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Torah Portion

Tetzaveh: Our Children Are Watching

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The Rebbe and the ChildA rabbi was sitting next to an atheist on an airplane. Every few minutes one of the rabbi’s children or grandchildren would inquire if they could bring him something to eat or drink or if there was anything they could do for him. The atheist commented, “It’s wonderful the respect your children and grandchildren show you; mine don’t show me that respect.” The rabbi responded, “Think about it. To my children and to my grandchildren, I am one step closer in a chain of tradition to the time when God spoke to the whole Jewish people on Mt. Sinai. To your children and grandchildren — unfortunately, you are considered to be one step closer to being an ape.”

Are children more inclined to respect their parents if they think they are one step closer to being an ape or if they believe that their parents are one step closer to being created by the Almighty who heard God speak?

-Rabbi Kalman Packouz
“Shabbat Shalom Weekly”
Commentary on Torah Portion Tetzaveh
Aish.com

No, I’m not taking a cheap shot at atheists but I would like to wake up a few religious people about the commandment to honor parents and what it all means. According to Rabbi Packouz, the original commandment regarding parents and the related scriptures (see Exodus 20:12, Deuteronomy 5:16, and Leviticus 19:13) actually describe two separate commandments:

We see from these verses that there are two mitzvot (commandments): 1) To honor your parents and 2) To revere your parents. Love motivates one to do positive things; fear keeps one from transgressing the negative.

We are to love and fear (revere) our parents. This may seem more apparent when one is a child. As an adult, we may still love our parents, but we typically don’t fear them anymore. After all, can an eighty year old father or mother send their fifty-eight year old son to “time out?”

But then again, we may be missing something about the full implications of this commandment.

And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”

–Matthew 22:37-40 (ESV)

We have a Father in Heaven who we are also commanded to love. In fact, in some ways, it’s by having a Father on earth that we can even begin to conceptualize the Father in Heaven. Of course, the analogy is far from perfect. A human Father can be flawed, selfish, distracted, drunk, abusive, overbearing, hostile, wishy-washy, the list goes on. God is perfect and therefore, all of His actions toward us are perfect.

In quoting Rabbi Packouz above, I immediately thought that the Rabbi’s children would only see their Father as closer to God if he acted in a manner consistent with that impression. It’s not like all kids of all Rabbis, Pastors, and other clergy people offer their Dad’s equal reverence. Sometimes it has little to do with the sort of job the Dad has or what the family’s religious tradition is, but children very much are affected by what their father’s actually do, and mold their opinions about him and about Dads in general based whether or not he acts consistently with his stated principles and ideals.

And sometimes how we relate to our earthly Father is how we relate to our Father in Heaven. If we haven’t learned to respect, love, revere, and honor our own Father and Mother, what sort of model do we have for respecting, loving, revering, and honoring our Father in Heaven?

But then, it can work in the opposite way, too. I’ve heard stories of people who have had horrible and abusive Dads, Dads who have sexually molested their children, brutalized them, neglected them, abandoned them. And yet some of those kids have learned to trust their Father who is perfect in Heaven in spite of the cruelty they had to endure from their Father on earth.

children-watchingI don’t think the Rabbi and the other airplane passenger had different relationships with their children because the children of the former saw him as one step closer to God while the children of the latter saw him as one step closer to the apes. I think the difference is who each person was as a Father and a man and how each one of them treated his children and most likely his wife, the children’s mother. Children are more likely to respond by what they see their parents doing rather than what their parents say or who their parents even are (a Rabbi vs. an Atheist). It’s a little scary to think that how we relate to our kids may strongly affect how they relate to God.

But how we behave as a parent and as a human being depends on who we are, what we believe, and then how we choose to act out of all of that.

Gather together and I will tell you what will befall you at the end of days.

–Genesis 49:1

Prior to his death, the Patriarch Jacob wished to disclose to his children the future of the Jewish nation. We know only too well what those prophecies were, and Jacob knew that revealing the enormous suffering that the Jews were destined to experience would be devastating to his children. The only way they could hear these things was if they “gathered together” and, by virtue of their unity, could share their strengths.

What was true for our ancestors holds true for us. Our strength and our ability to withstand the repeated onslaughts that mark our history lie in our joining together.

Jacob knew this lesson well. The Torah tells us that “Jacob remained alone, and a man wrestled with him” (Genesis 32:25). Jacob discovered that he was vulnerable only when he remained alone.

Some people feel that they must be completely independent. They see reliance on someone else, be it others or God, as an indication of weakness. This destructive pride emanates from an unhealthy ego. [There is sometimes an] apparent paradox that a humble person is one who is actually aware of his strengths, and that feelings of inadequacy give rise to egocentricity and false pride.

Not only are we all mutually interdependent, the Torah further states that when we join together, our strengths are not only additive, but increase exponentially (Rashi, Leviticus 26:8). Together, we can overcome formidable challenges.

Today I shall…

…try to join with others in strengthening Judaism and in resisting those forces that threaten spirituality.

-Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski
“Growing Each Day, Adar 9”
Aish.com

Part of the Rabbi’s “success” as a father in the original quote was his perception of himself as a Rabbi and as a Jewish man. Without his sense of spirituality and his identity as a Jew who is connected to all other Jews, both in the present, and back across history, how he would behave as a Father and how his children would respond to him might be very different. It might also be very different how his children would choose (or if they would choose) to respond to God.

