Tag Archives: Jesus

Forgiveness: Jewish Tradition and Christian Interpretation

July 6, 2014 James Pyles 15 Comments

“For this reason the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his slaves. When he had begun to settle them, one who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him. But since he did not have the means to repay, his lord commanded him to be sold, along with his wife and children and all that he had, and repayment to be made. So the slave fell to the ground and prostrated himself before him, saying, ‘Have patience with me and I will repay you everything.’ And the lord of that slave felt compassion and released him and forgave him the debt. But that slave went out and found one of his fellow slaves who owed him a hundred denarii; and he seized him and began to choke him, saying, ‘Pay back what you owe.’ So his fellow slave fell to the ground and began to plead with him, saying, ‘Have patience with me and I will repay you.’ But he was unwilling and went and threw him in prison until he should pay back what was owed. So when his fellow slaves saw what had happened, they were deeply grieved and came and reported to their lord all that had happened. Then summoning him, his lord said to him, ‘You wicked slave, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. Should you not also have had mercy on your fellow slave, in the same way that I had mercy on you?’ And his lord, moved with anger, handed him over to the torturers until he should repay all that was owed him. My heavenly Father will also do the same to you, if each of you does not forgive his brother from your heart.”

–Matthew 18:23-35 (NASB)

Christian tradition has upheld the high ethical teachings of Jesus concerning forgiveness. While the parable of the Unforgiving Servant is found only in Matthew’s Gospel, its message is stressed in the Lord’s Prayer, which became a vital expression of Christian faith. The prayer for Jesus’ disciples with its dynamic petition, “Forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors,” finds a prominent position in the Didache, which demonstrates that the early Christians emphasized the theme of forgiveness in the life of the church…Could the Lord’s prayer as recorded in the Didache have been influenced by the wording of this parable?

-Brad H. Young
Chapter 6: The Merciful Lord and His Unforgiving Servant
“The Parable in Christian Tradition,” pg 120
The Parables: Jewish Tradition and Christian Interpretation

I’m only a little more than half way through Young’s book but each chapter follows a similar pattern, taking a particular parable of Jesus (Yeshua) and running it past a specific analytical matrix. This isn’t unlike what Roy Blizzard has done in his book Mishnah and the Words of Jesus which I reviewed last spring. Blizzard compared various teachings of Jesus to those of the Rabbinic sages within a generation either side of the (earthly) lifetime of Jesus and determined that Jesus very much taught within the Rabbinic context of the late second Temple era.

Young, chapter by chapter, takes a specific parable of Jesus, shows his readers the traditional Christian interpretation, and then re-examines the parable through the lens of Jesus’ Jewish contemporaries, as well as later Jewish writings. This method also reminded me of a teaching by First Fruits of Zion (FFOZ) founder and president Boaz Michael that he gave a few years back called “Moses in Matthew” which I had the opportunity to listen to (as an audio recording) and review nearly thirteen months ago.

This method of understanding the words of the Master brings into question traditional Church exegetical concepts such as “the sufficiency of Scripture” and “let Scripture interpret Scripture,” both of which suggest that all you need to understand the Bible in general and Jesus in particular is you and a Bible translated into your native language (which for me is English). While most Evangelical Pastors will also say that a good concordance is helpful and it’s even better to understand the original languages along with something of the context in which the Biblical writers authored their works, they tend to neglect understanding the Judaism in which each Bible writer lived, worked, learned, and taught.

Apprehending Scripture from within an ethnically, religiously, historically, linguistically, culturally, and experientially Jewish framework often yields different interpretative results than the traditions handed down by the Christian Church in its many denominational “flavors”.

Although humor is difficult to define and understand because of cultural barriers, Jesus’ dry wit comes through in this story of one very fortunate servant.

-Young, ibid

I quoted this short sentence to illustrate both the point of “cultural barriers” and how we could miss something so elementary as humor. When we read the Bible, we tend to believe that it is always written in the utmost seriousness and, in many conservative Fundamentalist churches, the literal meaning of the text is always given tremendous weight. But what if the writer is saying something ironic, using Hebrew and Aramaic wordplay, rabbinic idiom? What if the writer is telling a joke?

If we don’t access resources to support our understanding of how Jesus most likely was teaching and how his immediate audience (those listening to him) and extended audience (the originally intended readers of the Gospels and Epistles) were expected to understand what he said, we are left with what we think it all means from a 21st century Christian American point of view.

Please keep in mind that point of view almost never takes ancient Judaism into account let alone immerses itself in said-Judaism as a pool of interpretive wisdom. In other words, we’re probably making a lot of wrong assumptions and coming to many erroneous conclusions.

In the cultural context, the sacred calendar of the Jewish people may provide the setting in life for this parable. The ten-day period between the Jewish New Year and the day of Atonement was designed for seeking forgiveness between individuals. A person was not prepared to seek divine mercy during the great fast on the day of Atonement if he or she had not first sought reconciliation with his or her neighbor. The day of Atonement was the experience of the community as every person participated in the fast. The preparation for this collective experience, however, focused on the necessity to forgive one another on a personal level so as to approach God without a bitter heart. Mercy from above depended upon showing mercy to those below (Compare to Matthew 5:23-24).

-Young, pp 123-4

We can see a corollary in Talmud:

For transgressions that are between a person and God, the Day of Atonement effects atonement, but for the transgressions that are between a person and his or her neighbor, the Day of Atonement effects atonement only if one first has appeased one’s neighbor.

-See m. Yoma 9:9 (Mishnah, ed. Albeck, 247)
quoted by Young, pg 124

We see the scene of the parable being unpackaged right before our eyes in the pages of Young’s chapter to illustrate what we should plainly see Jesus teaching: that the forgiveness of God and atonement for sins is dependent on our forgiveness of others who have sinned against us. If we believe we have been forgiven by God and our sins washed away, and yet fail to forgive those who have sinned against us, will the God of Heaven truly forgive? If we have sinned against another and asked God alone for favor rather than first seeking out the forgiveness of the one we have offended, will God forgive in the stead of the person against whom we have sinned?

Of course, if we have sought forgiveness and been spurned, we can only be held responsible for our own part. We cannot make another person forgive us if it is not in their heart to do so.

If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men.

–Romans 12:18 (NASB)

The lack of forgiveness in response to our sincere desire to repent to one against whom we have sinned is on the other’s head as long as we’ve done all we can to make amends and repay them for the wrong we have done.

There’s another implication in Young’s interpretation of Jesus’ parable based on his invoking the time period between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Particularly in Orthodox Judaism, it is believed that a Jew is written into the Book of Life year by year. It is an opportunity to have God hit a sort of “cosmic reset button” for the year to come, but it requires great effort on the part of the individual to make amends for sins committed, both against man and God, to perform good deeds, and give to charity.

This is quite foreign to a Christian’s point of view, particularly if you believe “once saved, always saved.” The moment you confessed Christ as Lord and believed in him, you were saved from your sins and guaranteed a place in Heaven when you die. You need to nothing else, and in fact, it’s impossible for you to do anything else.

That’s the truncated version of the traditional Christian understanding of the Gospel message, anyway.

It is said that there are two resurrections. The first is called the “resurrection of the righteous” and only those who “died in Christ” will be resurrected at the second coming of Jesus. They/we will all be raised into the air to meet him, and according to traditional Evangelical doctrine, the Church will then be raptured into Heaven to wait out the full fury of the Tribulation on Earth. Then, when all the bad stuff is over, Jesus leads the Church back down to Earth to establish his Kingdom where the Church will rule with him over a New Earth.

Or so it goes as far as many Christian churches are concerned.

The second resurrection is called the “great white throne” judgment where everyone who has died is resurrected and judged by God, with the righteous living in bliss for all eternity, and the wicked being cast into the lake of fire to suffer torment for all eternity.

But how does that judgment work? If we just believe in Jesus will we be saved automatically? Will we be given a free pass into Heaven? What about being forgiven by God as we’ve forgiven others?

