Tag Archives: Bible

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Journey of the Ger Toshav: First Step

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JourneyTosafos discusses how to understand how Eliezer, the trusted and faithful servant of Avraham Avinu, conducted himself in a questionable manner by letting an omen determine such a critical matter. The Gemara seems to say that he was in violation of the Torah’s law not to rely upon omens (Vayikra 19:26). Tosafos answers that according to one opinion, Eliezer was a Noachide, who was not commanded to avoid this type of conduct. And, according to the view that he was commanded to abide by it, we must say that he actually asked Rivka about her family before making any decisions.

Daf Yomi Digest
Distinctive Insight
“Relying on omens and signs which portend the future”
Chullin 95

And the 126th prohibition is that we are forbidden from feed­ing meat from the Pesach offering to [any non-Jew, even] a ger toshav.

Translated by Rabbi Berel Bell
Sefer Hamitzvot
“A Gentile Eating of the Paschal Offering”
Negative Commandment 126
Chabad.org

I’ve been trying to understand the relationship between Jews and Gentiles and how we are connected to God (and perhaps even to each other). This has been a recurring theme in my blogs for well over a year and I suspect I’ll never come to a final conclusion, but something in me refuses to let it go.

Between Christianity and Judaism, we like to think we have our roles all figured out. The Jews have Moses and the Christians have Jesus. Everybody else, well…they’re everybody else. The Jews believe that any non-Jew who adheres to the Seven Laws of Noah (see Genesis 9 for the source) is a “righteous Gentile” or Ger Toshav and merits a place in the world to come. This may well be true of the Gentile, regardless of what other traditions or religious practices the Ger Toshav follows. Christianity believes that a person must become a Christian in order to be saved and that there are no other alternatives (John 14:6).

While the Jewish perspective does not discount a Christian being a righteous Gentile (although worship of Jesus as God may rule that out, since it amounts to idol worship and polytheism), a Christian will absolutely not believe that anyone can come to God the Father except by accepting the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Period.

What surprises me is that, if the Old Testament record clearly points to Jesus as the Messiah, why does Judaism just “miss it?” Israel was the keeper of the Holy Scriptures and the only nation on Earth to worship the One and Unique God thousands of years before the concept of Christianity came into being. While Moses and the Children of Israel were standing before God at Sinai and accepting Him as their God, the ancestors of every Christian on Earth were worshiping pagan idols of wood and stone, and some were passing their own children through the flames of their false gods in (supposed) exchange for a good harvest.

There’s another wrinkle.

While traditional Christianity and Judaism have a more or less clear idea of who they are and what their roles are in relation to God and the Bible, there is a third group, rather small by comparison, but growing, which is called Messianic Judaism (MJ). Even within this group, there are a number of factions which have different and sometimes contradictory beliefs. I won’t go into a lot of detail, but the two primary groups are (for lack of better terms) One Law (OL) and Bilateral Ecclesiology (BE).

(Please keep in mind that these aren’t particularly formal groups, but in order to understand the concepts and positions, I need to assign some sort of labels to said-positions).

One Law is a movement within MJ that is made up primarily of non-Jewish Christians and Jews who come from a Christian background. This group states that Jesus never did away with the Law and that, when Gentiles are grafted into the root of Israel (Romans 11), they too become obligated to the exact same 613 commandments (as opposed to the 7 Noahide Laws) as the Jewish people. A major caveat in OL, is that this “Jewish” lifestyle is minus any directives from the Talmud, which they see as without authority and merely the opinions of men.

Bilateral Ecclesiology, a term coined in Mark Kinzer’s book Postmissionary Messianic Judaism: Redefining Christian Engagement with the Jewish People, posits that there are clear boundaries between the obligations and responsibilities of Christian Gentiles and Jews, even those Jews who have come to faith in Jesus (“Yeshua” is used as the preferred Hebrew name of Christ by both groups). BE supporters consider that a non-Jew insisting upon being “obligated” to all of the Torah commandments is blurring if not disintegrating the line between Jews and Gentiles and making meaningless what it is to be a Jew. From their perspective. OL effectively makes Messianic Jews and Christians one indistinct “blob”, where you can’t tell where a Jew leaves off and where a Christian begins.

The debate between the two groups can get rather heated on occasion, as you can see in the comments at Judah Himango’s blog, for example (please note that I’m just using this as an example. I like Judah and this is not a criticism of him or his blog). Here’s a sample of one of the comment’s in question (I like the commenter, too and am quoting him just to illustrate the point, not to be critical):

Where Scriptures makes distinction between men and women, priests, etc. There is no mentions whatsoever for Jew and Gentile distinctions as far as keeping Torah is concerned. Even your beloved “scholars at FFOZ only come up with one, only one verse where they have to twist it in order to sustain their agenda, and you drink the kool-aid….

One Law bases its assumption upon the following:

The same law applies to the native-born and to the alien living among you. –Exodus 12:49

You are to have the same law for the alien and the native-born. I am the LORD your God. –Leviticus 24:22

One and the same law applies to everyone who sins unintentionally, whether he is a native-born Israelite or an alien. –Numbers 15:29

Mount SinaiMy opinion is that these scriptures are completely irrelevant to the One Law position since the “aliens” being referred to in these verses are non-Jews who attached themselves to the God of Israel, joined with the Israelites as a people, and eventually were absorbed into that population. They started out as Ger Toshav and their ancestors did not retain their non-Jewish identity but essentially “converted” to Judaism. It would be impossible to apply this set of examples to a group of non-Jewish “Messianic” believers today who want to be as equally obligated to the Torah as the Jewish people but all the while, retaining their Gentile identity and only living a partial Jewish lifestyle (one that disregards Talmudic interpretation of the written Torah).

Groups that hold to a “Bilateral Ecclesiology” framework (I don’t think Kinzer ever intended to make a theology out of BE), while maintaining a rather large Gentile Christian following, are led by a core group of Jewish Rabbis (Rabbi as defined within their own context) who support Messianic Judaism for Jews, including a completely Jewish religious lifestyle (Talmud included). They see the Acts 15 letter as the defining pronouncement by James and the Jerusalem Council, those Jews who held the mantle of authority over the “Messianic” movement after the ascension of Christ. The letter clearly defines limits upon the obligation of the Gentile believers in relation to the Torah of Moses. The letter doesn’t completely illustrate those limits, since Jesus taught outside their scope, but nothing in the teachings of Christ specifically commands that Gentiles become wholly absorbed into the Jewish nation.

Further, Paul, in the book of Galatians, goes to great efforts to discourage the Gentile Christians from converting to Judaism, for in converting, the Gentile Christian would then become fully obligated to obey all of the Torah (Galatians 5:3). That would be a crazy statement to make if the Gentile Christians were already fully obligated, as OL suggests. (D. Thomas Lancaster recently wrote The Holy Epistle to the Galatians, in which he illustrates how to understand Paul’s letter as teaching this distinction.)