If you’re a parent, teaching your children about the commandments related to honoring and revering you as parents (which extends also to how they should respond to their grandparents) is a very good thing, but you may be having a much greater impact on your kids than you might imagine. In forging a relationship with your children, teaching them what God expects of parents and children, you are also teaching them what they should expect from God and how to respond to Him as a Father.

family-praying-picnicAs a Christian and a parent, you have a specific identity and source to draw from to define yourself and to define the relationship you have with your children based on what you know of God from His Spirit and from the Bible. While the Rabbi’s children were born Jewish (assuming they had a Jewish mother, and I think this is likely), a Christian’s children aren’t “born Christian.” A Christian doesn’t inherit his or her relationship with God the way a Jew does. Although Jewish children can, Heaven forbid, choose to reject their relationship with God and with Judaism, children born of Christian parents are one more step removed because every Christian must choose their path in life, including a path of faith. It’s even more important for us as parents and grandparents to behave in accordance with our stated beliefs and our faith because unless our children actually see that, we have no hope of transmitting Christian faith to the next generation. Even Jewish parents have a tough time transmitting Jewish faith and values to the next generation, so you can imagine what challenges there are for Christian parents.

That’s why we must make sure that God is continually with us so that our children can see that holiness is our constant companion.

When someone walks the street and thinks words of Mishna or Tanya, or sits in his store with a Chumash or Tehillim – that is more valued today than it was when the streets were bright with the light of Torah. We must not go about in the street with a vacant heart. We must have some Torah memorized, to take with us into the street.

“Today’s Day”
Sunday, 9 Adar I, 5703
Compiled by the Lubavitcher Rebbe
Translated by Yitschak Meir Kagan
Chabad.org

For a Christian, that means living, eating, reading, and breathing our faith, spending time in the Bible, associating with friends who are believers, and behaving in every aspect of our lives in complete consistency with what we know we should be doing as a Christian. This is also why it is vitally important for Jewish parents to perform the mitzvot, regularly daven, recite the Shema, and keep kosher.

No pressure, eh?

But what choice do we have? After all, our children are watching.

Good Shabbos.

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If I Should Ever Forget Your Torah

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Rescuing_torah_scroll_Beth_IsraelRashi on the Chumash (Devarim 31:21) comments and says that this verse serves as a promise that the Torah will never be forgotten from the Jewish people totally – ‫.לגמרי‬

There is a discussion among the commentators how to interpret the meaning of this promise. When the verse says that “Torah” will not be forgotten, Rashi understands that we are assured that the song of Ha’azinu will never be forgotten. This song will remain as testimony for the Jewish people for all generations, and its lesson of the trials and tribulations of the nation and its destiny will accompany them on their trek through history. However, there never was a promise that the rest of the Torah would be remembered forever. This, then, is what Rashi alludes to when he comments that the Torah will never be forgotten “totally”, because the song of Ha’azinu will always remain. This is also how Maharsha understands the statement of Rebbe Shimon ben Yochai in our Gemara.

Maharshal understands that the promise in the verse refers to the written Torah. However, it is the oral teachings that are vulnerable, and there is a danger of their possibly being forgotten. This explanation fits into the narrative of the Gemara, where we find that the day will come when a woman will take a loaf of bread and circulate among the shuls and batei midrash to find out if the loaf is tamei or tahor, but no one will be able to answer her question. The Gemara then asks how this can be so, for the halachah of tum’ah of bread is explicit in the verse (Vayikra 11:34)! Now, if the written Torah itself is not guaranteed to be intact and remembered, it would still be possible for the explicit information of the verses to be forgotten. It must be, explains Maharshal, that the Gemara knows that the written Torah will always be remembered.

Yet even according to Rashi, although the promise of continuity was only made in reference to the song of Ha’azinu, the halachah is that this shira cannot be written by itself (Rambam, Hilchos Sefer Torah 7:1). Therefore, if the song of Ha’azinu will remain forever, it will necessarily require that the rest of the written Torah accompany it in the same scroll. Therefore, the promise of Ha’azinu never being forgotten automatically indicates that the rest of the written Torah, as well, will never be lost.

Daf Yomi Digest
Gemara Gem
“The Torah will never be forgotten”
Shabbos 138

My father writes in one of his letters: A single act is better than a thousand groans. Our G-d lives, and Torah and mitzvot are eternal; quit the groaning and work hard in actual avoda, and G-d will be gracious to you.

“Today’s Day”
Monday, Adar Sheini 8, 5703
Compiled by the Lubavitcher Rebbe
Translated by Yitschak Meir Kagan
Chabad.org

For the vast majority of Christians, reading what I’ve just quoted above won’t make a great deal of sense, especially when we focus on the sure promises we have through salvation in Jesus Christ, but since I’ve been talking about Jewish identity in the body of Messiah lately, I thought those words applied. More specifically, I think it’s important for we in the church to try to comprehend what a sense of identity as a Jew means to many Jewish people, including those who have accepted Jesus (Yeshua) as the Jewish Messiah. Most of Christian history has created a sort of “reflexive expectation” in the church that results in our anticipating that Jewish believers should look and act like the Gentile believers, and that the things of Judaism (lighting candles on Erev Shabbat, davening with a siddur while wearing a tallit gadol and laying tefillin, keeping glatt kosher, and so forth) should simply go “bye-bye.”

This is at the heart of much of the debate between the halachically Jewish members of Messianic Judaism, and the Christians in the church, as well as many Christians attending Hebrew Roots groups. We non-Jews keep asking ourselves and the Jews who revere the Master what’s the big rip-roaring deal about remaining distinctively Jewish? Didn’t Paul say it was no big deal for him?

If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless. But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

–Philippians 3:4-11 (ESV)

paul-editedOK, Paul wasn’t saying that he exchanged his Judaism for his faith in Jesus Christ, since they are hardly mutually exclusive. He was saying that being Jewish, in and of itself, didn’t make him a “big deal” and didn’t hold a candle to everything he had gained since he had come to knowledge and faith in the Jewish Messiah. The Messiah is the goal, he opens all the doors, he holds all the keys, and compared to that, no matter who you are, it doesn’t mean as much as everything Messiah means.