What if the final judgment is like the ultimate Yom Kippur service? Have you ever been to a Yom Kippur service? It’s the single most solemn day on the Jewish religious calendar, full of tears, fasting, remorse, repentance, trembling, and fear.

It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

–Hebrews 10:31 (NASB)

The unmerciful servant does not forgive like his master. The lord of the servants, however, is not only merciful but just. The one who would not forgive will not receive a reprieve. His fellow servants recognize the injustice and report the actions of their unmerciful coworker to the lord. He is enraged.

-Young, pg 128

Belief in Jesus is hardly sufficient by this Biblical standard. What you think and feel is only part of the equation. What you do out of your faith is what really matters.

They were passing through in the morning, and they saw that the fig tree had withered from its roots. Petros remembered and said to him, “Rabbi, look! The fig tree that you cursed is withered!”

Yeshua answered and said to them, “Let the faith of God be in you. For amen, I say to you, anyone who says to this mountain, ‘Be lifted up and moved into the middle of the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but rather believes that what he says will be done, so it will be for him as he has said. Therefore I say to you, all that you ask in your prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be so for you. And when you stand to pray, pardon everyone for what is in your heart against them, so that your Father who is in heaven will also forgive your transgressions. But as for you, if you do not pardon, neither will your Father who is in heaven forgive your transgression.

–Mark 11:20-26 (DHE Gospels)

If this is so as we are judged by God day-by-day, how much more so is it true when we come before the Throne of God at final judgment and the great day of atonement?

Yet, for all its importance, the ritual of the synagogue is but a means to an end. In Judaism, behavior takes priority over belief. Faith without deeds will not change the world.

-Ismar Schorsch
“The Root of Holiness,” pg 553, July 12, 2003
Commentary on Torah Portion Balak
Canon Without Closure: Torah Commentaries

What use is it, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but he has no works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and be filled,” and yet you do not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that? Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself.

But someone may well say, “You have faith and I have works; show me your faith without the works, and I will show you my faith by my works.” You believe that God is one. You do well; the demons also believe, and shudder. But are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith without works is useless?

–James 2:14-20 (NASB)

It is doubtful that Schorsch meant to parallel the teachings of James the Just, brother of the Master, but this may reflect the fact that principles from ancient Judaism (for the teachings of Jesus and James are wholly Jewish), some at least, have survived the passage of time and endure in modern Jewish practice. As Christians, for anything we find good and gracious in our theology and doctrine, we must give thanks not only to God but to Judaism for its origins.

However, if we accept that, we must also accept that a Jewish understanding of the teachings of Jesus place a much greater burden on the shoulders of a Christian than many Pastors have led us to believe. Fortunately, I currently attend a church where this burden is taught and where sincerity of repentance and love and forgiveness of our neighbor and brother is held in great value.

Also fortunately, the God of Justice is also the God of Mercy:

Then the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth; who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin; yet He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished, visiting the iniquity of fathers on the children and on the grandchildren to the third and fourth generations.”

–Exodus 34:6-7 (NASB)

He remembered His covenant for them and relented in accordance with His abundant kindness.

–Psalm 106:45 (Stone Editon Tanakh)

…but if that nation repents of its evil deed of which I had spoken, then I relent of the evil [decree] that I had planned to carry out against it. Or, one moment I may speak of concerning a nation or kingdom, to build and establish [it], but if they do what is wrong in My eyes, not heeding My voice, then I relent of the goodness that I had said to bestow upon it.

–Jeremiah 18:8-9 (Stone Edition Tanakh)

God is eager to do good to all those who call upon His Name in sincere repentance and who do what is right, but to those who call upon Him yet continue to do what is wrong, there is no mercy, but instead, righteous judgment.

As Christians, we cannot afford to take our (so-called) salvation for granted, for who is to say that God won’t keep His word as He has given it and as Jesus has taught it? Who is to say that our forgiveness (or lack thereof) of others won’t be the model by which God will (or won’t) forgive us?

Young writes this by way of conclusion to his commentary on this parable:

The parable shows the deep roots of Jesus’ teachings in ancient Judaism. Jesus’ Jewish theology of God saturates the drama of the story as the action moves from scene to scene. The listener is caught up into the plot of the mini-play and participates in the trial, triumph, and tribulation of the servant. What happens when it is impossible to pay one’s creditor?

…The cultural and religious background is based on the teachings concerning the great day of fasting in Israel’s sacred calendar, which each person seeks forgiveness from God. The creation of humanity, in the very image of God, demands full accountability, which means that one must be merciful in the same way that God shows mercy. The images created by the parable lead the listener to join the actors on the stage. Each individual must ask God for forgiveness of a colossal debt. To what extent, however, do I extend mercy to others who have wronged me?

-Young, pg 129

The answer would seem obvious and Young addresses it again in the following chapter, “Chapter 7: The Father of Two Lost Sons,” his commentary on the parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32):

Jesus makes this a major theme in the prayer he taught his disciples: “Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.” On the day of Atonement, the Mishnah instructs the people to make things right one with the other before seeking forgiveness from God (m. Yoma 8:9). Thus the idea of human forgiveness is strong in Jewish theology.

-Young, pg 134

These parables are not cute little sayings of Jesus to teach us some interesting moral lesson. They are cautionary tales, warnings to the disciples, including us, that what we do and why we do it really does matter, and, looking back to the words of the prophet Jeremiah, what we have been given can be taken away at any time should we prove to be faithless and insincere, both to God and to our fellow human beings (also see Matthew 25:14-30).

While I suppose it’s not absolutely necessary to study the Bible from a culturally and religiously Jewish perspective and still live a good and upright Christian life, we see here, as I’ve pointed out many times before, that without a little extra “help” through an understanding in the wider body of Jewish religious literature, we can often miss the point, giving more power to Christian traditional interpretations than in what Jesus said in context. The Church has been taught to avoid that context because it has been taught that (if not the Jewish people) Judaism has been sitting on the shelf long past its expiration date. The Law is dead. The Jewish people just don’t know it yet.

Except that’s not the case and can’t be. Without a Jewish understanding of the teachings of Jesus filtered through an ancient and arguably modern practice of Judaism, the words of Jesus are just words on a page, devoid of some or much of their actual meaning. And without that meaning, the depth of our faith and how we actually live it out, including forgiveness, is just as absent of meaning. It may be good and even sufficient, but it could be so much more.

To what then may we compare (entry into) the Kingdom of Heaven?

I hereby forgive anyone who has angered or provoked me or sinned against me, physically or financially or by failing to give me due respect, or in any other matter relating to me, involuntarily or willingly, inadvertently or deliberately, whether in word or deed: let no one incur punishment because of me.

-Bedtime Shema from the Siddur

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When Jesus Returns, Will We Go To Church?

June 20, 2014 James Pyles 4 Comments

Let us rejoice and be glad and give the glory to Him, for the marriage of the Lamb has come and His bride has made herself ready.” It was given to her to clothe herself in fine linen, bright and clean; for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.

–Revelation 19:7-8 (NASB)

Who or what exactly is the “bride” of “the Lamb”? It’s presumed to be “the Church,” that is, the collection of individual Jews and Gentiles who came to faith in Jesus (i.e. converted to Christianity) prior to the great tribulation and the rapture to Heaven. Under this presumption, anyone converting to Christianity after the rapture is considered a believer, but not part of the Church. They can never be part of the Church. Only the Church goes up to Heaven with Jesus and only the Church returns with him.

And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war. His eyes are a flame of fire, and on His head are many diadems; and He has a name written on Him which no one knows except Himself. He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God. And the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were following Him on white horses.

–Revelation 19:11-14 (NASB)

According to Pastor Randy, the head Pastor at the church I attend (and if I’m remembering this wrong, I hope he’ll let me know), the “armies” returning with Jesus is the Church, who becomes the bride of Christ (“the Lamb”).

The idea of “the Church” has bothered me for quite some time. I finally gave my concerns a voice last April in a “meditation” called Notes on the Church from an Insomniac and followed it up with When is Church not Church, based on D. Thomas Lancaster’s article “Before the Church Was Called the Church”, published in the Spring 2014 issue of Messiah Magazine.