To recap, traditional Judaism and Christianity both see their roles as very clear within their own groups and in relation to each other. Jews believe the Torah is only for the Jews and Gentiles, including Christians, are not obligated to it and are, in many cases, forbidden to adhere to its instructions. Non-Jews may only come before God when accepting the obligation of the Seven Noahide Laws and becoming Ger Toshav, and there is no need to convert to Judaism. Christians believe that the Law was wholly replaced by the Grace of Christ (for Jews and Gentiles) and that anyone, even a Jew, must convert to Christianity to have right standing before God. The Christian covenant completely replaces the Abrahamic and Mosaic covenants in their eyes.

In other words, Jews aren’t trying to co-opt Christians and Christians aren’t trying to co-opt Jews. They are separate communities with few if any bridges across the gap.

Messianic Judaism muddies the waters of that gap considerably and is still trying to define who they are and who Jews and Gentile Christians are in relation to each other, to the Torah, and to God.

But what about the Ger Toshav? I previously addressed the differences between the Noahide and the Christian in a pair of blog posts: The Sons of Noah and Children of God. Nevertheless, I believe that the clues to how Messianic Jews and Gentile Christians are supposed to relate to each other, to the Torah, and to God may be found in the more traditional understanding by Judaism of the Ger Toshav (and I’m deliberately sacrificing sure footing for the sake to my journey in pursuing the Ger Toshav).

What started this line of thinking for me was Rabbi Bell’s translated statement, “…is that we are forbidden from feeding meat from the Pesach offering to [any non-Jew, even] a ger toshav“. It never occurred to me that a Noahide would have had a special status in relation to Passover and the other festivals in the ancient community of Israel, but that was a logical outcome of the “one law for the native and the alien” statements during the forty years of wandering.

Going to GodIn Messianic Judaism, One Law accuses Bilateral Ecclesiology of denying Gentile Messianics (Christians) access to the same benefits of Torah living as the Jews and, by inference, treating Christians as if they/we were any other Gentile group. BE states that Gentile faith in the Jewish Messiah does make a difference, but that difference is largely in the areas of moral and spiritual behavior and does not include Jewish identity markers (wearing tzitzit, laying tefillin, keeping Kosher, observing the Shabbat). Traditional Judaism, while not recognizing a special status among Christian Gentiles relative to other non-Jews, does believe there is a difference in expectation between the general population of the world and those Gentiles who accept the mantle of Ger Toshav.

(Just to be clear, traditional Judaism sees all factions of Messianic Judaism as Christians; “Jews for Jesus”. Traditional Christianity sees Messianic Judaism as a group of Judaizers who are “under the law”. Like I said, the waters are muddy)

Eliezer was considered a Noahide, a righteous Gentile, a Ger Toshav and the most trusted of the household of Abraham. He was empowered to select a bride for Isaac, the son of the promise, who would father Jacob and continue a line that would lead to the patriarchs, the twelve tribes of Israel, and ultimately, the Messiah himself. Yet Maimonides considered even a Ger Toshav as forbidden from eating of the Passover sacrifice. Who is the Ger Toshav and can we take any understanding away from who he is and who we are in Christ, especially as we attempt to relate to our Messianic Jewish brothers?

What does it all mean and can any conclusions be drawn from this rather confused mess? That’s what I’m going to try to find out in my next blog.

For now, I remain a Christian at the gates of the Temple of God.

Part two of this series is The Ger Toshav at Worship.

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The Words of His Image

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Hebrew FirePlants live in a world of earth, water, air and sunshine. Animals live in a world of the body and its senses. Human beings live within a world of their own words.

The sages called us “the speaking being,” saying that our soul is filled with words. When our words leave us, our very being goes out within them. We conquer with them. We declare our mastery over Creation with them. Our words tell us that we exist.

For us, nothing truly exists until we find a word for it. All our thoughts of every object and every event are thoughts of words. Our world is a world not of sensations and stimuli, but of words.

Build your world with precious words. Fill your days with words that live and give life.

Memorize words of Torah and of the sages. Have them ready for any break in your day. Wherever you go, provide that place an atmosphere of those powerful words.

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

All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and sea creatures are being tamed and have been tamed by mankind, but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.

With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be. Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring? My brothers and sisters, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water. –James 3:7-12

People are very careless with their words. Even the best among us tends to slip in what we say from time to time. More often than not, these “slips” are an indication of the difference between how we publicly present ourselves and what we’re really thinking and feeling inside. In that, we use our words, not to represent the person we are, but the person we want others to believe we are.

We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. –2 Corinthians 10:5

Yes, we are supposed to “take captive every thought”, but that’s easier said than done. As we see from both Rabbi Freeman and James, words are extremely powerful and have tremendous impact, for good or for ill. Words of Torah, kindness, and compassion are wonderful and can change the world around us for the better. But if we use the same mouth to utter words of praise to God, yet speak curses to men, what are we telling people about our inner being and what are our words allowing to become “real” in the world?

Taming the tongue and the mind that generates our words takes a lot of discipline. But there are rewards:

If you see someone’s faults hanging out and you truly want to help—whether it be a friend, a spouse, your child, or even your nemesis—don’t say a word about what you have found wrong.

Find something wondrous about that person, perhaps something that nobody ever mentions, and talk about it—to yourself, to those who will listen and sympathize.

In very little time, you will see such a new person, you will believe you are a maker of wonders.

Indeed, we all are.

-Rabbi Freeman
“Wonder Making”
Chabad.org

For God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. He died for us so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with him. Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing. –1 Thessalonians 5:9-11

Our words create wonders and even miracles in other people, if we choose them carefully. It’s amazing to think that something as simple as a word spoken by a single human being could be so powerful. Yet if our words can possess such might, remember that with a word, God created the universe:

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. –Genesis 1:1-4

By the word of the LORD the heavens were made,
their starry host by the breath of his mouth.
He gathers the waters of the sea into jars;
he puts the deep into storehouses.
Let all the earth fear the LORD;
let all the people of the world revere him.
For he spoke, and it came to be;
he commanded, and it stood firm. –Psalm 33:6-9

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. –John 1:1-3

The words of God are immense, and when they reach the hearing of man, it is no small and simple thing:

When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear. They stayed at a distance and said to Moses, “Speak to us yourself and we will listen. But do not have God speak to us or we will die.” –Exodus 20:18-19

Torah at SinaiAnd yet when God speaks, His words are always for our benefit. God gave the words of Torah at Sinai to the Children of Israel, and the Torah detailed every aspect of the Jewish lives as a unique community. But there are so many “words”:

But why so many mitzvos? Why so many dimensions to Torah? We have positive and negative commandments. The mitzvos also include logical laws, logic-defying laws, and everything in between. We have intellectual mitzvos, emotional mitzvos, agricultural mitzvos, business mitzvos, mitzvos dealing with food, dress, housing, and family life. The Torah include every medium of teaching known to man: stories, legal codes, numerological calculations, history, philosophy, ethics, poetry, metaphorical and mystical works.

Ethics of Our Fathers commentary
“Multiplicity”
Elul 22, 5771 * September 21, 2011
Chabad.org

It is said that God made man because He desired to dwell in “the world below”, in our world. To prepare the world, He gave the Torah to the Children of Israel, His “light to the world”. However, for God to truly inhabit our realm, “then the Divine presence must permeate its every aspect.” Man must be refined by the word of God “down to his every element and component” so that the human life will “become a vehicle for the fulfillment of the Divine will.”