But it also doesn’t mean that Paul thought being Jewish was nothing, either. He never stopped being Jewish, never stopped acting Jewish, never stopped eating, sleeping, walking, and breathing Jewish until the day he died.

And for nearly 2,000 years, the vast, vast majority of Christianity has required, demanded, insisted, and red-in-the-face screamed at the Jewish people desiring to come to Messiah to stop being Jewish as a condition of becoming a “Christian.” (and I put that word in quotes because of how it has been used against the Jewish people who are just as Jewish as their King). If we demand that they forget the Torah, that they set aside their halachah, that they extinguish their Shabbos candles for the sake of Moshiach, how are we any different from all those generations of Christians who came before us and demanded the same things or worse?

But there’s something more to consider.

Sitting at a table in a non-kosher restaurant is a problem of “marit ayin,” which means that we have a responsibility to avoid creating a situation where others may draw the wrong conclusion – i.e. a passerby might see you and think that the restaurant is really kosher and it’s okay to eat there. Or others might think that since you (who purports to keep kosher) are lax in observance, then somehow it’s okay for them, too.

-From Ask the Rabbi
“Eating in Non-Kosher Restaurant”
Aish.com

Sounds a little bit like this sort of problem…that is, if the Jewish person in question was a believer.

But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. For before certain men came from James, he was eating with the Gentiles; but when they came he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision party. And the rest of the Jews acted hypocritically along with him, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy.

–Galatians 2:11-13 (ESV)

You’d think that Peter would have gotten past this problem after his staying in the household of the Roman Cornelius back in Acts 10, but he still seemed to be worried about what some important Jewish men from James might think if they saw him eating with the non-Jewish brothers of the faith. Was it because Peter was enjoying a nice, big, juicy cut of pork or maybe a steaming hot bowl of prawns? Probably not, but that’s just a guess because the Bible doesn’t say what was on the menu. It’s more likely though, that whatever was being eaten was acceptable under the laws and accepted halachah involving kashrut, even if Peter was just having a salad, and he thought not all of the emissaries from James were totally on board with this whole “It’s OK to have table fellowship with the Gentile believers” thing.

kosher-in-los-angelesPaul, for his part, was completely OK with it and the fact that these were supposed to be “important men” cut no ice with him at all (v. 6). As the Aish “Ask the Rabbi” writer says, Peter may have been concerned with “a problem of marit ayin.”

I recently read David H. Stern’s book Restoring the Jewishness of the Gospel (2nd ed.) and one of the points Stern made was that a Jewish believer must continue to observe the mitzvot including the accepted halachah. Another of his points was that Jewish reluctance to share a meal with a Christian must not stand in the way of unity in the larger body of Messiah which includes both Jewish and non-Jewish “body parts.”

That’s a tough one, especially depending on the level of kashrut the Jewish believers are observing (I’ve seen some variability). Of course, it also depends on the level of kashrut being observed by the Gentile believers, but keeping kosher (in my opinion) is optional for non-Jews but (again, in my opinion) mandatory for Jews (particularly Jews considering themselves observant within the Messianic framework).

I should say at this point that it’s pretty cheeky of me to even suggest that I know what observant Messianic Jews should or shouldn’t do, except that I’ve been told on numerous occasions by a number of Jewish Messianic believers that this is how they think about kashrut as well.

In this particular blog post, I’m not going into what I think are the specific differences between how Torah should be applied to believing Jews vs. believing Gentiles, but I do want to suggest (again) that we Christians cannot expect or demand that Jews stop being observant Jews because we may not know how to operationalize “kosher” (for instance) or that we have issues with some of the halachah involved in kosher (or many other Jewish practices). Jews should be allowed to observe halachah as long as such practices don’t fly completely in the face of how the Bible describes the proper behavior for a disciples of Christ (and I realize I’m opening the door to various interpretations of “Biblically proper” here).

At this juncture, I can’t help but be reminded of this, particularly since it’s part of the blessings associated with the Birkat HaMazon.

If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget its skill! Let my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth, if I do not remember you, if I do not set Jerusalem above my highest joy!

–Psalm 137:5-6 (ESV)

And then, there’s this particular mitzvah.

In order that you remember and perform all My commandments.

–Numbers 15:40

Now we’re right back where we started: the commandment for the Jewish people not to forget the Torah. Of course, it’s not as if there haven’t been gaps when the Torah was not remembered let alone studied.

And when the king heard the words of the Law, he tore his clothes. And the king commanded Hilkiah, Ahikam the son of Shaphan, Abdon the son of Micah, Shaphan the secretary, and Asaiah the king’s servant, saying, “Go, inquire of the Lord for me and for those who are left in Israel and in Judah, concerning the words of the book that has been found. For great is the wrath of the Lord that is poured out on us, because our fathers have not kept the word of the Lord, to do according to all that is written in this book.”

–2 Chronicles 34:19-21 (ESV)

But then again, it’s always been rediscovered, and Israel has always repented and returned to God and the Torah.

Rolling the Torah ScrollWhether we Christians always understand it or not, there is a bond between God, the Torah, and the Jewish people. That bond has existed for thousands of years, in spite of every effort of the nations opposing Israel and those persecuting the Jewish people to destroy that bond (often by burning synagogues, Torah scrolls, volumes of Talmud, and sometimes Jewish people). So when we Christians attempt to loosen the bond between Jew and Torah, which includes halachah, we can expect to see some resistance and even some push back. Expecting a Jew to forget Torah, at least because we’ve said they should, is like expecting a mother to forget her only child.

Memory is a unique Divine gift. Indeed, to this very day, neuropsychologists have not discovered the secret of exactly how memory operates. The turnover of the chemicals in our bodies is such that after a period of time not a single atom remains in the brain that was there several months earlier, yet a person’s brain retains memories for years, decades, a lifetime.