In the first century CE, faith in and worship of Jesus of Nazareth, Yeshua ben Yosef, HaMoshiach, was a fully recognized branch of Judaism along with other branches such as the Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, and so forth (although “the Way” was most closely related to Pharisaism, and except for the realization of Yeshua as Messiah and it’s rather liberal attitude toward admitting Gentiles, was likely indistinguishable from Pharisaism).

Obviously, much has changed in the intervening twenty centuries or so, especially starting in the second century when Gentile Jesus-believers radically separated from their Jewish mentors and any Jewish practice, in order to form a completely divergent religion for Gentiles called “Christianity”.

But now that the Church has been created, has it replaced Judaism in all of the New Covenant promises God made with Israel (for instance, in Jeremiah 31:27-40)? With the Church as the “Bride of Christ,” what becomes of Israel and the Jewish people?

Let’s take a giant step backward. First of all, the concept of “the Church” isn’t presupposed in the Bible. Did I just shock you? What about all of those references to “the Church” in the New Testament? Did I just miss all of the times the word “church” is printed (in English) in my Bible?

As I’ve mentioned before, the Greek word “ekklesia” cannot directly be translated as “church”. In fact, the word “church” didn’t really come into being until many centuries after the New Testament canonization. Generations of Jesus-believers lived and died before anyone actually thought of or said the word “church”.

So, does “ekklesia” mean the same thing theologically and conceptually as “church”? That’s the $64,000 question and the answer might not be in the New Testament.

Thus says the Lord,
“Preserve justice and do righteousness,
For My salvation is about to come
And My righteousness to be revealed.
“How blessed is the man who does this,
And the son of man who takes hold of it;
Who keeps from profaning the sabbath,
And keeps his hand from doing any evil.”
Let not the foreigner who has joined himself to the Lord say,
“The Lord will surely separate me from His people.”
Nor let the eunuch say, “Behold, I am a dry tree.”
For thus says the Lord,

“To the eunuchs who keep My sabbaths,
And choose what pleases Me,
And hold fast My covenant,
To them I will give in My house and within My walls a memorial,
And a name better than that of sons and daughters;
I will give them an everlasting name which will not be cut off.
“Also the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord,
To minister to Him, and to love the name of the Lord,
To be His servants, every one who keeps from profaning the sabbath
And holds fast My covenant;
Even those I will bring to My holy mountain
And make them joyful in My house of prayer.
Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be acceptable on My altar;
For My house will be called a house of prayer for all the peoples.”
The Lord God, who gathers the dispersed of Israel, declares,
“Yet others I will gather to them, to those already gathered.”

–Isaiah 56:1-8 (NASB)

“For I know their works and their thoughts; the time is coming to gather all nations and tongues. And they shall come and see My glory. I will set a sign among them and will send survivors from them to the nations: Tarshish, Put, Lud, Meshech, Tubal and Javan, to the distant coastlands that have neither heard My fame nor seen My glory. And they will declare My glory among the nations. Then they shall bring all your brethren from all the nations as a grain offering to the Lord, on horses, in chariots, in litters, on mules and on camels, to My holy mountain Jerusalem,” says the Lord, “just as the sons of Israel bring their grain offering in a clean vessel to the house of the Lord. I will also take some of them for priests and for Levites,” says the Lord.

–Isaiah 66:18-21 (NASB)

“Thus says the Lord of hosts, ‘It will yet be that peoples will come, even the inhabitants of many cities. The inhabitants of one will go to another, saying, “Let us go at once to entreat the favor of the Lord, and to seek the Lord of hosts; I will also go.” So many peoples and mighty nations will come to seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem and to entreat the favor of the Lord.’ Thus says the Lord of hosts, ‘In those days ten men from all the nations will grasp the garment of a Jew, saying, “Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.”’”

–Zechariah 8:20-23 (NASB)

Then it will come about that any who are left of all the nations that went against Jerusalem will go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to celebrate the Feast of Booths. And it will be that whichever of the families of the earth does not go up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, there will be no rain on them. If the family of Egypt does not go up or enter, then no rain will fall on them; it will be the plague with which the Lord smites the nations who do not go up to celebrate the Feast of Booths. This will be the punishment of Egypt, and the punishment of all the nations who do not go up to celebrate the Feast of Booths.

–Zechariah 14:16-19 (NASB)

“It will come about after this
That I will pour out My Spirit on all mankind;
And your sons and daughters will prophesy,
Your old men will dream dreams,
Your young men will see visions.
“Even on the male and female servants
I will pour out My Spirit in those days.

“I will display wonders in the sky and on the earth,
Blood, fire and columns of smoke.
“The sun will be turned into darkness
And the moon into blood
Before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes.
“And it will come about that whoever calls on the name of the Lord
Will be delivered;
For on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem
There will be those who escape,
As the Lord has said,
Even among the survivors whom the Lord calls.”

–Joel 2:28-32 (NASB)

Sorry for the lengthy series of quotes. I wanted to present a representative collection of scriptures (though hardly exhaustive) illustrating how the Old Testament depicts Gentile involvement in the “end times” and/or Messianic Age, coming alongside Israel and turning toward God.

If I were to set aside the New Testament and concentrate on the scriptures in the Prophets, the image of Gentile worship of God becomes radically different from what we’ve been typically taught by the Church. There are a number of references to “survivors” of the Gentile nations who went up against Israel and who were defeated. There’s at least the suggestion of some sort of judgment against these Gentile nations and consequences for their behavior.

We also see Gentiles being gathered to witness the glory God bestows upon Israel and particularly Jerusalem, as well as statements illustrating Gentile observance of a weekly Shabbat, New Moon Festivals, and the Moadim (appointed times, sometimes referred to as the “Jewish festivals”) for those of us who have held tightly to His Covenant.

But where is “the Church?”

The Christian theology of Progressive Revelation states that from the past to the future in Biblical history, God revealed progressively more about Himself. This means the newer sections of the Bible contain much more information about God and His plan for Israel and humanity than earlier sections. This would lead most of us to conclude that we can “trust” the New Testament more than the Old, thus as Christians, our primary source of information about what to expect from God in the present and future should be the apostolic scriptures.

And yet, just yesterday, I reviewed an article written by Paul Meier called “Christian Theology and the Old Testament” published in Messiah Journal which solemnly described the severe dangers of taking a low view of the Old Testament and relying on the New Testament as our primary source for theology and doctrine. A low view of the Old Testament results in a low view of the Jewish people and the Jewish nation, Israel.

And yet, we rely a great deal on the New Testament to help us interpret and clarify many things we don’t understand about the Old Testament, including our understanding of how the New Covenant is being and will be applied to Israel and the nations. But are the New Testament scriptures really the problem, or is it merely how we choose to treat them relative to the Old Testament and the overarching message of the entire, unified Bible?

Progressive revelation teaches us that later parts of the Bible are more important, clearer, and better than the Older scriptures, but they are all Hebrew scriptures and the later parts cannot stand alone. They must be supported on the foundation of the earlier scriptures and later writings cannot and must not contradict earlier parts.

That’s where we have our problem.

The Old Testament is unequivocally clear that God has had a covenant relationship with Israel for many thousands of years and never has intended to abrogate that relationship. God may discipline Israel from time to time for disobedience, but the New Covenant language is extremely plain in its intent to create an environment within the Jewish heart and spirit that will result in individual Jews and corporate Israel being able to perfectly obey God through the Torah mitzvot and to know God, from the lowest to the highest Jewish person, in the manner of the Biblical prophets.

Unless God changed His mind or He’s a duplicitous liar (and God doesn’t change and doesn’t lie for He is truth), then anything in the New Testament that contradicts what I said in the previous paragraph must be erroneous interpretation on the part of the Church.

So what do we have? In the Old Testament, we have many, many examples of Gentiles from the nations choosing to join alongside Israel to go up to Jerusalem because the Jewish people are well-known to be close to God. Therefore, a Gentile can also become close to God by attaching themselves to Israel (which makes us “attached” or “grafted in” but not Israel itself).