While the Torah as given at Sinai was not expected to be placed upon the shoulders of the rest of humanity, not even the non-Jewish disciples of the Master (see Acts 15), we are not left wanting in this regard. That said, it isn’t always clear what are the specifics of Christian obligation to God. Put another way, if the Torah is the Word of God to the Children of Israel, is there a separate “Word” for Christianity?

The “official stance” of the church is that the Law (Torah) has been wholly replaced by the Grace of Christ for everyone (Jewish and Gentile Christians) and the Law is therefore irrelevant. The “One Law” branch of Messianic Judaism declares that Jewish and Gentile believers are equally obligated in lifestyle to all of the 613 commandments that typically believe constitutes the Torah. Jews (including many Messianic Jews) see Gentiles (Christians and otherwise) as being obligated to only those “words” spoken to Noah in Genesis 9, commonly referred to as the Seven Noahide Laws (although some in the Messianic community believe this is modified for Christians by the Acts 15 letter specifically and by the teachings in the Gospels and Epistles generally). Most people settle on “the system” that works for them. Some of us continue seeking His will daily.

(I previously examined the difference between Noahides or “God-fearers” and Gentile Christians in two blog posts: The Sons of Noah and Children of God)

Both Jews and Christians spend all their lives looking at the Bible, reading, studying, and gleaning insights from inspired teachers and Rabbis. We’re trying to understand who we are and who we are supposed to be in the eyes and words of God. What are the commandments of God for our lives? How are they different from person to person? How are they different from generation to generation? How are they different between Jew and Christian? How can we teach others what we are always trying to know in ourselves?

The Word of God and the words of men are tremendously important and powerful. But while God is not careless with His Words, men most certainly are. The Word of God is wielded with great care lest disaster should strike existence. If man would utilize an equal amount of care over his words, how blessed we would be, for in speaking kindness, charity, compassion, and words of Torah, we would re-make the world in His image.

So shall it be in the days of Messiah.

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Who is the King?

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Lion of JudahMoshe received the Torah at Sinai and transmitted it to Joshua; Joshua to the Elders; the Elders to the Prophets; and the Prophets transmitted it to the Members of the Great Assembly (Avot 1:1). The entire body of Judaic Law, written and oral, came through Moshe, who received it directly from God. God did not give it directly to the Jews. Why not?

The Talmud relates: The Emperor told Rabbi Yehoshua ben Chananya that he wanted to see God. Rabbi Yehoshua took him outside and told him to look at the sun. “This is not possible!” exclaimed the Emperor, to which Rabbi Yehoshua answered: “If you cannot even look upon the servant of God, how can you expect to look at God Himself?!” (Chullin 59b).

-Rabbi Chaim Kramer
“Tzaddik: Leader, Teacher, Intermediary?”
Breslov.org

He who is to be a good ruler must have first been ruled. -Aristotle

Several days ago, I compared the crucifixion of Jesus at the hands of the Romans to the murder of Rabbi Abuhatzeira in the morning meditation, The Death of the Tzaddik. I was trying to re-cast Jesus in the role of tzaddik and thus into a proper Jewish context, as well as communicating that, through the lens of Jewish mysticism, how both of these deaths can be considered to atone for “evil burdens”. After reading Rabbi Kramer’s commentary on tzaddikim, this “extra” meditation pretty much created itself.

But that’s not all:

Every time you people talk about the messianic era, and “the Moshiach” (which I assume equates with “messiah”), you insist on talking about him as a king. Well, we started guillotining kings over two hundred years ago, and they haven’t really been in fashion since then. We have found liberal democracies much more adept at protecting the rights of the individuals, and working for the maximum benefit of the maximum number of people. Kings, as a whole, were pretty lousy at all that.

So how about we just call him (or her) an “enlightened spiritual leader”? The “king” title seems such an anachronism.

Question written to Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
quoted in “Who Needs a King?”
Moshiach 101
Chabad.org

The different roles that Jesus plays can be really confusing. Servant, King, Tzaddik, Savior, Messiah. Just who is Jesus and what is the relationship between who he was, who he is, and who he will become? Also, since Judaism en masse rejects the possibility of Jesus actually fulfilling the role of the Moshiach (Messiah), is there any way we can look to Jewish sources (as opposed to Christian scholarship and commentary which, after all, is biased in a certain direction) and possibly see where Jesus might actually fit in?

I believe there is.

No, my case won’t be iron clad and I can’t present it all in a simple blog. Also, I lack the educational and scholarly “chops” to be able to prove anything to anyone. Still, I see patterns in some of what I read. I saw a pattern and wrote about it in my previous blog post and I see one today.

To continue reading from Rabbi Kramer:

With this in mind, we can attempt to examine the role of the Tzaddik. In Judaism, the Tzaddik is a leader, a guiding light to his followers. In general, people have a need for leadership. The average person is for the most part unsure of his responsibility in life and how to go about fulfilling it. He must learn this from the Tzaddik. Therefore, what is needed is true leadership; truly knowledgeable people with an understanding of what someone else’s capabilities are and what is demanded and required of that individual.

Let’s compare this to what Rabbi Freeman has to say about the role of the Moshiach in the Messianic age:

If so, in such a state, who needs a king? Who needs any government at all? Let the people, so fully enlightened and aware of their Creator and their responsibility to His creation, self-organize and work things out between one another. I mean, do you really expect enlightened beings to hurt, steal, extort, or otherwise cause bodily or monetary harm to one another? So who needs government in such a world, never mind a king?

Okay, to get to that point, we may well need an outstanding individual, a great leader who could deal with the oppressors and dictators and other powerful shmendriks of the world. As Maimonides puts it, someone who will strengthen the Torah and “fight the wars of G-d” (Mishneh Torah, Laws of Kings 11:4..) — not necessarily military wars, but actions that have very powerful political and social ramifications.

But once that mission is complete and the world is at peace, buzzing with wisdom until even the leopards and wolves are behaving and the very earth itself is full of knowledge, then everything changes. What would be crucial at such a point would be not a king, but a teacher. Yes, the world is enlightened, but it is still a world emerging into enlightenment. The Moshiach, as a teacher, would guide people to see and to understand this new world into which they had entered.

Now remember the quote from Aristotle?

He who is to be a good ruler must have first been ruled.

OK, I’m probably not playing fair bringing Aristotle into the argument, so I’ll let the Master speak for himself:

An argument started among the disciples as to which of them would be the greatest. Jesus, knowing their thoughts, took a little child and had him stand beside him. Then he said to them, “Whoever welcomes this little child in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. For it is the one who is least among you all who is the greatest.” –Luke 9:46-48

When he had finished washing their feet, he put on his clothes and returned to his place. “Do you understand what I have done for you?” he asked them. “You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and rightly so, for that is what I am. Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. Very truly I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them. –John 13:12-17

Talmudic RabbisThe Master himself set the prerequisite for being a leader and a tzaddik as being first a servant to others. Rabbi Kramer teaches that a tzaddik must be a leader and Rabbi Kramer and Rabbi Freeman tell us that a tzaddik and the Moshiach (respectively) must also be a teacher:

Torah is the instrument which conveys God’s Infinite Wisdom to man. Who among us can honestly say that he is wise enough to look at that medium and grasp what is required of him? The Talmud, Midrash and Shulchan Arukh stress the importance of receiving from a teacher, so that one’s understanding of Torah be clear. Thus, a teacher or rabbi has to have received from his teacher, and so on, back to Moshe Rabeinu. To look directly into the Torah and say “I know and understand,” is to say “I don’t know and never will, because I consider myself capable enough to glance at God by myself.” As the Talmud teaches: Even one who has studied, as long as he has not received from a Talmid Chakham, a qualified teacher, is still considered an ignoramus (Berakhot 47a). And: How foolish are those who stand up for the Torah Scroll, but do not stand up for the Sage (Makot 22b). The Torah can actually mislead a person who follows it, without the benefits of true guidance and leadership.