This unique gift should not be abused. Many times the Torah tells us what we should remember and cautions us against forgetting. The concepts and events that we must retain are goals that are vital to our spiritual well-being. Most siddurim list six verses of the Torah that we should recite each day to remind us of who we are and to caution us against idolatry and lashon hara (harmful talk).

However, if we use this wonderful gift to remember those who have offended us and to harbor grudges against them, or if we remember the favors we have done for others and expect them to be beholden to us, we are abusing this Divine gift.

The key to discerning what we should remember and what we should forget is contained in the above verse: “In order that you remember and perform all My commandments.” Any memory that does not assist us in working toward the ultimate goal of serving God does not deserve being retained.

Today I shall…

…try to retain in my mind only those things that contribute to my devotion to God, and dismiss those things that may deter me therefrom.

-Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski
“Growing Each Day, Adar 8”
Aish.com

I know someone out there is going to tell me how unfaithful the Jewish people have been to God throughout their history. I know someone is going to tell me that the majority of the world’s Jewish population is completely secular. Be that as it may, that doesn’t justify Christians requiring the believing Jews in our midst to also forget the Torah when they believe with great zeal that God has called them to always remember the mitzvot, to love God, and to obey Him, as He has long since taught His people Israel to do.

Torah Portion

Terumah: Why Do You Do Good?

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menorah“Take for Me an offering from everyone whose heart impels him to give.”

–Exodus 25:2

Rashi, the great commentator, tells us that “Take for Me” means that all donations for the Tabernacle should be given for the sake of the Almighty. The question: What difference does it make what a person’s intentions are as long as he does a good deed?

Rabbi Yehuda Leib Chasman clarifies the role of intentions with an illustration. Suppose there is a man who wants to ensure that every child in the community has wholesome milk for breakfast. Rain or shine he delivers milk every morning. What would you say about that man? Likely you would count him amongst the great tzadikim, righteous people, a person of great kindness.

However, what would be your opinion of the man if you knew he delivered the milk only because he was getting paid? No longer is he a great tzadik, now he is just a plain milkman.

Similarly, in everything we do. If we keep in mind that we are fulfilling the Almighty’s command to do kindness, even the mundane interactions at work can be elevated to a higher spiritual level. The bus driver is no longer just driving the bus, he is helping people get to work or to shop for their families. The deed may be a good deed with or without one’s intention, but our growth in character and spirituality depend on our intentions!

-Rabbi Kalman Packouz
“Shabbat Shalom Weekly”
Commentary on Torah Portion Terumah
Aish.com

I suppose you could link this back to commentary on last week’s last week’s Torah portion. In the Aish.com commentary for that week, we looked at the story of a young Jewish woman who was seeking spirituality and felt actually insulted that her Jewish teachers suggested she could find it in “the (Torah) laws regarding returning a lost item.” She abandoned her pursuit of spirituality within the context of Torah and Judaism and proceeded to India. But she found that the behavior of her guru in response to his finding a lost wallet containing a large sum of money showed her that spirituality, responsibility, justice, and mercy must all go together.

In this week’s commentary, we see that even doing what is good may not be enough if the motivation of the person performing the action is less than stellar.

But let’s take two people performing an identical mitzvah. Say both of our hypothetical people are donating food to a local food bank. They both give abundantly in money and goods and many people are fed through their efforts. The first man is primarily motivated by the desire to do good to the people of his community and to serve God. The second man is primarily motivated by the tax break he’ll receive and the recognition he’ll get from his friends and family as a “good guy.”

Which one would you say is the more “spiritual” man? Obviously the first one. But regardless of motivation, people are still fed. Even the man whose motivation is only for his self-interest is doing better to serve others than the person who has “nice, warm, fuzzy” spiritual feelings toward his neighbor but donates not even a single hour, dollar, or can of chicken soup to the food bank (or any other mitzvah).

So speak and so act as those who are to be judged under the law of liberty. For judgment is without mercy to one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment.

What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.

But someone will say, “You have faith and I have works.” Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder! Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless? Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar? You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by his works; and the Scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”—and he was called a friend of God. You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone. And in the same way was not also Rahab the prostitute justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out by another way? For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead.

–James 2:12-26 (ESV)

charity-tzedakahJesus said that you shall know a tree by its fruit (Matthew 7:20) and every tree that does not bear good fruits will be cut down and thrown in a fire (v19). James, the brother of the Master, connects faith with actions, the latter arising from the former. Jesus tells us that our very nature is revealed by our behavior. In this week’s Torah reading, God commands Moses to “accept gifts for Me from every person whose heart so moves him,” (Exodus 25:2) connecting the nature and amount of the gift with the nature of the giver. Rabbi Packouz says that regardless of motivation, an act that helps others is still of value to those being helped, “but our growth in character and spirituality depend on our intentions!”

If all we want is a tax break and to look good to others, we can perform acts of charity and help many people…as long as we are unconcerned about our relationship with God and growing within that relationship spiritually. On the other hand, if we are trying to take our relationship with God seriously, it’s not just what we do but why we do it that matters. Human beings can only see our behavior but God sees the heart.

This should be a no-brainer, but I find that in the community of faith, we are just as vulnerable to bad motivations, bad attitudes, the desire for self-righteousness rather than God’s righteousness, and the need to “be right,” as anyone operating in the secular world. Just look at the various religious blogs and discussion boards on the web and you’ll see what I mean.

Even a casual reading of the New Testament should tell any Christian who is having trouble with this concept of what to do and why to do it. It really isn’t hard to pick a mitzvah representing “the weightier matters of the Torah,” such as donating a couple of cans of soup of chili to the food bank, shoveling snow off your neighbor’s driveway and sidewalk, or holding the door open for someone who is entering the same place right behind you because it’s what Jesus has commanded us to do.