But how do we do that and why does it work?

We know that based on one particular aspect of the Abrahamic covenant (Genesis 12:1-3, Galatians 3:15-16, Ephesians 3:1-13), by faith in the “seed of Abraham,” that is Messiah, Son of David, the people of the nations can also benefit from the New Covenant blessings (holding fast to the Covenant), and through adoption, be called “Sons”, and enjoy forgiveness of sins, redemption, salvation, entrance into the Kingdom of God, resurrection, and life-everlasting in the World to Come at the end of all things.

That’s pretty terrific.

However, if you’re a Christian, there’s a problem. Where does “the Church” come in?

What is the Church, or more to the point, what is the ekklesia of Messiah? In the first century, it was a Jewish religious stream whereby, through the inauguration of the New Covenant era by the death (blood) and resurrection of Jesus (Yeshua), as a promise of things to come, Gentiles who came to faith in the God of Israel through discipleship in Messiah, were able to receive the Spirit of God (starting in Acts 10) as did the Jewish disciples and apostles (Acts 2), receive legal standing as equal co-participants in the Jewish stream of “the Way” (Acts 15) and in this ekklesia, form “one new man” (Ephesians 2) made up of Israel, the Jewish people, and the “people of the nations who are called by My name” (Amos 9:12).

It is said that in Messianic days, God will establish a reign of peace and that the whole world will be united together, Jew and Gentile alike (Micah 4:1-5, Isaiah 11:1-10). I see the ekklesia of Messiah, especially in the first century, as an example of that Kingdom of unity and peace in microcosm. The so-called “Church” was supposed to be an example, a picture, and foretelling of what is to come in the Age of Messiah, when Jews and Gentiles really will have peace with one another under the rule of King Messiah, with Israel as the head of all the nations, and Jerusalem as the Holy City, raised high above all other cities and nations (so imagine how I see true Messianic Jewish synagogues, such as Beth Immanuel, with Jewish and Gentile members worshiping together, relative to a prophetic, Messianic future).

Thus the first century ekklesia wasn’t just another Judaism or some sort of expression of a new theology, it was, and I think will be again, the ultimate realization of God’s overarching plan for Israel and the entire world, to return the planet and everyone and everything on it to complete obedience and consistency with the nature and character of the God of Creation, the way it was in Gan Eden (the Garden of Eden) before the fall.

That means it is impossible for “the Church” to represent a subset of humanity all sanitized of their distinctions, especially distinctions that define Jewish Israel, because in the end, there will only be one body of people: Jews and Gentiles, one-hundred percent of humanity, all devoted to God.

But wait a minute. What about “survivors” and those people who went up against Israel and God, who are to be judged, and who will have consequences delivered upon them? That hardly describes “one humanity” under God.

True. There will be many, many Gentiles (or maybe just a few considering they’re called “survivors”) who up until the point where Messiah and Israel win and the rest of the world is subjugated under an Israel ruled by Messiah, are not of God’s people. They have chosen to be apart. But does that mean they can never join the ekklesia, the vast collection of Jews (Israel) and Gentiles (the rest of the nations everywhere on Earth)?

Why would it mean that? Is teshuvah limited? Under Messiah’s rule, can no one repent? Is that the hard line in the sand?

And what will that world-wide ekklesia look like? It makes sense, based on more prophecies in the Tanakh than I can count, that the Jewish people still in exile will all be returned to and live in the physical nation of Israel. The majority of the human race who are also part of the ekklesia, the vassal nations all aligned with Israel as their head, will periodically go up to Jerusalem for festivals, to pay homage to the King, to pray at the Temple, but we’ll still live in our homes in the nations of the world.

How many religions will there be? If it’s still possible for people to willfully disobey God, there could still be a lot of religions and a lot of denominations within individual religious, but there will be one and only one way to worship God. It is said that one of the things Messiah will do in the Messianic Age is to teach the correct interpretation of Torah and even teach the hidden things of Torah, that which we cannot perceive or understand in the present age. I conclude based on that understanding, that Messiah will show Jews and Gentiles the proper way of prayer, worship, and devotion for Jews and for Gentiles.

I imagine there’ll be a lot of overlap between those two general populations who are under Israel’s God, but I also imagine that there will be distinctions, not the least of which is the fact that Israel will finally, truly be a wholly Jewish nation.

What will that body or religion (or will the term “religion” have much meaning when Messiah is King and we all “know God” because the Spirit has been fully “poured out on all flesh”?) look like? My personal opinion is that it will not be called “Church,” crosses will no longer be prominently displayed by Gentile devotees of God, Sunday will no longer be the primary day of worship, and if I read the Tanakh correctly, pork and shellfish will no longer be on our menus, we all will rest on Shabbos, observe New Moon festivals, and plan our vacations around the Moadim so we can present sacrifices and pray at the Temple in Jerusalem.

That sounds a lot more like a Judaism than any form of Christianity.

I’ve been planning on writing something like this for quite some time, but got a little push yesterday (today, as I write this), by reading an article written by Caleb Hegg at the TorahResource Blog and reblogged by Judah Himango at Kineti L’Tziyon called “Is Messianic Judaism Really a Part of Modern Judaism?”

I tend to take a different view on things than Mr. Hegg, and although I don’t possess the same background as he does, I must disagree regarding whether or not Messianic Judaism can be qualified as a modern Judaism. I know. A lot of people, both Christians like Mr. Hegg and most Jewish people, religious and otherwise, disagree with me. That’s to be expected. I haven’t done much in the way of research on this topic, so I can only guess folks will come along and attempt to poke holes in my arguments.

But I’ve written not of what Messianic Judaism is today, but what I believe the world-wide, multi-national ekklesia will be in the days of King Messiah. As I mentioned above, if you have to assign a “religious” designation to that future ekklesia, given the Biblical prophetic record of the Messianic Age and the realization of the New Covenant as it reaches fruition, it will not be the Church. If we have to call it anything at all, it will be a Judaism.

The word “Messianic” is not simply a Hebrew-based way to say “Christian.” Messianic Judaism is the Judaism of the Messianic Era, practiced today.

-Aaron Eby
as quoted from Facebook

As a non-Jewish member of the ekklesia of Messiah, and summoning the future Kingdom of God, at least a little bit, into our present world, I wish you all a Good Shabbos, which also foreshadows the Kingdom to come.

Addendum: A few months ago, I wrote a blog post somewhat similar to this one called The Church When Jesus Returns, but I didn’t take my point as far as I have on the current “meditation.” I still think they “fit” together, though.

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Briefly Revisiting Gentiles and the New Covenant

June 17, 2014 James Pyles 38 Comments

I see this has gotten out of hand.

I debated a long time before putting my fingers on the keyboard, but in the end, I can’t allow this misunderstanding to go unanswered.

It has been said by one individual that I believe Gentiles (i.e. Christians) are excluded from the New Covenant. Frankly, as the kids say, “that’s crazy talk.” Nevertheless, my recent blog posts Unity in Messiah: A Commentary on One Law and the Gentiles and Walking in the Dust of the Footsteps of Moshiach have inadvertently made me and my blog something of a minor lightning rod. That was hardly my intent.

I wrote these blogs, first of all, to speak of and expand upon some of the concepts behind a recent commentary on Torah Portion Shelach published online by First Fruits of Zion (FFOZ). Actually, that was the motivation for the first blog post. I wrote the second in response to some online misinterpretation of my intent and motives, but that only made things worse.

It seems I need to restate my beliefs about the New Covenant and the place of the nations in relation to Israel. That won’t be easy to contain in a single blog post, since the information is vast. It took me eleven or twelve blog posts to work through my original investigation and D. Thomas Lancaster covered the New Covenant material in five sermons on four CDs in his What About the New Covenant series.