Using Moshe (Moses) as an example and a starting point, Rabbi Kramer shows us that one of the main functions of a tzaddik is to present the correct and proper interpretation of the Bible to his disciples (for Christians, substitute “Bible” for “Torah”). Jesus did this continually in the Gospels, with one noteworthy example being the Sermon on the Mount (see Matthew 5). This also goes back to a point I have been trying to make in various blog posts. We cannot simply read the Bible in English with our own understanding, without any training or scholarly background, and expect to always understand what God is trying to say to us. Rabbi Kramer makes this clear when he says, “Even one who has studied, as long as he has not received from a..qualified teacher, is still considered an ignoramus” (quoting Berakhot 47a). Christianity dispenses with the roles of Rebbi and tzaddik as authoritative teachers at our own peril. This model of learning is one of the reasons I am attached to Judaism as a teaching platform.

But why will King Moshiach also need to be a teacher? Here’s Rabbi Freeman’s response:

This will also be the character of the Moshiach. Yes, he will be a teacher—because that’s what those times will be all about: learning, knowing, gaining divine wisdom. But a teacher—a good teacher—limits his lesson to that for which the student is ready and can handle. The Moshiach will be a teacher, but one with a kingly character: as enlightened as they may be, he will see far beyond. And yet, as a teacher-king, he will be capable of transmitting that transcendental knowledge to all of us as well. Perhaps not cognitively, but in some form in which it can be shared.

This teacher, then, is the ultimate of teachers. For he will show us the very core essence of our souls, and how they are rooted in the Core Essence of All Being.

So from Christianity’s point of view, we see that Jesus was required to teach the “lost sheep of Israel” and, through the Gospels, teach all of the subsequent generations of Jewish and Gentile disciples throughout the ages up to the current day, and then beyond. We also see that in the Messianic Age, he will still continue to teach and be the authority for our understanding of the Word of God and how that lamp will completely illuminate our souls.

Even in the beginning, the way Christ taught was considered astonishing:

When Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at his teaching, because he taught as one who had authority, and not as their teachers of the law. –Matthew 7:28-29

Typically, no Rabbi taught in his own name. He taught in the name of his Master; his Rebbe, who also taught in the name of his Master, and so on. Not that there couldn’t be exceptions:

This does not mean that there are no exceptions to the rule. The Talmud speaks of those unique individuals who did succeed in Torah study, though they did not follow the prescribed approach to study outlined by our Sages (see Avodah Zarah 19a). But these singular human beings are very few and far between. One must receive at least the basics of learning from a rabbi, whose task it is to see that the material taught conveys its true meaning (Bava Batra 21a,b).

With apologies to Rabbi Kramer, Jesus would have been even more unique in having “learned” the Torah from his Father, the One God of Heaven. On the other hand, when Rabbi Kramer says, “One must receive at least the basics of learning from a rabbi”, is it such a stretch to consider Christ’s teacher and Rabbi to also be his Father?

The Tzaddik is also an intermediary. He is an agent between God and ourselves. Yet, he is not an intermediary at all. God forbid that anyone should think he needs a medium between the Almighty and himself; not from his side, and certainly not from God’s. Rather, because the Tzaddik is one who has conquered the physicality of this world and entered the spiritual realm, he serves as an agent and a catalyst for bringing spirituality to this world. Having attained the wisdom and understanding necessary for serving God in a true and proper manner, the Tzaddik serves Him by bringing His will to mankind and by getting people to recognize God in all aspects of their lives. The average person cannot perceive God’s will, and therefore has to turn to someone who can. Thus, in this sense, the Tzaddik is an intermediary.

Who is Moshiach?And so, though Rabbi Kramer wouldn’t present it this way, Jesus is an intermediary between us and God as our great High Priest in the Heavenly Court (Hebrews 4:14-16). He “serves as an agent and a catalyst for bringing spirituality to this world”. We are not alone nor are we, even though not Jews and recipients of the gift of Sinai, without one to petition the Father with our needs.

Rabbi Freeman tells us the role our teacher plays out for us today and where it will lead tomorrow:

An interesting idea, because it fits so well into the idea of what the messianic era is all about and how it fulfills the purpose of creation—as Rabbi Schneur Zalman writes, “everything depends on our work throughout the time of exile.”

Meaning that through the toil of our hard work, our struggle and persistence in the most trying times right up until that glorious era, we will draw into the world a deep light, an essence-light, such as could never have been revealed without that labor. It is that essence-light that the Moshiach will have the job of revealing to us. Something entirely transcendental, and yet, something that each of us touches; something from which each of us draws strength every time we defy the confusion and darkness of our present world to do what we know is right and beautiful.

I cannot help but see Jesus as the Messiah through the teachings of the Rabbis. In fact, I see him more clearly as I read the words of Rabbis Kramer and Freeman than I do in the books written by traditional and modern Christian scholars. I see Jesus in the words of Talmud, as interpreted by such Rabbis (again, I emphasize that these Rabbis would never have intended that I take such a meaning. This is due to Jesus being completely “re-painted” in the image of a Gentile Christian “god” by the church). How can I not? I must seek him where he is to be found.

The Moshiach is found among his people; among his Father’s chosen ones; His Am Segulah, God’s treasured, splendorous children. As servant and teacher, whose death atoned for an evil decree upon mankind, as Intermediary, Priest (Hebrews 6:20), and Messiah King, he first came for Israel but is the redeemer of all the world. We seek him and God sent him to us so that we, in seeking God, could be found by Him and return home.

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Jesus, the Oral Law, and the Talmud

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Moses at SinaiIf a man will have a wayward son, who does not hearken to the voice of his father and the voice of his mother, and they discipline him, but he does not hearken to them; then his father and mother shall grasp him and take him out to the elders of his city and the gates of his place. They shall say to the elders of his city, “This son of ours is wayward and rebellious; he does not hearken to our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.” All the men of his city shall pelt him with stones and he shall die; and you shall remove the evil from your midst; and all Israel shall hear and they shall fear. –Deuteronomy 21:18-21 (The Stone Edition Chumash)

This commandment, from yesterday’s Torah Reading Ki Tetzei, is very difficult for us to understand. It’s one of the examples that Christians traditionally point to in explaining why God has removed the law and replaced it with grace. It’s one of the commandments the secular world uses to illustrate the “evil” religion represents and how much better humanistic and “progressive” atheism is in terms of compassion for others, including children and “wayward teens”.