If you find yourself paying more attention to a belief that certain “ceremonial” mitzvot are your “right” while neglecting matters of “justice and mercy and faithfulness,” (Matthew 23:23), or worse, performing no acts of charity and kindness at all thinking your “faith” is all the covering you’ll need, then you might earn the same ire from the Master as did the scribes and Pharisees Jesus was originally addressing.

There is much in the Torah of Moses for everyone and it acts as the rock upon which the Prophets, the Writings, and the Apostolic Scriptures firmly rest. However, as we see, application isn’t meaningful in a spiritual sense unless we are actually using what we know to do good to others and for the right reasons.

The words of Torah should be as fresh to you as if you first heard them today.

-Rashi, Deuteronomy 11:13

Excitement often comes from novelty, but novelty is exciting only as long as it is new. Someone who buys a car fully loaded with options may feel an emotional high, but after several weeks, the novelty wears off and it is just another vehicle.

Spirituality, too, suffers from routine. Human beings may do all that is required of them as moral people and observe all the Torah’s demands in terms of the performance of commandments, yet their lives may be insipid and unexciting because their actions have become rote, simply a matter of habit. The prophet Isaiah criticizes this when he says, “Their reverence of Me has become a matter of routine” (Isaiah 29:13). Reverence must be an emotional experience. A reverence that is routine and devoid of emotion is really no reverence at all.

Path of TorahThus, the excitement that is essential for true observance of Torah depends upon novelty, upon having both an understanding of Torah today that we did not have yesterday and a perception of our relationship to God that is deeper than the one we had yesterday. Only through constantly learning and increasing our knowledge and awareness of Torah and Godliness can we achieve this excitement. Life is growth. Since stagnation is the antithesis of growth, it is also the antithesis of life. We can exist without growth, but such an existence lacks true life.

Today I shall…

…try to discover new things in the Torah and in my relationship to God.

-Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski
“Growing Each Day, Adar 4”
Aish.com

“And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make.”

-Lennon/McCartney
The End (from the Abbey Road album)

Good Shabbos.

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Return to Jerusalem, Part 5

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apostles_james_acts15The majority of Jewish believers in 49 CE did not accept Paul’s gospel of Gentile inclusion. They challenged the Pauline message by telling the God-fearing Gentile believers, “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved” (Acts 15:1). They contended, “It is necessary to circumcise [the Gentile believers] and to direct them to observe the Torah of Moses” (Acts 15:5).

The Jewish believers calling for circumcision and conversion did not object to God-fearing Gentiles who wanted to learn about Judaism and Yeshua of Nazareth. God-fearers could be found in any Jewish community – not just among believers. Paul’s opponents objected to elevating the status of God-fearing disciples of Yeshua to that of co-heirs with Isarel and fraternity with the Jewish people. Rabbi [Yechiel Tzvi] Lichtenstein [Commentary on the New Testament: The Acts of the Apostles (Unpublished, Marshfield, MO: Vine of David, 2010), on Acts 15:7; originally published in Hebrew: Beiur LeSiphrei Brit HaChadashah (Leipzig: Professor G. Hahlman, 1897)] explains, “Paul and Barnabas said that the brothers among the Gentiles did not need to be circumcised and keep the [whole] Torah of Moses, but they were still full brothers in Israel and shared in their inheritance.”

-D. Thomas Lancaster
Torah Club, Volume 6: Chronicles of the Apostles
from First Fruits of Zion (FFOZ)
Torah Portion Mishpatim (“Judgments”) (pg 457)
Commentary on Acts 15:20-31

Continued from Part 4 of this series. Make sure you’ve read the previous parts  before proceeding here.

It’s hard to believe that any Christian, regardless of denomination or variant sect, could possibly object to such a bright promise as the one Lancaster interprets from the text of Acts 15, but as we’ve seen from some of the comments folks have made in previous parts of this series, such a promise is hotly contested. Traditional Christians tend to balk at the suggestion that the Jewish disciples of Christ never intended to “cancel” the Torah for Jews, and certain branches of the Hebrew Roots movement are dead set against the idea that all Christians everywhere aren’t fully obligated to the Torah mitzvot. It seems that full co-heir status with Israel in the Kingdom of Heaven and in all of the Messianic promises just isn’t enough.

But if Lancaster is correct and James and the Apostles never intended full Torah obligation on the Gentiles (unless some of them chose to convert to Judaism), then what does this mean?

Therefore my judgment is that we should not trouble those of the Gentiles who turn to God, but should write to them to abstain from the things polluted by idols, and from sexual immorality, and from what has been strangled, and from blood. For from ancient generations Moses has had in every city those who proclaim him, for he is read every Sabbath in the synagogues.”

–Acts 15:19-21 (ESV)

The four prohibitions (v 20) aren’t always easy to pick out in inline text, so here they are in list form:

  1. abstain from the things polluted by idols
  2. from sexual immorality
  3. from what has been strangled
  4. from blood

But of all the prohibitions James could have applied to the Gentile God-fearing believers, why these four? What was so special about them? Was he imposing some version of the Seven Noahide Laws on the non-Jewish disciples?

These seven laws, developed centuries after the lifetime of James, Peter, and Paul, are based on what we find here:

And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth and upon every bird of the heavens, upon everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea. Into your hand they are delivered. Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything. But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning: from every beast I will require it and from man. From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man. “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image. And you,[plural in Hebrew] be fruitful and multiply, increase greatly on the earth and multiply in it.”

God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant that I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.”