Here’s the “Reader’s Digest” version:

“Behold, days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them,” declares the Lord. “But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” declares the Lord, “I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,” declares the Lord, “for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.” (emph. mine)

–Jeremiah 31:31-34 (NASB)

The direct objects of the New Covenant are the House of Judah and the House of Israel, the descendants of the object of the Sinai Covenant, the Israelites. The nations are not mentioned in the New Covenant language so they (we) are not directly connected. Then how are we involved at all? Consider the Abrahamic Covenant:

Genesis 12:1-3 – God promises to make Abraham into great nation, bless those who bless him and curse those who curse him, and all peoples on earth would be blessed through Abraham.
Genesis 15:18–21 – God promises to give Abraham’s descendants all the land from the river of Egypt to the Euphrates, and this area is later referred to as the Promised Land or the Land of Israel.
Genesis 17:2–9 – God promises to make Abraham a father of many nations and of many descendants and the land of Canaan as well as other parts of Middle East will go to his descendants.
Genesis 17:9-14 – God declares that circumcision is to be the sign of the covenant for Abraham and all his male descendants and that this will be an eternal covenant.

Notice that only portions of the first and third condition have anything to do with any other people besides Abraham’s descendants through Isaac and Jacob. The first condition promises that “all peoples on earth” will be blessed through Abraham, and the third condition states that Abraham would be a father of many nations. Of course that last part speaks to the wives of Abraham and the children he had with them after Sarah died, so that condition doesn’t really figure into how all of earth’s people will be blessed.

Brethren, I speak in terms of human relations: even though it is only a man’s covenant, yet when it has been ratified, no one sets it aside or adds conditions to it. Now the promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. He does not say, “And to seeds,” as referring to many, but rather to one, “And to your seed,” that is, Christ.

–Galatians 3:15-16 (NASB)

We have to go to the apostolic scriptures and Paul’s epistle to the Galatians to understand how to interpret Genesis 12:1-3, but we see that the blessing to the nations comes through Messiah. He is the “mechanism” by which we Gentiles may be “grafted in” to the promises, not making us Jewish converts without a bris, but beneficiaries of the blessings such that we too can approach God as sons and not strangers (Ephesians 1:4-5).

Some things have been said about me ignoring that Israel is to be a light to the nations (Isaiah 49:6). The idea is that the Gentiles were to be attracted to that light (Deuteronomy 4:6) and then be prompted to join the nation, assimilating into the tribes and clans and becoming one with Israel.

I refer you back to FFOZ’s One Law and the Gentiles article for the details about what it was to be a “Ger” both in the days of Moses and in the time of the apostles.

Well over a year ago, I wrote Building My Model, which was my prior attempt at summarizing Gentile inclusion in the New Covenant. I reduced everything down to five points:

God creates a provision in his covenant with Abraham that allows the Gentiles to be blessed through Messiah (Abraham 12:1-3).
The New Covenant (Jer. 31, Ezek. 36) renews, affirms, and amplifies all of the previous covenants God made with the people of Israel and the people of Judah which, by definition, includes the Abrahamic covenant.
Messiah alludes that the (new) covenant is poured out in his blood (death), (see Mark 14:22-24, Luke 22:19-20) for all people.
Paul interprets the Abrahamic covenant provision referring to Gentiles as Messiah being our connection to God (see Galatians 3:15-16).
Paul describes the process of Gentiles being made co-heirs to the Messianic promises through Messiah as a mystery (Ephesians 3:1-13).

There are multiple portions of the Prophets that mention Gentiles, the Temple being a house of prayer for all peoples, Gentiles holding fast to observing the Shabbat and the Festivals, and ten men of the nations taking hold of the fringes of a Jewish man’s clothing to go with him and to be near to God.

All of those passages speak to Gentile involvement alongside Israel in being devoted to God in the future Messianic Age, but in sending the Messiah the first time, God sent a message and a gift, a foreknowledge and guarantee of the coming Kingdom and confirmation that God will fulfill all of the New Covenant promises.

The coming of the first Gentiles into relationship with God by receiving the Spirit (Acts 10) just as the Jews did (Acts 2) is one of the signs of that promise and guarantee. The prophesies of Joel (Joel 2:28) must have come to Peter’s mind as he saw Cornelius and his household receive the Spirit, and when Paul, as Messiah’s emissary to the Gentiles, brought vast numbers of former goyishe idol worshipers to the God of Israel through faith in Yeshua, it must have seemed as if the Messianic Age was close to fruition, and that the New Covenant times were about to burst into completion.

That hasn’t happened yet, but we are in the midst of that process. The fact that Gentiles continue to be drawn to Messiah by the Spirit and to desire to learn about the Jesus of the Jewish scriptures is clearly a sign. Of course, we Gentiles are involved in the New Covenant, but only through Israel for the Master said “salvation comes from the Jews,” (John 4:22).

I’ve tried to compress a great deal of information about a very complex topic into one short article and I hope I’ve been successful. For a more complete picture of my understanding of the New Covenant, go through my eleven part series, starting with part one: The Jesus Covenant: The Foundation, and then click through the subsequent parts until you get to the end. Afterward, you should also read Gifts of the Spirit Poured Out on all Flesh which filled in one last piece of my investigative puzzle.

I hope this puts a few frenzied souls to rest. I also want to remind everyone reading my blog that my opinions are solely my own. I may quote from First Fruits of Zion and similar resources, but that doesn’t mean I work for them or am their “mouthpiece.” I also quote from Aish.com and Chabad.org but that doesn’t make me an Orthodox Jew or Chabadnik. Like any researcher, I utilize different sources to support my commentaries. You can bug organizations like the UMJC if you want, but I am not affiliated with them in any way so my comments should not be taken as representing them. Nor do they (or any other organization) have the ability to censor or repudiate me.

Now will people please calm down? It’s OK to disagree, but any level of adult emotional maturity should enable a person to have differences of opinion with others without personalizing conflict. Otherwise, all we’re doing is engaging in “spitting contest” and I hardly think that sort of behavior is for the sake of Heaven.

“The world doesn’t care how many times you fall down, as long as it’s one fewer than the number of times you get back up.”

-Aaron Sorkin, American screenwriter

Thanks.

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Unity in Messiah: A Commentary on One Law and Gentiles

June 15, 2014 James Pyles 3 Comments

As for the assembly, there shall be one statute for you and for the alien who sojourns with you, a perpetual statute throughout your generations; as you are, so shall the alien be before the LORD. There is to be one Torah and one ordinance for you and for the alien who sojourns with you.

–Numbers 15:15–16

But does the Torah really make different laws for Jews and Gentiles? According to Numbers 15:15–16, there is to be only one law for both Jews and Gentiles.

This seems simple enough. According to these verses, there is one law for both Jews and Gentiles. Therefore, Gentile believers should keep the whole Torah.

But wait. It’s not that clear.

“One Law and the Gentiles”
Commentary on Torah Portion Shelach
First Fruits of Zion (FFOZ)

I quoted from this article just the other day as an example of what sometimes provokes other believers to anger and how I want to avoid being excessively and needlessly provocative. While the “One Law” issue is a “non-event” for the vast majority of the Christian world, this is a “hot button” issue in certain small (relative to the overall body of believers worldwide) religious circles in the blogosphere.

But then, I’ve been thinking about an ad I received by email recently. Eichers.com has extended its annual Talis and Tzitzit sale to June 24th. As I read the advert, I found myself involuntarily pining for the days when I used to actually don a tallit to pray.

Then my reality check came in and I closed the ad, but not before I started pricing tallit gadolim (just “window shopping”).

Many years ago, my wife arranged for a friend who was visiting Israel, to purchase my first tallit at the Galilee Experience. It was a total surprise when it arrived from Israel by mail and my wife presented it to me.

But that was a long time ago, and to put it mildly, my wife’s attitude about Christians and tallitot has changed considerably. For that matter, so has mine.

I don’t really regret the “course correction” I’ve instituted in my life, but I do need periodic reminders of who I am and what I need to be doing that’s important to God in order to counterbalance my attraction to various aspects of Judaism as a worship practice. Really, if I had my “druthers” and it didn’t matter to God (or anyone else, especially the Missus) one way or the other, comparing evangelical Christian worship and study to a (Messianic) Jewish template, I’d probably choose Jewish practice.