This is also an example of how you can’t just read the Bible, any part of it, without employing some modifying information to help understand what is being taught. After all, even if your son is a total rebel, drunken, disobedient, even a criminal, what mother and father could simply hand him over to the court and, without a trial or any due process, watch him be stoned to death at the gates of their city?

But then, if the Torah as we have the document in our hands today doesn’t present the whole story, and if it didn’t fully explain commandments like this one when they were given in the day of Moses, how can we possibly understand the Bible? Let’s take another example.

He returned and began to teach by the seashore, and a great crowd of people was assembled to him. He went down and sat in a boat in the sea, and all the people stood on the seaside on dry land. He taught them many things with parables, and he said to them as he taught them:

Listen closely: The sower went out to sow seed. As he sowed, some of the seed fell by the road, and the birds of heaven came and ate it. There was some that fell on a rocky place where there was not much soil, and it sprouted quickly because it did not have deep soil. When the sun shone, it was scorched and dried up because it had no root. There was some that fell among thorns, and the thorns came up and crowded it out, and it did not bear fruit. There was some that fell on the good soil, and it bore fruit, coming up and growing. One made thirty times, another sixty, and another a hundred. –Mark 4:1-8 (DHE Gospels)

This is the entire text of the parable that Jesus taught to those listening to him at the lake. In verse 9, we read Jesus saying, “Whoever has ears to hear, let him hear.” If Mark had ended his narrative there and we had no other way to interpret the words of the Master, we might be just as puzzled as Christ’s audience. Even the Master’s closest inner circle of disciples had no idea what he was saying. Sure, you know what Jesus meant when he told the parable, but only because you’ve read his explanation as he related it to his most intimate of disciples:

When he was alone, the men that were with him approached with the twelve and they asked him about the parable. And he said to them:

To you it is given to know the secret of the kingdom of God, but to those outside, everything is in parables, so that they may look closely, but they will not know. They will listen well, but they will not understand, or else they may repent and be forgiven for their sins.

And he said to them:

Do you not know this parable? How will you understand any of the parables? The sower sows the word. Beside the road, these are those in whom the word is sown, but when they hear it, the satan immediately comes and picks up the word that is planted in their heart. Likewise, the ones sown on the rocky places are those who hear the word and they quickly receive it joyfully. But they have no root in them, and they only stand for an hour. After that, when trouble and persecution come on account of the word, they quickly stumble. And these are those sown among the thorns: They are those who hear the word, but the worries of this age and the guile of wealth and other cravings come and crowd out the word, and it does not have fruit. But these are those sown on the good soil: They are those who hear the word and receive it, and they produce fruit. One produced thirty times, another sixty, and another a hundred. –Mark 4:10-20 (DHE Gospels)

I want to emphasize my point here so I’ll quote verse 10 again: “the Twelve and the others around him asked him about the parables.” Even those who walked and talked with Jesus daily had no idea what he meant when he taught in parables. Only those closest to him were able to ask what he meant and hear his more straightforward explanation. We have the parable and the explanation together only because Mark and the other Gospel writers documented them together decades after these lessons were originally spoken. It would be many centuries before everything was put together as one “New Testament” and centuries more before the Bible was mass-produced and accessible to anyone who wanted to read it (Gutenberg didn’t invent the printing press until around 1440). We take reading the Bible as a unified document for granted today, but in times past, information like parables and their explanations weren’t always available in one book or scroll.

Now let’s get back to the example of the wayward son and his rather ghastly death sentence. If we, like the audience of Jesus, can’t get the full explanation from one place, where else can we go?

The Torah tells us that the Ben Sorer U’Moreh [Wayward and Rebellious Son] is brought to Beis Din [Jewish Court]. If the evidence is upheld, he is put to death, based on the principle “better he should die innocent now, than have to be executed as a guilty party somewhere down the road.”

The rules and circumstances for a Ben Sorer U’Moreh are so complex, specific and narrow that the Talmud in the eighth chapter of Sanhedrin says that there has never been and will never be a Ben Sorer U’Moreh. So then why, in fact, was the entire section written? The Talmud answers that the section was written in order that we might “expound it and receive reward”. In other words, this section was written for the sake of the lessons inherent in it.

The lessons that the Torah wants us to derive from this section are lessons about raising children. The Torah wants to teach us how we should and should not raise a child. It is likely that some grievous mistakes were made in the raising of the Wayward and Rebellious son. The Torah is providing us with clues of what to do and what not to do when raising our sons and daughters.

-Rabbi Yissocher Frand
“Rabbi Frand on Parshas Ki Seitzei”
Torah.org

This may make the Torah seem even more difficult to comprehend. Why would there be a commandment documented by the hand of Moses for the Children of Israel that they were never expected to obey?” Rabbi Frand tells us the commandment had a much deeper intent regarding parenting but where was this intent to be discovered?

He references the Talmud and particularly tractate Sanhedrin 8, but the Talmud didn’t exist in the time of Moses and wouldn’t be recorded in any written form until after the time of Jesus.

But is that exactly true?

Wayward SonAccording to classic Jewish thought, when Moses was on Sinai with God for forty days and forty nights (Exodus 24:18), in addition to imparting the instructions for building the Mishkan (Tabernacle) and its various elements, God also gave Moses the Oral Law or the means by which to interpret the directives listed in the written document, such as the aforementioned commandment regarding wayward sons. However, no list of commandments, written or oral, could possibly cover all contingencies and circumstances as they would arise in the following years and centuries, so God also commanded that a group of Judges be assembled to hear the various cases and complaints as they arose (Numbers 11:24-30). Authority was given to this system of Judges, originally the Sanhedrin but in modern times, the rabbinic Beit Din, to make rulings and judgments regarding the practical application of the written and oral Torah we have with us today.

So in the case of the wayward son, for an ancient Israelite, it wasn’t enough to know the written Torah on how best to deal with the situation. You had to learn and understand its intent via the Oral Law given to Moses at Sinai and interpreted by the ancient Israeli judicial system which also was established by God. Add to this that, as you grew up and were taught the elements of Torah by your parents, teachers, and priests, you would learn that the commandment of wayward children was meant not as a harsh punishment to use against your son should he become a drunken thug, but a lesson in how to parent your children so that they would “hearken” to your voice.

All that is fine and well for the Israelites, but you’re probably asking yourself what all this has to do with Jesus and his parables. What if I were to tell you that Jesus did the same thing: took the Torah and interpreted it? Christians believe he did so, but only in the very limited scope of doing away with the Torah, but I believe that, like Moses, like the Sanhedrin, like the lesser courts there were appointed in the various towns in Israel, and like the individual judges, Jesus also gave oral rulings, laws, and interpretations by the authority given to him by God the Father, the great Ayn Sof, the infinite, unknowable, ultimate, and unique One God.