–Genesis 9:1-7, 17 (ESV)

While there may be some superficial similarities, it doesn’t seem reasonable to say that James’s four essential prohibitions were directly lifted from the covenant God made with all of humanity through Noah. Also, and this is important, if some version of the Noahide laws were already understood within late Second Temple Judaism, wouldn’t the Jews have already considered all Gentiles bound by these laws? Why would James bother to simply re-state them and how would it have made any sort of distinction between the Gentile disciples of Jesus and the rest of mankind?

Are these four laws of the apostolic decree the only commandments of the Torah enjoined upon the Gentile believers? No. Judaism already taught a minimum standard to which the Torah held all God-fearing Gentiles. The sages taught that certain commandments of the Torah apply universally to all human beings. If not, how could God have punished the Gentiles in the story of Noah? For what did He punish the people of Sodom and Gomorrah? Why did He drive out the Amorites and Canaanites in the days of Joshua? – As Paul says, “Sin is not imputed when there is no Torah” (Romans 5:13).

Based on this line of reasoning, the rabbis derived a list of seven universal commandments. The earliest version of the list appears in the Tosefta (see t.Avodah Zarah 8:4-6).

-Lancaster, pg 459

D.T. LancasterI know what you’re thinking. I (and Lancaster) am being anachronistic. How can the Noahide laws, which I’ve already said were codified many centuries after James, have been applied to humanity and understood as such by James and the Jerusalem Apostles?

Some critics argue that, since the rabbis formulated the list of seven laws subsequent to the days of the apostles, those laws are not relevant to the context of Acts 15. On the contrary, the apocryphal “Book of Jubilees” (c. 150 BCE) demonstrates that the theological concept behind the laws of Noah already existed well before the days of the apostles:

Noah began to command his grandsons with ordinances and commandments and all the judgments which he knew. And he bore witness to his sons that they might do justice and cover the shame of their flesh the one who created them and honor father and mother, each one love his neighbor and preserve themselves from fornication and pollution and all injustice … [And he said], “No man who eats blood or sheds the blood of man will remain upon the earth … You shall not be like one who eats [meat] with blood, but beware lest they should eat blood before you. Cover the blood … You shall not eat living flesh …” (Jubilees 7:20-32)

That is not to say that the apostles considered observance of the laws of Noah or the four laws of the apostolic decree as sufficient for attaining salvation. The laws of Noah offered Gentiles a baseline for ethical, moral conduct, but salvation came to the God-fearing Gentile believers “through the grace of the Master Yeshua.”

-Lancaster, pp 459-60

I know. Jubilees isn’t canonized Bible, but the plain history of the document tells us that the Jewish people were aware of an application of the laws of Noah over a century and a half before James made his pronouncement that Luke recorded in Acts 15. There was already a Jewish consciousness that God held humanity to a certain set of universally applied standards. And the apostolic decree thus was not a simple restatement of the universal laws of Noah. As we see, Lancaster doesn’t believe that obeying any combination of laws actually “saves” anyone, and the message of James confirms that for Jews and Gentiles, salvation is from the Jews through Jesus Christ.

In today’s “meditation,” I’ve defined the four prohibitions by what they aren’t (the Noahide laws) rather than what they are. So what are the four prohibitions for Gentiles in the apostolic decree and what are their implications for the Christians in ancient times and today? For the answer to that question and more, you’ll have to read the sixth and final part of this series. I had intended to write only five parts rather than six, but when I tried to include all of my material in a single blog post, it was well over 3,000 words long. I’d rather write shorter missives that are easier to read and digest.

See the conclusion of Return to Jerusalem in Part 6.

Blessings.

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Return to Jerusalem, Part 4

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teshuvahTherefore my judgment is that we should not trouble those of the Gentiles who turn to God…For it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay on you no greater burden than these requirements: that you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols, and from blood, and from what has been strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well.

–Acts 15:19, 28-29 (ESV)

After presenting the proof text, James placed Simon Peter’s decision before the council. He declared, “It is my judgment that we do not trouble those who are turning to God from among the Gentiles.” That is to say, “We should not require circumcision and conversion as the criteria for salvation.” James referred to the God-fearing believers as those “turning to God from among the Gentiles.” The word “turning” corresponds to “repentance.” The Gentile believers responded to the gospel message, “Repent, the kingdom is near.”

The decision exempted the Gentiles from circumcision and the particular commandments that pertain specifically to Jewish identity. It prohibited the Jewish believers from forcing those issues on Gentiles. Nevertheless, the apostles did not forbid the Gentiles from voluntarily participating in the Sabbath, the dietary laws, or any aspect of Torah-life.

-D. Thomas Lancaster
Torah Club, Volume 6: Chronicles of the Apostles
from First Fruits of Zion (FFOZ)
Torah Portion Yitro (“Jethro”) (pg 442-3)
Commentary on Acts 15:1-20

This is a continuation of the “Return to Jerusalem” series and I recommend that, unless you’ve done so already, you read part 1 through part 3 before continuing here.

We’ve seen the problem of whether or not Gentile disciples of Jesus should be compelled to convert to Judaism and conform to the full yoke of Torah brought before James and the Jerusalem Council. Each side of the debate has made its case and it appears that the testimony of Peter and his experiences with the Roman Cornelius and his household (see Acts 10) have weighed the debate heavily in one direction. James has presented Amos 9:11-12 as his proof text for allowing Gentiles to receive salvation and access to the Messianic promises without converting to Judaism and in accordance with Peter’s position on the matter.

And now we see what James is going to do about it.

For the Jewish disciples and apostles, the crux of their argument was if or how the Gentiles were to be admitted into discipleship. Should they convert and take on the full yoke of Torah or be allowed to remain Gentiles (not convert) and perhaps follow some other or abridged set of behavioral standards? It was the mechanism for admission that was the point for them, not whether or not Gentiles could/should follow the Torah.