In any conceivable way, nothing would be removed from my devotion to Yeshua (Jesus), but a richness in spiritual texture and connectedness to the people of God that extends all the way back to Sinai would be the platform and environment for that devotion.

I know that if any Hebrew Roots people with a bent for “One Law” ever read this, they’d probably say, “go for it!”

But, no. I have good reasons not to. It’s not my world and my practice. God chose the Jewish people for a reason and He gave them the Torah as the conditions of the Sinai covenant for a reason. Then He made it possible through the emergence of the New Covenant for Gentiles to be grafted in, and provided conditions for we grafted in Gentiles in a binding legal ruling that outlines a distinction in how Gentile disciples are obligated to the Torah.

I can live with that, knowing that we Gentiles have a unique role in supporting Messianic Jewish return to Torah and in perfecting the world in preparation of Messiah’s return.

Also, living with a Jewish wife and daughter, I have a special appreciation for their own uniqueness as Jews and how my mimicking Jewish behavior in some sort of evangelical Jewish cosplay cheapens who they are and totally misrepresents me and all other Gentile disciples of the Master.

It was also no coincidence (in my opinion) that Chabad.org’s “mitzvah minute” email was on Tzitzit: Fringe Judaism this past week.

Most people don’t think of Judaism as a fringe religion. Yet that’s our uniform. Under their shirts, Jewish men and boys wear a poncho called a tallit katan (literally: small cloak), with fringes hanging from each corner, just as the Torah prescribes (Numbers 15:37–40), “They shall make fringes on the corners of their garments . . .”

That’s “Judaism,” not Christianity that wears the fringes. I’m not a thief. I don’t take things that belong to someone else. Donning a Tallit Gadol for prayer belongs to someone else…Jewish people.

Jacob Milgrom contends that in the ancient Near East the ornateness of the hem was a mark of nobility. Hence the wearing of tzitzit denoted that all Israelites were members of a priestly nation with a universal mission. That status and its attendant obligations rest on God’s deliverance of Israel from slavery, as the passage makes clear at the end: “I the Lord am your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt to be your God: I, the Lord your God.” (Numbers 15:41)

-Ismar Schorsch
“The Distinction between History and Memory,” pg 522 (June 16, 2001)
Commentary on Torah Portion Shelach
Canon Without Closure: Torah Commentaries

I assume D. Thomas Lancaster wrote the small article on “One Law and the Gentiles” and in referencing Numbers 15:15-16, he says:

First of all, the context deals not with the application of Torah as a whole, but specifically with the sacrifices. In other words, if an alien wanted to offer a sacrifice in the Temple he needed to follow the same Torah guidelines as the Israelite. The passage is not saying that all the laws of Torah apply equally to Jews and Gentiles.

Second, by the time of the apostles, the word translated as “alien” (ger, גר) was no longer understood as just a Gentile non-Jew. The Hebrew word had shifted its semantic value to refer specifically to a Gentile who had gone through a full, legal conversion to become Jewish, i.e., a proselyte. That conversion process included circumcision, immersion, and a sacrifice. That’s how the Greek version of the Torah (lxx) translates the word too. That’s probably how the apostles would have understood it.

Interestingly enough, Lancaster (I presume) says the Didache actually agrees with the surface reading of Numbers 15:15-16:

If you are able to bear all the yoke of the Lord [i.e., Torah], you will be perfect; but if you are not able, do as much as you are able to do. (Didache 6:2)

Wait a minute! What just happened? Did Lancaster say that the Didache supports an identical application of the Torah mitzvot on both Jewish and Gentile disciples of Jesus?

The Didache agrees with Numbers 15:15–16. There is not supposed to be a different Torah for Gentile believers. The Gentile believers are not supposed to have a different type of worship or religion. There is only one Torah for God’s people. The only question left open is to what extent the Gentile believer is obligated. Most of the laws of the Torah apply equally to Jewish and Gentile disciples of Yeshua.

On the other hand, Gentile believers are not obligated to keep all of the ceremonial laws as the Jewish believers such as circumcision and other distinct markers of Jewish identity like the calendar, the holy days, the dietary laws, and so forth. Despite that, the Bible does not create alternative Gentile versions of these institutions.

In the days of the apostles, the Gentile believers kept most of those things along with the Jewish believers as part of their participation in their shared religion.

The Torah, the conditions for the Sinai covenant, are the same conditions for the New Covenant. God didn’t re-write the conditions, just the material upon which they are written, on paper and tablets formerly, but later, on the human heart.

So Torah applies to all who come under the New Covenant. The only question is how the roles and applications differ between those who entered into covenant with God at Sinai vs. those of us who were later grafted in, that is, between Jews and Gentiles.

Lancaster ended his small write-up by saying that in the apostolic era, it was likely the Gentile disciples, especially those embedded in Messianic Jewish synagogues in the diaspora, would have appeared much more Jewish than we Christians do today. Their practice and observance would have been modeled on their mentors, and as Lancaster mentioned, the Didache seems to support this view and was formally taught to newly-minted non-Jewish disciples.

So where does that leave me? Right where I am.

If I lived in a different environment, if my wife was Messianic, if a thousand other things were changed, how I outwardly worship God would probably not look the same as it does now. But there are no “what ifs” in God’s creation, there is only here and now and what is real.

What matters about discipleship and devotion to the Master is doing the will of God. I pray. I study. I worship in fellowship. I perform many of the mitzvot in the Torah such as giving charity to the poor, providing food for the hungry, visiting the sick, comforting those who grieve.

The message of the Good News of Messiah changes not at all for the Jew or the Gentile, and the coming of the Kingdom alters not one little bit for the descendants of Israel or the people of the nations. In fact, being a devoted Gentile who has fully apprehended a Messianic world view and perception of the Bible makes me a lot more valuable to the cause of Christ for Jewish and Christian people than if I felt that I would only be on God’s “approved list” if I looked and acted “Jewish”.

I know parts of what I’ve written will make certain people unhappy, but please remember, I’m not telling you or anyone else what to do, I’m just talking about who I am and what I need to do. I can’t allow how others view me to affect what I must do and refrain from doing before God.

The Kotzker Rebbe said that the mistake of the spies was in the words “and so we were in their sight.” It should not bother a person how others view him. (Otzer Chayim)

A person who worries about how others view him will have no rest. Regardless of what he does or does not do he will always be anxious about receiving the approval of others. Such a person makes his self-esteem dependent on the whims of others. It is a mistake to give others so much control over you. Keep your focus on doing what is right and proper.

-Rabbi Zelig Pliskin
from his commentary on Torah Portion Shelach (pg 330)
Growth Through Torah

There is “one law” but it is applied differently, even within formal Judaism, depending on who you are. It’s applied differently also for the Gentile. There is One God who is God of all. There is one Messiah who brings salvation to the world. There is one Kingdom waiting for the devoted to enter. There is one world to come where we will return to the Garden, because that’s where it all began.

If that’s not unity in Messiah, what is?

Final note: distinctiveness in identity and practice does not mean dissolution, disagreement, or disconnection. My wife and I are obviously different as man and woman, and we are different as Christian and Jew. Nevertheless, we are a family together with our children and grandson, and we share strong connections within that context. The same can be said for the Messianic community of Jews and Gentiles. We form a unity not in spite of our differences, but because of them. That is the beauty of “one new man” (Ephesians 2:15). You are changed, not in terms of ethnicity, nationality, or obligation, but because, men and women, Jew and Gentile, no matter how one differs from another, we are all interconnected in Messiah, may he come soon and in our day.

Addendum: See the “sequel” to this “meditation”: Walking in the Dust of the Footsteps of Moshiach.

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Is It For His Glory?

June 12, 2014 James Pyles 8 Comments

There is to be one law and one ordinance for you and for the alien who sojourns with you.

–Numbers 15:16

The Torah says there is to be only one law for both Jews and aliens sojourning with the Jewish people. On the surface, this appears to be a simple statement, but when we dig deeper into biblical studies and interpretations, it becomes a complicated issue.

“One Law and the Gentiles”
Commentary on Torah Portion Shelach
First Fruits of Zion (FFOZ)

Be careful not to become involved in quarrels with your friends. Arguments will only create distance between you and others.