Now look at this. We have a written Bible, for Jews, the Tanakh, what Christians call the Old Testament. It isn’t sufficient as a guide to provide a means by which Jews can apply the will of God in every possible situation they may encounter in their lives (and by inference, it means Christians may not have all the information we need just by reading the Bible). There are many questions Jews encounter as to how a commandment may or may not fit something that happens to them, such as a son coming home late and drunk. In fact, since situations and interpretations change across the scope of time, the Torah couldn’t possibly tell a 21st century Jewish parent how to deal with this situation in a way that would also meet the needs of a 12th century Jewish parent under similar circumstances. Both the Talmudic rulings and probably the advice of a Rabbi or a Beit Din might be needed.

Jesus did the same thing in the New Testament. The most famous example of him doing so is in the “Sermon on the Mount” (see Matthew 5) but keep in mind, Jesus wasn’t undoing the Torah commandments or giving a radical and “unJewish” meaning to them. If he had done that, he would have completely lost his Jewish audience including all of his closest disciples. The reason anyone in ancient Roman Judea listened to Jesus and followed him; the reason even the Pharisees could not discredit anything he taught, was because everything he taught and interpreted was completely consistent with the Torah of Moses and the intent of God at Sinai.

There’s no way that we can simply toss the Oral tradition, the Talmud, and the rabbinic rulings out the window and proceed as if the Bible were a completely self-sufficient document. The Bible is the firm foundation of the Word of God and the Rock on which we all stand. But it is not like a latest best-selling novel that we can read and digest all by itself without studying and relying on authoritative interpretations. Jesus is the living expression of that Rock (“the Word became flesh” –John 1:14). However, Jesus himself must have followed the halakhah or the traditional rulings of Torah observance as understood during the Second Temple period (if he didn’t, all of his followers, including Peter, would have walked away from him, branding him a heretic). Those places where we see him apparently disregarding halakhah, are those points where his authority is giving a better ruling; one more consistent with the original intent of God at Sinai.

Just as Moses, the Sanhedrin, the lesser courts, and the judges and priests of Israel were given authority on earth to interpret Torah and to make rulings and judgments for the people, Jesus was given that authority and more as the Son of God. If we understand Mark 12:28-44 correctly, none of his rulings, judgments, and interpretations contradicted the Torah in any way, although as I mentioned, some of his rulings weren’t entirely consistent with the understanding of the Pharisees and Sadducees. In Jesus, we have a living example of how there can be a written Torah and a set of oral interpretations. This supports the ancient and modern Jewish tradition of having a written Torah, an oral interpretation, as well as later rabbinic rulings which were recorded in the Talmud, and a rabbinic court to interpret Torah and Talmud in individual cases.

Given everything I’ve just said, I’m not supporting that Christians suddenly start trying to live their lives by Jewish standards. Most of what is written in the Torah and Talmud applies only to Jews, but if you’ve been reading this blog for any length of time, you know that I believe Christians can learn much about God, the teachings of Jesus, and the meaning of our lives as disciples of the Master by studying the Jewish texts. If Jesus, in a sense, taught like Moses, like a Judge, like a Priest, and like a Rabbi, then only by learning about and trying to understand the complete system of Jewish teachings and judgments can we even begin to understand the Savior and Messiah we follow and adore.

Talmud StudyLike the ancient Israelite and the commandment of the wayward son, we don’t have all the information we need just by reading a few paragraphs in the Bible. Like the inner disciples of Jesus, we don’t understand the parables of the Master given to the masses without his interpretation of them. As modern Christians, we can’t always know the underlying meaning of the teachings of Christ (even though we currently have a record of his parables and their explanations) without digging a little deeper into how Jesus taught like a Maggid.

Christian, I’m not saying that we must take on board the full yoke of Torah including Talmud and halakhah. Far from it. However, I am saying that while it is not required of us, we can still learn a great deal about Jesus by the study of Judaism, for it is from Judaism that our faith has emerged and it is within Judaism that the heart of the Messiah beats for his people, both those who are the natural branches and those of us who have been grafted in (Romans 11).

As believers, we have no right to judge the Jewish people for following the halakhah, from studying Talmud, from living by the rulings of the sages, and from obedience to the Torah of Moses as understood and interpreted by oral tradition and rabbinic judgments. These rules are not binding on us, but the Jewish people were given a more comprehensive yoke than what has been asked of the Gentile disciples (Acts 15). Yet, as implied by James and the Jerusalem Council, there is still value in learning the Torah among the Gentile disciples because it is that Torah, those Judges, those Prophets, those Disciples of the God of Israel that are the core of Christ’s message and the foundation of who we are as believers in Jesus.

You have heard it said, but there is more than that. A great deal more. Let’s continue to study together and to allow both Christian and Jew to take their specific paths to the gates of God’s Temple.

Note: Quotes from the Gospel of Mark were taken from the Delitzsch Hebrew Gospels, Hebrew/English translation adapted and published by Vine of David from the original 1890 text that was produced by Franz Delitzch and supervised of Gustav Dalman.

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Seeking the Awe of Heaven

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Gates of HeavenThere are two approaches to the Bible that prevail in philosophical thinking. The first approach claims that the Bible is a naive book, it is poetry or mythology. As beautiful as it is, it must not be taken seriously, for in its thinking it is primitive and immature. How could you compare it to Hegel or Hobbes, John Locke or Shopenhauer?

The second approach claims that Moses taught the same ideas as Plato or Aristotle, that there is no serious disagreement between the teachings of the philosophers and the teachings of the prophets. Aristotle, for example, used unambiguous terms, while the prophets employed metaphors.

Abraham Joshua Heschel
God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism.
pp 24-25

Everything is within the power of Heaven except fear and awe of heaven. –Berachot 33b

Although I may have left the Rohr Jewish Learning Institute’s lesson on Toward a Meaningful Life behind with yesterday’s morning meditation, the Christian search for God in the Torah, Tanakh, and Talmud still occupies me. I’m sure reading Heschel’s classic only provokes my interest.

The quote from his book which I just posted presents a more interesting dilemma than the one Heschel considered. He was presenting how Jews view God through the lens of the Torah as compared the perspective of the Greek (and later) philosophers and their “more rational” position on God. From a Jewish way of looking at the issue, it’s a matter of Jewish religion vs. non-Jewish, secular philosophy. Now let’s toss a monkey wrench into the spinning machinery.

It is said that much of how Christianity understands and interprets the Bible stems from the study and adherence to Greek philosophy. I’ve known more than one believer who has left the church because they came to realize that the Christian tradition had “Helenized” the Bible, stripping it of its original Hebraic meaning and intent. If they are right, then a Christian studying the Jewish perspectives will either discover something precious or lose something essential in their faith.

Almost two months ago, I read a blog post warning Christians that to study Judaism and Jewish writings was an invitation to apostacy and the abandonment of Christ himself. The danger was that becoming too attracted to Judaism would result in a person who would eventually lose their Christian faith and perhaps even decide to convert.

That concern doesn’ t particularly worry me. There’s something else to consider. I wonder if the Jewish Bible and the Christian Bible even speak the same language. Ponder this statement from Heschel’s book (page 25):

The central thought of Judaism is the living God.

That begs the question, “what is the central thought of Christianity?” The most obvious answer is “Jesus Christ”, but is that the same answer, a related answer, or does this represent two completely different answers? When a Jew thinks of God, he isn’t thinking of the Messiah because nothing in Judaism presupposes that the Messiah must be God. We imagine because the Jewish Bible makes up the first two-thirds of the Christian Bible, that there must be a significant overlap in how Christians and Jews think of, understand, and approach God, but that isn’t particularly true. As my (Jewish) wife keeps telling me, Jews conceptualize God, faith, and the world around them in a fundamentally different way than everyone else, particularly Christians.