However, I’ve received some comments lately on the earlier parts of this series about whether or not we non-Jewish disciples are obligated to the full list of Torah mitzvot (and arguably, all or much of the subsequent Rabbinic commentary on just how one performs the mitzvot) based on Acts 15 among other New Testament scriptures. Further, the question of whether or not the Jerusalem Council “cancelled the Torah” for Gentile and Jewish disciples of Jesus came up. To me, and especially after reading Lancaster, this is a no-brainer, but I keep forgetting that for most Christians, this raises a tremendous conflict in terms of what they’ve (we’ve) been taught (and as you can tell from my writing, I don’t always think like most Christians).

But I want to continue with my review/analysis of Lancaster’s Acts 15 commentary because I think it has a lot to say to both believing Gentiles and Jews. I won’t say that I believe every word Lancaster writes is undying Gospel (you should pardon the expression), but I do think we should take a serious look at what he says and see if there’s merit in what he’s teaching. I think we can learn much.

For instance, while Lancaster has said that Gentile believers are not obligated to the full yoke of Torah, and especially those mitzvot that have to do with Jewish identity (since they aren’t going to be converting to Judaism), he also says that “the apostles did not forbid the Gentiles from voluntarily participating in the Sabbath, the dietary laws, or any aspect of Torah-life.” But then how are we to separate Gentiles being limited to voluntarily participating in only certain elements of “a Torah-life” and “any aspect of Torah-life?”

I’ll address the specifics of what Lancaster defines as “Torah-life” for the Gentile later parts of this series. That said, Lancaster does give us a bit of a picture of what the “early Christians” were up to relative to the Torah, and maybe even a beginning of the answer to the question I just asked.

The God-fearing Gentile believers of the apostolic era were more Torah observant than most Messianic believers (Blogger’s note: or traditional Christians) today. They worshipped in synagogues in the midst of the Jewish community. They had no other days of worship or holidays other than those of the synagogue. They did not drive vehicles to get to their place of fellowship. To share table-fellowship with Jewish believers in the community, they maintained the biblical dietary laws. For all practical purposes, they looked Jewish already.

PaulTo support this claim, Lancaster quotes from Le Cornu’s and Shulam’s “A commentary on the Jewish Roots of Galatians” (Jerusalem, Israel: Akademon, 2005), 835:

This principle has obvious bearing on the language of “troubling” and “burdening” the Gentile believers. James’ ruling for the “majority” of the Gentiles who are now turning to God through Jesus: The Jewish community in Jerusalem will not impose anything on them which they will not be able to bear as a whole. This does not preclude their taking upon themselves additional observances according to their respective abilities and desires.

This lends a great deal of support to Lancaster’s and FFOZ’s position on Gentile Christians and the Torah. While obligation to all of the mitzvot is not imposed on the Gentile disciples as a whole, individuals among the Gentiles may choose to follow the path of Torah more fully and to varying degrees.

I’m going to skip over the “Four Essential Prohibitions” until next time and focus on how the Torah in general is applied to Jewish and Gentile believers. We see that, according to Lancaster and the Jews present at this debate, it was abundantly clear that Gentiles, if they do not convert to Judaism, are not obligated to the full yoke of Torah as a group. But what about the Jews? Did James really abolish Jewish observance of Torah in one fell stroke?

The apostles agreed that Gentile believers did not need to undergo circumcision and full obligation to the Torah as Jews. The obvious corollary requires that Jewish believers are obligated to observe the Torah. The thought that a Jewish believer might also be exempt from the whole yoke of Torah did not enter the minds of the apostles.

Traditional Christian interpretation, however, often assumes that Acts 15 releases both Jews and Gentiles from keeping the Torah’s ceremonial laws of circumcision, Sabbath, calendar, dietary laws, etc. On the contrary, the entire argument of the chapter presupposes that those obligations remain incumbent on the Jewish believer.

-Lancaster, pg 443

Lancaster then finishes off this point by citing some (to Christians, anyway) rather unusual authorities: both a believing Jewish commentator from the 19th century and two unbelieving Rabbis from the 15th and 18th centuries who also wrote scholarly opinions (amazingly enough) on Acts 15. For the full content of their writings as presented in the Torah Club, I encourage you to purchase Vol. 6, but I will briefly quote one source.

And it is forbidden for us to say: “If we have the righteousness of the Messiah unto eternal life, why do we need to observe the Torah, if this is not required for eternal life, for we are only saved by faith?” We are forbidden to speak this way, for who are we to annul it? The Messiah was not made the servant of sin. This is similar to what the Christians said: “Why do I need any longer to give alms to the poor or to do any other good deed, according to the New Testament? Is not my faith enough for me?” It is forbidden to speak like this, for he is a sinner who closes his fist, and the Messiah was not made the servant of sin. Therefore faith does not benefit him, as it says in the epistle of James 2:13, 1 John 3:3, and Paul himself in Romans 6:15. And James says (4:17): “One who knows to do good and does not do it, it is a sin for him,” for the omission is a sin. For when he repents and regrets the wickedness of his heart, then the faith by its power saves him, as Paul also says in Acts 26:20: “Return to God and perform deeds in keeping with repentance.” Then the faith is beneficial.

-Yechiel Tzvi Lichtenstein
“Commentary on the New Testament: The Acts of the Apostles”
(Unpublished, Marshfield, Mo: Vine of David, 2010),
on Acts 15; originally published in Hebrew: Beiur LeSiphrei Brit HaChadashah
(Leipzig: Professor G. Dahlman, 1897).

jewish-prayer-israelI am positive that this is the single most difficult message from Acts 15 for the vast majority of Christians to absorb. We have been taught that when it says Jesus is the goal of the Torah, it means the finale as opposed to the “gold standard” of obedience to God that the (Jewish) believers were to unservingly strive for. It is extremely acceptable to most Christians that we in the church are not subject to the “slavery” of the Law, but to believe that any Jewish person who is also a believer continues to be obligated to the Torah teachings is almost too much for us to bear.