The most effective approach to avoid needless arguments is to master the ability to remain silent. You don’t have to say everything you think of saying. At times there is an actual need to clarify a specific point and it’s appropriate to speak up. But a large percentage of arguments come from making comments that don’t need to be made.

-Rabbi Zelig Pliskin
quoted at Aish.com

When I read the commentary at FFOZ about “One Law and the Gentiles”, I immediately wanted to jump on it as yet another classic example of the ongoing debate within various branches of Messianic Judaism, Hebrew Roots, and Evangelical Christianity. Then I thought about how such debates can be damaging and when I should ignore such temptations. Then again, I’ve also learned that sometimes you have to speak up for what you believe is right.

The trick is to find the right topic and the right timing. That isn’t always easy and in fact, there are times when no matter how well you craft your message, it’s going to provoke a hostile if not violent response:

“And when the blood of Your witness Stephen was being shed, I also was standing by approving, and watching out for the coats of those who were slaying him.’ And He said to me, ‘Go! For I will send you far away to the Gentiles.’”

They listened to him up to this statement, and then they raised their voices and said, “Away with such a fellow from the earth, for he should not be allowed to live!”

–Acts 22:20-22 (NASB)

Of course, this is a pretty extreme example. Most of our online debates, arguments, and trolling don’t come anywhere near actual riot conditions. On the other hand, why do we fight at all?

A couple of weeks ago I spoke to several pastors and asked them, “How many of you have received a nasty email in the last six months?” Every single person in the room raised their hand—including me.

Let me be clear; I believe the majority of people are civil and respectful in their online dialogue. However, there remains a vocal minority who insist on remaining unpleasant both in tone and word. And these unkind words come from many who self-identify as Christians, who somehow believe that malice is an acceptable form of communication.

Which raises a question: Why do so many Christians persist in being mean?

-Pastor Michael Hidalgo
“When Did Christians Get So Mean?” June 9, 2014
Relevant Magazine

Pastor Hidalgo went on to say:

Many of us have the luxury of not having to look beyond the small world we create for ourselves. We attend churches, listen to talk radio and watch news programs that only serve to affirm our previously held beliefs. We have fallen asleep in the insulated comfort of accepted, collective thinking. We live among those who think like us, look like us, talk like us, and we assure ourselves we are right and others are wrong.

It may do us well to break out of these enclaves we create for ourselves.

I worship in an “enclave” where my “previously held beliefs” are not at all affirmed, so I can’t expect to be insulated within a comfortable cocoon as the Pastor suggests most Christians may be. In fact, I’ve tried to nudge some of my fellow-Christians out of that cocoon, and while they haven’t “gotten mean” or anything like it, some didn’t really understand that there could a life for a believer outside of their own highly-specific context, especially a valid and sustainable Christian life.

More’s the pity.

I think that’s what triggers a lot of the “yelling” online, because the blogosphere isn’t a cocoon, it’s the wild, wild west, where anything can and usually does happen, and any opinion can be expressed with impunity.

But an opinion may or may not be “truth”:

We forget that every venomous word we speak or write to others is an assault on the heart of a man or a woman made in the image and likeness of the Almighty.

Some, no doubt, believe they need to stand up for truth. A few believe standing up for truth demands they attack those who seek to distort the truth. But this is not the case. If the truth is spoken without grace it is not true at all. It turns out we can be right about a lot of things, but if we do not have love we are dead wrong.

So on the one hand, we must stand up for truth, but on the other hand, the way we do it is very important, for even if we are actually “right” about what “truth” is once in a while, if he have to do a hatchet job on another human being to defend that truth, then we’ve defended truth at the cost of denigrating a person created in God’s image.

Pastor Hidalgo suggests that our first response to another person with whom we disagree is to listen. That’s not easy to do when, particularly on the web, upon detecting something “wrong,” we’ve been conditioned to stop receiving information and to start sending it in abundance. We’ve been taught that we have free speech rights and that we possess the truth, and we have not only the right but the responsibility to shove that truth down everyone else’s throat until they choke on it.

Then we’ve won.

Hooray.

But why are we really supposed to share the truth of the Bible? To sanctify the Name of God, to spread His Name throughout all the earth, to illuminate people with the Good News of Messiah.

But as I said, Paul found out on an endless number of occasions, that no matter how you listen and how well you craft your message, there will always be times when you and your message will be rejected, and there will always be people who are so convinced of the truth and rightness of their own message, that they cannot possibly give you a fair hearing. In fact, the minute you start saying anything contrary to their version of truth, they’ll start bombarding you with their own, and eventually when they realize you’re never going to change your mind and agree with them, they’ll boot you out and start “badmouthing” you to all their (virtual) “friends”.

Well, that’s the classic scenario anyway. It doesn’t describe all of the possible responses to disagreements in the world of religious blogging, so please don’t start taking all this personally. I’m probably not even thinking about you at all.

This is obviously a continuation of what I’ve been writing about for the past week or so. What is the answer to surviving not only a community of faith in the local church but the extended world of faith on the Internet? I’m sure there must be an answer. Pastor Hidalgo summarizes that answer with a single word: “grace.” I think in the ideal, that’s probably the right answer, but most of us aren’t “ideal”. That’s why this life is a journey of struggle, exploration, and experience, not just reading the Bible and being programmed to be Christ’s perfect little disciple.

The Bible isn’t a record of how people got “perfect” once they heard about God, it’s a chronicle of how God was and is gracious with a whole planet full of damaged, imperfect, grumpy human beings across thousands upon thousands of years of history. God has promised us a better way to be human beings, but dangles “perfection” in front of us like a carrot, with the guarantee of a good meal only if we faithfully hang on long enough:

“Behold, days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them,” declares the Lord. “But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” declares the Lord, “I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,” declares the Lord, “for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.”

–Jeremiah 31:31-34 (NASB)

This stuff hasn’t happened yet, no matter how much some Christians believe it has (or wish it had). We are imperfect people living in an imperfect world. We want to “know God” perfectly and to have His Word written on our hearts (and not just in our Bibles), but the finger of God has only just started moving, and it’s having to chisel through lots of stone in order to get at the heart that’s supposed to be tender flesh.

The problem is, we don’t want to be tender, we want to be stony. Tenderness can be hurt but rocks are pretty tough. We like being tough. We like being right. We like making the other poor, dumb fool be wrong. It makes us feel better about ourselves.

No, I’m not saying you shouldn’t take a stand. I take a stand often enough, both here on this blog and at church in Sunday school. But it matters how you take your stand. If expressing truth, however you understand it, involves insulting or embarrassing another person, you’re probably doing it wrong. I know. I’ve gotten it wrong often enough, including quite recently.

I actually agree with FFOZ’s commentary on One Law and how Torah does and doesn’t apply to Gentile believers. I even agree that the FFOZ author wrote the article in a measured and respectful manner. I know that regardless of all that, the message will cause “all the wheels to fall off the cart,” so to speak, for a number of folks who have a very different opinion on the matter, and for some of them, their self-esteem and self-image are tightly dependent on believing their opinion is universally correct.

But that’s how most of us operate. We personalize disagreement and conflict rather than realizing God hasn’t called us to be the best bloggers in the religious world. He’s called us to be the best representatives of His Good News to the world, religious and otherwise. How do we do that? By arguing? By being right all the time? Most of us are wrong most of the time.

Truth is knowing when to speak and when to be silent. Truth is knowing when to talk and when to listen. Truth is the ability to hang on at the right times and to know when to let go.

Professor Henry Jones (Sean Connery): Junior, give me your other hand! I can’t hold on!

Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford): I can get it. I can almost reach it, Dad…

Professor Henry Jones: Indiana. Indiana… let it go.

Professor Henry Jones: Elsa never really believed in the grail. She thought she’d found a prize.

Indiana Jones: And what did you find, Dad?

Professor Henry Jones: Me? Illumination.