But is there no common meeting ground? Don’t both Jews and Christians seek God? Doesn’t the yearning to walk in His Presence stir in both the Jewish and the Christian heart?

The Bible has several words for the act of seeking God (darash, bakkesh, shahar). In some passages these words are used in the sense of inquiring after His will and precepts (Psalm 119:45, 94, 155). Yet, in other passages these words mean more than the act of asking a question, the aim of which is to elicit information. It means addressing oneself directly to God with the aim of getting close to Him; it involves a desire for experience rather than a search for information. Seeking Him includes the fact of keeping His commandments, but it goes beyond it. “Seek ye the Lord and His strength, seek His face continually” (Psalms 105:4). Indeed, to pray does not only mean to seek help; it also means to seek Him. (Heschel page 28)

Hasid AlleywayI certainly can’t see why this couldn’t be the basis of searching for God for both the Jew and the Christian…or any person seeking the God who calls to them in their pain and their dreams.

There’s a certain irony in the fact that, while I as a Christian am seeking God through a Jewish understanding, there was once a Jew who did quite the opposite…and yet remained Jewish:

He read the Gospels in German. Then he obtained a Hebrew version and reread them. Though he was in the midst of a Gentile, Christian city where Jesus was worshiped in churches and honored in every home, Feivel felt the Gospels belonged more to him and the Chasidic world than they did to the Gentiles who revered them. He found the Gospels to be thoroughly Jewish and conceptually similar to Chasidic Judaism. He wondered how Gentile Christians could hope to comprehend Yeshua (Jesus) and His words without the benefit of a classical Jewish education or experience with the esoteric works of the Chasidim.

Taken from Jorge Quinonez:
“Paul Philip Levertoff: Pioneering Hebrew-Christian Scholar and Leader”
Mishkan 37 (2002): 21-34
as quoted from Love and the Messianic Age

Paul Philip Levertoff, born as Feivel Levertoff first encountered a page from the Gospels as a nine-year old Chasidic Jewish boy in the late 19th century. He found a scrap of paper in the snow one day written in Hebrew and assumed it was from a Jewish holy book. He took it home to his father to see what should be done, but when the man realized what was written on the paper, he threw it in the stove to burn. But while that scrap of paper was reduced to ashes, a different kind of fire was kindled in Feivel Levertoff that day and that fire never left him for the remainder of his life.

Levertoff couldn’t believe that anyone not schooled in the Zohar, the Tanya, or other mystic and Chasidic Jewish wisdom could ever understand the words such as are written in John’s Gospel. As much as anything, Levertoff’s experience lets me anticipate that someone with an essential faith in Jesus can hope to allow that faith, understanding, and worship to grow and expand when nurtured with some of the same fertile Jewish prayers and readings (see my review of Levertoff’s Love and the Messianic Age for more).

Returning to Heschel (page 31):

There are three starting points of contemplation about God; three trails that lead to Him. The first is the way of sensing the presence of God in the world in things; the second is the way of sensing His presence in the Bible; the third is the way of sensing His presence in sacred deeds.

What Heschel is describing as three starting points are what he later defines as worship, learning, and action. In my reading and subsequent review of Gershom Scholem’s Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism, I noticed that it was not recommended for each to person take the same path to God. It seems that not everyone is cut out for the “mystic approach”. Rather, some people are best suited to approaching God through deed, others mainly through study, and still others, primarily through prayer and worship. How interesting that Heschel should offer the same three options, mapped to different scriptures:

  • Worship: “Lift up your eyes on high and see, Who created these? –Isaiah 40;26
  • Learning: “I am the Lord thy God.” –Exodus 20:2
  • Action: “We shall do and we shall hear.” –Exodus 24:7

The human race is a people seeking God. Many don’t understand that His face is the one they long to see and if you ask them about it, they’ll deny it vehemently. And yet, mankind thirsts for justice, cries out for mercy, begs for forgiveness, and pleads for their wounds and sicknesses to be healed. Who are they crying out to if not God?

How much more can this be said of those of us who understand that we are seeking the face of God and yet, there seems to be more than one road to His Throne (not contradicting John 14:6). Even in narrowing these methods to worship, study, and actions, there are still so many choices to consider. I continue to make my choice in one particular direction. Hopefully, Rabbi Heschel wouldn’t have minded.

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A Christian at the Gates of the Temple of God

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Toward the light“Yes, religion consoles us for our fate, but it also moves us to believe that with God’s help, we can change it. Hence the Christians, Jews and others who fought to abolish slavery then, global poverty now.”

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks
from “When People Lose Faith in God, They Lose Faith in Humanity Also”

“To the Jewish mind, the understanding of God is not achieved by referring in a Greek way to timeless qualities fo a Supreme Being, to ideas of goodness or perfection, but rather by sensing the living acts of His concern, to His dynamic attentiveness to man.

Abraham Joshua Heschel
God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism

“Why would the Jewish people ask for G-d’s name?”

from the Rohr Jewish Learning Institute lesson book
Toward a Meaningful Life

This is the last in my series of blogs based on this Rohr JLI course but probably not the last thing I’ll write about the significance of people and how we can have a relationship with God, which after all, are rather universal questions. Also, the question I’m asking today is really at the heart of just about every article I’ve written on this blog: “Can I apply Jewish wisdom, teachings, mysticism, and folk tales to Christians and our relationship with God through Jesus Christ?”

Gee, that’s quite a mouthful. Here’s what I mean.

Take another look at the link to the Toward a Meaningful Life course work. Notice the title of the course says, “Toward A Meaningful Life: A Soul-searching Journey for Every Jew”, That’s “for every Jew”. Does that mean I’ve been wasting my time going over this material because I’m not Jewish? Has it been written and presented in such as way that it cannot apply in any aspect to a person who isn’t a Jew and specifically can’t apply to a person who is a Christian?

Just about every quote I borrowed from the material I’ve been reading, when it refers to people at all, refers to people; human beings, not necessarily just Jews. Here are a few examples:

The Holy One, Blessed be He, has any number of names. All of these names, however, designate only various aspects of divine manifestation in the world, in particular as these are made known to human beings.

-Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz
“Divine Manifestation”

A human being should feel the same sense of warmth and security when he or she comes home.

-Simon Jacobson
“Why is Home Life So Important?”

The Biblical view of marriage is unique among the many extant religious, philosophical and sociological views. The Bible sees a married couple as two people who have made a contractual agreement…

-Rabbi Pinchas Stolper
“The Man-Woman Dynamic of Ha-Adam: A Jewish Paradigm of Marriage”

Every one of these references can easily be applied to people in general and not just Jews specifically, so it seems as if this material can have meaning for a wider audience. Of course, it is marketed to a Jewish groups rather than to churches, mosques, and corporate management seminars, so I may be wrong in my assumptions here. Also, looking at the quote from Rabbi Stolper’s article, even the title says, “A Jewish Paradigm of Marriage” and he points to the “Biblical view of marriage” being different than other religious perspectives (presumably including Christian perspectives) on the topic, so again, I may be reading too much into his content.