I admit that given the scope of Lancaster’s commentary and the limitations of my already lengthy summary of his work, that I cannot indisputably prove that Gentiles have no obligation to Torah while Jews still do (although I think the point regarding Gentiles and Torah is reasonably well made). But in my meager attempts at study and to try to put myself in the place of the people witnessing the council debate this hotly contested (both then and now) issue, I think that Lancaster has made a good case for his conclusions. Again, space and time limitations prevent me from offering a more complete analysis and I don’t want to simply transcribe two weeks of Torah Club lessons into my blog (I’m already guilty of replicating a large portion of the two Acts 15 teachings from TC Vol. 6). Again, if you want to read the entire content of the work supporting these conclusions, you’ll have to consult the Torah Club Volume 6 lessons.

The remainder of this series will address the “Four Essential Prohibitions” and what they mean for Gentile believers, both in ancient and modern days. That’s where we’ll start in Part 5 of “Return to Jerusalem.”

Torah Portion

Mishpatim: Law and Spirit

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tzitzit1There was once a Jewish girl who stopped in Israel on her way to India to seek spirituality. Friends suggested that she go to Neve Yerushalayim to take a class and give Judaism one last shot before seeking other pathways to spirituality. The one class happened to be studying the laws regarding returning a lost item — when is an item considered lost, what if the person gave up hope of its return, what constitutes a legitimate identifying mark to claim the item, to what extent and cost of time and money are you obligated for returning the item… The girl was furious! This is NOT spirituality. She left in a huff and headed off to India.

Six months later she and her guru were discussing a philosophical matter while walking through the village. They came upon a wallet filled with rupees. The guru picked it up, put it in his pocket and continued with his point. The girl interrupted him and asked, “Aren’t you going to see if there is identification in the wallet to return it?” The guru replied, “No. It was his karma that he lost it; it’s my karma that I found it. It’s mine.” The girl implored, “But, he might have a large family and that might be his monthly earnings … they could starve if you don’t return it!” The guru responded, “That is their karma.”

-Rabbi Kalman Packouz
“Shabbat Shalom Weekly”
Commentary on Torah Portion Mishpatim
Aish.com

You may be wondering what all this has to do with this week’s Torah study. Consider that, according to Rabbi Packouz, Mishpatim is one of “the most mitzvah-filled Torah portions, containing 23 positive commandments and 30 negative commandments. Included are laws regarding: the Hebrew manservant and maidservant, manslaughter, murder, injuring a parent, kidnapping, cursing a parent, personal injury, penalty for killing a slave, personal damages, injury to slaves, categories of damages and compensatory restitution, culpability for personal property damage, seduction, occult practices, idolatry, oppression of widows, children and orphans.”

For most Christians and probably many Jewish people, reading Mishpatim can seem like not only an incredible bore, but completely irrelevant to leading a life of spirituality and holiness…

…until you read the commentary about the Jewish girl seeking spirituality, which I quoted above. Let’s “cut to the chase” and see what the Jewish student in India concluded about her experiences.

The young lady then remembered the class she took in Jerusalem — and realized that spirituality without justice, kindness and concern for others is just a false spiritual high, corrupt emotion. She returned to Jerusalem and ultimately returned to her Torah heritage.

I imagine there are a lot of people who believe spirituality is a rather “warm and fuzzy” and “feel good” state of being where one contemplates self, God, and the nature of the universe, and through this, the wear and tear of daily living can be put to the side as if it were a cast off garment. And yet, as the Jewish student learned, it is nothing of the sort. Spirituality is a “lived” experience that permeates our day-to-day lives. There is not one aspect of what we do, from the moment we wake up until the instant our heads hit our pillows at night where God is not present (and He’s present when we sleep as well) and we are not acting either within his will our outside of it.

This past week, I’ve been commenting extensively on Acts 15 and the implications of admitting non-Jewish disciples of the Messiah into a wholly Jewish religious sect. There is a single sentence within that chapter which has caused much confusion among Christian and Jewish commentators and scholars.

For from ancient generations Moses has had in every city those who proclaim him, for he is read every Sabbath in the synagogues.”

–Acts 15:21 (ESV)

I’ll give that statement more treatment in my Return to Jerusalem series in the next few days, but we can take a look at it now from the perspective of this Torah Portion commentary. What did James and the rest of the Apostles expect the Gentile God-fearing disciples to learn by going to the synagogue each Shabbat and hearing the Torah read, especially if, as I’ve said previously, the Apostles never desired that the Gentiles convert to Judaism and thus be obligated to the full yoke of Torah?

karmaWhat was the Jewish student supposed to learn by “studying the laws regarding returning a lost item?” When she was in India following the path she thought she really wanted, she discovered the answer.

While there is much in the Torah that has to do with the specifics of living a Jewish life, there is also much more that teaches us, all of us, how to live an ethical and moral life within a spiritual and material world context. The student in India didn’t have to be Jewish to learn that lesson, it could have been learned by anyone. Hopefully, it is being learned by everyone who reads the Bible and studies the mitzvot delivered by God to humanity through Moses and the Prophets.

The “Law” isn’t boring (unless you let it be). It’s all “God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” (2 Timothy 3:16-17)

Studying scripture is like spending time with God in prayer. It is an act of intimacy. It is like this:

On the seventh day He called to Moses from the midst of the cloud. Now the Presence of the Lord appeared in the sight of the Israelites as a consuming fire on the top of the mountain. Moses went inside the cloud and ascended the mountain; and Moses remained on the mountain forty days and forty nights.

–Exodus 24:16-18 (JPS Tanakh)

Good Shabbos.