sufficient.

God is sitting among those who are farthest from the seats of honor and He can be found in the simple places.

 

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Practicing Faith, Part 3

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What has to be healed in us is our true nature, made in the likeness of God. What we have to learn is love. The healing and the learning are the same thing, for at the very core of our essence we are constituted in God’s likeness by our freedom, and the exercise of that freedom is nothing else but the exercise of disinterested love – the love of God for His own sake, because He is God.

The beginning of love is truth, and before He will give us His love, God must cleanse our souls of the lies that are in them. And the most effective way of detaching us from ourselves is to make us detest ourselves as we have made ourselves by sin, in order that we may love Him reflected in our souls as He has re-made them by His love.

This is the meaning of the contemplative life, and the sense of all the apparently meaningless little rules and observances and fasts and obediences and penances and humiliations and labors that go to make up the routine of existence in a contemplative monastery: they all serve to remind us of what we are and Who God is – that we may get sick of the sight of ourselves and turn to Him: and in the end, we will find Him in ourselves, in our own purified natures which have become the mirror of His tremendous Goodness and of His endless love…

-Thomas Merton upon entering a Trappist monastery as a novice
Part Three, Chapter Four: “The Sweet Savor of Liberty” (pp 409-10)
The Seven Storey Mountain: An Autobiography of Faith

I hadn’t planned on writing a “part 3” to the part 1 and part 2 of “Practicing Faith,” but this quote form Merton’s book, which I did want to write about, sort of demanded it. I’ve been trying to define what “practicing faith” means which, for me, isn’t always the same as “practicing religion.”

Religion is the mechanism or the interface by which we practice our faith. For Thomas Merton, that interface was the Catholic church and eventually, a Trappist monastery. That’s not exactly my cup of tea and it may not be yours either, but it certainly was his and in the above quote, he has a point to make that I rather like.

But it’s not perfect.

On the one hand, Merton draws a sharp dichotomy between our human self and our selfless love of God. On the other hand, he reunites these two halves when he says our “purified natures which have become the mirror of His tremendous Goodness and of His endless love…” Christianity tends to split the world into the secular and the Divine, devaluing the former and elevating the latter to the highest degree. This explains the rationale for Merton’s joining a “contemplative monastery” in which he could engage in the “little rules and observances and fasts and obediences and penances and humiliations and labors” that comprise monastery life as a life dedicated to our holiness while minimizing our human nature.

Judaism doesn’t support a monastic lifestyle and generally believes that everything we do in the secular has meaning and substance in the Divine realm without really being separated from it. Life is life and faith is faith; a unified whole, much as God is, not divided or relegated into different categories, meanings, or realms. If God created you to be here in the world, then He meant for you to live out your holy life in a concrete universe, not pining away for the ephemeral, spiritual heavens.

When we are confronted to lead a life of faith, we have to ask ourselves (and God) how we’re supposed to do it. For Merton, the answer was to convert to Catholicism and later, to join a Trappist monastery in Kentucky. That isn’t the answer for all of us.

But wait!

If God is One and His Name is One, isn’t there just One religion or One religious sect…one and only one way to worship Him?

You’d think so, which is what allows many people in many different religions to say, “we are the one and you are not.” But I recently compared Thomas Merton and some of the things he teaches to Rabbi M. M. Schneerson and his teachings, and I think we can agree that these two men had radically different ways of practicing faith and certainly of practicing religion.

But the vision or essence behind the mechanics of their practice may have been more closely aligned than we can see on the surface. True, they would have disagreed on a good many things, but they also seemed to see and talk to the same God and I am convinced that God talked to both of them.

I don’t know how they would have tolerated each other if they had actually ever met (both the Rebbe and Merton have since passed away some time ago, so only God knows what a conversation between these two would be like), but in stripping away the “little rules and observances and fasts and obediences” involved in each of their daily lives, maybe we can get a glimpse of the bigger picture.

He has an opinion of how each person should be, how each thing should be done. Those who follow his choreography are his friends, those who dare dance their own dance are his enemies; and few, if any, are left without a label.

In truth, he has neither enemies nor friends. He has only himself, for that is all that exists in his world.

“If you don’t want to be so lonely,” we tell him, “make some room for the rest of us.”

-Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
“The Thick Lagoon of Ego”
Based on letters and talks of the Rebbe
Rabbi M. M. Schneerson
Chabad.org

I suppose I’m coming dangerously close to saying that what religion you practice doesn’t matter and that there are many roads that lead to God. That statement is bound to offend just about everyone, since we are all deeply invested (me too) in our various religions and how our particular religion is a wonderful way (or the wonderful way) to encounter God and find the meaning of our life in Him. In fact, as proof there is one and only one way, Christians will undoubtedly quote:

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. –John 14:6 (ESV)

This, for the Christian, would automatically rule out the Rebbe as having the ability to come to God and for many Protestants, it would rule out Merton’s having a life of holiness as well. And yet, how can we be so sure of just who God accepts and who God rejects, based on their life and how they understand practicing faith?

Human beings can be terribly arrogant and self-absorbed. In order to feel as if we matter to God, we sometimes make the mistake of believing that God cares less for people who are not like us than for people who are like us. For God to love us more, He must love someone else less. We have to be the favorite child to feel secure, so God’s other children can’t also be “favorite.”

Blowing out someone else’s candle doesn’t make yours burn any brighter. -Anonymous

If you want to get better at your faith, by all means, please practice it. But this isn’t a competition. You don’t have to worry that God has only one “gold medal” in the “holiness Olympics.” If we’re competing against anyone, it is ourselves. The only challenge is to be a better person of faith today than we were yesterday. What someone else does or doesn’t do in practicing their faith cannot and does not affect who we are and what we are doing as people who are faithful to God.

We spend all of our lives trying to understand God and understand who we are in Him. That’s a full time job. Do we really need to waste that time worrying about the other person and how he or she chooses to practice faith?

There are no things. There are only words. The Divine Words of Creation.

The words become scattered and we no longer understand their meaning. Only then are they things. Words in exile.

If so, their redemption lies in the story we tell with them. Reorganizing noise into meaning, redefining what is real, and living a life accordingly.

-Tzvi Freeman
“Reinterpretation”
Based on letters and talks of the Rebbe
Rabbi M. M. Schneerson
Chabad.org

We are all journeying on our own path. We are all using our own words to tell our story about God. We each live our life according to that story. The story is our tale about how we practice our faith, and it is always different for each person…but God is the same.