I’m not picking on any of these teaching materials or the contributing authors, but I do want to examine just how far we can generalize concepts and teachings that were originally written for Jewish people living in a completely Jewish ethnic, cultural, and religious context into a much broader population. OK, this material is also for Jews who are not well connected to religious Judaism and designed to help re-connect them to who they are, but that doesn’t necessarily mean we can extend all this to the rest of us, does it?

I spend a lot of thing wondering if I’m taking everything I’m reading too far. I can read something by a Jewish author and see how it might connect to something in a Christian context (at least “Christian” as I understand the term), but that doesn’t mean there’s anything causal going on. To put it another way, just because Rambam wrote something in the 12th century that seems to connect to how I understand the words of Jesus doesn’t necessarily mean the two are related in any sense. It certainly doesn’t mean that the source of what Rambam wrote in any way shape or form, can be traced back to any of Christ’s teachings.

I can’t explain why Jewish teaching materials, commentaries, and lessons call to me in a way that Christian books and blogs never do. Derek Leman recently published a blog post called The Message of Jesus via Scot McKnight (Leman is something of a “fan” of Scot McKnight), After scanning Leman’s blog post, I found that I didn’t have a great deal of interest in what McKnight had to say at the moment. Some of the quotes from McKnight’s materials posted in the comments of Leman’s blog seemed to confirm that McKnight’s opinion of Jews, in relation to the church, weren’t any different than many other Christians: that the Jews are “done” as far as God is concerned, and it’s now all about the church and Jesus. Here’s an example:

“The book stands on four arguments: that the gospel is defined by the apostles in 1 Corinthians 15 as the completion of the Story of Israel in the saving Story of Jesus; that the gospel is found in the Four Gospels; that the gospel was preached by Jesus; and that the sermons in the Book of Acts are the best example of gospeling in the New Testament.”

“The completion of the Story of Israel”? Guess the fat lady has sung.

I suppose I’m being unfair and maybe I should spend some time on McKnight’s blog to see more of what he’s all about, but I really, really get tired of “big shot” Christians saying, “we Christians are so cool and the Jews are toast”. On top of that, Antwuan Malone mirrored a lot of my frustrations with the church in his recent blog post 7 Things Getting Old in the Church…Fast!

I feel like I’m caught between two worlds but I don’t belong in either of them. I don’t belong in a church because of how commercialized and secular most of them have become and frankly, because my perspectives are just too “un-Christian” (if you can’t tell that from reading my blog, you haven’t been paying attention). I don’t belong in the synagogue because, frankly, I’m not Jewish. That is, I’m not connected culturally and ethnically to the Jewish community. I wouldn’t fit in. I’d be too “Christian”.

River of LifeWhere do I go from here?

I’ve just spent the past week or two spewing my angst on whether I can have a relationship with the Creator of the Universe all over the Internet, so that’s the only place I know where to go. Even then, my relationship with God is far from perfect. I struggle every day with the simplest of ideas, concepts, feelings, or efforts to make the most ephemeral of connections.

Can I apply Jewish themes to a Christian life? I don’t know, but in my case, I’ll probably keep doing it anyway, just because nothing else makes sense to me. Do Jews intend for their themes to be applied to a Christian life? Probably not.

Rabbi Yosef Yitzchok of Lubavitch was famed for both his selfless devotion to the needs of every Jew and for his steadfast stand on the integrity of the Torah. The Rebbe maintained that to deal with the growing danger of assimilation and Jewish rootlessness by compromising on the Torah’s principles will only serve to repel those whom one is seeking to “accommodate”. Deep down, said the Rebbe, the Jew wants the truth; offer him a watered-down quasi-truth and you will drive him even further away from his identity.

Once, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchok was asked: “True, under ideal conditions, one wants his water to be pure. But when a fire rages, is this the time to be particular? The fire must be put out by any and all means at one’s disposal, including polluted or tainted water. The current crisis of identity among the Jewish people is threatening our very existence. Surely it is a time to be more flexible and accommodating.”

Replied the Rebbe: “What you say is true, so long as one battles fire with water. But if one rushes to pour any liquid on the flames, without realizing that his bucket contains say, benzene instead of water, the result is the exact opposite of what one is seeking to accomplish.”

-Rabbi Yanki Tauber
“The Accommodating Firefighter”
Once Upon a Chasid: Parshah Re’eh
Chabad.org

What did Rabbi Tauber’s commentary say? “The current crisis of identity among the Jewish people is threatening our very existence. Surely it is a time to be more flexible and accommodating.” Here’s Rabbi Yitzchok’s response to that suggestion: “What you say is true, so long as one battles fire with water. But if one rushes to pour any liquid on the flames, without realizing that his bucket contains say, benzene instead of water, the result is the exact opposite of what one is seeking to accomplish.”

Expanding that to the current conversation, Judaism can’t extend itself very far outside its own sphere without risking the danger of losing its identity and cultural integrity. Trying to “marry” traditional Jewish and Christian viewpoints and concepts will either water things down too much or, like tossing benzine on a fire, cause an explosion.

Yet, there’s a certain beauty in many of these things I read and then write about, that provides me with a unique way to approach God that wouldn’t be available to me any other way. Even if I’m climbing the proverbial “wrong tree” from everyone else’s point of view, it still seems like the “right tree” to me. It’s the tree that, in the climbing of it, seems to lead to God more than any of the others in the forest.

I came across something at AskNoah.org a few weeks back that I’ve wanted to share: Will Gentiles be permitted to worship at the Third Temple in Jerusalem? When I first read the title, I really wanted the answer to be “yes”. The article answers the question in part, quoting from Isaiah 2:2-3:

“And it will come to pass at the end of days that the mountain of G-d’s House will be firmly established, even higher than the peaks, and all the peoples will flow toward it as a river. And many nations will go and will cry, ‘Let us go up toward the mountain of G-d’s House, to the House of the L-rd of Jacob, and we will learn from His ways and walk in His paths, for out of Zion goes forth Torah and the word of G-d from Jerusalem.’ “

That sounds very much like this:

Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever. –Revelation 22:1-5

I doubt that I’ve answered my own question. I don’t feel very satisfied with my answer. I feel like I’ve just asked more questions, but right now, this is the path that’s calling me, so this is the path I will walk. A year from now, I can’t say where I’ll be or what I’ll be doing, but with God’s providence and grace, I’ll be where He wants me to be. Someday, Jews and Gentiles will sit down together at the feast of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Matthew 8:11) and all of these questions will be answered. Until then, it’s the questions, not the answers, that drive me.

“If a foreigner who is not of Your people Israel comes from a distant land for the sake of Your name – for they shall hear about Your great name and Your mighty hand and Your outstretched arm – when he comes to pray toward this House, oh, hear in Your heavenly abode and grant all that the foreigner asks You for. Thus all the peoples of the earth will know Your name and revere You, as does Your people Israel; and they will recognize that Your name is attached to this House that I have built.” –I Kings 8:41-43

The road

The road is long and often, we travel in the dark.