-from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989)

Professor Jones’ quest to discover the resting place of the Holy Grail ended up in the loss of the grail, yet he didn’t consider it a loss at all. What he found wasn’t a treasured object, a valued prize, or even immortality (by drinking water from the grail). He found illumination from God.

Yes, this is fiction and there was never such a thing as the “Holy Grail” but besides being a good adventure story, there’s a lesson in values here.

Kazim (Kevork Malikyan): [to Indy] Ask yourself, why do you seek the Cup of Christ? Is it for His glory, or for yours?

That should be a question we all ask ourselves before we speak up in Sunday school class, or put our fingers on the keyboard to either write a blog or respond to someone else’s.

Rabbi Avraham Mordechai of Gur explained that the nature of a person with humility is not to be stubborn about his own opinions and wishes. He is compliant and will easily give in to the opinions and wishes of others. The other spies were all very distinguished and important men. Moshe feared that Yehoshua might concede to their opinions and be swayed by them even though he felt differently. Therefore, Moshe especially prayed for Yehoshua not to be negatively influenced by the others.

Rabbi Zelig Pliskin

When a question of Torah ideals is involved, one must not budge. That is when it is appropriate to resist. When dealing with basic principles, remain steadfast and do not allow others to sway you. One needs wisdom to know the difference between situations when it is proper to give in to others and when it is not. For this we need the Almighty’s assistance.

Dvar Torah for Torah Portion Shelach
based on Growth Through Torah by Rabbi Zelig Pliskin
quoted by Rabbi Kalman Packouz on Shabbat Shalom Weekly
Aish.com

Addendum: Yesterday, I read a commentary about Pastor John MacArthur’s parenting advice to a Christian parent of a gay child. In tomorrow’s “morning meditation,” I respond.

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Does Unity Always Demand Passivity?

June 9, 2014 James Pyles 7 Comments

Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love, being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

–Ephesians 4:1-3 (NASB)

How is it pleasing to the Lord when hungry believers with different backgrounds and viewpoints, come together in a spirit of unity to study and apply His Word? What Christ-honoring qualities, in Ephesians 4:1-3, do we need to embrace in order for this to happen?

-from the Sunday school study notes for June 8th

I know I’ve accused myself (and been accused by my wife) of collapsing the Tent of David because of my arrogant presumption, which has subsequently caused me to question my role in the church (if any, beyond being a pew-warmer in services and a silent witness in Sunday school), but I’ve got just one question: are we supposed to “dumb down” the Bible and ignore blatant error for the sake of unity among believers?

I’m really tempted to ask my Sunday school teacher that question, but I know it would just stir up hard feelings (and I’ve done that before).

We’re studying Acts 22:22-29 and somehow my Sunday school teacher has gotten the impression that Paul became all humble, meek, and mild for the sake of Jesus Christ. Really, the last thing I imagine Paul to be in the face of adversity is meek and mild. I also think Christians largely misunderstand humility, especially in leadership.

Moses’s humility was a function of his greatness. Penetrating more deeply into the unfathomable mystery of things than anyone before or since, he was more acutely aware of his ignorance. As the Torah relates at Mount Sinai: “Moses approached the thick cloud where God was” (Exodus 20:18).

-Ismar Schorsch
Commentary on Torah Portion Beha’alotekha
“The Inscription on My Father’s Tombstone,” pg 498,
May 28, 1994
Canon Without Closure: Torah Commentaries

To make his point, he recast a verse in which Moses declares: “It is not because you are the most numerous of peoples that the Lord set His heart on you and chose you — indeed, you are the smallest of peoples” (Deut. 7:17). Nevertheless, the midrash continues, “the Holy One Praised Be He told Israel that I love you because each time I bestow greatness upon you, you shrink yourself before Me. I bestowed greatness upon Abraham and he said to Me: ‘I am but dust and ashes’ (Gen. 18:27). Upon Moses and Aaron and they said: ‘who are we?’ (Ex. 16:7) Upon David and he said: ‘I am a worm, less than human'” (Psalm 22:7).

-ibid,
“The Humblest of Men,” pg 513, June 5, 2004

And from another source:

Rabbi Yaakov Kamenetzky was about to take his place at the end of a long line waiting to board a bus, when someone in the front of the line who knew him called out, “Rebbe, you can come here in front of me!”

“I’m not permitted to,” replied Rav Yaakov. “It would be stealing.”

“I give you permission. I don’t mind.”

“But what about everybody else behind you?” said the Rosh Hayeshiva. “I would be stealing their time and choice of seat by moving them back one. Who says they allow me to?”

-Rabbi Zelig Pliskin
Commentary on Torah Portion Beha’alotekha
“Even when traveling be careful to observe Torah values,” pg 320
Quoting The Jewish Observer, Nov., 1985
Growth Through Torah

Here we see that humility is a reflection of strength of character and the upholding of Torah values (or Biblical values if you prefer), and is not the result of a person willing to sacrifice those values for the sake of unity, peace, or to prevent a “spirited debate.”

Certainly no one could accuse Abraham, Moses, Aaron, or David of being “meek and mild” and unable or unwilling to take a strong personal stand for what is right just to avoid an argument or to dodge a disagreement.

That said, we can also see from Rav Kamenetzky’s example that it is also required to sacrifice personal convenience for the sake of said-values, and from that, I derive the principle that you don’t enter into a debate, even if you think you’re correct, just for the sake of being right and proving the other person or people wrong.

I continually struggle with that last bit, even as I compose this blog post and anticipate (as I write this) Sunday school tomorrow morning (yesterday as you read this).

And as compelling as the examples I’ve already presented may be, there’s one more that should “seal the deal” so to speak:

When the ten heard this, they began to be upset with Ya’akov and Yochanan. Yeshua called to them and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles are the ones who oppress them, and their great ones dominate them. But it is not to be that way among you. Rather, one who desires to be great among you is to be as a servant to you, and the one who desires to be the head will be a slave to all. For even the son of man did not come in order to be served, but rather to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.

–Mark 10:41-45 (DHE Gospels)

It is true, and Chancellor Schorsch supports this in his commentary, that people operating outside of the Covenant community (Gentiles, in Schorsch’s as well as Jesus’ case) have leaders who feed off of power and self-glorification, while leaders in Judaism, at least in the ideal, become more humble as God heaps greatness upon them.

But as I said, this doesn’t mean humility equals passivity.

In the Temple he found merchants of cattle, flocks, and young doves and those who give change for money sitting there. He took cords, twisted them into a whip, and drove all of them out of the Temple, along with the flocks and cattle. He scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. To the dove merchants he said, “Take these out of here, and do not make my Father’s House into a marketplace!” His disciples remembered the passage, “For the zeal of your House has consumed me.”

–John 2:14-17 (DHE Gospels)

Of course, that hardly gives me license to make a whip and go charging into Sunday school, even metaphorically, for the sake of making a theological point. On the other hand, if unity were the single, overriding priority in the community of faith, then we would never see any Jewish leader, including Jesus, take a strong, personal stand for the sake of Heaven.

There is a line in the sand that, once crossed, must provoke a response. So on the one hand, I could have been wrong to remain silent in Sunday school class when I felt that line had been crossed. On the other hand, I need to choose my battles. I usually do that in class, selecting only one or two points in the class notes to address openly, but even then, it doesn’t always work out.

How do I tell my Sunday school teacher (or do I tell him at all) that unity is not the be all and end all of communal life in the congregation of Christ?

Be careful not to become involved in quarrels with your friends. Arguments will only create distance between you and others.

The most effective approach to avoid needless arguments is to master the ability to remain silent. You don’t have to say everything you think of saying. At times there is an actual need to clarify a specific point and it’s appropriate to speak up. But a large percentage of arguments come from making comments that don’t need to be made.

-Rabbi Zelig Pliskin
quoted at Aish.com

By the time you read this (Monday morning), I might have the answer.

Addendum: It’s Sunday afternoon and Sunday school class actually worked out better than I thought it would. I’ll write more about this later.

"When you awake in the morning, learn something to inspire you and mediate upon it, then plunge forward full of light with which to illuminate the darkness." -Rabbi Tzvi Freeman